New Horror JRPG on Steam Channels Doki Doki Literature Club Tension in a Game Where Choices Are Life or Death

Doki Doki Literature Club redefined what a “cute” visual RPG could be by weaponizing player attachment, and while Unfriendly Friend seems to be doing something similar, it certainly seems a bit more earnest in its intentions. The upcoming horror RPG adventure on Steam from solo developer/self-publisher betetiro is targeting a Q2 2026 release, and the available demo is a breath of fresh air in terms of polish. Polish visually, sure, but just as much for what Unfriendly Friend is mechanically, a choice-driven horror RPG where the decisions you make put real characters at risk; the limited demo already shows that tension is baked in from the very first scenes.

From YOUR decisions, many people could get hurt. Can you save your friends or at least save yourself from the horror that awaits?

Unfriendly Friend’s features at a glance:

Branching, consequential choices
Atmospheric environmental horror
Puzzle-solving woven into exploration
Inventory and item management
Environmental storytelling via journals, characters, and puzzles

Unfriendly Friend Builds Its Horror Through Characters You Care About

The DDLC (Doki Doki Literature Club) comparison is apt because, beyond its unique meta-gameplay, its broader genius was rooting horror in real emotional investment before pulling the rug. If Unfriendly Friend‘s demo is anything to go by, it’ll follow this same structure. The difference in this blend of JRPG, visual novel, and horror game, is the severity of the rug-pulling, as with Unfriendly Friend, expectations are a bit clearer from the jump.

Dakota’s home life with her (implied to be) widowed mother is bleak, and the dusty bottles, the packed-up boxes, and generally beautiful black-and-white hand-drawn visual style suggest as much in their own mournful way. Dakota has friends: Rina, Freddie, Jeff, and Luke, but depending on the choices made, it’s clear that a history exists, one that’s left the group uptight, bickering, but specifically inclined to these traits. A boy, Jeff, clearly shares an even deeper tension with Dakota that shifts the gameplay drastically depending on player choices.

Where Unfriendly Friend Takes a Turn

Image via betetiro

The inciting hook of the demo arrives with Dakota’s school day: rumors of a missing junior, an impromptu trip to the abandoned St. Mercy Hospital, and the long walk there through the rain. The horror of this new indie horror game has yet to show its face, but dread is already present in the demo spades. It’ll be a lean title, as the demo states that it’s about ~15% of the full game and ends before the hospital, but the full weight of this dread speaks to what is still ahead, and the groundwork is clearly laid to ensure whatever comes next lands hard.

Unfriendly Friend’s Demo Proves Dakota’s Choices Actually Matter

The idea that choices matter in a title is an often overused promise, but two radically different playthroughs of the demo were enough to prove that what Dakota says and does yield genuinely different character dynamics and outcomes. How players interact with the world is altered considerably by what Dakota says to those who inhabit it, and the gameplay variety beyond the walking and talking is diverse. In the demo alone, there’s a drawing section, a series of riddles, an item-based puzzle, and a clue-based puzzle.

The gameplay is meaningfully diverse enough to keep the pacing interesting, but the quality of these individual systems is what pushes the demo ahead of other JRPGs in the horror genre. The mechanical polish of each of these systems was flawless, but the depth is what quality means in this case. A great example is a combination lock puzzle toward the end of the demo that provides background on the world of Unfriendly Friend and changes information from the very first scene of the demo.

The less narratively impactful moments of interactivity, like the drawing bit, or the Walkman music selector in the first area, aren’t mundane either — they deepen immersion rather than pad runtime. It’s not unlike how DDLC utilizes its poem-writing mechanic to meaningfully connect the player to the world of the game. The full game also promises an expanded inventory system and more interactive elements beyond the demo.

Mysteries in the Making

The game’s music selector is particularly interesting, too, as it speaks to meaningful worldbuilding in one way, and raises questions just as well. The Walkman sits among other objects on Dakota’s desk, and while one would expect a series of dour options in the playlist, the tonal contrast of the seven different song options swings for the fences. There’s a creepy music box rendition of Clair de Lune right alongside cheerful big band tracks like Cup of Champagne, or Kukuruz, and it’s a compelling choice — one that feels like it’ll pay off in some way down the road.

The Visual Style Is Doing a Lot of Heavy Lifting

Beyond narrative and gameplay, Unfriendly Friend‘s black paper/white pencil, hand-drawn art style is striking, distinctive, and tonally perfect for the subject matter. Despite a general lack of color, there are shadowy blues and warm yellows occasionally, but the shadowing and pencilwork make the world visually rich and worth exploring just to look around on its own. There seems to be an intentional contrast between the cozy/mundane (Walkman, home life) and the encroaching dread, which is amplified by the monochromatic aesthetic.

Based on the title, another color seems to lie ahead as well: red. It’s easy to see why crimson would come into play in other Indie horror games like Unfriendly Friend, but just how it’s implemented here seems a bit more opaque. The demo makes it clear that whatever happens next, blood or not, it’s up to the player’s decisions.

The Best of Unfriendly Friend Lies Ahead

Unfriendly Friend has a demo available on Steam now, but it seems like the best is yet to come, when it arrives sometime in Q2 2026. The full content advisory is rather immense, signaling the game intends to follow through on its darker promises. If DDLC‘s brand of emotional horror (where one likes the characters before the game starts hurting them) is your thing, Unfriendly Friend certainly looks like it belongs in the same conversation.