A new computer game created by a Memorial University Libraries’ staff member is a whimsical take on packing up a house.

Or is it?

“It’s cute and casual,” said Gord Little, a manager of IT services at the Queen Elizabeth II Library. “And then the walls start moving and stairs appear, and you think you are done but you can’t leave.”

Mr. Little got the idea to create his fourth video game, Moving Houses, last Christmas.

“My wife was playing PowerWash Simulator,” said Mr. Little. “It’s her favourite game. She likes the calm, zen-like quality of the game, there’s no timers, there’s no death. And I was playing the game Alan Wake 2 about a novelist trapped in his own mind.”

Moving Houses takes inspiration from the soothing joys of washing away your worries with a pressure washer and the horror of being stuck in a nightmare of your creation, shaking them together into a cocktail of deception.

“What a person takes away from the game is going to be very individual,” said Mr. Little. “Is the house trapping you or are you trapping yourself?”

Psychological slow-burn

Mr. Little doesn’t set out to overtly trick people playing the game.

There are clues and suggestions along the way that the gamer is privy to that develop a mutual understanding that something bad is going to happen.

“It is very much a slow-burning psychological horror,” said Mr. Little. “There is no monster or beast trying to kill you. The horror is what your mind creates given the absence of actual stimulus. Things start to get weird very slowly.”

He says his video game-creating hobby is a way for him to unwind, likening it to creative puzzle-solving.

“Moving Houses also deals with a lot of traumas and I was working through a lot of things myself as I was creating it.”

The game is dedicated to Mr. Little’s twin brother, John, who died by suicide on Feb. 5, 2023.

“It’s been very healing,” said Mr. Little. “I spent a lot of time pondering life’s traumas, my own traumas and how they can make or break you. And I’m still here! The process of dealing with grief as a subject itself is what really helped.”

While the subject matter of Moving Houses can be dark, Mr. Little said he test-drove the game with his tween-age kids. And while he recommends adult supervision, he got the seal of approval from everyone in his household.

“The kids loved it,” he said. “They got a huge kick out of throwing stuff around the house like little giggling chaos goblins and then they would squeal when things got weird.”

Moving Houses will be released on Oct. 1 on the PC platform Steam, a digital storefront for video games. In 2025 it will be available on Switch, PlayStation and XBox.