The Forest Game
By Mitchell Bryan
Copyright 2012 Mitchell Bryan
Chapter 1
When I was checking the news sites for any updates on the Jovian war I stumbled across a news story about the government issuing an emergency ban on a game called Forest. The game apparently was the creation of an independent game company. Sales skyrocketed after reports came out of at least twelve people having heart attacks, someone being murdered, and eight people killing themselves because of the game. Like any virtual reality game its main appeal was its ability to be mixed into the player's regular life. It was one of those "art" games that didn't have an objective. The game's purpose was for the player to experience something new and profound.
I spent hours researching the game. The name of the game came from the fact that it made the world around you turn into a massive forest, while retaining the other people in the area. To think that only forty years ago scientists were first installing chips into people brains.
The only information about the game that I couldn't find was why people were dying from the game. Since the game was designed in such a way that you could play it twenty-four hours a day, someone was bound to just happen to die while playing it. The suicides and the murder were harder to explain. The company that produced the game never responded to questioning from news sources.
My curiosity got the better of me and I decided to take a stab at the game. A government ban simply meant that the game couldn't be sold. That certainly didn't stop people from pirating the game. I visited the site that I usually go to when I needed a hard to find piece of software.
After the game was finished installing I went out to get some groceries. Once on the subway I realized that I never launched the game. I pressed down on my left wrist, causing a box to appear in the bottom-left corner of my vision. By using eye movement I was able to launch Forest.
To say the game was beautiful would be an understatement. The integration of the real world into the virtual one was astounding. The subway itself had turned into a hollow tree. The windows of the subway were holes in the log that let in the sun. The walls were covered in moss and dirt. The people around me were still there, seeming very out of place in the environment in the environment that was bursting with flora.
When the subway got to my stop a few vines moved from where they were to allow me out of the hollow tree. Once I got outside the subway tunnel I saw something that amazed me. The whole city was a massive forest. The buildings were giant trees. The roads were dirt paths. The cars were animals being ridden by their drivers.
I had completely forgot about the groceries I left the house to get. I was too busy looking at things. I thought that maybe people's hearts stopped from the beauty they were seeing.
After spending the rest of the day experiencing the nature of downtown, I was pretty hungry and wanted to go home. In my apartment I turned off the game so I could properly see what I was doing while I cooked, even though I enjoyed the notion of cooking on a tree stump stove.
The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, with most of my time being spent cleaning up my apartment, as it looked better clean when I was playing Forest. After I was done I checked for any updates on the Forest ban. I found many new links to websites that had programs that removed Forest entirely. I thought "Why would anyone want to remove Forest? Was it because that people were spending too much time looking at things instead of doing things?"
The next day I called in sick to work. I figured that since I hadn't missed a day in years no one could blame me for taking the day off. After completing my morning routine I checked for any updates on the Forest ban.
I was dumbfounded when I saw a headline that said "Over ninety deaths attributed to Forest." I lurked around a few internet forums and they all said the same thing. The accepted reasoning was that the game's integration of the physical world wasn't perfect, and this caused certain things to be missed, such as an open manhole or a clean glass window. Another theory was that people were walking in front of cars or off buildings because they were too distracted by the beauty. Reading this, I was comforted by the fact that I would be safe if I just stayed in areas of the city that I knew, and if I stayed off the streets.
Outside, I just wandered around aimlessly; I tried my best to stay away from any busy intersections. Whenever I needed to cross the street I turned Forest off so that I could properly assess the traffic. Eventually I arrived at the mall. Inside I was free from any fear of accidently walking into traffic or anything of the sort; The mall was usually a safe place. Inside the mall I spent a while just taking in the sights.
I needed to get new shoes so I went to the store. Inside I sat on a log and talked to an employee about the shoes, which were sitting on tree branches. While I was paying for my new shoes I noticed a man in the corner who was staring at me. His skin was white as milk and he wasn't wearing any clothes. He looked as if he hadn't eaten in a year; His skin was stretched over his bones. He was bald save for a couple of patches of hair that extended halfway down his chest. His eyes were white as his skin. His lips were the only thing that weren't white, they were blue, as he lacking oxygen. No one else in the store seemed to have any problem with him.
I asked the cashier "What's with Mr. Skinny?" The cashier followed my eyes and said, "Sir I don't see anyone over there."
I was confused to say the least. I tried to think of a reason for the cashier not being able to see the man and I had an idea. I turned Forest off and he disappeared. Where he stood was only a sign that advertised two for one shoes.
Chapter 2
I found out that I was searching in all the wrong places for information. When I searched for information on the deaths I found countless stories about the ban and the removal software. When I searched for information on the skinny man I found a forum that was dedicated to discussion about forest.
I searched through the forum until I found a thread about weird sightings in the game. Apparently after playing the game for a set amount of time certain events would occur. The skinny man was talked about heavily, with many people posting drawings of him. There were people who had the game on constantly since it was released and they were the ones who would inform the forums about what to expect in the future. I made a list of all the events that would occur and their expected time frame for occurring.
