Survival horror Zombie Horror puzzle Horror escape Short horror

Mansion of the Dead

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Nine people vanished from this villa. You are the tenth to wake up inside.

Platforms: PC
Stores: Steam
Price: Paid
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (95% of 113 reviews). Survival Horrors called it a fun 90-minute survival horror ride, worth its few dollars.
Length: about 1.5 hours
Players: 1
Controls: Keyboard and mouse, in first person: E to use, Q to examine, Tab for the inventory, as the on-screen prompts show.
Made by: Caicai Studio
Released: 2025

No. 26 of the prison horror games · No. 28 of the detective horror games

What frightens A private investigator wakes locked inside a remote villa where nine people vanished over twenty years; zombies roam its dark corridors and grounds, and by flashlight you find bodies, chains and a bloody pentagram while you look for clues and a way out.
Content: gore, violence, dead bodies, jumpscares, mature content.

Mansion of the Dead is a first-person survival horror game. Private investigator Agent Kim sneaks into a remote villa where nine people have vanished over twenty years, is knocked out and wakes as its prisoner, and must solve its puzzles and get past the zombies that roam the estate to escape.

About Mansion of the Dead

Mansion of the Dead is an indie horror game by Caicai Studio, released for Windows on Steam in March 2025, with full English voice acting and text in thirteen more languages.

You play Agent Kim, a seasoned private investigator. Over the past twenty years nine people have disappeared from a villa deep in the wilderness, the latest your client's adventurous relative, Mr. Lin, and the police have found nothing. You sneak in to look for yourself, are struck down by something you do not see, and wake in a cold, bare room: the mansion's newest prisoner.

From there it plays as first-person survival horror. You explore the villa's dark rooms, stairs, cellar and grounds by flashlight and lantern, pick things up and examine them, read notes, and work keypads, valves and other puzzles to open the way. The undead stalk the halls, and an axe in your inventory is described as fit for self-defence. Deeper in, the house shows its past: chained rooms, bodies, blood and a pentagram on the wall.

It's small and short. The Survival Horrors reviewer went in expecting little and got about 90 minutes of cheesy jumpscares, some real fright and puzzles that keep getting better. Letters introduce the villain early on, and there's a little combat, brief but better than you'd expect. Steam players mostly agree: nearly all of its reviews are positive.

If you liked the mansion in the first Resident Evil, or Heaven Dust, and want something you can finish in one evening, this is a cheap pick.

How to play Mansion of the Dead

Explore the villa in first person, using the flashlight and later a lantern to see.
Press E to use or pick up things and Q to examine them; read every note and document.
Open the inventory with Tab to check and use the items you carry.
Solve the keypads, valves and other puzzles that lock the way forward.
Avoid or deal with the zombies, and find the way out of the estate.

Screenshots

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a cellar wall marked with a bloody pentagram and the words Get out, hung with chains and shackles, lit by a lantern

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a note held up to the flashlight shows a hand against a door and reads Zombies are stupid. They don't know how to open a door!

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a flashlight shows a carpeted staircase and a grandfather clock in the villa's dark hall

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a numeric keypad lock with four green lights above it

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a dark parlour with a lit marble fireplace and candelabras, a hunched figure leaning in at the right edge

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: a dark, blood-stained cellar with bodies on the floor and one hanging from chains

Mansion of the Dead screenshot: the inventory grid with a flashlight, a lantern, a bottle and a selected axe, health at 100

Tips

Read the notes: one of them points out that zombies cannot open doors.
Examine documents and photos closely, since clues for the keypads are hidden in them.
Keep the axe ready for when the undead block your way.