Bad Dream: Coma

About Bad Dream: Coma

Bad Dream: Coma is a point-and-click horror game by Desert Fox, part of its Bad Dream series. It came out on Steam for Windows and Mac in March 2017, on Nintendo Switch in January 2019 and on Xbox in April 2021; Forever Entertainment published the console versions.

You travel through a surreal and disturbing dreamland, a place known from the earlier Bad Dream chapters, and meet familiar creatures in new forms. You cannot die, but you can suffer greatly. The art is minimal ink drawing on stained paper, with red blood as almost the only colour, and its scenes run from an infirmary and hospital wards to graveyards, a morgue and a kitchen where a clown waits by the fridge. Nintendo Life found that the music adds loud, hellish sounds every so often, though it met no jump scares.

You click from scene to scene, pick up items, use them on the world and talk to the people and creatures you meet. Little is explained at the start; hints of the story turn up in things like newspaper scraps. The game is built on action and reaction, with no obvious choices. Small things you do, or fail to do, change the characters, the dialogue and the ending, and the store encourages finishing it once and then asking what would happen if you did it differently. Nintendo Life counts three endings and warns that a single slip can rule out the good one.

HowLongToBeat puts one run of the main story at about four hours, while finding every ending and hidden secret takes far longer. Nintendo Life found it genuinely disturbing in places, with logic puzzles that can be too cryptic and some that are terrifyingly bizarre. The store notes occasional violence, gore and self-harm, and the Xbox store rates it Mature 17+ for violence, blood and gore. It suits players who like strange, dark point-and-click games such as Fran Bow and the Rusty Lake series and who enjoy replaying to see what changes.

How to play Bad Dream: Coma

1. Buy it on Steam (Windows, Mac), GOG, the Nintendo eShop for Switch or the Xbox store.
2. Click around each scene to look, pick up items and talk to the creatures you meet.
3. Use items on the world to solve puzzles and move deeper into the dream.
4. Pay attention to how you treat others; small actions change the ending.
5. Play again and act differently to see what changes and find hidden content.

Tips

• Think before you act: Nintendo Life warns that one simple mistake can rule out the good ending.
• The store says there are no obvious choices, so treat every action as one.
• Look closely at small details; the store promises hidden content for curious players.
• Read the newspaper scraps and notes you find; they hold the hints of what happened.

Questions