Jurig Escape (PC)

So, I can go back to special Halloween review. Let’s start with something small. Let’s go with Digital Happiness’ Jurig Escape (2010).

 

Nice creepy title screen there. There’s rumor when I was University student that there’s PC game where the player shoots pocong around. Without doubt. This is the game. I come to know exactly the game’s title from video of special anniversary of Dreadout or something like that. It’s free on steam, by the way. Digital Happiness claims that this game is prototype of Dreadout as you can see the protagonist is 90% similar to Linda Meilinda from Dreadout. Changing from gun-toting gameplay with supranatural photography a la Fatal Frame, is probably for the best because it may seem encouraging gun usage. Our country, Indonesia has quite strict gun control. Only military officers, polices, and non-military executive of government department that allowed to have gun and homemade gun is forbidden. Although there’s several numbers of mini mart robbery with homemade gun and murder case done by depressed police. But none big shootout accident like in Thailand or Philippine, fortunately. There are terrorisms involved gun and mostly bomb around 2000 but we pass from that time. By the way, Jurig escapes means Ghost escape. I like the shortcut icon is the face of sheet ghost.

 

The game starts with Proto Linda wakes on the floor inside of empty classroom. She’s surprised with handgun on her hand and instinctively throw it away. Suddenly, a creepy head falls behind her. Then she reluctantly decides to use the handgun that he threw before. Not sure, why she’s surprised having handgun in her hand even though she already wears holster belt on her hip.   

 

The control is as you probably can guess. WASD to move proto-Linda around. Mouse motion to aim/look around. Left mouse button to shoot. Holding left shit and pressing W or S button allows proto-Linda to run forward and backward. As for the HUD. On the left bottom corner there’s “nyawa” which is health indicator. She has 8 pips of health by default. Then on the right bottom corner there’s Jiwa Sesat Needed which mean Lost Soul Needed. The number of enemies you have to defeat in order to finish the game. This classroom location almost similar to the one in Dreadout 2, but the class is smaller in size.   

 

As I have mentioned before that, the enemy is pocong. The tied corpse. Our culture usually tied dead body before putting it inside the grave to minimize the dangerous potency in case it gets resurrected or zombified. Of course, that is joke. The real reason is to ease carry of dead body without coffin which is heavy and expensive. Also to symbolize the humbleness of dead person. Strong or weak. Rich or poor. We wear the humble white shroud called kain kafan, eventually when we die.

You notice that my health goes down by half because of my fault. I thought I don’t need to reload my gun. Apparently, I have to! Pressing R button should reload my gun. I know it’s common knowledge that revolver has 6 bullet capacity but it will be nice if there’s bullet count HUD somewhere so I know exactly when to reload. Pressing reload button anytime works! Linda really obeys my input to reload her gun even though her revolver is already full. Thankfully, Linda doesn’t need to put bullet one by one like in real life and the process relatively fast.

 

There’s doorless toilet with squat toilet on top of that. It’s quite common in Indonesia but I don’t like it. My legs get tired fast when I take a dump. Anyway, there’s shiny thing there. It’s life restoration item. It fixes my health by 1 pip. It’s useful but I don’t like creepy giggle sound when I pick it up. I don’t think it’s proto Linda’s doing. It’s more like the ghost giggles at me and criticize my decision to pick health restoration item. “You need that 1 pip health refill badly? Noob!”

 

Look at this bastard unable to pass through half-opened door. But I have to lure him to the right and there’s not much space there.

 

GOBLOK! EDAN! (Translation: Bloody stupid! Bloody crazy!)

Suddenly, 3 of them jump on me and one of them on top of the other. Freaking crazy! It takes like 3 – 4 bullets to defeat each pocong. So, fighting 3 at once will guarantee cost my life because I need to reload while enemies still around. No. Headshot doesn't matter.

 

I take few steps into this Ruang Guru (more or less: Faculty Office) and 2 Pocong spawn immediately. Yes, I know they’re ghost. Naturally, they can spawn out of thin air but can’t get through half-opened door. So stupid. These pocong will drop a red soul when defeated. You need to collect it but there’s scream of agony when you pick it up which gets my nerve everytime. 

