The "Super Mario Bros." of modern horror games; their gameplay distilled into its rawest form, warts and all. A love letter to some of the most popular works in the genre, yet creative enough to feel like its own, unique experience. For such a straightforward gameplay loop, it's ridiculous how good Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion is.

The goal of the game is simple; survive one-thousand rooms, and reach the end of the mansion. The catch is the "Specimens" inhabiting its halls, which will try and end your progress. A good half of them revolve around chasing the player to the exit, but each is visually distinct, and adds their own unique quirk to the chase. About halfway through, the game gets creative with new encounters, and the race to the next save point becomes much more thrilling.

I think my only gripe with the game is the writing, which is very of-its-time. Particularly, some of Spooky's dialogue, and the closing line of the "good ending". There's a ton of nods and winks, and I think this sort of self-aware dialogue can work, but I just thought it lacked nuance, at times. I think some small revisions to the script would make this one timeless, though that is just my opinion.

Overall a fun time that masterfully iterates on a simple concept. It somehow manages to be tense, as well! I honestly was expecting it to be a horror comedy, but Spooky's absolutely crafts some great atmosphere through its sound design and bestiary. Yet, despite this, it's pretty accessible, and gives the player plenty of room to breathe. If I were ever asked a recommendation for someone's first horror game, this would be it.

Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion is a game I always generally appreciated. While I never played the game until now, I really loved its concept, its simplicity, and its execution. For a game with a simple concept, it does what it does really well. And I feel as if the game gets better with the additions of the Karamari Hospital and the Dollhouse DLC expansions. I chose to play the HD Renovation solely because it came with the DLC added, and I wanted the most recent version of the game. I really like the game, now that I’ve played it proper, and I do have some thoughts on it.
As I explained moments ago, I find Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion to be of a simple concept. As the game tells you as you start it, you have to go through 1000 rooms, and the game isn’t lying there. You will find yourself running through 1000 rooms of a mansion, dealing with threats along the way. While that sounds like a daunting task, to get through those 1000 rooms, it only takes about 2 hours of time. Even then, I messed around for a little bit, so if you focus solely on beating the game, it’ll take even less time. I also imagine that the length of time is determined by what rooms you’re given. Every floor is randomly generated from a selection of rooms. Most of them are simple, though there are some unique rooms alongside some really long rooms in the rotation. As you progress further and further throughout the game, more threats appear that you’ll have to deal with, and the specimens themselves are probably my favorite aspects of the game.
The specimens as it’s already obvious are the threats you’ll have to evade through the entirety of the game. And the further you get through the game, the more complex they become, all in interesting ways. What makes most of the specimens interesting is how they’re introduced. Aside from the first 2 specimens you encounter, each specimen has a unique location that you can find them in. This provides a noticeable change in aesthetic, alongside interesting worldbuilding, either about the specimen, or things affected by it. Yet again, the further I progressed through the game, the better these unique locations became. I particularly remember really enjoying the one for Specimen 12, where part of the specimen would get close to your location, and you had to hide until it was safe. And to further elaborate on why I enjoy the specimens as much as I do, aside from 2 of the 13 main specimens, all of them are inspired by famous horror creatures or IPs. And what’s great is that while you can see the clear inspiration of them, the specimens all feel extremely unique in and of themselves. One of my favorite Specimens is Specimen 10, as its major mechanic is how you cannot run too far away from it, making avoiding it a delicate balance. For my playthrough of the game, I definitely had some specimens appear more often than others. Specimen 2 appeared super often, alongside Specimen 3, 5, and 8. Specimen 6, 10, and 11 really only appeared once throughout the entire game. And running away from Specimens can really be determined by what rooms you get during those chases. Sometimes, I continuously got these long winding chamber rooms, and the specimens that were chasing me were ones that could float across empty gaps. I mean, I never died to them so it’s not that bad, but it was a little frustrating. One great positive about Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion and how the Specimen chases work is the music. Not only is a lot of the music just really good, but it’s also an amazing indicator for when you’re in danger. A lot of the time in the game, you don’t need to look behind you to see what specimen is chasing you. However, the music indicates not only if a specimen is chasing you, but who it is as well. It allows you to instinctively know how to react to what the threat will be.
While this would be all I need to say for the base game of Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion, as the game really is as simple as that, there’s also the DLC that the game has, Karamari Hospital, and The Dollhouse. And genuinely, I think they’re great expansions to the game as a whole, and for the dollhouse especially, probably my favorite parts of the game.
While I love the random room generation of the game’s main story, I think I ultimately prefer the controlled environment of the DLCs. What I mean by that is that each room in the DLCs are purposefully crafted, and are much more puzzle oriented. Having to solve puzzles or find keys throughout a location, while surviving a number of specimens located within the general area. I really love the specimens found within the DLC, though some are kind of simple (mostly the ones in Karamari Hospital). I think that The Dollhouse is probably my favorite segment of the entire game as a whole, and has some absolutely great specimens. Woormy Charles is really fun, and I really love the reverse weeping angels mechanics of the Hooked Doll. The Dollhouse is also an amazing way to end of Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion, especially with how the DLC actually expands on Spooky as a character.
One last thing I’ll add is that I think the endless mode is really nice. I didn’t play it at all, but I appreciate it for what all it does. It provides a fun arcade-y type of game, and it would be an interesting challenge to see how far you can actually get. I also like the addition of the new specimens, especially knowing that White Face from IMSCARED makes a cameo.
Spooky’s Jumpscare Mansion is a game of simple premise, but great execution. Now having properly played it, I really appreciate what it’s able to do, and it’s super charming. It feels like a love letter to horror in some way, especially with how many inspirations can be found through the specimens you find in the game. With how short it is, I can definitely recommend giving it a shot, you can probably beat the game, DLC included, in about 3 hours of time. It’s a really nice game overall.

