How did I come to play that game? Well, thanks YouTube and Max Horror that did a gameplay video of Dead of Winter. I wanted to experience it myself and then found another video of CJU Games playing Under the Stairs. So I was more motivated to play it. And I was delighted to see Slay Bells that I've played it without having any preview of it.

The story puts you in the shoes of Henry Crane, a Copperport constable sent to check on Peter Renton, as he didn't give any sign of life since a few days...

I really liked the ambiance and the story itself. I'm not really into horror games per se but I like an horror game making sense and with a huge emphasis on the psychological side. Under the Stairs is not a pyschological horror game BUT you must admit that it's quite leaning towards it as you're not being hunted by a ghost or a by an Egyptian spirit, you're not surrounded by enemies and it's not like you're waking up in a strange place and must escape. It's just a story like it can happen every day of a police officer checking on someone that wasn't seen for some days, in a normal house, in a nice neighbourhood. And while the game isn't scary at all (I mean that jumpscares are a rarity), you're still feeling like the other shoe will drop. 

What can also contribute to that is that the game is without any color: it's black and white, well, more grey. 

One thing also I appreciated is that you can switch from third to first person view though that I felt like the third person view is your intended view, so I've stayed in it.

Another thing that I liked is that the casefile is numeroted (I think 849 or 847?), which means that there are a large potential to find out about more cases set in the past, as the game is set in 2019.

I will point two things (one bothering and the other not).

First, the not-bothering is that you can find some spelling mistakes (not so much). Being myself not an English native speaker, I find some of them hilarious, like 'locatated'. It doesn't really break the story, everything is understandable. If you see a review telling you that the English is bad, it's not true at all. I could quite understand everything. It is always better than playing a badly translated game, I can assure you.

The most bothering is the fact that I was victim of a bug (and I don't know how it happened). I never found the letter opener that would allow me to continue. I knew it was on a desk but it never appeared. I've checked my inventory, it wasn't there. I had to restart the game from the beginning to secure it. Thanksfully, it was the beginning of the game, not the end.

Under the Stairs is really an enjoyable short game, between "horror" and mystery. The kind of game that I love write a walkthrough for (I'm in process to do it for my favorite website). And I'm glad to have chosen to pay for it instead of getting it for free. I can't wait for another casefile and search for evidence.

4/5 but really it's a 4.5/5. I just wish we could give half-stars.