As Dusk Falls

• Title — As Dusk Falls • Developer — Interior Night • Publisher — Xbox Game Studios Interior Night (PS4, PS5, GOG.com) • Engine — Unity • Platforms — * Windows • Xbox One • Xbox Series X/S • PlayStation 4 • PlayStation 5 • Released — Windows, XB1, XBX/S 19 July 2022 PS4, PS5 7 March 2024 • Genre — Adventure, interactive fiction • Modes — Single-player, multiplayer • Director — Caroline Marchal

The gameplay of As Dusk Falls revolves around interactive storytelling, as well as novel techniques used to gauge consensus among players for pivotal narrative decisions when playing co-operatively in its multiplayer modes. Its narrative is a multi-generational story about "two families whose trajectories collide in the Arizona desert in 1998."

In 1998, the Walker family—Vince, his wife Michelle, six-year-old daughter Zoe, and father Jim—are relocating to St. Louis, Missouri. On their way through Two Rock, Arizona they are involved in a car accident with the Holt brothers, Tyler, Dale, and Jay, and their car is left immobile. Unable to proceed, the family rent a room at a nearby motel, the Desert Dream. The Holt brothers arrive at the house of Sheriff Dante Romero, intending to steal the hundreds of thousands of dollars in his safe. The youngest brother, Jay, also takes a book on birds because he likes them. The Sheriff arrives home unexpectedly and the brothers flee, but Romero sees their truck and assigns his entire force to locating it. The brothers arrive to and take shelter in the Desert Dream, taking the Walkers, owner Joyce, and handyman Paul hostage, intending to hide until dusk. Based on choices made, the police are alerted in different ways and surround the Desert Dream. Various flashbacks reveal that the Walker marriage is struggling in Sacramento, California. Vince was fired from his job as an aircraft engineer after a technical fault that led to two people being injured and one killed. Despite having warned the owners of the fault, Vince is under pressure to take the blame in exchange for money. Michelle has also begun an affair, and Jim, long-absent from Vince's life, is suffering from a brain tumor. The Holts are revealed as a dysfunctional family kept in poverty by their gambling addict father Bear. The brothers robbed the Sheriff to pay off his debts and remove the threat to their lives from his debtors. Jay either prevents Bear killing himself for the insurance money or lets him die. The Holts' mother Sharon talks her way into the building by convincing the police she will convince the brothers to surrender. Instead she plots with them to escape. Romero makes contact with Vince and encourages him to locate a black book unwittingly stolen by the brothers. Working with Jay, they eventually realize it was inside the bird book he took. The black book details Romero's corrupt dealings including bribes and criminal money, all held in a single offshore account. Romero is adamant that the money belongs to dangerous people and he needs the book back, launching two futile assaults that get several officers shot and killed. Finally ramming a school bus through the front door of the motel, the bus is set on fire and explodes and the surviving Holts flee with a hostage, Vince or Zoe. Dale is shot and killed, and depending on decisions made, Michelle, Joyce, and Vince can also die.

The Holts are involved in a car crash, forcing Sharon and Tyler to flee, leaving Jay behind. Jay eventually recovers but is concussed and taken in by a young girl called Vanessa. The pair can bond before Jay leaves, eventually reuniting with Sharon and Tyler in a woodland cabin. He learns that Tyler intends to flee to Mexico with Sharon because Jay is not actually her son, he was born to her sister who died in childbirth. Jay decides to flee North to Canada alone. Jay escapes to Salt Lake City, Utah, and calls Vanessa for help. Struggling with her overbearing father and still mourning the loss of her brother, Vanessa runs away with Jay to help him escape. They stop at a house party in Idaho Falls, Idaho to ask Vanessa's old friend for help. Depending on decisions made, Vanessa can abandon Jay or agree to run away to Canada with him as a friend or lover. Jay can escape the pursuing FBI through Glacier National Park in Montana with or without Vanessa and leap into the water marking the border, being assumed dead, or he can be imprisoned. Sharon meets with Paul, Romero's cousin and an old friend. Depending on choices made, Paul can agree to run away with Sharon by emptying Romero's offshore account or get her arrested. In 2012, Zoe is revealed to still be suffering from nightmares and anxiety caused by her experience in the Desert Dream, especially as she has started receiving letters from Jay asking for her to write back. She speaks with Jim, who revealed to Vince previously that he lied about his tumor in an attempt to be closer to his estranged family. Jim now struggles with Alzheimer's, and encourages her to confront her own fears. Zoe tracks Jay down, revealing that he is either in prison or a fugitive in the Canadian wilderness; if he escaped with Vanessa in 1998, Jay explains that although he and Vanessa spent many years together, she eventually grew tired of living in hiding and moved to California. The ending is determined based on various choices made: Zoe can forgive Jay but ask that he no longer contact her, or she can turn him into the police; Jay can live free but on the run, be imprisoned, or executed; Tyler can be caught, or remain a fugitive working on an oil rig; Sharon can be caught or escapes to a tropical beach with Paul; Vince can take the blame for the aircraft incident and work an office job or sue the airline and open his own flying school; Michelle can die, be separated or still married to Vince, or engaged to someone else; and if Bear survives, he places flowers on Dale's grave. After Zoe returns from seeing Jay, she visits Jim and comes across him being assaulted by a stalker who runs past her as she looks on an unknown scene, while a phone message to Zoe from Jim reveals he has a secret past in Two Rock that he has never told anyone about.

As Dusk Falls was announced on 23 July 2020 at the Xbox Games Showcase event. Development was led by creative director Caroline Marchal, who was previously employed by Quantic Dream as a designer for the company's titles Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls. The game was released for Windows, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S on 19 July 2022. It also launched on Xbox Game Pass for cloud, console, and PC via Steam. It was released for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and GOG.com on 7 March 2024.

• Year — Award — Category — Result — Ref • 2022 — Golden Joystick Awards — Xbox Game of the Year • The Game Awards — Games for Impact • Innovation in Accessibility • 2023 — New York Game Awards — Herman Melville Award for Best Writing in a Game • Great White Way Award for Best Acting in a Game (Alex Jarrett) • British Academy Games Awards — Debut Game