Eyes Never Wake: the indie horror game where you have to hide under your actual desk

There are several ways a horror game can put you in a constant state of peril. Some developers employ clever tactics that break the fourth wall, such as listening to your microphone, and the upcoming Eyes Never Wake definitely falls under that category.

Developed by Allan Hedlund, this is an indie horror title that – as the description on Steam says – blurs the “line between game and reality.” Essentially, Eyes Never Awake gets its kicks by allowing a pursuing monster to actually see you through your webcam, as seen in the footage below.

In the teaser, we see the player (presumably the developer), actually ducking behind their desk as some sort of monstrosity seeks them out. We also see how the game scans your face through your camera. Hedlund describes the project as a “strange game” that’s “not meant to be played.”

What else will it see you doing via your webcam, I wonder…

For those who have concerns about privacy – given that the crux of the gameplay is in having access to your webcam – Hedlund tries to alleviate worries about intrusiveness. In a response to someone on X, they write the following:

…just know that the game simply uses OpenCV and OpenCV for Unity for face recognition which uses pre-trained models. Everything runs locally – nothing gets sent to any server or anything like that. And you can always turn the mechanic off at any time.

Additionally, in order to dissuade people from cheating by simply holding something up to the camera, the game will also check for “large uniform objects and other things.” But, then again, if you’re playing a game where the object is to physically hide from something that sees you through your webcam, what would be the point in cheating?

Eyes Never Wake doesn’t have a release date yet, but as a horror fan myself, I’ll be following progress on this one pretty closely. Maybe it’s just a gimmick, but I like that indie developers are at least trying new ways to be immersive.