The Sorrowvirus

About The Sorrowvirus

Wyatt Heyll has been ill since childhood, with cancer after cancer, and his parents made a desperate choice: they gave him the Sorrowvirus. It keeps its host from passing into the afterlife. When Wyatt dies he wakes in Purgatory, a liminal place made of memories, dreams and nightmares, where his body mends, and then he returns to the living, sicker each time. His parents let him die, over and over, in the name of research, profit and a cure that may never be meant for him.

You walk Purgatory with him in first person, through home hospital rooms, cellars, overgrown archives and memorials to the son his parents call their magnum opus. You pick up documents and tapes, use doors and levers, carry key items and work out padlock codes from what you read. Time behaves strangely there: grandfather clocks act as checkpoints that keep track of it, and after the first run you can find a wristwatch that lets you explore without the clock. One run lasts about 45 to 60 minutes and has no save points.

The game remembers each ending you reach. When you come back, something has shifted: lines of dialogue change, rooms warp and it grows harder. There are four endings, and the makers say only one is the true one; all four runs are needed for the whole story. TheXboxHub singles out the dolls that come to life, the tormented souls and the rooms that turn as you move, and praises the lighting, the voice acting and the music, while calling the lack of saves annoying.

The Sorrowvirus came out on Steam in May 2020, made by WATCHMAKER with Adam Sklar as project lead and writer. It began as a short story from the world of Faceless, a larger game its team is working on, and the store now says it is based on the novel Children of Sorrow. YouTuber 8-BitRyan voices Wyatt, and the music is by David Denyer. eastasiasoft brought it to PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series X|S and Switch in April 2022.

The store warns of death, suicide, euthanasia and strong language, and the ESRB rates it Mature for blood and gore, intense violence and language. It suits players who like story-led psychological horror that is short enough to finish in an evening and rewards playing again.

How to play The Sorrowvirus

1. Set aside about an hour: a run has no save points, though the game keeps the endings you have reached.
2. Explore Purgatory in first person, reading documents and listening to tapes for the story and for clues.
3. Find the grandfather clocks as you go; they keep Wyatt's time in check.
4. Use the clues you have read to open padlocks and find the key items that let you go further.
5. Reach an ending, then start again: dialogue, rooms and difficulty change on each return.
6. Play all four runs to see the whole story and its four endings.

Tips

• Start a run only when you have an hour free; quitting midway loses the run.
• Read every note you find; padlock codes are often hidden in the documents.
• After the first run, look for the wristwatch the store mentions if you would rather explore without watching the clocks.
• Pay attention to what changes between runs; new dialogue and clues in the rooms point toward the true ending.
• Use headphones; the music and voice acting carry much of it.

Questions