What In The Existential Heck Is The Exit 8 – More Importantly, What Makes This Phenomenal Game So Good
Exit 8 has a very simple, albeit plain intro. In the game, you, the player, are stuck. You are basically in an underground passage, much like a subway corridor. Your objective is to get to The Exit 8, per the game’s page on Steam. Sounds simple enough, right? Pay attention, and you’ll get to your destination here shortly.
So Wait, What Is The Exit 8?
The Exit 8 is quite literally an intriguing first-person walking simulator. It isn’t your average one where you look at pretty scenery or something scary happens. This doesn’t have vistas or ghouls, just a really long underground passage inspired by Japan, coincidentally the game is also only available in Japanese and English.
Most would probably question the authenticity of a walking simulator that is neither scenically beautiful and is seemingly void of horror. Kind of makes one wonder what the point of the game is, doesn’t it? Though it is said to be a luminal style, or atmospheric, kind of game, which is common in psychological horror.
Yet nearly 10,000 people have left reviews, and 93% are positive! Not only that, but they even made a movie about it. What is even happening? It is currently on sale for less than $3, so I decided to give The Exit 8 a shot.
What Do You Even Do?
When loading the game, boom, just thrown into it, there’s no menu, no controls, nothing. It throws the user right into the… Whatever this thing is. True to their description, it is, in fact, a walking simulator. It is also a strange sort of puzzle? I’m honestly not quite certain how to really describe the game. It does have a simple set of rules, which should be easy enough to follow. Maybe.
First time through, one might not even know anything anomalous is even happening, which is the hard part! How many anomalies exist within the game? Also, not a single clue, but after beating it twice, there are 20 remaining! Something players have to do, though, is keep their ears and eyes wide open. Failing to spot the anomaly will result in starting over from the beginning. That part can be a little frustrating without any hints as to what was missed.
What Exactly Is Going On?
The game itself seems to be more of a psychological prank, a pretty sophisticated one at that. It comes fully packed with weird light shows and strange auditory hallucination-style sounds. There were a few times where going down the corridor, everything seemed fine until suddenly everything was most assuredly N O T fine. The lights dimmed, only a small pool of light was coming from the first-person perspective, and then I turned around and immediately ran back the way I came.
Absolutely not happening. You are not catching me in the dark, mister sinister. How exactly does this turn into a psychological game? By the very fact that it turns the user against themselves. Literally. The player will be questioning themselves after the first half-dozen wrong turns. While the game isn’t really labeled as horror, it definitely creates an existential crisis of the mind on the player. No matter how silly it may sound, it really is true.
So Wait, Why Now?
Yes, The Exit 8 was released at the end of Nov. 2023, that doesn’t make it any less intriguing that it’s become so well-liked. It was so enrapturing that when something blatantly breaks from the pattern, it actually is sort of a weird jump-scare of sorts. That may be what prompted Genki Kawamura to actually turn this whole crazy first-person walking simulator of nightmare-inducing whackiness with the soundtrack to scare the pants off you into a full-fledged movie.
Yes, another video game with weird thematics and strange gameplay features made it into the movie universe. The movie was adapted in 2025, but it was finally released nationwide under the name Exit 8 on April 10, 2026.
