Psychological horror Horror puzzle Horror

Someday You'll Return: Director's Cut

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Your daughter did not come home. Go into the Moravian woods and find her.

Platforms: PC, PlayStation
Stores: Steam
Price: Paid
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (84% of 305 reviews); 4.1 of 5 stars on the PlayStation Store (427 ratings)
Length: about 12 hours
Players: 1
Made by: CBE software
Released: 2023

On PlayStation: one of the PlayStation horror games.

No. 10 of the swamp horror games · No. 9 of the bunker horror games

Get it on Steam PlayStation Store (PS4, PS5)

What frightens A father goes into the old Moravian woods after his missing daughter Stela, and the search unravels his sanity: abandoned camps, swamps and collapsed bunkers give way to otherworldly places, a burning cross in the fog and something out there watching you.
Content: violence, blood and gore, strong language, drug use.

Someday You'll Return: Director's Cut is a first-person psychological horror game by the Czech studio CBE software. A father searches the old Moravian woods for his missing daughter Stela, following hiking markers and a map, crafting, brewing potions and solving otherworldly puzzles while he loses his grip on what is real.

About Someday You'll Return: Director's Cut

Someday You'll Return is a psychological horror game by the Czech studio CBE software, first released for Windows in May 2020. The Director's Cut, published by Bohemia Interactive on 7 March 2023, brought it to PS4 and PS5 and replaced it on Steam, where owners of the PC original received it for free. It adds better story pacing, new optional areas, new puzzles and story content, better navigation tools, a photo mode, improved lighting and character models, over 30 minutes of new music, full controller support and a hidden ending for New Game+. It was also translated into seven more languages; it is voiced in English.

Your daughter Stela has gone missing, and you go back to the place where tragedy first struck: the old Moravian woods. The forests are based on real places in South Moravia, around a hiking trail near Uherské Hradiště. You find your way with a map and the marked hiking trails through a landscape of old memories, abandoned camps, murky swamps and collapsed bunkers. Local tales hold the keys to otherworldly puzzles, and a journal keeps the drawings and diary pages you find.

A workbench lets you inspect what you collect, take it apart and craft new items. You also gather rare herbs and brew potions from recipes, which the store says can heal the soul or corrupt the heart; one recipe in the screenshots purifies a body corrupted by black spittle that brings nausea and voices. There is no combat: when danger comes, you sneak past it.

The forest is often beautiful by day, with sandstone rocks and autumn trees, which makes the turns into nightmare harder to take: a living room set out on a cliff at night, a chapel on a floating heap of concrete in green fog, a glitching cellar overgrown with roots. Expect blood, violence, strong language and drug use; PEGI rates it 16 and the ESRB M.

HowLongToBeat puts the main story at about 12 hours. It suits players who like slow, story-led horror in real places, and puzzles more than fights. Critics were divided on the original, faulting its confusing forest and some clunky mechanics, while players on Steam and PlayStation rate the Director's Cut well.

How to play Someday You'll Return: Director's Cut

Buy it on Steam for Windows or on the PlayStation Store for PS4 and PS5.
Follow the map and the marked hiking trails into the Moravian woods in search of Stela.
Collect items and herbs, then take things apart, craft and brew potions at the workbench.
Read the journal and the local tales you uncover, and use them to solve the forest's otherworldly puzzles.
When danger comes, stay out of sight and sneak past it; there is no fighting.

Screenshots

A wooden double-barred cross on a rocky ledge above a misty autumn forest of sandstone pillars at sunset

A burning cross-shaped pole in night fog behind a standing stone carved with figures, among rubble and bent rebar

A girl hugging her knees by a sofa and floor lamp set out on a rocky ledge in a dark forest

An old woman in a headscarf sits by a night campfire among rocks, glowing orbs floating up beside her

A small wooden chapel with a cross on a floating heap of broken concrete slabs in thick green fog

A dark, glitching cellar with a metal table, a hanging lamp and tangled cables and roots, seen through warped vision

The herbalism screen: a Purification potion recipe beside a chest of herb drawers, a stove and a mortar at night

Tips

Keep checking the map; the trail markers are your main guide through a forest that is easy to get lost in.
Pick up herbs as you walk; the potion recipes in the herbalism tab need several of them.
Inspect every item at the workbench; many puzzles depend on what you craft from it.
If you finish it, New Game+ in the Director's Cut holds a hidden ending.

Questions

What is the difference between Someday You'll Return and the Director's Cut?

The Director's Cut adds better pacing, new optional areas, puzzles and story content, better navigation tools, a photo mode, new music, seven more languages and a hidden New Game+ ending. Owners of the PC original got it free.

Where is Someday You'll Return set?

In the forests of South Moravia in the Czech Republic, modelled on real places around a hiking trail near Uherské Hradiště.

How long is Someday You'll Return: Director's Cut?

About 12 hours for the main story by HowLongToBeat's count, and close to 15 with the extras.

Is there combat in Someday You'll Return?

No. You sneak past danger, solve puzzles, craft and brew potions instead of fighting.