World of Horror is one of the most original horror games of this year. Strong of a peculiar art-style, important references to horror manga, and a system inspired by retro text-based RPGs, World of Horror created a unique and disturbing universe for modern horror-RPGs. The cosmic horror typical of Lovecraft meets the aesthetic and the creatures of Japanese horror manga, such as the works of Junji Ito or Kazuo Umezu, creating the perfect melting-pot for creepy and disturbing creatures.

Grotesque ghosts, cursed cultists, unthinkable abomination, and ancient eldritch gods surround the small town at the center of all the events of the game. There are bosses and random encounters, and the battles occur using a classic turn-based system. The entities can hurt the player’s Stamina or Reason, based on their background, while the stronger abominations can damage both. Cryptic creatures will not damage directly the player, but will increase Doom, a doomsday counter, difficult to reset, which will awake the Old Gods when reaching 100%, causing of course Game Over. Worth to specify that ghosts and other intangibles entities are immune to physical damage, and can be mainly defeated by guessing the correct ritual. World of Horror is a rogue-lite game with a heavy random component. To face all the monsters, the player needs to finish the game multiple times.

In the following article, I will describe the most disturbing, grotesque, and interesting creatures from World of Horror. The game is still in Early Access, so more creatures will be added in future updates. However, even now the bestiary is very generous, with more than 50 disturbing enemies. Probably this article will also expand and update following the final release of World of Horror, including even more twisted and eldritch abominations.

• Scissor Woman

The first boss of the game and one of the most amazing designs, the Scissor Woman is an innovative interpretation of a classic Japanese urban legend. Three faces are vertically fused, with a giant and grotesque smile working as a bridge between the heads. The rest of the body is just a normal woman dressed in a long coat. As the name suggests, she fights using long and sharp scissors, a dangerous foe able to inflict an insane amount of damage.

The Scissor Woman has 3 different forms, each more difficult than the other. The human form can be faced by performing the correct ritual during the case. A wrong ritual will instead summon the Horror version of the boss, definitively a tougher battle. The Burned version is more rare and can be faced only by burning the school as result of the ending of a previous case. In this case, not only her face is a grotesque nightmare, but the flesh is also burned and fused together, creating probably the creepier manifestation of this boss.

• Puppet Matron

A group of three hideous and grotesque dolls, which were hiding in the wardrobe of an ancient mansion. Their faces are like bloated and sweating, looking more organic than it should be. The two dolls behind look more submissive and scared, also missing the eyes, compared with the one in the middle. The matron looks definitively more dangerous and dominating than the other two. She is holding a knife and is not afraid of using it. The creature can slightly damage both Stamina and Reason, affecting both body and mind. The creature is probably inspired by Jean Pierre, the puppet from Junji Ito’s House of Marionettes.

• Class of 1971

Definitively this is a unique and disturbing creature, with a simple but effective design. The story behind this monstrosity is rooted in the tragic accident of the class of 1971. All the kids of the infamous class felt inside the sea while taking a group picture. Till now, the bodies were never recovered. The collective creature is an amorphous amalgam of the drowned bodies, a grotesque creature missing any trait, except for several limbs. The monster can be faced only as a random encounter in the seaside. It is a tough enemy, considering that it is not a boss, which can damage both Stamina and Reason.

Class of 1971 could be inspired by Kazuo Umezu’s work, more than Junji Ito’s ones.

• Ribcage Woman

What can be more disturbing than a woman having a ribcage opening directly inside her face? If you are looking at the picture, the answer is probably “very few things”. The creature is odd and grotesque, an enigmatic being outside of any logic. She is quite weak and not very dangerous, damaging the body of her victims. There is no explanation for her terrible state, or why her face is a mass of flesh and bones, she is just a mysterious creature emerging from the darkness of a forest. Another secret of World of Horror.

