The Italian horror game Anna is coming to Steam this September, and will be available to download for PC and Mac. Developer Dreampainters originally released Anna earlier this summer, and now German publisher Kalypso Media will be distributing the game onto Steam for $10, a few cents higher than its original price tag.
The game is set in an old sawmill based between Champoluc and Periasc, a place actually existing in the Val D'Ayas in Valle d'Aosta, Italy, Anna has players solve puzzles and 'face' the presences who inhabit the buildings. The main character has come back to the sawmill in the valley to discover the meaning of some nightmares. He doesn't know what he will find, but the weight of his past is stronger than any reason. He must enter the sawmill and resolve puzzles to finally meet his destiny.
Depending on the mental health of the character, the locations will change and reveal different secrets, which will lead to one of the three possible endings.
The game is said to be based on legends from the Val D'Ayas area, which seem rather numerous, and involve everything from ghosts, witches, the devil, and someone who managed to choke out a friggin' bear. Though little is known about Anna's story, only legend I've found that seems like it could have served as inspiration would be that of the Arlaz Windmill.
On the Arlaz "ru", in a place thought to be enchanted, there was a windmill. The last miller was a solitary and quiet man. Thanks to his rough manners he gave himself a bad reputation and strange rumors about him started to circulate. For this reason people stopped bringing him grain to grind and nobody dared go near the windmill after sunset. One day in autumn, some workers returning from Émarèse noticed a man, strangled to death, with his neck tied between two pegs of the fence surrounding the windmill. The space between one peg and the other was very slender and they couldn't understand how the man's head could've passed through. Rumors immediately started that the miller did it. From that moment on the bad reputation of the place increased. Still today it is said that the miller's soul wanders about without peace.
Seems plausible for inspiration, right? Anywho, Anna features:
- Evocative setting: a faithful reconstruction of an old sawmill actually existing in Valle d'Aosta, Italy
- 3D real time graphics with dynamic light effects
- 3 different endings based on the mental health of the main character
- Soundtrack composed by the italian gothic/progressive band Chantry
