The Mouth Of The Woods

About The Mouth Of The Woods

The Mouth Of The Woods is a short horror story game by Jan U. Wine, published on itch.io by the DOMINO CLUB collective and part of its Dream Gallery Jam in 2023. It is built with the Tape Window engine and plays free in the browser; the page recommends fullscreen.

It opens on a local news notice: twenty-seven-year-old Casper Antilles was last seen on a blacked-out street on Wednesday night, and a search of the park begins tonight. Two of his friends join it. Their conversation, typed out line by line beside their names, alternates with pages from Casper's diary, written in the weeks before he disappeared, over looping sepia footage of a winter forest.

There is nothing to solve and no choice to make: you advance the text with one button. The fear is in the reading. The friends' small talk in the dark and the diary's flat, honest account of depression and a recurring dream about the heart of the woods pull against each other, and the diary grows more disturbing with each page. The maker warns of descriptions of gore and violence and of suicidal themes.

It suits readers of short, literary horror who want a half-hour story with striking presentation rather than a game of skill.

How to play The Mouth Of The Woods

1. Open the itch.io page, press Run game and switch to fullscreen, as the maker recommends.
2. Wait for the images to load, then click, tap or press a key to advance each line.
3. Read the friends' conversation and the diary pages in turn until the story ends.
4. Choose Replay at the end to start again.

Tips

• Play in fullscreen with sound on; the typing sounds and music set the mood.
• If the game stops at the loading screen, refresh the page; the maker fixed display problems in Firefox in a May 2023 update.
• Read the content warnings first: the diary describes gore and touches on suicidal thoughts.

Questions