An English Haunting

About An English Haunting

An English Haunting is a point-and-click adventure by Postmodern Adventures, the studio behind Nightmare Frames and The Dark Rites of Arkham. It came out on Steam in May 2024, and a Nintendo Switch version followed in October 2025.

The year is 1907 and London is gripped by spiritualism: séances and stage shows where the dead speak to their families are everywhere. Professor Patrick Moore runs a department of psychic investigation, and he has 72 hours to prove that the Great Beyond exists or it will be shut down. With the help of Beatrice Shaw, a medium who is a fraud, he sets out to finish the Box of Revelations, a device left behind by his missing mentor that is meant to reveal dimensions hidden in our world. The trail runs from foggy London streets to the Scottish coast and finally to 34 Benwell Street, said to be the most haunted manor in England.

You play it with the mouse in the classic way: talk to people, look at everything, pick up objects and use or combine them to get past each problem. There are more than 60 pixel art backgrounds and over 70 characters, including real figures of the time such as Florence Cook, William Crookes, Harry Houdini and Arthur Conan Doyle, whom you control for one of the game's mysteries.

The horror is that of the old English ghost story. The maker names M.R. James, Algernon Blackwood and Arthur Machen as its inspiration, and the store warns of gore and violent deaths. The store pictures show a medium breathing smoke beside a pale ghost, robed figures gathered at a ritual among standing stones, and a manor gate in the rain at night. Players describe it as atmospheric and eerie rather than full of jump scares, with some humour in the dialogue.

It suits players who like slow, story-led horror adventures such as The Last Door or The Excavation of Hob's Barrow, and anyone who enjoys period ghost stories.

How to play An English Haunting

1. Click on places to walk there and on people to talk to them.
2. Look at objects and pick up what you can carry.
3. Use or combine items from your inventory to solve each puzzle.
4. Follow the case from London to Scotland and on to the manor at 34 Benwell Street.
5. Visit the side places, such as the horror bookshop and the archive of supernatural cases, for extra stories.

Tips

• Talk to everyone more than once; new lines often open after you find an item.
• Read the archive of supernatural cases and the books in the shop: they set the mood and give background on the period.
• If you are stuck, check every room you can reach again for objects you have not picked up.

Questions