Q3, 1989
Bell tower ltd
Bell Estate, UK
3,550,000 (was 3,750,000)

Ill met by moonlight released

Publishing cost: 200,000
Ill met by moonlight
Genre: Survival-Horror
Topic: 2d point and click 
Audience: M
Price: 35
Regions: UK/IE, Europe, North America
Languages: English, Continental European languages (Excluding Russian, as there's no access to the USSR anyway)
Platform: PC
Features
-16 bit graphics, with the shading applied to make the textures look dark and foreboding
-Stereo sound
-creepy voice acting
-Point and click
-Inventory screen
-Jump scares (Don't you just love the little girl ghost? No? Too bad, here she is again!) What? No, of course that aint a cheap scare!
-Tension. The monsters can see light, so the player is often forced to go dark when they encounter a monster... Which leads to the player praying they wont be horribly consumed
-A "horror" version of the Bell Tower logo; clouds gather above it and with a clap of thunder, lightning strikes it just before the transition to the main menu... Because someone in the office clearly had too much time on their hands and some stock sounds...
-A "lighting" and "torch" system. The player can find and carry a flashlight, which will help to illuminate the path ahead, or a lamp, which lights up all around the player, but doesn't have the reach of the flashlight. When the player has neither of these, for instance if the fuel/battery dies, the area surrounding the player duller and harder to see, while the ends of the screen are completely dark, which can mean the player misses items or even fail to see dangers until its too late.)
-The player is not a fighter, they are expected to hide from monsters. When the player acquires a melee weapon, it usually breaks quickly and often serves only to provide a brief window to run away. The guns that can be found also have very limited ammo, and has a chance to "attract" more monsters, spawning them.
-If the player looks close enough, they will realise that the monsters bear a resemblance to the different towns people seen at the beginning. A bit of plot relevant shock... If the player is lucky (or unlucky, and their death cries can "attract" more monsters, spawning more trouble) enough to kill one of the monsters, it wont appear again in the game and the respective person will be absent from the ending.
-A non-password save system
-A unique score: Town of the damned. Consists of a low track of classical music in the background, with a ghostly girls voice singing over it..
-Double clicking will make the character run, which might "attract" monsters or alert those unaware of the player, but is faster than walking. The player automatically enters "sneak mode" if they see a monster but none are , which makes much less sound but moves very slowly. This can be broken by running
-Multiple endings
-Codes, because whats a game without some good old codes?
-To encourage movement, if the player remains in one location for too long, the "stitch eye ghost" will appear. This ghost will "attract monsters", forcing the player to relocate
Plot: The game story is revealed over time. The player is a traveller known as "Sarah Foster" who breaks down along the road. She gets out of the car heads towards a light in the distance. She arrives in a small town, where a mechanic agrees to fix her car. The game begins and the player is able to either talk to various residents or just head straight on to the inn and continue the game if they want, though they will miss both an old newspaper clipping that can be found by talking to the man at the nearby newsagents, which mentions a young girl who went missing, as well as the elderly Mrs Annabelle Till who lives in the mansion at the centre of town and tells the player "Not to mind all the rumours" about the mansion and that "They're just old wives tales". She checks in at the inn, but she is awoken in the middle of the night by a crash outside, and looks out the window to discover a thick mist has descended on the town and to see something dart away on all fours. The player proceeds downstairs to discover that everyone has vanished... The player must explore the town and discover the dark secret surrounding the town and the mansion that lies at its centre.
Proceeding through the inn, she finds a map which the player uses to navigate the town. The player proceeds through the game, avoiding the hideous monsters which now infest the town. The player proceeds through the town, where they encounter notes, newspaper clippings and diary entries revealing terrible fragments of the past, such as more information about the girl the newsagent mentioned, "Emily Till". The players will encounter the terrifying spirit of a girl whose eyes are stitched shut, with a cheerful music playing. From the news paper clippings description of the body of the girl, it appears she is Emily Till
Finally, the player will make their way through the dark and eerie mansion and find the elderly Mrs Till, who tells Sarah that she is an immortal witch who cursed the townsfolk and all their blood line during the 19th century as she believes the town Sheriff covered up the murder of her daughter, because the killer was the mayors deranged son. Depending on what the player found, they may be forced to try and kill Mrs Till or convince her to end the curse as the towns people responsible are long since dead and it is their descendants being tormented.
The games states in the instructions that there is no "fail" state. The story always ends...
Ending A: (very bad ending) This ending occurs is killed (A dark still image of the killer appears in the death scene) The secret of the town is never discovered and another car is shown driving towards the town the next day, its occupants a man, his wife and two young children... a ghostly childs voice proclaims "The curse remains..." 
Ending B (Middle ending): Sarah kills Mrs Till, the curse is lifted but the mansion collapses and kills Sarah. 
Ending C (Good ending...?) This requires the player to not have visited the asylum and discovered the secret of the mayors son. Sarah convinces Mrs Till to lift the curse and leaves the following morning... However as she drives away, Mrs Till is whispering to the "stitch eye ghost". It is left ambiguous as to whether Mrs Till truly lifted the curse. 
Ending D (Good ending) This requires the player to have visited the asylum and discovered that the mayors son was secretly committed shortly after the killing. As the player learns from his scrawlings and the nurses notes, he didn't commit the killing. After she was mauled by a bear, his insanity led him to believe he could bring her back to life through some bizarre machinations that were the reason he stitched her eyes shut and stitched all her wounds up, placing a music box in her chest in a mad attempt to give her a voice again... Sarah convinces Mrs Till to lift the curse and leaves the following morning. As she leaves, the "stitch eye ghost" aka Emily Till is revealed to have been trying to break the curse and is finally laid to rest now her mother knows the truth. The mansion crumbles, implying that Mrs Till let herself die after 197 years of life. 
Ending E (Bad ending/middle ending depending on a players personal feelings) Sarah waits out the night and survives. This can be done through surviving all through the night but not reaching the endgame. The town returns to its normal state, none of the residents nor Sarah have any memories of the event, and Sarah drives away... However, identically to ending A, a family is shown arriving in the town and a ghostly little voice announces that the curse continues
Ending F (...) The player kills all 30 of the monsters which is no small feat without cheating (which stops the ending anyway) The player stops moving and the mist leaves the town, revealing that with all its victims killed, the curse has ended. However, all does not end well for Sarah. It is revealed that the bodies retained their wounds upon return to human form, and after a police investigation, Sarah is arrested and commited to an asylum for the criminally insane. 
Ending G (The cheater ending) This ending supersedes all others if the player enters a code (Except for one code that actually makes the game harder) Whenever they access what would have been one of the other endings, they are instead treated to the message "Cheaters never win" and a jump scare.
Systems: Although not really a system, the concept of survival horror is relatively unique at that time period. Most horror games of the time were platformers or action games with horror themes rather than true horror games