ABSTRACT
Gone Home draws on the tradition of haunted house narratives. Like many Gothic stories, it unfolds in a family home, characterised by flickering lights, locked rooms, secret passageways and self-reflexive references to horror culture. Players investigate this abandoned space, uncovering details of a dysfunctional family closely associated with the building’s contents. They are positioned as archivist, anthropologist and exorcist, gathering story fragments from letters, documents and artefacts, which are haunted by the characters whose stories they tell. Connections between the walking simulator and the Gothic short story format are explored. Further Gothic literary traditions include giving voice to women and marginalised groups, narrating hidden histories, and exploring sexual repression within the home. The central narrative concerns the protagonist’s gay sister struggling against social and domestic homophobia. The ghostly lesbian voice, the post-mortem associations of the voiceover, and the absent presence of the invisible protagonist, suggest an ambiguous Gothic doubling between the haunter and the haunted. Gothic culture’s ambivalent interest in depicting non-normative sexualities is reflected in queer gameplay, as players follow in the sister’s footsteps, discovering secret hiding spaces within the heteronormative family home, conducting a non-linear investigation, which is nevertheless prone to straightening.
