A seriously underrated and incredibly inventive platformer from Double Fine Productions, now best known for star developer Tim Schafer's incredibly successful crowdfunding campaign to get new adventure title Broken Age funded, Psychonauts was a surreal and often silly game. Much like Schafer's back catalogue, however, that silliness was concealing a hidden darkness. Throughout the game you use your psychic powers to explore the minds of your fellow campers at a summer school for "Psychonauts" - spies who use their abilities for espionage - and help them overcome their fears and bad memories by completing puzzles and defeating enemies. One such mind doesn't seem like it can be helped, however. And it isn't just the player's. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ford0MGvWIc In the level "Milla's Dance Party" you dive into the mind of the fun-loving Milla Vodello, and for the most part it lives up to the jauntiness of its title. However, discovering the secret room in her subconscious will reveal that not all is as well in her mind as she's been making out. She warns you that's not where the party's at and, well, she's right. The room has a bunch of burning figures circling you whilst yelling "WHY DIDN'T YOU SAVE US MILLA", whilst the woman herself begs you to leave whilst you still can. Eerie enough in itself; then you find the scrapbook which explains Milla's nightmare, and it turns out she used to work in an orphanage that burned down. And all the kids died. And there are illustrations of it. And now you probably need to lie down in a dark room and feel sad.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
