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The weird folk horror of MundaunThe devil is in the details
The devil is in the details
Many horror games either try to establish a sense of mundane familiarity in a recognisable, contemporary world before shattering that familiarity, or else rely on the dusty, done-to-death setting of haunted manors. In most cases, neither approach does much to surprise. Horror often relies on the grotesque, but Mundaun’s weirdness is different. It is an earthy kind of weirdness, a strangeness with roots so deep that it might be confused with familiarity. It’s a horror that smells not of blood, but of hay and dung, snow and soot.
Mundaun | Announcement Trailer | MWM Interactive | Hidden Fields | Available Spring 2021Watch on YouTube
Mundaun | Announcement Trailer | MWM Interactive | Hidden Fields | Available Spring 2021
It’s folk horror that embraces traditional aesthetics and themes that modern games often reject wholesale: the loneliness of alpine landscapes, the centrality of a rural and simple kind of Christianity stripped of all theological intricacies, as well as old folk tales, beliefs and customs.
It’s the basic blueprint for many folk tales. You apparently can get a lot of things done with a little help from your infernal friend. In Mundaun, the devil buries advancing enemy soldiers under an avalanche. According to the legends surrounding the Teufelsbrücke or devil’s bridge of the Schöllenen Gorge, he built a daring bridge after all human efforts proved in vain. And in the classic horror novella Die Schwarze Spinne - The Black Spider - he comes to the rescue of the serfs of a small village subjected to the harsh whims and demands of their lord, using his dark magic to perform the backbreaking labour that would have left the fields untended and thus have led to the starvation of the whole community.
There’s much more to it, but you can already see the echoes. Mundaun may not have demon spiders, but it shares a preoccupation with many of the traits of folk stories, like its Christian rural setting, the concerns of common people and a deal with the devil, a love for weird and grotesque imagery, as well as an interest in the consequences of past sins for future generations.
