Game intel
Dreamed Away
A walking simulator in which you control a mentally ill hero. You must escape the "something'' you encounter and return to the original world as you know it. E…
Dreamed Away grabbed my attention because it doesn’t just chase “EarthBound but darker” vibes-it actually backs them up with a combat pitch that could work. It’s a pixel art action-adventure RPG set in 90s France, built by solo dev Nicolas Petton and published by Pineapple Works, landing October 23, 2025 on PC, Xbox One/Series X|S, and both Nintendo Switch and the upcoming Switch 2. A free demo is out now, and if you’ve bounced off indie horror for being all mood, no mechanics, this one might change your mind.
On paper, Dreamed Away is classic indie bait: an intimate, personal story about Théo, a boy who wakes to an empty house and a France that’s turned slightly wrong—familiar streets kink into ghost-filled catacombs, and warm memories curdle into something colder. It’s pitched as an action-adventure RPG with psychological horror, but the headline feature is its “fast-paced” combat built from mini-games: bullet patterns to dodge, quick-time prompts to hit, and weirdly delightful ideas like “slapping ghosts away” instead of swinging swords. The soundtrack’s by Petton, too, which tells you how hands-on this project is.
Release is locked for October 23, 2025 across PC (Steam/GOG), Xbox One and Series, and both Nintendo Switch and the next-gen Switch successor. The demo out right now runs about an hour and has seen multiple updates—good sign that the team’s iterating rather than treating it as a throwaway marketing beat.
Plenty of games chase “retro melancholy,” but Dreamed Away’s angle is cleaner: a grounded European setting and a combat model that, yes, nods to Undertale’s bullet-dodge duels but pushes toward speed and rhythm. That’s crucial. Too many narrative indies silo the good stuff behind repetitive, low-stakes battles. If Petton’s mini-games keep evolving—with new patterns, cadence shifts, and enemy quirks—combat becomes a narrative instrument, not just padding between cutscenes.
The other hook is the 90s France backdrop. We’ve seen American suburbia (Omori) and dreamscapes (Yume Nikki), but small-town France has its own texture: rain-slick cobblestones, neon pharmacy crosses, soot-stained cathedrals. If the art leans into that everyday specificity before corrupting it, the horror lands harder. Nostalgia only works when it feels lived-in.
Mixing turn-based structure with bullet dodging and QTEs can sing—or collapse—depending on three things: input timing, readability, and escalation. The demo suggests patterns are snappy and readable (think small arena dodges rather than screen-filling chaos), with timing windows that punish panic but reward rhythm. That’s promising. The “slap” idea is smart too—it’s playful, disarming, and suits a kid protagonist better than a pocket broadsword.
Where I’m cautious: QTE fatigue and difficulty spikes. If every encounter leans on the same timing prompts, players will burn out. The best implementations use QTEs sparingly as punctuation, not the whole sentence. Difficulty settings and accessibility options are the safety net here—slower QTE timing, colorblind-friendly patterns, rumble cues, and the ability to retry specific phases would keep the door open to more players without flattening the challenge curve.
Controller feel matters too. On PC, latency is rarely the villain. On older consoles (Switch 1, Xbox One), sloppy frame pacing or mushy input can turn a clean design into a frustration machine. If Pineapple Works’ porting chops hold up and the game targets a locked 60 on modern systems—30 on Switch 1 is survivable if timings are adjusted—then the design should survive the trip.
Psychological horror with a child lead walks a thin line. It can elevate the stakes—or veer into trauma tourism. The demo frames scares through mood and uncertainty rather than gore, which fits the pixel aesthetic and keeps the focus on Théo’s perspective. The promise of personal storytelling from Petton is a double-edged sword: authenticity helps, but it also raises expectations for payoff. If the mystery of Théo’s sister Louise resolves with emotional clarity (not just a twist), Dreamed Away could punch above its weight alongside Omori and Lisa in the “indie RPGs that linger” category.
Cross-gen coverage is great, but here’s what matters for players:
Price and post-launch plans haven’t been detailed yet. Given the scope, I’m expecting a focused, single-playthrough story rather than a live-service treadmill. That’s a feature, not a bug.
Dreamed Away has that rare “small but sharp” energy. If the team nails encounter variety and keeps the horror human, this could be one of those word-of-mouth indies that quietly takes over your group chat in October. If they miss on tuning—too many QTEs, uneven difficulty, or performance hiccups on older hardware—it risks being a beautiful mood piece people bounce off. The good news: you don’t have to guess. The demo’s right there, and it already shows a confident hand.
Dreamed Away blends Undertale-style dodge duels with a grounded 90s France horror story, aiming for punchy, readable combat instead of filler. The October 23 launch across PC, Xbox, and Switch (including Switch 2) looks solid—just watch difficulty tuning and performance on older consoles, and try the demo to see if the feel clicks for you.
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