I was recently watching a CaseOh stream when he decided to play a SP👻👻KY GAME! It was a first-person thriller called Uncle Joe's Motel, and while this short game has many great aspects, it is the story that truly stuck with me the most.
⚠️ WARNING: this post will contain heavy spoilers, as well as some sensitive subject matter. All screenshots have been provided courtesy of the CaseOh stream ⚠️
The game focuses on a young unnamed woman; an aspiring actress who has gone to work for her uncle, Joe.
Uncle Joe runs a motel -- one that he claims to be haunted -- yet this doesn't deter our protagonist. Rather, it makes her more intrigued...
The objective of the game is uncovering what happened to the housekeeper before her.
The gameplay is fairly straight forward: clean the rooms, get some clues! 🙌 But, naturally, they come with some puzzle-solving, although it isn't anything too difficult. The protagonist's phone is utilized in a number of ways, including snapping photos for clues, phone calls to Uncle Joe, and even some app's to use in the character's free time.
(Some examples of the rooms that you come across. Honestly, some of them are a vibe!)
Best of all, your character has a furry companion with her that hangs out in the manager's office: Finn the cat! 😻 Your character can interact with him, and he is actually vital in advancing the game.
The way that I am to interpret the game is that the motel actually IS haunted -- haunted by the Lady of Flies.
For those who are unfamiliar, the Lady of Flies is a childhood fable in which a witch causes a young girl to swallow a fly. In order to get rid of the fly, the girl then swallows a spider, then a bird, then a cat, etc. Eventually, the wound in her stomach becomes too great, and the girl's soul is sucked out through it by the witch!
In this game, the witch's victim is a little girl who attempts to help the protagonist revive Susan.
However, it is the housekeeper that came before the protagonist -- Susan -- whom I truly connected with. Like the protagonist, she also set out to become an actress, but ended up coming second to everyone, dated the wrong man, got caught up in the wrong things...
Unable to escape the clutches of the witch while working at the motel, Susan attempts suicide, inadvertently putting herself into a coma.
By giving Finn/Teddy to Susan, she is finally able to recover and wake up.
That is why the moral of the game is one that I truly appreciate; as uncle Joe states himself:
Sometimes it's better to endure the pain in favor of short-term remedies. Sometimes pain is the only thing capable of shaping us into who we need to be. Sometimes it actually saves us from more damage.
Aside from the game itself, a lot of Susan's story hit very close to home for me. Many things were said that were reminiscent of the situation I went through. I found "This world isn't written for you; stop fighting," to be very personal to me, as I have always felt that I was not made for this world...
