A free-to-play demo has just dropped for lily’s world XD, a “fourth wall breaking psychological horror.” Published by Kwalee, who is also known for Draw It and Rocket Sky!, and developed by SonderingEmily, players explore the world of Lily, a teenager growing up in 2004, through her laptop. Featuring Y2K aesthetics and real life photos from SonderingEmily’s adolescence, players are fully immersed in the early days of the internet. 

“Lily is a typical teenage girl — dramatic, emotional, awkward,” but she was kidnapped, and it is the player’s job to find out what happened to her. Players are quick to learn that Lily is, like a lot of teenagers in the early to mid 2000s, a self proclaimed “lonely nerd”, dealing with mental health issues that have just begun to surface on the internet during this time. Lily’s world XD sheds light on loneliness, body image issues, and low self esteem through private messaging and photo albums, drawn directly from the developer’s personal experiences.  

Lily’s laptop has twelve different apps on her desktop to click on and explore, each hiding a clue as to where, exactly, Lily disappeared to. These apps include a photo album, messenger, internet browser, email, and even files labeled as “secret” and “journal.” All of these hold information that is necessary on the quest to figure out what happened to Lily. 

Players must piece together this information quickly, though, because they are on a clock. The fact that Lily is a stranger to the player, not a friend, becomes increasingly relevant as the clock runs out and players piece together more about her life, revealing a “dark truth” about the circumstances surrounding Lily, who is also keeping secrets. Whoever took her clearly does not want her to be found by anyone, and the closer the player is to learning the truth, the closer they are to suffering the same fate. Although the release date for the full version of lily’s world XD is unknown, the demo trailer is available below, and can be played on Steam.