It made sense now. The heart attacks at least. I read that after two days of playtime the skinny man would first appear. After a week he would begin to move, and he would follow you. After two weeks he would begin making groaning noises. Finally, after three weeks he would attack you. It seemed rather silly since he couldn't actually hurt you. Since no one had found out what happens beyond three weeks, I decided to forego the forums and any news about Forest. I wanted to see what happens after four weeks for myself.
*****
It had been a month since I started playing Forest. I regret having not found out about the game sooner. Sure, I had to deal with this weird skinny man who was kind of annoying. The game was still amazing, albeit in a new way.
The forest had begun to decay. The trees were losing their leaves, and were becoming petrified. The sun was always blocked out by clouds, and virtual rain fell every few hours.
The forest also become quite macabre. The skinny man started getting creative in his tactics. He no longer followed me around all the time. He just showed up every now and again. His appearances would have been scarier if he didn't make so much noise; I could hear him coming from a block away. However, I do have to say that even though he is unable to startle me, he is able to entertain me, in a disturbing way. Sometimes I'll walk into a room and he'll be standing there, surrounded by hanging bodies, smiling.
Forest started out as a beautiful game
that could be considered art. It had turned into nothing more than a high-school haunted house. While I enjoyed the antics of the skinny man, I'd begun to grow tired of him. He was mildly entertaining, sure. But between the rotting landscape and the corpses he leaves lying around it has started to interfere with my life. When I'm in a meeting at work he'll make so much noise hanging a corpse from a tree branch that I can't hear the presentation.
I figured I just needed a break from Forest. On the ride home in the hollow and rotten log I turned off Forest for the first time in a month. It was weird seeing the subway car looking so perfectly normal.
When I got back home I checked on the forums. I was excited to learn about what happened to the people who were playing twenty-four hours a day since release. At the top of the forum was a post titled "PLEASE READ!!!" The post was by one of the forum regulars who had been playing since release. The post was saying that everyone who had the game should get the removal software, and to not play for more than seven-hundred and twenty hours. I did a little math and found that I'd been playing for a little less than eight-hundred.
While searching the forums for the reason not to play for more than seven-hundred and twenty hours I found a post by another of the players who had been active since the launch. He was saying that there was nothing to worry about, and that Forest was completely safe.
While reading about I should expect in the next month if I continue to play Forest I heard a scraping sound in my kitchen. In my kitchen was a hanging body that looked familiar. The body had a sign hanging off of it that said "Too late." I looked at the body and realized who it was. The hanging corpse was me. While looking at my new chandelier I heard the skinny man behind me groaning and moaning like he always does.
Looking at him standing there smiling I realized something. I wasn't playing Forest.
Chapter 3
There I stood. In my kitchen staring a virtual reality video game character who had escaped his game. I looked back at where my body should've been hanging and found that it was no longer there. I turned back to the skinny man, only to find him also missing.
Back on the forums I posted a message stating what just occurred to me. In only a few minutes I had a response from one of the players who said that many people had experienced the same thing, and that once you got to this point you couldn't be saved by the removal software. He continued on to say that the only way out is to keep playing. Some players stated that killing the skinny man would result in him never appearing again.
I turned Forest back on and left the house. The skinny man would only show up a few times a day after the seven-hundred and twenty hour mark, but if you were constantly moving around the chances of encountering him were higher.
My mission was a simple one: Find the skinny man and kill him, by any means necessary.
I called up a few of my friends and asked if any of them were playing Forest. An old friend of mine named Tyrone said that he was in the same situation as me. We decided to meet up at a local restaurant.
Inside the decayed tree that held the restaurant I found Tyrone. "Tyrone, how you holding up?"
"Good, other than the fact I'm being stalked by a damned video game character!"
"Have you tried the removal software?"
"I was able to remove Forest, but that stupid skeleton still found its way into my life."
"So what'd you do?"
"I had to reinstall Forest. If you're right all we have to do is kill the bastard."
"Will my skinny man be the same as your skinny man?"
"I have no idea. I hope so."
"Alright, well we have a better chance of finding him if we move around."
"Sounds like a plan."
We must've walked for hours before we found him. We were happy that we both saw the same skinny man. He was just sitting there in an alleyway between two dead trees groaning at us. We walked over to him and tried to figure out a plan.
"How are we going to do this?" I asked. Tyrone just looked around and found an old tree branch. "I guess we just do it," he said.
He brought the branch down with enough force to smash in the skull of the skinny man. He must've been pretty angry because he beat him with the branch for a full two minutes. He only stopped when we heard someone screaming at us. Looking at the skinny man I saw something horrifying.
That wasn't the skinny man. The bloody mess at our feet had transformed into a now deceased homeless man. The second I realized what had happened I ran. I heard Tyrone follow close behind me the entire time. After running for what felt like days we stopped to catch our breath. While we were panting we both turned off Forest.
