Netflix’s Unhinged turns your phone into a horror game controller

Netflix will release Unhinged on June 30. All you need is a Netflix account and a phone. The game turns a habit most streamers already have, glancing down at a handset while something plays on the TV, into the control scheme for a horror story built around Ava, voiced by Zoë Kravitz, as she tries to survive inside her apartment building during a Category 5 hurricane.

Ava is trapped with the stairwell locked shut, while her best friend Claire, voiced by Sadie Sink, calls from across the street and Ben, voiced by Troy Baker, stays in the mix as the situation closes in. The game is designed to run about the length of one episode of a favorite show.

The game links through a QR code in the Netflix Games row, then uses the phone as an in-story controller. The handset’s movement tracks 1:1 with Ava’s hands, so players can sweep a flashlight through dark rooms and make split-second calls when interactive objects appear. The phone also becomes part of the fiction: it rings, vibrates, and plays call audio when Ava gets texts or calls, while the TV handles the environmental soundscape.

The game will be available to all Netflix subscribers. Netflix built in two modes. Story Mode removes the timer and prevents death, while Standard Mode adds a shrinking timer bar and checkpoint restarts if you miss the right object in time. There are no ads or in-game purchases. IGN's hands-on puts the runtime at just under an hour, while Polygon's hands-on pegs it closer to 30 minutes. The game was built in the Unity engine.

Night School Studio is the Netflix-owned team behind Oxenfree. Game director Sam Warner said the team drew inspiration from the Wii and Nintendo DS.