 

Finally, I’m allowed to get into deeper part of faculty office. Goodness gracious. This place is freaking mess. Lots of tumbled down shelves and room separators. This bastard generous enough to spawn quite far from my position but I don’t think I can snipe him from here either because of fallen shelf or limited range of my gun. Fine. I will walk around a bit to get to him.

 

There! I can kill him. I mean exorcist him. Yeah. I notice there’s poster behind the pocong is our national heroes in The Beatles (color) cover album. They’re: Tuanku Imam Bonjol on top-left, Sultan Hasanuddin on bottom-left, and Pangeran Diponegoro on bottom-right. Lastly, on top-right is Sultan Iskandar Muda, I think.  

 

“Yang tidak berkepentingan dilarang masuk”. Unauthorized personnel forbidden to enter. Don’t tell me what to do, stupid sign! I have gun with unlimited ammo and you just stupid sign. Ok! This door can’t be opened. It’s just another wall. Moving on then.

 

There’s exit door on faculty office. But I need 3 more lost souls collected to open it. I get distracted by this school sign. SMU Harapan 5 Bandung. Jln Bilatung no. 5 Bandung. From quick search I know this school’s name and address is parody of SMUN 5 Bandung (Public High School 5 Bandung) which located in Belitung Road. Belitung is name of island east of Sumatra. As Bilatung, that’s maggot in Indonesian. Dreadout involves maggots at some point so this kind of foreshadowing. Anyway, as I distracted by this sign a Pocong ambushes me from left side. Scout_sf12_badmagic09

 

Hah! You spawn at the wrong side, stupid git. I have the high ground! What the heck? How you able to hit me when I’m up here! Scout_negativevocalization03.wav

 

The last pocong spawns near chair that’s under light, not far from that bastard that able to hit me even though I have high ground advantage. So, I go back to the faculty office and go to the exit door. Yes. It looks demonic but also silly because he has cross-eyed expression and tongue sticked out. Then I abruptly return to the main menu. No congratulation screen or credit roll. The game just ends as I reach the exit with all enemy’s souls collected. I though the exit door kills me while my health is only 1 pip. However, I reply the game, reach the exit door with 5 health pips and the result still the same. So, this is really the end. Let’s wrap things up then.

Digital Happiness’ Jurig Escape (2010) is rough yet serviceable short game. The control is fine. The flashlight follows the body instead of aim, which something that you may get used to. I believe the gun shooting is intended for the game because it’s simple to program. But kudo to developer to put more effort to change the gameplay from the gun shooting into photo shooting which feels more reasonable and family-friendly. The pocong will spawn after you walk near their spawn point, which is sensible for ghosts do that but quite often they give you so little space to engage with them safely. I wish I have shotgun instead of revolver pistol, for stronger close-range gun. But handgun is already super luxury in Indonesia. Another alternative for relatively allowed gun in Indonesia is hunting rifle for bird but it’s more cumbersome for close range combat and deal less damage than handgun, I think. As for the pocong themselves. Sure, they’re scary and iconic Indonesian ghost. But how do they exactly put misery on you. Their limbs are tied and what they can do is basically hopping or maybe some teleportation. They’re less flexible to attack than Jiangshi which has free arms even though stiff due to rigor mortis. Jiangshi can grab you and sink their teeth on your neck. As for pocong, I’m not sure what they can do. Staring at you very hard, I think. Then just don’t focus on their eyes. All I can think what Pocong can bring misery to you is: headbutt you, body splash on you, or do drop kick. The game settles with the first method. The real horror of this game come from the sound. There’s always shrilling sound in this game which nerve-wrecking for me much like in Kuon. Moreover, there are creepy laughter when picking up health item and cry of agony when picking up enemy’s soul.

 

Sure. I can recommend you to play Jurig Escape (2010). It’s free on steam and very short game. The question is: is your bravery big enough for to overcome the game’s scariness, though? This game is not for those with weak heart! I tell you.