In Sound Mind

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Step into your patients' worst memories, one tape at a time.

Platforms: PC, PlayStation, Xbox
Price: Paid
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (95% of 7,029 reviews); Metacritic 75 (PC)
Length: about 8 to 14 hours
Players: 1
Made by: We Create Stuff
Released: 2021

Get it on Steam Steam Official site PlayStation Store Xbox

What frightens A therapist wakes in a twisted copy of his own apartment building and finds tapes of his patients' sessions; each one pulls him into a memory turned nightmare, with a faceless mannequin in a locker room, a girl in a shop full of watching TV screens, and a stalker for every patient that hunts him until he works out how to stop it.
Content: violence, disturbing imagery, themes of trauma and mental illness, jumpscares.

In Sound Mind is a first-person psychological horror game from We Create Stuff, the makers of Nightmare House 2. As a therapist trapped in a strange version of his building, you play his patients' session tapes and enter their memories, solving each one's puzzles and facing the horror that stalks it, with music by The Living Tombstone.

About In Sound Mind

In Sound Mind is made by We Create Stuff, the team behind the cult Half-Life 2 mod Nightmare House 2, and published by Black Lantern Collective. It came out in September 2021 on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, with a soundtrack by The Living Tombstone.

You play Desmond Wales, a therapist who wakes in the corridors of an inexplicable building that looks like his own. Doors to his patients' apartments appear, and inside them are cassette tapes of their therapy sessions. Playing a tape drops you into that patient's memory, a long, strange level shaped by their fears, from a shop of watching televisions to stranger places. A cat named Tonia keeps you company in the hub.

Each tape brings its own tools, weapons and mechanics, and its own stalker, one of the imposing horrors from that person's mind. You explore, solve puzzles and finally face it in a boss fight that is solved like a puzzle. Back in the hub, new equipment opens new doors, in the manner of a Metroid map.

Reviewers praised its imagination, humour and level design; some found the later tapes overlong and the horror more unsettling than frightening. It suits players who liked Nightmare House 2 or Observer and want inventive levels with a story about the mind.

How to play In Sound Mind

Explore the hub building and find the doors to your patients' apartments.
Play each patient's cassette tape to enter their memory.
Solve the memory's puzzles with the tools you find there, and use new gear to open more of the hub.
Learn how each stalker works and solve how to beat it in its boss fight.
Return to the hub between tapes, and look out for Tonia the cat.

Screenshots

In Sound Mind screenshot: a faceless, mannequin-like figure stands between open lockers in a dark changing room, caught in the flashlight

In Sound Mind screenshot: in a dark shop, rows of TV screens show a staring eye and a girl standing in the middle screen

In Sound Mind screenshot: a therapist's office with a desk, a cat sitting on it and a patterned rug, the player holding a flashlight

In Sound Mind screenshot: a tall shadowy creature looms at the end of a tunnel of glowing purple light

Tips

Search every corner; supplies and secrets are hidden throughout each memory.
Use each tape's new tool on old obstacles in the hub.
Watch and listen to the stalkers before fighting; their weakness is part of the puzzle.
Read the notes; they fill in each patient's story.