Don't Get Your Hopes Up

About Don't Get Your Hopes Up

Don't Get Your Hopes Up is a single player action game with a horror theme. It was developed by Krish Raghav and was released on September 16, 2025. It received very positive reviews from players.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up is a short interactive comic about housing shortage and horror in architecture. Based on desperate apartment searches undertaken in 2022 and 2024, and drawing from a half decade of conversations about Amsterdam's housing crisis, the game moves between fiction, documentary, and social commentary. With disquiet and creeping unease, it dismantles the consoling fictions of …

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Reviews

94%Audience ScoreBased on 54 reviews

music6 positive mentions

Provides a deeply relatable and insightful portrayal of the housing crisis, especially in Amsterdam, with a unique blend of surrealism and Kafkaesque bureaucracy.
Exceptional storytelling combined with beautiful art and excellent music creates an immersive and emotionally impactful experience.
Free, short, and well-crafted visual novel that effectively humanizes the impact of housing insecurity, making it accessible and worth an hour or two of playtime.

Clicker mechanics and some gameplay elements feel unpolished or unnecessary, occasionally detracting from the experience.
Abrupt music transitions and absence of ambient sound design can be distracting or diminish immersion.
Certain narrative and stylistic choices (e.g., sudden switches to real photographs, story surrealness) may not appeal to all players and some find the writing bland or mundane.

music
13 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
46% positive mentions, 31% neutral mentions, 23% negative mentions
The music in the game is generally praised as excellent and well-suited, adding to the overall atmosphere and complementing the comic-style storytelling. However, some users note issues with abrupt starts, stops, and occasional silence, which can be jarring. Overall, the soundtrack is considered a strong and enjoyable aspect of the experience.
- “Plus the vibes are cool and it has a good soundtrack.”
- “By the end of the game, I was left with the long-lost feeling of “reading my favorite short novel on a sunny Saturday afternoon.” Brilliant writing, outstanding visual expression, and excellent music choices.”
- “Some really nice touches and great music for a project like this.”
- “When no music is playing, the game is completely silent, except for a single moment in the story where you can hear what seems to be a stock restaurant ambience loop.”
- “On top of that, the music sometimes starts very abruptly, stops just as suddenly, and occasionally cuts off right in the middle, only to start again briefly and fade out after a few seconds.”
- “For example, when I’m reading something, I can’t comfortably listen to music with vocals at the same time, because I tend to focus on everything at once including the music and start analyzing it, which can be quite exhausting.”
story
12 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
25% positive mentions, 50% neutral mentions, 25% negative mentions
The story is praised for its surreal, humanizing, and humorous approach to relevant and relatable themes, often reflecting urban life with a comic style. While generally considered short, engaging, and emotionally impactful, some find it occasionally confusing or in need of refinement. Overall, it is viewed as a compelling narrative experience well worth experiencing, especially for fans of story-driven games.
- “The story really goes there with the surreal horror and very effectively uses it to create an incredibly humanizing experience.”
- “An excellent story that many of us can relate to around the world.”
- “In some ways this could be a story in any major urban metro in the world right now, and in another it is very specific to Amsterdam right now.”
- “The story was decent overall and shows a certain amount of potential, but also reveals that there is still room for improvement.”
- “When no music is playing the game is completely silent, except for a single moment in the story where you can hear what seems to be a stock restaurant ambience loop.”
- “The story is simply too surreal, and doesn't make sense.”
humor
7 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions
The humor in the game is characterized by a Kafkaesque, surreal, and satirical tone that blends absurdity with relatable truths, often eliciting genuine laughter. Its subtle, biting wit enhances the experience, adding levity without undermining the game's underlying themes. Overall, the humor is well-crafted and notably effective in engaging players.
- “Done with humor and a Kafkaesque eye for bureaucratic absurdity and the surreal.”
- “It could be hilarious if it weren't so close to the truth (it's still very funny!).”
- “Also made me laugh out loud in its biting satire.”
gameplay
5 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
60% positive mentions, -20% neutral mentions, 60% negative mentions
The gameplay is minimal and lacks depth, primarily consisting of occasional, unimpressive clicking mechanics that add little engagement. It functions more as a visual novel with unique apartment settings, serving as a scenic or narrative experience rather than a traditional game with meaningful mechanics.
- “Each apartment is unique and the gameplay (big word considering it never stops being a visual novel) reflects it nicely.”
- “The draw of this game isn't particularly the gameplay or narrative, it's a scenic window to see from a perspective unusual.”
- “And so this short game has pretty much no game mechanics, sometimes you will find yourself clicking the mouse madly as fast as humanly possible, and then later on you wonder what happens if you don't?”
- “This short game has almost no game mechanics; sometimes you find yourself clicking the mouse madly as fast as possible, and then later wondering what happens if you don't.”
- “I found the occasional clicker mechanics terrible; in such situations, I would much rather have a small well-designed minigame or nothing at all.”
- “The draw of this game isn't particularly the gameplay or narrative; it's more like a scenic window to see from an unusual perspective.”
graphics
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50% positive mentions, 50% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions
The graphics are praised for their artistic and surreal style, effectively complementing the game's social commentary. They add charm and cultural relevance, enhancing the experience with cute nods to expat Dutch life. Overall, the visuals are described as wonderful and engaging.
- “Wonderful graphics and narration, cute nods to expat Dutch life.”
atmosphere
1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions
The atmosphere is highly immersive and effectively sets the mood, though the overall experience is brief.
- “Very atmospheric, short experience.”
emotional
1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions
The game delivers a short but powerful emotional experience, effectively capturing the anxiety of a modern economic crisis with exceptional writing. Its intense, panic-inducing atmosphere stands out among free visual novels, deserving more recognition for its impactful storytelling.
- “Short, free, panic-attack-inducing piece of art you can get through in an hour with the benefit of immensely better writing than most free visual novels on Steam, and absolutely deserving and in need of more attention for how effective it is at soliciting a very hyper-specific emotional response to a contemporary economic hellscape.”

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Don't Get Your Hopes Up is a action game with horror theme. Common tags for Don't Get Your Hopes Up include linear, surreal, psychological, emotional, psychological horror and others.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up is available on PC, Mac OS, Windows and Linux.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up was released on September 16, 2025.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up was developed by Krish Raghav.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up has received very positive reviews from players. Most players liked Don't Get Your Hopes Up for its music but disliked it for its story.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up is a single player game.

Similar games include and Roger, NORCO, Missed Messages, Life Tastes Like Cardboard, The Beginner's Guide and others.

Don't Get Your Hopes Up

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About Don't Get Your Hopes Up

Games Like Don't Get Your Hopes Up

and Roger

NORCO

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The Beginner's Guide

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Depression Quest

Reviews

music

story

humor

gameplay

graphics

atmosphere

emotional

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