Emily Wants to Play

Gameplay

The game begins with a pizza delivery man, controlled by the player, walking into a house on his last pizza delivery. Upon entering, the front door closes and is locked, presumably by Emily, since she appears for an instant in front of the door. The player must then survive the night from 11pm until 6am in the morning. Each hour of the game is a new level. The player can explore the house freely looking for clues as to why they are trapped inside. Various notes and recordings containing story elements are spread out in different rooms. At a fixed amount of time the hour changes and new gameplay elements are added in the form of a doll or Emily. The player must then figure out how to interact with each doll and Emily herself in order to survive the hours. If a doll or Emily attacks the player, in the form of a jump scare, then the player loses and the game is over. The player will be restarted at the beginning of the last hour. There are various clues on notes and on a whiteboard in the kitchen that help the player to learn how to handle a doll when it appears. The mechanic of each doll and Emily's game build upon each other. The player may have to run, stay still, or face a certain direction to survive. During the final level, the player must survive all of these elements in combination.

Plot

A month ago, two people were found dead in the living room of their house as they were packing up to move. A pizza is ordered to the house using an online pizza delivery service by what is presumably a deceased and ghostly girl named Emily. A pizza man comes to the house to fulfill the order. Details in the order explain that the door is open and to walk right in. When the pizza man walks in, the door is closed and locked behind him. During his stay in the house, the pizza man notices boxes stacked around the house as if it looked like whoever lives here is preparing to move to a new home along with a laptop with the online pizza delivery service in the kitchen and encounters Emily and three living dolls named Kiki, Mr. Tatters, and Chester. They want to play variations of children's games with him such as peek-a-boo, tag, red light green light, and hide-and-seek. A whiteboard in the kitchen tells the opposite of what he has to do to survive. If the pizza man plays these games correctly and survives from 11 to 6, Emily and the dolls will let him go free. When the pizza man finally escapes, the police come back to check the house. A news report exclaims that the pizza delivery man is now under psychiatric evaluation, but the dolls matching his description have been recovered.

According to the notes in the house, Emily was a depressed girl who found some dolls in the basement. She considered the dolls her friends, but her parents would like to take them away from her. The recordings left behind seem to be from Emily's mother, and were recorded to help with her own depression. The recordings explain that Emily was acting strangely ever since they moved here, presumably because she didn't like her new home. Emily was showing signs of erratic and violent behavior which led her to harm other children at school and murder the dog that they bought her. Because of this, her parents decided to keep her at home and lock her in the basement. During this time, Emily found the dolls, and even stranger occurrences started to happen. The dolls appeared in different places around the house without anyone moving them, and Emily has opened up a giant hole in the floor of her room that would be impossible for a small child to do. Emily was found lifeless one day in the basement, leading the parents to decide they should move from the house.

News audio that plays on a staticky television explains that a couple was killed a month ago while they were preparing to move. This is presumably Emily's parents, and someone had killed them before they were able to move, which could possibly be Emily or one of her dolls.

There are hints to a possible subplot. The phrases "Join Us" and "We Are One" can be seen written on a few notes, on the bottom of a crashed Windows computer and heard at the end of a recording in the basement. There is also a strange figure depicted behind what looks like Emily and her dolls on the back of one of the notes.

Development

The developer, Shawn Hitchcock, announced that he will be releasing Emily Wants To Play on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, creating a VR update and a sequel.