Into the Dead launches on Steam, but can its story carry the horror this time?

Zhuishu has officially launched on Steam. Developed by Qiaoyu Deng and co-published by Qiaoyu Deng and Paras Games, this 2D psychological horror narrative puzzle game is debuting with a 10% discount, bringing the price down from 32 yuan to 28.8 yuan through May 26. The developer has also released a free demo, so players can sample it before buying.

What makes Zhuishu immediately more interesting than a standard scare reel is its structure. It opens with two linked cases: a girl's suicide in an abandoned apartment and a student's mysterious death. From there, the game splits into a dual-protagonist investigation, letting players follow both detective Yang Fan and teacher Jiang Yufei. That setup suggests a game less interested in cheap shocks than in how trauma echoes across different lives and points of view.

The most encouraging part of the pitch, at least so far, is how restrained the design sounds. Zhuishu is built around story-driven light puzzle-solving, with puzzles closely tied to the main plot rather than treated as standalone obstacles. That is usually a better sign for this kind of game. When horror leans on narrative first, the experience tends to hold together better than when it relies on jump scares alone. The real question, though, is whether the full release can make its two narrative threads cohere, because games like this ultimately live or die on whether the characters' motivations stand up under scrutiny.

Its setting also has real promise. Zhuishu mixes a Southeast Asian regional backdrop with Chinese folk horror, and that combination gives it more textual potential than a generic haunted-house frame. If handled well, that blend could make place, custom, and memory feel meaningfully entangled. If not, folklore risks becoming little more than visual dressing. Still, the current materials point in the right direction: case investigation, two playable leads, and a psychological-horror focus all suggest a game trying to let story generate the dread, rather than simply wheeling monsters onstage.

As a purchase, the ask is modest. At 32 yuan, or 28.8 yuan during the launch window, Zhuishu is relatively easy to take a chance on. It supports Simplified Chinese and English for both interface and subtitles, is single-player, and includes Family Sharing support. If you mainly care about combat feel, action, or dense systems, this probably should not be a priority. But if you care more about character writing, clean suspense, and horror that works through psychological pressure, the safest move is obvious: try the free demo first, then decide before May 26. For fans of narrative puzzle games, the most compelling question is not how frightening Zhuishu can get, but whether it can turn its two lines of fate into something that genuinely lands.