Ginkgo

About Ginkgo

Ginkgo is a free horror game made by a team of students from the USC Games program and released on Steam in June 2020. Its store calls it a 20 to 40 minute demo.

You wander a dreamlike space built from traditional East Asian architecture: paper screens, lantern-lit corridors, a red room hung with masks, a shrine and a temple under the stars. Your only tool is a magic needle with a long red thread, and with it you can sew parts of the world together, joining spaces and objects to open the way.

The horror comes from what lives there. The store promises close-up encounters with intricately designed yokai monsters, who can aid or disrupt your journey, and the key art shows a skeletal figure with long black hair crawling out of a painted screen.

It suits players who like Japanese horror settings and puzzle games, and who want a short, free and unusual idea to try in one sitting.

How to play Ginkgo

1. Explore the dreamlike house and look for places the thread can connect.
2. Use the needle to sew parts of the world together and open new paths.
3. Solve the 3D spatial puzzles to move deeper in.
4. Watch the yokai: some help you, others will disrupt your way.

Tips

• Follow the red thread; it shows what you have sewn.
• Look at a room from every angle before you sew: the puzzles are spatial.
• It is short, so play it in one sitting with the lights off.

Questions