Jagged Bone

Rate it

Your father's house in the forest, and something else in it tonight.

Platforms: Browser
Stores: itch.io
Price: Pay what you want
Rated: 4.7 out of 5 from 49 ratings on itch.io
Players: 1
Controls: Mouse only: click the highlighted words and choices
Made by: Nessa Cannon
Released: 2019

What frightens You arrive at night at your dead father's half-renovated house deep in a forest, to sort through his things alone; then a light goes off that you do not remember, something drips in the dark hallway, a shuffling stops outside your door, and your mother lets slip that your father once drew something in the house, all blood and antlers.
Content: blood, violence.

Jagged Bone is a short, free choose-your-own-adventure horror story by Nessa Cannon, made in Twine and read in the browser. You spend a night alone in your late father's house deep in the woods, and something is in there with you; the maker calls it a story about transformation and perspective.

About Jagged Bone

Jagged Bone is a piece of interactive fiction by Nessa Cannon, her first Twine game, made for a narrative design class and built upon afterwards. It has been on itch.io since 2019, where it is free to read in the browser, with a download and a name-your-own-price option, and players rate it 4.7 out of 5.

The maker describes it as a branching choose-your-own-adventure horror game about transformation and perspective. It opens on a long, winding road that ends at a small house at the edge of a dark forest, and asks a question: is this your house? The answer changes whose night you follow.

In the house you are an only child sorting through your father's belongings weeks after his death, worn out after the drive, in rooms full of boxes, books and half-painted walls. The text reveals itself as you click on words, a sentence or a clause at a time, so the dread arrives in small steps: a light you do not remember switching off, a steady dripping, a smell, shuffling in the hall that suddenly stops. When you call home, your mother tells you something about your father she had kept back.

From there you choose whether to hide, call for help, run or fight, in a story that takes a few minutes to read through and invites another reading from the other side. It suits readers who like quiet, cabin-in-the-woods horror told in text.

How to play Jagged Bone

Open Jagged Bone on itch.io and press Run game; it plays in the browser.
Click the red highlighted words to reveal the next part of the text.
When choices appear, click the one you want to follow.
Read to the end of your path, then play again and choose differently at the start.

Tips

Click every highlighted word; the story often hides the choice at the end of a passage.
Your first choice, whether the house is yours, changes whose story you follow; try both.
Read in a dark, quiet room; the text builds its dread a sentence at a time.