The Unfolding Spider

[discordance]

THE UNFOLDING SPIDER: A TALE OF LOVE, ADVENTURE AND BETRAYAL

You wake up in a grimy gas station bathroom.
You remember everything.



Is the gas station attendant actually The Angel Gabriel? Why does the man waiting outside call himself The Weaver? What really goes on after hours at The Intolerable Dark, a gentleman's club for gentlemen? Are you searching for revenge - or for redemption? What waits for all of us in the darkness?

A TRAGICOMIC DETECTIVE ADVENTURE MYSTERY HORROR STORY, FORGOTTEN BY HISTORY



The critics are furious!

"BAD... NOT GOOD... A VERY BAD GAME"
-The Guardian

"ABOMINABLE... FOWLEY, MY PET CLAMSHELL, MAKES BETTER GAMES AND HE IS NOT EVEN SENTIENT"
-Huffington Post

"LAST NIGHT I PLAYED THIS GAME. TODAY I WOKE UP IN A GARDENING SHED COVERED IN A STRANGER'S BLOOD. WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME?"
-Country Home and Garden

PLAY IT IMMEDIATELY! CLICK ON ME

[Igor Hardy]

I love the title - somehow immediately grabbed my attention.

But maybe that's some kind of idiom I never heard about?

[TomatoesInTheHead]

I love the title - somehow immediately grabbed my attention.

But maybe that's some kind of idiom I never heard about?

Ditto!

[qptain Nemo]

Oh man. I just love your games. And your music in them. And the design. And... and... let's just say you're one of these reasons true gamemaking isn't dead. Cheers.

[kaputtnik]

I won! I am THE TARNISHED HALO. 

[Bogdan]

Nice short game. Had fun playin' it!

[discordance]

I love the title - somehow immediately grabbed my attention.

But maybe that's some kind of idiom I never heard about?

Nope, just an unusual phrase.

Also thanks everyone!

[FrancoFranchi]

I won! I am THE TARNISHED HALO. 

Me too!  Not sure if it counts as a "win" though - would be good to know how many possible endings there are.

Enjoyed this a lot, even if I'm not 100% sure of all the story details. 

[Grim]

It was a real joy to play this beautiful game. I'm very impressed... Simply, one of the best AGS games in a long time, visually simplistic, but so wonderfully abstract and artistic that it doesn't matter at all that the characters are just few pixels stuck together, and the backgrounds are rather plain...

  This game is a journey and I enjoyed every step of it. I think you deserve to be noticed for it because... it's honest, it's very clever, and it challenges the player in many new ways than we are not yet used to. Consider me a fan. Well done!

[Igor Hardy]

Finished it. Simple and not very interactive, but (positively) shocking and atmospheric.

Can you tell me if there's more revealed at the end depending on the your actions throughout?

Oh, and did you do the music yourself or borrowed?

[discordance]

The ending will be slightly different depending on your actions, but not significantly.

And yeah, I wrote all the music.

[Grim]

Me too!  Not sure if it counts as a "win" though - would be good to know how many possible endings there are.

Enjoyed this a lot, even if I'm not 100% sure of all the story details. 

I think this is not the kind of story that needs to be fully understood. It's there, it's a bit stange, like Lost Highway, and it just creates the impression that there is something bigger surrounding it, but there probably isn't. If we knew about it, the illusion would be destroyed and the whole thing just wouldn't be as much fun as it is now;)

I keep thinking about this game... I hope PC Gamer picks it up for review/DVD free version?

[kaputtnik]

That's basically why I wrote "I won", I just found it a funny idea to "win" a game like that, like winning a poem contest, then. You enter the stage, say your romantic poem and then you shout "I WIN!". The best approach might be to just enjoy the unsharpness of the story and let yourself get carried by the unreliability of the narration; I really felt that, even though my decisions might not have mattered a lot, the game let me invest my personal emotions and take meaningful decisions. It might be pretty linear at its core, but all those strange hints and disconnected layers of the story made it a really poetic experience to me. And now I want to see the clamshell that can do better than that!

[Dualnames]

The game is definitely a film I'd watch.

"You wake up in a grimy gas station bathroom.
You remember everything."

This, here, is the ultimate mockery to game plots.

I love how everything in this game is a mockery to adventure games and how this game is still an adventure game.

I can't honestly put it with words, on how fantastically inspired and amazing this game is. This is probably the closest thing to Brazil a game could ever be. Funny, satirical, horror-like, weird, and sad. You pick whichever emotion you liked best.

Sir, i thank you, for being incredibly awesome. This game is everything I hoped "How they found silence" would be. A simple and yet so utterly clever game. A masterpiece.

[Grim]

I'd just like to add that synopsis of the game in the first post was actually what sold it to me. As soon as I read the first sentence, I was hooked, and willing to look past the simple graphics.

  And Dual, if I hear Brazil one more time... I might even watch the damn thing at last

[pmartin]

  And Dual, if I hear Brazil one more time... I might even watch the damn thing at last

Brazil, Brazil, Brazil...

[Chicky]

Moderate darkness 

That's the bad one right?

[Igor Hardy]

I've received "you're an indecisive git" final evaluation - something in that vein anyway.

And yeah, I wrote all the music.

I'm impressed.

And that said, I agree with others that the graphic art is the only aspect that cheapens the overall effect of the story.

[LRH]

I actually take the opposite approach on the graphics. I think the simplicity involved was what made it all the more interesting.

[FrancoFranchi]

I actually take the opposite approach on the graphics. I think the simplicity involved was what made it all the more interesting.

I agree with this - having a stick-figure hero was a great move.  It helps quick-start your imagination more than a detailed sprite would have done.