• Drowner Sponge

The disturbing creature at the beginning appears only as a rock lying on the seaside. At a closer look, the abomination is revealed. The name and the description (“It needs another body now”) imply that the black spongy mass full of mouths is a sort of parasitic entity, which uses dead bodies to move around. The Drowner Sponge is a creature probably living in the oceans, preying on the people swimming, drowning them to then control their bodies. The creature is tough but weak, relying mostly on its disturbing appearance to damage the mind of the victims outside the water.

An interesting detail is that the creature was before called the “Bondage Demon” with concept and head-design completely different.

• Dream Devourer

Dream Devourer is one of the most cryptic and dangerous entities of World of Horror. Cosmic abomination defying reality and sanity, the creature is an invisible force feeding on the dreams of its victims. The Dream Devourer is responsible for a series of unexplained comas, of course, related to the victims that it is feeding on. The Dream Devourer can be faced only by retrieving a specific powder, which will reveal its presence while feeding on a comatose subject. The worm-like creature is otherworldly, with an empty face full of void and glyph, while the body is slimy and naked. The real mystery behind this creature will be revealed only after defeating it: the long worm-like body is connected directory to a huge mass in the sky. The Dream Devoured is not a monster, but just a part of it, like a finger of a gigantic hand! The battle is also one of the most challenging in the game: the creature is highly-resistant and able to heavily-damage both the mind and the body of its victims.

The Dream Devourer is heavy-inspired by Juni Ito’s Long Dream, not for the design of the creature, but more for the background related to dreams inducing coma.

• Tatoru

A chaotic mass of fur, teeth, and dirt, disgusting in the appearance but not very dangerous. The floating entity lives in the woods, hanging on trees or telephone poles, just a hairy ball ready to drop on its victims. The creature is unable to inflict direct harm, but with its only presence, Tatoru will speed up the awakening of the Great Ones, increasing Doom at each turn.

• Forgotten Specimen

A twisted and grotesque mass of flesh, devoid of any consistent shape. In the amorphous conglomerate of flesh, the only distinguishable thing is an intense spiral pattern. If the creature was part of a bigger being, it is now a mystery, since this is only a biological sample stored in the school lab. However, I could speculate how this is only a sentient sample of Oetaru (see below), due to the similarities. A teacher killed himself with a knife in front of the mysterious jar, highlighting how the creature is probably able to irradiate suicidal impulses. This is consistent with its way of attacking, since the creature can only damage Reason. However, regardless of how creepy and mysterious it could look, the Forgotten Specimen is a weak and easy fight.

The spiral pattern is, of course, a strong connection with Uzumaki, probably the most famous Junji Ito’s story.

• Bloated Swimmer

There is nothing so original about the background of this creature, basically it is just a ghost or a ghoul infesting a swimming pool. But its design is so mysterious and creepy, so I feel that the Bloated Swimmer should be here. The body is wet and partially bloated, while the face is hidden in shadows, increasing the sense of dreadful mystery of the creature. Judging from the silhouette, the creature is bold, with big sparkling eyes. The bloating of the drowned body looks weirdly wrong, like if the female creature is somehow pregnant, more than simply bloated. As previously said, the Bloated Swimmer is a sort of ghoul living at night in the school swimming pool, drowning the people wandering there. The battle against this creature is an easy one, since its attacks are weak and its body fragile.

• Oetaru

Here we are entering the world of colossal cosmic abominations. Oetaru is an old and forgotten god living underground, and probably the only one that can be directly challenged in World of Horror. Just to better understand the size of the monster, the small background behind is a city, with also a lighthouse far on the horizon. The part that we can see of Oetaru is a mass of twisted flesh, a sort of colossal tentacle emerging from the ground below the city. The battle is of course impossible to win, the colossal creature cannot be damaged by any mortal weapons. The only way to survive is to escape or to sacrifice an ally, to please the old gods back to its slumber. Oetaru will not directly harm the main character, but will quickly speed up the Doom clock toward an early Game Over. In this case, the creature will kill the player by causing a massive sound wave.

The spiral pattern is again a strong reference to Uzumaki. But the references are not ending here, since Oetaru also clearly resembles the final form of the entity in Ito’s work.