PARASiTE FLOWER

Title: PARASiTE FLOWER
Publisher: Catowo
Developer: Catowo
Release Date: March 23, 2024
Genres: Horror, Indie, Visual Novel, Walking Sim
Platform: Microsoft Windows, Steam
Where to Buy: Steam, itch.io
Rating:

A short disturbing horror game where you're playing as Ari Yeong, she is re-living the same day over and over again . With each loop the world around her get's darker and more dangerous.

Get her to school safely.

WARNING
This game can be highly triggering ( especially for women ) and it does include sensitive subjects such as s*icide, SA and gore.

Review

PARASiTE FLOWER is a short but disturbing game about a troubled girl, Ari, heading to school each day. The beautiful hand drawn animations, music, and sound effects work together wonderfully to create a tense atmosphere. There is no UI or indicators to tell you what you can and can’t interact with, which add to the immersion with the game, even if some things can be missed. Even from the start before anything had even happened, I felt dread during my first walk.

There isn’t a lot to interact with and you are presented with a few binary choices which can lead to a bad ending, similar to a choose your own adventure. Most of the bad choices are fairly obvious and the minimal dialogue is simplistic. There are a few jump scares and gruesome bits there for shock value, but overall I felt the game lacked depth.

The one thing the game does well is capturing the anxiety of being a vulnerable young girl. The game is filled with potent symbolism about depression and the silencing of victims; eyes that watch Ari as she passes, days that seem to repeat, and changes to her appearance each day you look in the mirror. The game is set in 2004, a time before everyone had a smart phone in their pockets and teenagers were less supervised.

I was able to relate to my own experiences having grown up during this same era. I can’t count the number of times I was stared at, followed, offered rides, encountered groomers or was told how “mature” I was from the age of 12 onwards. When I reached my 20s these interactions began to decrease, a terrifying realization I had when I came of age. It’s dangerous out there for children and teens, especially girls, and because of my experiences it’s caused me to become an anxious and protective parent. I respect what the developer was able to accomplish here.

Unfortunately the game is borderline unplayable. There is a bug when entering the train where the scene is frozen. The only solution is to reload the save, and at times the save file may be toast. I didn’t know beforehand and was frustrated when I ran into the bug immediately, and then again later on subsequent train rides. The only way to get through the entire game was to create multiple saves at the two checkpoints: the bed at the start of the day and again right before the train arrives. For a game that only takes around 30 minutes to play this makes the experience more troublesome than it should be.