Stray Souls: The Psychological Horror Game You Didn’t See Coming

I absolutely love horror, but it takes an awful lot to scare me. Jump scares are all well and good for a quick startle, but I’m always looking for those experiences that will stick with me long after the credits roll. I’m talking Silent Hill 2 or “Paranormal Activity” levels of psychological terror! The day Stray Souls came across my desk, within the first 10 minutes, I knew that the folks over at Jukai Studio were my… Souls-mates. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Stray Souls tells the story of Daniel, who is your average 18-year-old in an anything but average situation. After inheriting the home of his estranged grandmother, he thinks he’s got it made, with a place to finally call his own and the independence that comes with it. However, his joy is short-lived once he discovers that he may not be alone in the house after all.

Turns out, Grandma was hiding some pretty big secrets! Fortunately for Daniel, his nosy neighbor Martha knows quite a bit about what’s going on in his home. Unfortunately for Daniel, his nightmare is only just beginning.

Playing as Daniel, you and Martha head out on a mission in search of answers about your past. Each piece of the puzzle leads you closer to the truth, but you’ll encounter dark forces at every turn all too happy to try and stop you.

Like any good horror game, you’ll get to face off against hordes of gruesome baddies, but what separates Stray Souls from other games in the genre is that our hero, Daniel, is a teenager, not a trained soldier. He doesn’t have access to a huge cache of weapons and body armor, which means you’ll need to rely on combat strategy and resource management to survive. You can even run from most fights if you want to!

The team at Jukai Studio are students of the genre and it shows. You can really feel the influence of classic horror games throughout, but modernized for today’s gamer. Like puzzles, for example. The puzzles are designed to be challenging, but solvable without having to look up the answer online. No more lugging around etched crests trying to figure out what to do with them!

What hooked me most about Stray Souls as a player is how the developers have crafted this tense, creepy atmosphere that never feels truly safe. Apparitions moving in the distance. Snapping branches all around you. Is there something waiting just around the corner? Your imagination is sometimes your own worst enemy in Aspen Falls and I love it!

Stray Souls is coming to Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S this fall, and I absolutely cannot wait for everyone to get their hands on it. I’ve never had so much fun working on a game while simultaneously getting the holy heck scared of me every step of the way!