
The free-to-play first episode of a horror-mystery game with dark humor and hand-drawn art by Black Tabby Games. Note — we are retiring this store page. While the build here is still up-to-date, please download the DEMO from the main Scarlet Hollow store page. Thank you and have fun!
Modeled estimate, not a reported figure. How we estimate →
Media

About
Note — we are retiring this store page. While the build of Episode 1 here will be kept up-to-date with the current state of the game, please download the DEMO from the main Scarlet Hollow store page. Thank you and have fun!
This page is a free demo for Scarlet Hollow that contains the entire first episode. If you'd like to purchase the rest of the game, we're releasing it episodically on our Early Access page. Episode 4 is out now on that page, and we'll update that build with future episodes as they release. All of your Episode 1 saves should automatically transfer to the full game as well.
Trapped in the dying Appalachian mining town of Scarlet Hollow for the funeral of your estranged aunt, you quickly find yourself at the center of a dark mystery that threatens your life.
From award-winning graphic novelist Abby Howard, Scarlet Hollow is a horror visual novel and adventure game where your choices deeply matter. Hand-drawn backgrounds and sprites work together with a complex relationship system to bring to life an immersive world of charming (and terrifying) characters. Who lives, who dies, and the fate of an entire town rests on your shoulders.
Features
A heavily branching narrative where your choices matter. The relationships you forge and the decisions you make will dramatically alter your journey.
Good jokes and good spooks.
A complex relationship system that changes how characters act around you. Characters don't just like or dislike you. Become friendly rivals, bitter adversaries, best friends, or mild acquaintances based on how you approach the story.
Trait-based dialogue and role-playing. Scarlet Hollow's dialogue system is driven by role-playing elements that let you choose who you want to be. Are you quiet and observant? Hot and clueless? Over a dozen different character builds change how you interact with the world and how your story unfolds.
Original monster designs. Every monster and supernatural being in the game is an original Abby Howard design-- you won't find any predictable vampires or zombies here.
Five romance options. Whether you're into goths, dads, plant-lovers, Youtubers, or skeletal boys, we've got all your bases covered.
Dozens of meticulously hand-drawn and traditionally inked backgrounds. Every background in the game is meticulously drawn by hand and inked on massive 19x24 inch paper.
Hundreds of hand-drawn, immersive sprites. Each major character has dozens of hand-drawn sprites that interact with backgrounds and capture a full range of lighting and emotion.
Stats
Languages: English
Engagement
Reviews
This game is the definition of lame
good
Scarlet Hollow — Episode 1 is not a game, it's not even an e-book, it's an advertisement for an e-book that's been dumped on Steam masquerading as a game. As an advertisement for a visual/interactive novel, this doesn't feature any notable gameplay, it's just a lot of clicking through badly written dialogue that would never have been accepted or published in print, which poses the question, "How did something this badly written end up on Steam?". When someone hoping to become an author has written something so bad it would never be published in print, they spend $100 and dump their high school fan-fiction onto Steam, under the guise of a game. This is a mildly horror themed Choose Your Own Adventure where the choices barely matter, the artwork is mediocre and the writing is worse. But this isn't even the E-book, it's just an advertisement/the first chapter. The "author" of this junk wants TWENTY UNITED STATES DOLLARS for the rest of the e-book... forget that. What a joke! Visual novels/e-books are tedious at best... imagine the best novel you ever read, be that Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy or 2001: A Space Odyssey or Twilight (if you have terrible taste in literature), but then translate that to a format where the words dribble out and you have to click your mouse every time you wanted to read the next sentence, instead of just turning the pages. You'd think it was garbage. Now imagine that experience, but with much worse writing (because if these guys could write professionally, they'd be published authors and this would be on shelves in bookstores, and they wouldn't have to pay Valve $100 to self-publish this on Steam), and you have your average Steam e-book. One of the chief problems with failed authors polluting Steam with non-game E-books is that E-books can easily just be presented in a web browser... there's no justification for charging money on Steam for what might as well be a webpage. We don't spend thousands on buying a gaming rig to spend money on Steam for something Chrome or Firefox could do. While this E-book is "free", you can get better quality, professionally written books and comics for free online (from places like Project Gutenberg) or from public libraries. Steam isn't a comic book store, neither is it Netflix, it's for games. Your gaming rig is not a Kindle. And if you like advertisements for books, Amazon has plenty of ads. If you prefer more general kind of advertising, turn off your ad blocker or just jump on Youtube, where you can see literally thousands of advertisements without needing to add them to your Steam library and download them. I can't recommend books or advertisements for books to PC gamers.
Related
Related
Trends
Modeled estimate over time.
Hours played at review time, across 40 reviews with recorded playtime.
Really enjoying this. So much variance in both the text and art. Looking forward to picking up the full game!
Good game
10/10 will play this on a plane to get on international tabloids. I think one of the secret achievements is bugged, though
This was so good! Can't wait to play the rest
Кожна гра від цієї студії - шедевр. Окремий плюс за музику.
S vizuálními novelami nemám moc zkušeností. Nikdy mě to nelákalo sledovat ani poslouchat. Většina, které jsem náhodou zahlídl, byly japonské a o vztazích na střední škole. Pak mi ale Steam náhodou nabídl Scarlet Hollow a já zjistil, že jsem zanedbával celé zajimavé herní odvětví. Protože tohle přesně tato hra je, zajímavá :) Jde o mírně hororový příběh z malého městečka v americe. Na rozdíl od těch japonských novel je tady překvapivě hodně možností rozhodování, zkoumání vedlejších větví dialogů a dokonce vedlejších větví příběhu. Hra má první kapitolu na vyzkoušení zdarma a pak další tři už za běžnou cenu. Hrál jsem jen tu první kapitolu a musím přiznat, že mě to bavilo. Dokonce tolik, že jsem ji natočil na youtube, kdybyste se chtěli podívat a rozhodnout, jestli to za to stojí :) https://youtu.be/EFc6XDXvIts?si=eMpdLC_S1V0UD9Ut
it took me an hour to speed-buy the full game lmao
Momentum
Pace estimated from the game's recent review growth (our daily snapshots) at its own sales-per-review ratio — a momentum signal, not booked sales.
Audience
Estimated from the language of this game's reviews — a proxy for where players are, not official Steam demographics.