Wonky stealth horror game Hello Neighbor is getting a prequel, publisher Tinybuild has announced.
Titled “Hello Neighbor: Hide and Seek”, the game tells the story behind your neighborly nemesis and his family. In particular, it will focus on the neighbor’s two children.
“Hello Neighbor: Hide & Seek follows the tragic story of the Neighbor’s family in this dramatic prequel to Hello Neighbor,” Tinybuild said in their announcement on their website. “Experience playing a game of hide-and-seek with your brother as you both deal with a loss of a family member. The game explains events that lead up to the original Stealth Horror hit Hello Neighbor.”
The announcement also provided of a surprisingly emotional trailer, which implies a gradually deteriorating relationship between the Neighbor and his children, and between the children themselves. Cheerful!
How the prequel will actually play remains unclear. The trailer shows a much broader range of environments, suggesting that it will involve more than simply sneaking around increasingly elaborate versions of the Neighbor’s house. Given the stronger story focus this time around, it's reasonable to anticipate a slightly different take on the first game's blend of stealth and horror.
Despite its intriguing premise, PC Gamer’s Chris Thursten found the original to be a buggy mess, but that hasn’t stopped the game selling half a million copies as of February this year. Hello Neighbor also has a surprisingly active modding scene, currently the 24th most popular game on ModDB (which is impressive given it’s less than a year old).
No release date for Hide and Seek was announced, but you can currently download a free Alpha version of the prequel via the Hello Neighbor website.
