The Beast within Her Choice: Little Nightmares Review (WARNING SPOILERS)

Out of breath, tossing and turning in a restless attempt to escape the nightmare from within, Six, a nine-year-old caught in this boat like prison called The Maw, tries to escape a world filled with dangerous creatures, traps, and secrets that within this 2D horror game even made me do a double-take. Now, as a person who is desensitized to a lot of horror in video games, there were moments I was genuinely surprised at, which spoiler alert I LOVE. A lot of the game was predictable, beautiful morbid, and slightly weird to get through in terms of the controls but I will get into that later, let’s go into the first part of this review…

Where did it all come from? As soon as you enter the game Little Nightmares you are not given any notes, any indication of where you are, or who you are for that matter. All we are given is a geisha in the nightmare we had, a little kid in a yellow rain jacket whom I was unsure of the gender and name of until I researched it, nomes, and geisha dolls which you are supposed to break. So there is a lot of confusion upon starting the game and even when finishing it. In the game I was not told that this place Six is trapped is called “the maw”, I had no indication of anything. The only thing that gave me any names was the achievements that were unlocked after a chapter’s completion. Even with that, I don’t remember six’s name or location name ever coming up. The fact that people know her age is beyond me. Going further into the game there are different pieces of symbolism, abstract concepts, and eyes, lots of eyes.

The Fight Begins 

During the beginning, we encounter these adorable creatures known as Nomes, in the game. These nomes I found out were actually once children, but had their souls taken out by “The Lady”. There are thirteen Nomes you can capture for an achievement called “Lost Little Things” Since these nomes were children I did some digging and found out that in the DLC for Little Nightmares, the runaway kid is the nome that Six later eats in the game. As we get into the meat of the game we see a lot of nooses and a dark ambiance that fully engulfs our mood and spirit. This area is called, “The Prison” since this isn’t a Psychologically Gaming review, I won’t go too in-depth with everything, but the first part of the game is definitely the most gut-wrenching in a sense because of how mentally dark it is, and how many symbols we encounter, like the nooses, cigarettes everywhere, and a man hanging from the ceiling.   Later on, in the game, we encounter our first monster/worker in The Maw, The Janitor. Now, The Janitor is the only character that six actually kills n the game while all the others she escapes from. This creature has long arms and a sense of smell that would make a dog jealous. With this creature not being able to see it made me think of, I hear no evil, speak no evil see no evil. As we continue on there are these security systems called the eyes, which I'm guessing are to watch over the children of The Maw.  While big brother watches six they don’t see the real evil, or maybe corruption just has selective viewing.

 The Beast Within  Now what I found interesting was that Six will have levels of hunger that get increasingly violent, at first it was a piece of bread, which is fairly early on in the game. Then she eats a piece of raw meat, then a rat, then a Nome, then The Lady. Going from I’m hungry to I’m hangry to a full-on cannibal. There are different reasons and theories as to why children are kept here but mine and the other popular opinions suggest that these are children who are being cooked up for the guests who are the gluttonous creatures we see later in the game.  Now, as we progress in the game we then encounter the twin chefs who are surprisingly fast and make really weird noises while they cook. As we get further into the game, we are then in an area where guests board the ship, big gluttonous creatures that try to eat six. This explains the name of the ship called The Maw, the word Maw means the jaws or throat of a voracious animal. These guests are trying to eat six in the jaws of the maw.

Tying it all together. 

A lot of the aesthetics of the game as we get towards the final chapter are inspired by Chinese décor, which I don’t see in a lot of games so points for originality!  Also, something I’d like to point out. Masks, lots and lots of masks. The chefs wore them, the guests and the lady wore them. The masks that the guests were wearing were more symbolic to the Chinese culture, where you have the dramatic eyebrows, red lipstick, and two red dots in the cheeks which in both Chinese and South Korean culture are placed there to drive away evil forces, which is kind of ironic if you think about it.  Later on, as we get to the ending part of the game we are in the Lady’s quarters, we hear a mournful song as we witness her brushing her hair, watching herself in a broken mirror. All the mirrors in this section are broken, and she does not look at herself, bearing a mask to hide her identity. As the game comes to a close, and we have fought the lady, (which the boss battle is easy once you’ve gotten the hang of it). The game plays on the lore of medusa with the lady not being able to look at her own reflection and sucking the souls out of creatures including the children on board the maw. We defeated the lady, weakened her, and then six presumes to eat her. No im serious, six eats the lady and absorbs her powers which a lot of people have been saying six has become the little nightmare, which is cute. Don’t know if I want to fully jump on board with thinking that’s why the game was named the way it was but it’s a plausible theory.  The way this game was designed, not reviling much of the story has me both peeved and intrigued to play the next one. Considering the fact that the controls got a tag annoying when running from enemies, and jumping was a task on its own at certain points I give this game a solid 9.5/10 coffee mug. Simply because they didn’t explain much of anything to us in the game which, again had me both in suspension and in agony.  But the game as a whole, take away the little things I nitpicked is incredible. The graphics are beautiful, the characters are unique in design and context, and the nomes are adorable.