In Sound Mind

About In Sound Mind

In Sound Mind is made by We Create Stuff, the team behind the Half-Life 2 horror mod Nightmare House 2. Modus Games released it on September 28, 2021 for PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S, and a Nintendo Switch version followed on October 11, 2022; Steam and the Epic Games Store now name Black Lantern Collective as its publisher. The Living Tombstone wrote its soundtrack, with a song for each patient's story.

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. The patients, it turns out, were all exposed to the same experimental chemical. Playing a tape drops you into that patient's memory, a long level shaped by their fears, from a shop of watching televisions to a foggy rail yard. A cat named Tonia waits in your office, and yes, you can pet her.

Each tape brings its own tools, weapons and mechanics, and its own stalker, one of the imposing horrors from that person's mind. A shard of mirror glass shows clues and paths that are not there to the naked eye; mannequins move when you are not looking. You explore, solve puzzles, fight with what you find and finally face the stalker in a boss fight you win by working out how it can be beaten. Back in the hub, new equipment opens new doors.

It frightens most in its first hours, with things glimpsed at the edge of sight and figures that should not move. Later tapes lean toward action and humour, including a voice on the phone that keeps calling to mock you. Reviewers praised its imagination and level design; some found the later tapes overlong and the horror more unsettling than frightening. It suits players who liked Nightmare House 2, Layers of Fear or The Evil Within 2 and want inventive levels with a story about the mind.

How to play In Sound Mind

1. Explore the hub building and find the doors to your patients' apartments.
2. Play each patient's cassette tape to enter their memory.
3. Solve the memory's puzzles with the tools you find there, such as the glass shard that shows what is hidden.
4. Fight off the lesser creatures with the weapons each tape gives you, and watch your supplies.
5. Learn how each stalker works and solve how to beat it in its boss fight.
6. Return to the hub between tapes and use your new gear to open more of the building.

Tips

• Search every corner; supplies and secrets are hidden throughout each memory.
• When you are stuck, look through the glass shard; many clues only show in its reflection.
• 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.

Questions