When the Darkness comes

Indie· Psychological Horror· Free to Play· Walking Simulator

Released Mar 2019

When the Darkness comes is a walking simulator whose glitchy and dark tale tries to illustrate the hardships of depression and anxiety through a variety of imaginary digital landscapes.

92% positive · 8,425 reviews

Done

All announced content has been released

High confidence

Done

All announced content has been released

High confidence

Where to get it

Free on Steam

Steam Free

Evaluation

When the Darkness comes is a free walking simulator released on Steam on March 1, 2019 by solo developer Sirhaian. The game was explicitly created as a personal creative outlet — a self-contained artistic experience exploring themes of depression and anxiety. The store description includes a direct statement from the developer: "I won't be updating it anymore (safe for major bugs) since it was simply an outlet for my own creativity." This makes the game's completion status unambiguous. Following launch, the developer released a handful of small patches in early March 2019 (addressing bug fixes and minor quality-of-life improvements), with the last update on March 5, 2019. The final developer communication was a November 26, 2019 post nominating the game for a Steam Award. There are no DLC listings, no roadmap, no announced future content, and no ongoing update cadence. The game shipped as a finished, self-contained work and has remained so.

Evidence

Game launched on Steam as a free experience on March 1, 2019, following roughly one year of development.

news post · Mar 1, 2019 source content shipped

high

Developer explicitly states in the store description: 'I won't be updating it anymore (safe for major bugs) since it was simply an outlet for my own creativity.' This is a direct declaration that the game's content is complete.

description source development ending

high

Media

Details

Developer

Sirhaian

Publisher

Sirhaian

Achievements

Platform

Windows

Controller

—

Steam Deck

Playable

Players

Single-player

Psychological Horror Free to Play Walking Simulator Indie First-Person Horror Dynamic Narration Adventure Atmospheric Dark Story Rich Psychological Emotional Choices Matter Puzzle

About this game

A Game Without Meaning.
A Game Nobody Should Play.

When the Darkness comes is a walking simulator whose glitchy and dark tale tries to illustrate the hardships of depression and anxiety through a variety of imaginary digital landscapes.

A clock, a piano and a girl. What do they all mean?
What is meaning, anyway? What has meaning?
Do you have one? A path, a goal, something determined, pre-determined?
A light to follow?

Discover a world filled with loneliness and fear. A world where despair breathes and hope dies. A world about you, about us. A world about humanity and about life.

Before Starting

This Experience is NOT for everyone.
This Experience explores themes such as depression, anxiety, verbal abuse, manipulative control, and suicide.
This game could also potentially trigger epilepsy attacks.
Seriously, do NOT play this Experience if you believe this might affect you in any way.

The first Arc should take about one hour to complete.

About the Experience

This was the culmination of a self exploration into my own psyche. If it can help anyone else explore their own I am thankful for that, and if the game isn't to your liking I appreciate you taking the time to try it anyway. I won't be updating it anymore (safe for major bugs) since it was simply an outlet for my own creativity but enjoy it as it is.

Controls

Movement: WASD or arrow keys
Interact: F
Jump: Space
Sprint: Shift

There's a toggle to swap between AZERTY and QWERTY layouts in-game.

This Experience might not be suitable for streaming audiences.