Neighbor

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Your dream apartment, and the price that comes with it.

Platforms: Browser
Stores: itch.io
Price: Pay what you want
Rated: 4.6 out of 5 from 170 ratings on itch.io
Players: 1
Controls: Arrow keys or D-pad to move, Z or A to interact, Enter or Start for the main menu
Made by: Horatiu.nyc
Released: 2020

What frightens A woman moves into her dream apartment in an old city building, and its dark secrets begin to haunt her; in Game Boy greys you search rooms where someone may have just been, meet pale, staring figures in close-up cutscenes, and uncover what the building hides over five chapters.
Content: mature themes.

Neighbor is a free horror game in the style of the original Game Boy, made in GB Studio by Horatiu.nyc and playable in the browser. A woman finds her dream apartment, and the dark secrets of the building begin to haunt her across five chapters with alternate endings and hidden secrets.

About Neighbor

Neighbor is a horror adventure by Horatiu.nyc, built in GB Studio to look and play like an original Game Boy game. It came out on itch.io in chapters through the autumn of 2020 and was completed that December with Chapters 4 and 5, an epilogue, an alternate ending and a secret chapter. It plays free in the browser, and the Game Boy ROM can be downloaded at a price you name to play on an emulator or an Analogue Pocket; a deluxe edition adds box art and concept art, and the maker has made a small run of physical cartridges.

The maker calls it a game about the price that comes with finding your dream apartment. You move in and start to explore the old building and its neighbourhood, talking to the people who live there. Things are not right: a room where someone seems to have just been, a question of whether the place is haunted, and mysteries that unfold as the building's dark secrets come to the surface.

It is drawn in the four greys of the Game Boy, with top-down rooms and streets and sharper close-up portraits for its cutscenes, including pale, staring faces. The first two chapters each have two separate endings, and hidden secrets expand the world. One player's thread calls it the weirdest game they have played; some report bugs in later chapters, which the maker has patched over the years.

It suits players who like retro handheld horror and slow-burn apartment stories, and anyone who has wondered about the people next door.

How to play Neighbor

Open the itch.io page and play in the browser, or download the Game Boy ROM at a price you name.
Move with the arrow keys and press Z to talk and look at things.
Explore the building and the city, and talk to everyone you meet.
Pick a chapter from the menu once you have unlocked it.
Replay the first two chapters to see their other endings, and look for the secret chapter.

Screenshots

Game Boy-style apartment room with a TV, desk and bed as the heroine asks 'Is this place haunted?'

A dim room with a staircase as the heroine asks 'Was someone in that room?'

The Chapter III title card over a close-up of a pale, staring face

Tips

Search every room; the maker says hidden secrets expand the world.
Each of the first two chapters has two endings, so choices are worth trying again.
If a chapter breaks, the maker has posted bug fixes; reload the latest version.