Horror puzzle Psychological horror Short horror 2D horror

Dinner with an Owl

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A business dinner with an owl-headed host, and an evening that never ends.

Platforms: PC
Stores: Steam, itch.io
Price: Free
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (95% of 882 reviews)
Players: 1
Made by: BoringSuburbanDad
Released: 2021

Not on PlayStation. Dinner with an Owl is on Steam, itch.io and PC. It is not in the PlayStation part of the site you came from.

Get it on Steam itch.io (original jam version)

What frightens You arrive at a red-walled mansion for a business dinner and find your host has the head of an owl. His other guests are held there by a spell, the evening keeps looping back to the same meal, and the more you learn about what is served, the worse it gets.
Content: fantasy violence (store rating), dark humour, unsettling themes.

A free, short point-and-click adventure by BoringSuburbanDad. You are a guest in the mansion of an owl-headed host whose other guests cannot leave, and you replay the same evening, learning more each loop, to break his spell. It mixes dark humour with a creeping sense of dread.

About Dinner with an Owl

Dinner with an Owl is a point-and-click adventure by the one-person studio BoringSuburbanDad. It began as a game jam entry, still on itch.io, and came to Steam in May 2021 as the free Dessert Edition, with full voice acting and a new soundtrack.

You play a businessman invited to the mansion of Mr. Brown, a well-dressed gentleman with the head of an owl. The house is full of red wallpaper, heavy furniture and guests who seem friendly but are trapped there under his spell. Each time the evening ends, it starts over at the same dinner.

The play is classic point and click: walk between a few rooms, talk to the guests in multiple-choice dialogue, look at the objects around the house and carry what you learn into the next loop. Little by little you work out who the guests are, why they cannot leave and what the owl wants.

The horror is quiet and creeping rather than loud. The host's politeness, the looping meal and the hints about what is really on the table build a growing unease, and the game is willing to turn grim. It is also darkly funny, and players often mention its strange humour alongside its eerie mood.

It suits players who like short, odd point-and-click mysteries in the style of Rusty Lake, and anyone who wants a free evening of gentle dread rather than jump scares. A prequel, Owl Observatory, has been announced.

How to play Dinner with an Owl

Get it free on Steam, or the original jam version on itch.io.
Walk through the mansion's rooms by clicking where you want to go.
Talk to the host and each guest, choosing your questions from the dialogue list.
Examine objects and note what you learn before the evening resets.
Use what you learned in the next loop to get further and find a way to break the spell.

Screenshots

The owl-headed host and a woman at a dinner table in a red-lit dining room, with the word Delicious over them

A man in a suit and a woman in a long dress by a door in a red-walled hallway, with the dialogue choice Do you want to leave this place?

The guests gathered in the mansion's sitting room as the owl host says Let's have dinner

A close-up portrait inset of a frightened woman and a man, over the line Sometimes, he lurks in the dark

Tips

Ask every guest every question; a line that seems idle often opens something on the next loop.
Pay attention to what each guest says about the host and the dinner.
When the evening restarts, go straight to what you have not tried yet rather than repeating old talks.
Play with sound on: the voice acting and music carry much of the mood.