A Haunting: Witching Hour

It was in 1695 when Elizabeth Ainsley was accused of being a witch. She was betrayed by the one person she cared for the most, Rev James Beaumont. Little did he know the terror he was about to unleash upon the small town of Shady Hollow.

It wouldn’t be until the 1940’s before the Beaumont family would return to Shady Hollow. Cliff and Linda Beaumont along with their children Sally and John moved to Shady Hollow to open a coal mining operation. The woods outside of Shady Hollow were known to be rich with coal, and being in the coal business, the Beaumonts’ saw this as a great opportunity.

Several months after their arrival, their daughter Sally went missing. For weeks, the towns people searched the woods and the coal mines but all they would find is a shoe belonging to Sally by the Hollow Creek. Most believed that Sally must have fallen into the creek and drowned while others believed it was the curse of The Hollow Creek Witch.

A year later, both Cliff and Linda Beaumont grew ill and soon died. It was rumored that the loss of their daughter was too much for them to handle. John, being the sole remaining member of the Beaumont family was taken to an orphanage.

About thirty five years later (1975), John, now a grown man was approached by another mining company looking to buy the rights to the Beaumont Coal Company. The coal company was abandoned after the death of his parents so John agreed to sell his share of the company. On the morning of March 15th, 1975, John and two miners would travel through the woods to take mineral samples at one of the more lucrative mining sites in Shady Hollow. John would be the only person to return from that trip.

After several searches, the two miners were found. What the police saw would haunt them the rest of their lives. John Beaumont was immediately arrested for the murders and spent his remaining days in the Shady Hollow Mental Hospital.

In the spring of 2015, 5 indie film makers travel to Shady Hollow to do a documentary about the disappearance of the two miners in 1975 and the Beaumont family. After arriving, they soon find out that the townspeople of Shady Hollow don’t welcome outsiders and are resistant to speak about the troubled past of the town. They soon begin to uncover the urban legend of the Hollow Creek Witch that haunts the woods surrounding Shady Hollow.

A Haunting : Witching Hour is a storytelling Virtual Reality game of dark horror and desperate survival. An immersive experience finds players discovering – and taking part in – a rich story that explores the dark corners of human nature. It will unfold in episodes, giving players the opportunity to continue to unravel a complex mystery through downloadable content that picks up where the previous episode’s cliffhanger left off.

It is scheduled for release on both PC and console platforms.

Episode One follows an indie film crew who travels to Shady Hollow to produce a documentary on John Beaumont and the disappearance of the 2 miners. In 1975 John was accused and convicted of murdering two coal miners. During the investigation, John claimed it was the Hollow Creek Witch responsible for the disappearance of the miners.

Players take on the role of Eddie, a character with a checkered past who has psychic abilities that allows him to see things from the past while touching items found throughout the game. The game will start off with Eddie being found along a lonely road by police. The police bring Eddie in for questioning in regards to the whereabouts of the remaining film makers. As Eddie tells his story, players are taken to that point in the story and play through what happened at that point.