For an engine update of a very simplistic free game, I appreciate the QOL here. Having all the DLC + a lot more polish makes this a relatively easy experience to go through and recommend.

It's very charming in it's simplicity and effective at keeping you guessing what you'll encounter next. I think all the various chasers are unique and interesting and there's some really fun set piece locations in the back half of the game that I think help freshen things up.

Though I think the game can definitely be on the tedious side. Even at like 3 hours, I felt like it overstayed its welcome by just a little too much. Sometimes RNG just makes 1000 rooms feel like a lot of padding.

And for all the annoying YouTubers out there, there's JUST enough meat and lore here for them to make 6 hour video essays about.

My feelings on this are the same as the general consensus of it being a well-done bait and switch that kinda drags on too long, even if the joke is supposed to be that some horror games are prolonged periods of nothing followed by jumpscares.

The enemy variety is too spaced out to make most of the game interesting; all the cool ones who require you to do something that isn't just run or run at a specific distance are either at the end of the game or one and done deals where you never see them again. Plus, at some point, you're going to not care that a monster shows up purely because you were probably already sprinting from each room to the next anyways.

If it were any longer or any less tongue-and-cheek it'd probably be extremely annoying, but since it's so short and self-aware you can easily just get it over and done with before it starts to grate on you.

A charming but repetitive horror game that blew up a couple years ago. It piqued my interest as slightly different than other mascot horror games, but sadly there's not much to see here. The story is convoluted and not super well conveyed; the gameplay is fine but monotonous. I wish there were more variety in the specimens and game formula. Stuff like the McDonalds area and the arcade games were great, but most of the game is just running from a monster that chases you while maybe looking at it. I enjoyed the general aesthetic and loved Spooky herself, though.

