The House Before, an upcoming body horror game from Gabriel Helfenstein and the art collective Fantasia Malware, casts players as a house with its own internal landscape to explore. The game merges elements of visual novels and text adventures with a variety of minigames, offering a journey through the player's own "architectural guts."

The premise centers on an existential transformation, evoking Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis" with a twist: "You wake up as a House. Your limbs stretch through endless rooms filled with grotesque creatures. You can never see outside of yourself, never feel the world that lies beyond the fleshy walls of your body." Players must manage their "insides" while questioning their own nature, wondering if they are a "good house or just a pale afterthought of the House Before?"

The gameplay appears to span multiple genres, including first-person maze exploration, virtual pet simulation, and top-down tile-based movement. The interface design is noted for its bespoke, retro-inspired aesthetic, reminiscent of 1990s game installers and virtual desktop music players. While the opening description suggests a claustrophobic experience of being trapped within one's own form, the game also incorporates colorful and garrulous creatures. Its aesthetic has been described as vaporwave-adjacent, with shimmering pinks and purples, alongside oozy textures that evoke Nickelodeon. The developers aim for "ghastly and inventive composites."

The House Before is slated for release in November on Steam and Itch.io. A press release suggests the game will appeal to fans of short stories like Thomas Ligotti's "The Red Tower" and games such as "Growing My Grandpa!" by Yames, citing their surreal and unsettling themes. Ligotti's "The Red Tower" deals with shared, degenerate interpretations of a mysterious structure, while "Growing My Grandpa!" involves nurturing a grandfather through feeding him unconventional items. The developers acknowledge that The House Before "won't be for everyone," despite its intended short playtime of a few hours.

Gabriel Helfenstein's previous work includes the 2016 game North.