Survival horror Zombie 2D horror PS1 horror

You Will Die Here Tonight

Rate it

A squad split up in a cursed mansion, where every death carries forward.

Platforms: PC
Stores: Steam, GOG
Price: Paid
Rated: Very Positive on Steam (90% of 601 reviews); OpenCritic top critic average 65 from 10 critics; 4.1 of 5 on GOG (31 ratings)
Length: about 4 hours
Players: 1
Made by: Spiral Bound Interactive
Released: 2023

No. 28 of the soldier horror games · No. 23 of the horror games with traps · No. 13 of the dungeon horror games

What frightens The six members of Aries Division are separated by mysterious forces inside Breckenridge Estate, a cursed 19th-century mansion. You explore it from above with scarce resources, switch to first-person combat against the undead when running fails, and each teammate who dies stays dead, leaving the rest to carry on.
Content: blood, gore, violence, strong language, alcohol and tobacco.

You Will Die Here Tonight is a survival horror game by Spiral Bound Interactive. You play each of the six members of an elite unit in turn inside a cursed mansion, exploring top-down and fighting zombies in first person, and when one dies for good, the next carries on with what they left behind.

About You Will Die Here Tonight

You Will Die Here Tonight is a survival horror game by Spiral Bound Interactive, released on 31 October 2023 for Windows PC on Steam and also sold on GOG. Its makers call it a love letter to the survival and action horror classics, with one twist: death is only the beginning of your story.

The elite Aries Division goes into Breckenridge Estate, a cursed 19th-century mansion with a tragic history, and its six members are separated by mysterious forces. You play each of them in turn, and the official site says each has their own skills and motives. Most of the time you explore from above, through pre-rendered rooms: a dining hall with bodies on the checkered floor, a study thick with cobwebs, a rainy garden lit by torches, cells and a torture chamber below. You scavenge, solve puzzles and buy weapons and upgrades. When an enemy blocks the way and running is no longer an option, the view drops into a first-person fight in mid-90s style 3D, with tuxedoed undead servants and other creatures coming at you out of the dark.

Your teammates will die, and they stay dead. What each one did, the items they took and the decisions they made carry forward to empower or endanger whoever is left, so the store asks you to take what you need and leave some for the others. Traps can kill you, and the makers warn of blood and gore in the shooting scenes and trap deaths.

Critics were split. OpenCritic's top critic average is 65, while players on Steam rate it Very Positive. TechRadar praised the retro look and the switch to first person in its fights, but found the characters too thin to mourn and some puzzles slow, and finished the whole game in under five hours. HowLongToBeat puts the main story at about four hours.

It suits players who like classic mansion survival horror and want a short game where losing a character is part of the story rather than a game over.

How to play You Will Die Here Tonight

Explore Breckenridge Hall from the top-down view and search its rooms for supplies.
Decide whether to flee or fight each enemy you meet.
Fight in first person when you cannot escape, aiming carefully with limited ammunition.
Solve puzzles and spend what you find on weapons and upgrades.
When a teammate dies, continue as the next one, using what they left behind.

Screenshots

First-person view holding a knife as three undead servants in tuxedos, one with glowing red eyes, reach out in a dark candlelit room

Top-down view of a bloodied dining hall with a feast table, a lit fireplace, bodies on the checkered floor and a soldier's portrait in the dialogue box

A team member aims at zombies on a rainy, torch-lit garden path at night, with the line Eric! What did they do to you?!

A soldier standing before three iron maidens on an octagonal platform in a candlelit stone torture chamber

A soldier fights pale, gaunt creatures in a torch-lit dungeon corridor lined with barred cells

A rotting zombie in a white collar and dark vest screams in front of a moonlit arched window, in low-poly first person

A soldier at a pipe organ between two coffins covered in white roses, with the line A church organ. Reminds me of growing up.

Tips

Do not take every item with the first character; the ones who come after you will need supplies too.
Avoid fights you do not need; ammunition and health are scarce.
Watch for traps in the mansion's rooms, they can kill outright.
Remember where a teammate fell, so the next one can find what they carried.
The official site says the game rewards replaying without dying, so a second run where you keep more of the team alive is worth trying.

Questions

Is You Will Die Here Tonight top-down or first-person?

Both. You explore the mansion from above and switch to first-person arcade combat when you fight.

What happens when a character dies?

They stay dead, and you continue as another of the six members of the team. Their actions and decisions carry forward to the ones who remain.

How long is You Will Die Here Tonight?

HowLongToBeat puts the main story at about 4 hours and finishing everything at about 6. TechRadar finished it in under five hours.

Where can I buy You Will Die Here Tonight?

It is a Windows PC game, sold on Steam for $19.99 and on GOG. Steam also has a demo.

Is it gory?

Yes, in places. The makers note blood and bodily damage in the shooting scenes and gory deaths from traps, and rating boards in Germany and Brazil list strong violence and bad language.