"What the hell was that? He was the skinny man, you saw, right?" I asked.
"I saw, but you know as well as I do that that skeleton can mess with our heads. He made me kill a man! Do you hear me? I'm a fucking murderer now!"
"I ... You didn't kill him on purpose."
"Of course I didn't! You think I don't know that?"
"No, it's just-"
"Just what?"
"It's just that you can't blame yourself."
"Blame myself? You know who is to blame? The game company. They created this game, and they must've known what it could do."
"The game company? Hey, why don't we go down to their headquarters or something? They should have some answers for us."
"Yeah, where are they?"
We found their address online and luckily enough it was only two hours away. We got to the office building and walked right in. In the elevator we pushed the button marked with the game companies logo and waited while the elevator elevated us.
The elevator opened to a dark room. Tyrone found a light switch and flicked it. The floor was barren. White walls, and empty offices. The floor was devoid of any evidence of occupancy.
Tyrone was staring at something. I followed his eyes and saw what he saw, the skinny man. He was standing there smiling with an arm raised, pointing at Tyrone.
"It could be another trick," I said.
"No, that's him, I'm sure of it," said Tyrone. He walked slowly towards the skinny man. When they were face to face Tyrone raised his fist. "You made me a murderer!" He swung at the skinny man, only to have his fist go through him. When Tyrone hit the floor the skinny man let out a laugh. It was a slow cackling laugh that sounded like nails on a chalkboard. Tyrone and I spent the next few hours in that building trying anything we could think of to hurt him. When all of our attempts failed we returned home defeated.
The next day I went to Tyrone's place so we could figure out a plan of action. I knocked on his door a few times, and when he didn't answer I used a key I found under his doormat. Inside I found something that shook me to my core. I found Tyrone hanging by his neck, with the skinny man standing next to his hanging body.
When I fell to the ground to puke the skinny man turned to me and let out another of his tormenting laughs. I found a note on his counter that explained that he couldn't handle living his life knowing he killed someone. I cut down Tyrone, called the police and I left.
Back at my place I sat in the dark thinking about what to do. I turned off the lights so that I couldn't see the skinny man. I could hear him cackling in front of me, but at least I didn't have to look at him.
I didn't sleep for the next few days, because whenever I tried the skinny man would wake me with his groans and cackles. After spending four days in my apartment with no progress on figuring out how to kill the skinny man I decided to once again check the forums. I found the "PLEASE READ!!!" post had been updated. The author of the post said that he had given up his attempts at killing the skinny man, and that he wouldn't be updating his posts anymore.
Reading this, I had an idea. The skinny man had come from Forest, and Forest was only a game that used chips installed into one's brain. If I get my chip's removed I'll get rid of the skinny man. I called up every hospital and specialist I could find, apparently I needed a referral to get brain surgery, and the waiting list if I h
ad one was over four months long.
I decided that since I was incapable of working in my present condition I might as well take a vacation, since I most likely wouldn't have another opportunity. I booked a flight and packed my bags. I was leaving the next day.
Chapter 4
The plane ride was rather boring. The skinny man would drag corpses down the aisles and when I looked out the window there were bodies being pulled through the air by the wings. I was so tired by this point that I was able to sleep through the skinny man's attempts to wake me, or maybe he just didn't try.
When I landed I decided to see what the island would look like if Forest was on. I walked down to the beach and activated the game. The sky turned dark, and let out a drizzle every now and again. The water was thrashing and black, not surprisingly I spotted a few bodies in the water. The sand of the beach was littered with bones.
I enjoyed the macabre view on the beach for a hour or two and then walked back into town. The town was much more decayed in comparison to the city. Nearly everything was grey and petrified, and the ground was covered in ash. The town was eerily silent. I could hear nothing other than the sound of my own breathing. The skinny man was nowhere to be found.
As I walked back to my hotel I saw something rather out of place. I saw a tree. A perfectly healthy tree, just standing there, as if in spite of the deadness around it. I walked up to it and I could smell it, something the trees in Forest never did before. I put my hand up to it and I could feel the bark, which was sticky with a bit of sap. I was confused by this. Never before could I feel anything that was in Forest.
Staring at the tree I realized something. It was a real tree. I turned Forest off, and it was still there. I noticed many people around me were staring at me. I walked away from the tree and found a map shop in the town.
Inside the map shop I asked only one question. "Where is the nearest forest?" It was only five minutes away. I ran. Once there I turned on Forest and I laughed. When in the actual forest nothing changed when Forest was on. I walked around the forest for hours. It reminded me of when I first played Forest, how foolish I was.
Eventually I saw something that was out of place in the forest. I saw the skinny man standing under a tree. Next to him was a hanging noose, with no one in it. I approached him and reached up. The noose was real. I turned off Forest for a second and found that to be true. "Do you want me to hang myself? Is that what you want?"