Fran Bow by Killmonday Games is a dark point-and-click adventure which follows a young orphan girl. Fran is on a mission to find her black cat, Mr. Midnight, in hopes that the two friends can find out what really happened to Fran’s parents. Players need to solve puzzles, pick up anything not nailed down, and play arcade inspired mini-games to help Fran and Mr. Midnight find their way home.

The main element which sets Fran Bow apart from the traditional point-and-click is Fran’s Duotine medication. Taking these red pills causes Fran to have ghastly hallucinations reminiscent of the Silent Hill and Resident Evil franchises. While hallucinating, Fran can find key items and important pieces of information which can be used in the real world to move forwards in the game. For example, after popping a pill a bed in the orphanage where Fran resides can become a stairwell to another room, as seen above. Taking another pill will end the hallucinations and return the bed to its normal state.

After Fran is reunited with her dear kitty, Mr. Midnight can provide small hints when the player is feeling stuck. The tips are fairly vague, but they can sometimes be quite useful for being pointed in the right direction. This is very important because many of the solutions to the game’s puzzles are not always straight-forward due to dark hallucinations playing a big part in the game. It is highly recommended that players speak to every character and try different branches of conversation as well. Therefore, players who read and click everything and everyone will eventually persevere if they get stuck.

The most common negative comment about the game is that it doesn’t have a completely persistent horror theme. Therefore, some players will find Chapter 3 of the game to be completely detached from the rest due to its almost fairy-tale atmosphere. It can feel as though you’re suddenly playing a completely different adventure game until the horrors finally return to haunt poor Fran. A break from horror and gory can be good, but this pause may be a bit too long for fans of the horror genre. Thankfully, after pushing through the Vegetative State chapter players are rewarded with the return of the game’s main themes.

The hallucinated versions of locations in the game can often be quite gory, so if you do not enjoy gore this is definitely not a game you should play. If you’re looking for a more bloody and grotesque game for your Halloween game night however, this is a perfect choice. The game takes about eight to nine hours to complete, so it may take more than a single sitting to complete, unlike Mad Father. So while the game cannot necessarily be played in a single night, do be sure to queue up Fran Bow if you’re planning out an entire Halloween-themed gaming weekend.