I'll be honest it's ben SO long since we got a new haunted PS1 demo disc but as we all know: Patience is a virtue. So I spent most of my time playing the older demo discs (Except Madvent 4. It wouldn't let me play that one for some reason.) and played some retro horror games while I waited. And when a new demo disc finally dropped I was super excited to play it.
Also be weary of spoilers for the demo. Seriously this demo has plenty of content so if you don't want the demo spoiled I recommend playing it first before you read this.
First impressions and it forces me into a intro cutscene which I cannot skip. (Must be important?) Which is weird because Haunted PS1's Museum and Spectral Mall did not have one aside from a small in-game opening when you boot up Spectral Mall with a fresh save file. But there's one thing this game has something over the others: A fully fledged story!
In the opening you play as a kid and follow after Skully down a pier. It has some nice story bits with the two and then once you get there it transitions into an FMV cutscene under the PS1's capabilities. In it the kid and Skully make it to the party where it houses several characters from past demo discs including Bitey! But not Gifty. I guess she abandoned him after Madvent 4 but I can't say for sure since I couldn't play that one.
They set up a ritual to summon a new demo disc and... One of the steps makes me uncomfortable as they literally plan on having the blood of the child be part of the process. Thankfully they don't follow through with it as the ritual goes through anyway with a younger version of Skully but it still leaves a poor taste in my mouth.
The new kid wreaks havoc which stops when the kid shoots it. But unfortunately he is too slow since Skully was shot and now has to lie down. Probably him dying who knows?
But after that we are brought to the main menu which is pretty clever since it's environment IS the menu with the remote being the options, The painting being the credits, The VHS set letting you re-watch cutscenes and the TV housing the game library. While it is better than how the very first demo disc handled it, I still think it is beat by the museum from the 2021 demo disc and spectral mall. (Most of the Madvents are excluded since it wouldn't be fair to include them.)
But as it implies the gimmick is it's flip capability with one side housing the horror games and the other housing the... dream games? I know you wanted something fresh but this is Haunted PS1! If you want to have something other than horror for a PS1 jam have it be it's own line-up of demos called Dreamy PS1 or something! Don't just shove them into a Haunted PS1 Demo Disc! But regardless it's a cool idea to have half of the games separated and you even get an animation for clicking on the PS1. That being said I am going to start with the horror games since that's the main appeal of Haunted PS1.
The Haunted side of games are surprisingly good with only 2 games I couldn't play due to Norton being a jerk and 1 that was out of place feeling more at home on the NES than a PS1. The horror was also balanced really well with it having enough horror so I don't fall asleep to it from boredom but also not going overboard so sleeping is not an issue at night. Though I think Juice took it a bit too far. As it made me feel uncomfortable. But not in a scary way but in a way which had me saying "What the actual hell is wrong with you?!"
One nice thing is that it lets you toggle if the game is cleared or not so even if you can't play the game you can still make progress. Would have ben handy for the chained demos but hey I'm still happy that even if you can't play all the demos you can still make progress.
The menu for horror is honestly a step up from the 2020 demo disc as it feels more like a horror menu. It shows 3D blood particles which re-present the games though they don't have PS1 styled covers anymore which kind of sucks but they do have an eye showing the demo in action before you trigger the sub-menu. Though the jazz music just doesn't cut it for me. Feels less fitting than the 2020 demo disc honestly.
SPOILER WARNING!!!
After beating some of the horror demos a mid-game cutscene plays where the kid gets a Metal Gear styled call from someone who sounds like Solid Snake. As it turns out he's ben mutated into the area and the PS1 horror mascot Haunty is the only way to revert it. It succeeds and after he's freed he tells the kid to keep playing the demos in hopes of freeing everyone. The kid follows suit and it's back to the main menu.
After all of the horror demos have ben beaten the PS1 glows again and the kid reverts another demon back to normal in the frozen kitchen (You think Bitey would have ben there instead of it but whatever) and he's reverted back to normal. After that it's back to more demos!
SPOILERS STOP FOR NOW
The dream side is where everything takes a turn into the "What?" valley. While it is nice that Skully's youger self is getting some recognition, it's still odd that games about dreams are in a haunted PS1 collection.
The menu itself feels wrong because of the balloon showing you the demos which has no logic whatsoever over a cityscape with trains representing the games with a relaxing OST. If anyone wanted to know what the horror was about, I'd start with the horror side of the disc first.
The games themselves are good to mediocre with the same amount I couldn't play as the horror side but they feel out-of-place in a demo like this. It feels like there are actual horror games mired in the dreams that shouldn't be here. Though during the dream portion the demo disc crashed on me when I tried to load a game I couldn't play. Never with the horror-side.
SPOILER WARNING!!!
After 3 demos on the dream side it's time to revert the demonic chicken back to the cool chicken that was in the intro who is chasing some dude. It feels like part of the dream side we don't even get to play and once he's saved and the chicken is normal it's off to more demos.
After 9 demos in the dream side Bitey and Soyna are next in the only unique cutscene in the game and also the most out-of-place because it feels more like a NES RPG game. Bitey actually wears something unique this time which carries over into her normal form while Soyna is reverted from her monster form and then it's off to the last 3 demos.
MAJOR SPOILER WARNING!!!
After finishing all the demos in both sides the younger skully returns to heal the real Skully back to full and after apologizing to the younger skully, he waves farwell and returns to the 2021 demo disc game he came from which confuses everyone. And all of that for a bonus game that's just a walking simulator. Not. Worth. It.
Honestly I think this demo disc is sandwitched between the 2021 museum demo disc and the Spectral Mall demo disc. It can't top Spectral because it had that fully explorable attribute to it while this demo doesn't.