It starts off simple and cute, which gives you a bit of reassurance, but it does so knowing that you know the title of the game.
because of course, "Jump Scare Mansion" doesn't sound very nice and peaceful and the setting reminds you of this. At the beginning, there is a little music, which quickly goes away and leaves you in complete silence, with only the sound of rain, thunder and wind.
It's the first few levels, there's really no real danger, but I like the way the game subtly lets go of your hand. It's like when you take the little wheels off your bike as a kid. Someone is holding your back and you're so focused on not falling that you don't realize that no one is holding you and you're done. While that fills you with confidence, at the same time it makes you miss that warmth, but it's hidden by the joy of having made it. In this case, you notice that absence. you feel that absence, and the more time you spend in silence, the more you remember the title of the game, a name that penetrates your mind until out of nowhere, you are no longer alone.
Sure, there's the wind and the rain in the background.... but you start to feel something else and you can't figure out if it's your own mind or if there really is something or someone else.

The more you think about it, the more you get scared by the jumpscares that come out from time to time, which are cardboard and it's just a cute sound + a cute image, but that scare is what distracts you from it, and that's why it can scare you in the first levels, especially because those sounds intensify, making everything more tense, until you get to your first note, and the first thing you notice is that the game doesn't pause. Why wouldn't it pause? is one of the many questions that, despite being something minor, made me very uneasy, and even more so when you realize that the saving is done by "safe rooms". You can't save whenever you want, only every certain amount of rooms.

It is very difficult for a game to not only give you everything you need, but to sell it SO WELL in just the first 5 minutes, and for this reason I highly recommend it.
Now, does the quality of the game hold up to the end of the game? 100% and the fact that it has 2 expansions (free, on HD) with no randomized rooms and always something to do beyond "get to the next room alive" not only keeps the game fresh, but expands the original concept with something new instead of stretching what the player is used to, and personally it's these expansions that made me interested in the game, as I only saw it as "the funny game that makes streamers/youtubers scream, and I was very happy to see that it had something much more than that.

Time Played: 3h 51m

You know that moment in the original Resident Evil where you go through a door and it plays a little animation of you entering the room? And how is it's neat creative way of loading up the next area without going to a boring black screen? Well, Spooky’s Jump Scare is essentially that but exaggerated to a thousand and not as charming. In this game, you mindlessly progress through countless rooms that each lack any kind of variety, while occasionally encountering some monster that chases you and which you must avoid by, you guessed it, entering different doors to lose it. Ultimately, the creatures in this game are a joke and you can simply hold forward and maybe sometimes swerve to the side to get them off your back. It’s an extremely repetitive game with honestly not much to offer, at least in terms of the main campaign, which is a shame because the little story that I have seen is interesting, albeit a bit silly at times but also charming. It just sucks that you have to mind numbingly go through the game to appreciate it. I’m aware that much of the game’s praise comes from its additional modes, one being a roguelike-esque mode where you have to escape from a handful of monsters from the base game at the same time. There’s also a mode that provides more structure to it that incorporates actual puzzles and a narrative that adds to the main campaign. However, after my four hour long session of opening door after door, I couldn’t be bothered to see what else the game had to offer. It’s a glorified door opening/walking simulator with an occasional cheap jumpscare.

kinda infuriating how much i like this! its whole mechanical identity is more or less Stubbornly Refusing To Do Anything beyond a few fleeting formula twists and silly pastiches, and its whole thematic identity (from a birds-eye view) is a very shallow and condescending parody. but the charm is Everything, it is so incessant that it just wore down my defenses. and maybe its not so shallow and condescending: horror often counterintuitively thrives on predictability, benefits from establishing baselines of expectation or repurposing famous ones, so that even tiny disruptions to that status quo are adding color. being a Horror Fan often means , for example, watching enough generic slasher movies that u are fully capable of loving them, the beats of the genre so internalized that yr brain is free to pick up on whatever minor bits of strangeness and resonance u can find that are imperceptible to ppl who's brains are too occupied by being annoyed at the surface elements. it makes sense then that this concept that Should be a lame parody actually comes across more like a deeply insider note of appreciation and affection. god dammit i dont even think i hate the pastiches, i cheered when i saw that giant sickle! i like horror sue me!!