Madness reigns. The first challenge your soul must endure is the lobby. You wait with your feeble flashlight hoping to get your "Blind the killer 3 times" tome challenge, causing the killer to bring a Mori and creating a perfect circular vortex of toxicity that encompasses the entire lobby. Once you attain access to the trial, you jog to the nearest generator only to discover that this is a false achievement; the killer has equipped Corrupt Intervention. Across the map, other survivors frantically stop and start in chase with no apparent thought or plan--- turns once begun are quickly abandoned, pallets thrown with unmatched recklessness, the players seemingly immune to physics. At last you find a free generator, but the price is having to compete with Huntress's Lullaby. In the Killer Shack, human beings scramble like beetles whose rock has been upended. They all want the flashlight save. The killer equipped Lightborn. It is a grotesque parody of the bazaar at Marrakesh, as if dumb animals had been granted only the amount of sentience required to mock humanity. Meg disconnects on her first hook. The exit gates are difficult to find. You must search for NOED. The constant running back and forth causes a numbness that borders on profound despair. The killer camps you on hook. They swing their weapon at your dangling carcass and nod. Your conscious mind registers merely annoyance, impatience. But on a cellular level, your body cries out in weariness. The fatigue you feel is a warning: millions of years of evolution trying to save you from becoming mired in the tar, from sinking into the warm blackness of the fog and ultimately being reclaimed by The Entity itself. There is a quarter of the Endgame Collapse remaining. Ash runs to your aid. He hook trades, sacrificing himself for you. You may not have completed your challenge, but you have escaped with clarity, hope for humanity, and a newfound respect of Ash mains. Perhaps some kind people remain in this chaotic realm after all.

HeatStroke has awesome visuals and music, plus an amazing story that reminded me of "Flowers For Algernon" in the beginning and "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream" towards the end. Made me realize how abysmally slow of a typist I am after 8 consecutive hours of playing.