What’s the genre called for games that recreate a desktop PC interface? There’s gotta be a name right, there’s enough games to justify it, but PC game is kind of already taken as a term. In any case, while we ponder over that question, let’s look at an upcoming addition to that genre, Imprinted, a horror game where you are tasked with restoring mysterious, damaged cassette tapes.

You are Vincent Brandt – no, not you, you, the game you, you – an ” engineer specialized in audio restoration of all sorts,” who has been contacted over these aforementioned audio tapes from the late ’70s. The tapes come from the collection of an experimental musician who disappeared under “suspicious circumstances,” and as you fix them up more and more, you fall deeper into a conspiracy-filled rabbit hole. Some immediate Her Story vibes structurally here, but the devs cited that one as a direct inspiration, so no surprise there.

Ah, there we go, here’s the term we were looking for, right on the game’s Steam page – it’s a “fake OS” game. Part of your job includes analysing and reconstructing those tapes of course, but there’s a plethora of photos, texts, notes and more to go through that dig deeper into Vince’s own life. When it comes to the main job itself, however, you have the opportunity to record your own version of the missing musician’s tracks, something that’ll surely end well.

There’s some cute touches on the Steam page too, like the initial description being essentially a Craigslist ad, with the about section offering an in-world response. It’s neat! No release date just yet though, so you’ll just have to add it to the ol’ wishlist for the time being.