Seduce serial killers on the dark web in dating sim Killer Chat, which is free on Steam

If you’ve been struggling lately with the thought that everybody you interact with online is a closet serial killer, why not fire up Killer Chat, which will remove all uncertainty from your brain and flood it with delicious, sexy fear. Hitherto available on Itch.io, and just released on Steam, it casts you as a reporter researching a book on serial killers.

If it were me, I’d be watching Manhunter, but no, this reporter is the kind of snoop who accidentally joins a chatroom on the darkweb while googling “how to make ribcages decompose fast”, and immediately gets cosy with users called “goreboy”. You’ve got to pass yourself off as an embryonic Hannibal Lecter, as much for the sake of survival as to gather info for your book. And while you’re getting to know this crowd, you might as well fuck a few of them. Yeah, that should pan out well. Here’s a trailer.

Over the course of six in-game months, you’ll rub shoulders with various extremely pretty anime murderers, catching up with them over text or videocall in a dating sim format. There are eight endings that presumably range from your character waking up dead through you calling the police to you becoming a killer yourself. Each route to the finish should take 2-3 hours. All told, you can expect 9-12 hours of slayer-slaying if you’re committed to the cause.

All this need cost you nothing, save the possibility of some worrying revelations about your own kinks. The base “Original” Steam edition of the game is free, having previously been crowd-funded. There are also various DLC packs and a forthcoming expanded edition that will offer at least double the words, with over 20 possible endings. I am picturing those words scribbled all over the walls of a dingy apartment full of pickle jars. “Just his mind poured on paper,” breathes an anime version of Morgan Freeman, before blowing you a kiss.