Sorry We're Closed review - an enthralling, demonic love story in survival horror clothing
Meat cute.
Breaking up can be hell, but at least most of us don't have to deal with partners and exes who are also actual demons at the same time. Unfortunately, the same can't be said for London shop worker Michelle. Not only is she still reeling from a bad break-up with her very human girlfriend that happened several years previously, but she's also recently caught the eye of a very demanding arch-demon called The Duchess who simply won't take no for an answer - cursing Michelle with a third eye and the prospect of death and eternal damnation if she doesn't submit to love The Duchess in three days' time.
It's pretty intense as romances go - less whirlwind and more category five hurricane, perhaps - but Sorry We're Closed isn't the lusty visual novel you're probably picturing in your head right now. Rather, this is a love story viewed through the dark and grungy lens of survival horror, where celestial bust-ups are brought crashing down to earth in bars, hotels, underground stations and aquariums, and where hearts get broken with over-the-top axes, pistols and soul-shattering shotguns. But even though its PS1-era visuals and fixed, third-person camera angles give it an air of an angels and demons Resident Evil, that's really only one side of the story here. For when you're not fighting off legions of hellspawn, you're also taking on branching sidequests to fix the love lives of your mates - many of whom also happen to be angels and demons, it turns out. It's survival horror with a lite RPG glaze, in other words, and it's probably one of the most striking games you'll play this year.
Set over the three fateful days of Michelle's curse, our heroine discovers the only way to escape The Duchess' clutches is to follow the trail of the demon's other unfortunate lovers, who have all been turned into giant, unspeakable nasties in three distinct locations across London (and would very much like to kill Michelle themselves in the process). By claiming their third eyes, Michelle hopes to gain enough power to challenge The Duchess herself, though this is presented very much as mature, emotional growth rather than extra video-gamey skills and abilities. No matter, though. Across its brisk, six-hour runtime, Michelle has everything she needs to carry us through this demonic allegory of finding love in the modern age right from the very beginning, with developer à la mode games making the most of their limited toolset.
Chief among them is Michelle's own third eye. With a tap of the space bar (and a natty click of her fingers), a halo of alternate reality opens up around her, instantly revealing the pristine truth behind her freshly grimed up underworld surroundings, and vice-versa. Apart from being a neat visual trick, it also serves lots of different functions, such as turning ghostly apparitions of demons and angels into flesh and blood beings, and paving the way for some gentle, but smartly designed puzzles in the three main dungeon locations.
Of course, dimension-hopping and bleeding the real with the unreal is hardly a new idea, but Sorry We're Closed does a great job of stamping its own mark on it, pushing it much further than just the kind of item and obstacle-based puzzles you've come to expect from Resident Evil-style horror throwbacks. You see, it's also integral to the game's first-person combat, as once enemies cross that boundary into your inner circle, their hearts become visible, allowing you to shoot or swing your axe at it for critical damage. Stronger enemies will require more bullets before their heart can be fully broken, while bosses will need you to charge up special one-and-done bullets to take them down properly. The real clincher, though, is that only those heart hits will land when your third eye's open. Anything else will get absorbed into nothing - and bullets will also disintegrate if they, too, pass beyond your eye's outer limits. The closer enemies get to you, particularly when they're coming en masse, the more thrilling and tense fights become - and with increasingly varied enemy types being thrown at you in each of the main dungeons, there's always something new to get your head around.
There is, inevitably, a little bit of awkwardness as you transition from third-person exploration to first-person shooting. The camera will naturally remain in whatever direction Michelle's facing when you start to take aim, and she's always rooted to the ground, too, which can make beating a hasty retreat a little frantic in confined spaces. Personally, though, I think it all adds to that sense of dread and unease that seems to permeate its rusty, bloodstained interiors. This is not a game that's had its edges sanded down, and it works - everything from its brash, neon colour palette to its angular, jagged character models makes it clear that this isn't some gooey-eyed play for nostalgia. It would sooner bite your head off than kowtow to that kind of nonsense, and I love that it's retained that sense of friction that makes its players work for the best rewards. Sure, you can close your third eye and just shoot enemies anywhere to your heart's content, but at the cost of precious ammo and (most likely) vital and equally rare life-giving water bottles as the hordes begin to swell.
But plumbing the depths of the underworld for additional arch-demon-fighting-eyeballs isn't all that Sorry We're Closed's about. Between your daily excursions, you'll flit between jogging through the halls of The Duchess' hotel and your own local street of shops-cum-apartment block building. Here, Michelle's various friends either need a helping hand solving their own romantic entanglements, or they're scheming towards each other's downfall. There are angels and demons who yearn for each other across the divide, toxic manchildren that really need to get their act together, and the grifters trampling over everyone else to try and get ahead - and Michelle can choose whether to have a hand in their fate, and possibly alter her own fate in the process thanks to four different endings.
These decisions often take the form of simple requests, the binary outcomes of which will nudge these side plots in certain directions. Early on, for example, you can tell lug head Darrel whether to surprise his restaurateur boyfriend Oakley with a hamster-that's-definitely-not-a-rat 'now' or 'later'. The former will coincide with a health inspection taking place in Oakley's diner that morning, thereby driving them further apart due to Darrel's stupidity, while the latter will avoid that awkward encounter and potentially put them back on track to mending their already quite fractured relationship. Others will require you to perform time-sensitive actions - deliver a letter, say, or take an incriminating photo with the one-shot camera you're given especially for this one task before showing it to the correct person.
You'll need to pay close attention to both the dialogue and the location of these characters to see their sidequests through to their conclusion, as most have one key story beat taking place each day which can be easily missed if you don't act fast. You can also just ignore them entirely if you so wish - they're entirely optional at the end of the day, though some do take Michelle's fate in more interesting and layered directions than just the default 'break this curse and get the hell out of here'. They're worth seeing through if you ask me, and once again, I admire how hands-off the game is here, leaving you to figure things out on your own rather than being beholden to objective markers and clearly defined deadlines.
You're afforded the same courtesy when it comes to Sorry We're Closed's underlying story, too. For example, the Duchess may appear to be an outright villain at first - a symbol of control and emotional abuse - but there's nuance and depth, and even a small kind of tragedy, to her motivations with Michelle, which are sensitively teased out by a raw and hard-hitting script. Each facet of romantic relationship you encounter in Sorry We're Closed feels like it's been pulled straight out of the still-beating heart of its creators, and it deftly debates big, existential questions about what it means to love others and oneself, as well as how love changes a person, and the effect that has on everyone around you. Not in a sweet, warm, saccharine kind of way. But with a bruised, visceral and lived in experience, and whose celestial framing only serves to heighten the life-changing stakes of its subject matter. Ultimately, you decide whether that transformation is one that's worth pursuing for all of these characters, even if it means breaking up and putting them through their own kind of personal hellfire.
All in all, Sorry We're Closed simply isn't afraid to make big demands of its audience, either thematically or mechanically, and I absolutely applaud it for that. Sure, there will be times when you wish this or that were just a tiny bit smoother, or a teensy bit less persnickety. The fact you can never really tell when you're taking damage from an enemy outside your immediate sight line remains a bit of a problem. But those points of resistance nearly always fell on the right side of good for me, giving this not-at-all-scary survival horror RPG the kind of bite and personality that lets it stick in the memory long after you've hit the end credits. There is nothing else quite like Sorry We're Closed, and I implore you to set a date with it as soon as possible. It's one hell of a ride.
A copy of Sorry We're Closed was provided for review by publisher Akupara Games.