Boreal Tenebrae Act I: "I Stand Before You, A Form Undone"

Boreal Tenebrae Act I: "I Stand Before You, A Form Undone"

released on May 19, 2020

Boreal Tenebrae Act I: "I Stand Before You, A Form Undone"

released on May 19, 2020

Delve into the dream of a dying town in 'Boreal Tenebrae', a retro-style adventure with horror elements. Taking cues from the fixed-camera angle games of the PS1 era, and the dream logic of works like 'Yume Nikki', vignettes beget vignettes in this web of Trees and Streets. Explore the interweaving narratives of a northern community, cast adrift in an increasingly urbanized world.


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i love the feel of a ps1 adventure game with horror vibes but i don't love the game-breaking bug i encountered. i like the art and story but i don't think it is very complex or even necessarily well-told. i think this is good and interesting and something people should consider picking up and playing, and also a flawed and amateur work that needs to be approached as such. no rating because it's a beautiful contradiction that deserves more consideration than getting boiled down into a simple score.

When I accidentally glitched through a wall and found the narrator I knew this was special.

Incredible vibes, confident presentation. A dead-end town playing idly with its lighter as a sickness slowly engulfs it. The calm before the storm, before the death throes kick in. Systems of power play a big role in every story in Boreal Tenebrae, tangibly through threats of violence and death but also intangibly through poverty, desperation and exhaustion. The boss at the local factory spends his time crushing unions even as he plans to close down and move elsewhere. The mayor talks a big game about unity while packing his bags to leave in the middle of the night. All the while the broken cast characters fighting against the oncoming tide of malicious magical realism with whatever hasn't been stripped away from them.

Act 1 is astoundingly cheap on Steam and Itch right now, and it's also a part of the BLM Bundle if you've got that.

Bought this on a whim last year based on a few seconds of a trailer, and it's so nice to find it was well worth it.

A town succumbing to static. Fading by choice or indifference. Diving in and out of what might be dreams or memories. Carrying items across conscious states and time to solve puzzles. To find your sister. To atone for a moment of madness. To finish a ritual.