5 Days a Stranger
Windows - 2003
Description of 5 Days a Stranger
One of the best freeware adventure games I have ever played, 5 Days a Stranger is yet another excellent medium-sized adventure from Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw, the freelance author behind such classics as the Rob Blanc trilogy.
5 Days a Stranger is similar to his previous game The Trials of Odysseus Kent in terms of game length, but it is different from all of Yahtzee's previous games in all other ways. Which, given his talents, can only mean good things for us adventure gamers.
In contrast to Rob Blanc games, 5 Days a Stranger is neither a funny nor 'light' game. It is a serious horror/mystery game that is reminiscent of Clock Tower on the console and Alone in the Dark. You play Trilby, a veteran "gentleman thief" who broke into the supposedly empty DeFoe Manor in search of loot, only to find that something is amiss. Soon, you find that you are trapped in the house, and that four other people are trapped as well. Together, you must find secrets of the mansion and get the hell out - before it is all too late.
For a medium-length amateur game that you can finish in 2-3 hours, 5 Days a Stranger is near perfect. The graphics are more than adequate, there are no pixel-hunting puzzles to annoy you, and all the characters - including various DeFoe personnages you will learn about - are interesting. Each of the four NPCs that are trapped in the house with you has his or her own personality and agenda, although it's too bad dialogue choices (which are well-written) are not more adaptive: sometimes after you find a horrible event you can only say "how are you doing" to certain people.
This nitpick aside, the game is a lot of fun to play. The focus is clearly on plot and characters than on puzzles, which are quite easy to solve. The plot is unravelled in an exciting way, with many long cut-scenes and books you can read up on DeFoe history. Despite its cartoony graphics, 5 Days a Stranger managed to startle me a few times - something that speaks highly of how effective it is as a horror game.
If you are a fan of Clock Tower or horror genre in general, 5 Days a Stranger will not disappoint. Two thumbs up, way up!
Review By HOTUD
External links
Captures and Snapshots
Comments and reviews
Holograman 2021-12-02 1 point
It's a good game, but I thought it was always free on bigbluecup aka adventuregamestudio. I even played the sequel, 7 Days a Skeptic, which was also a great adventure game. Wonder why it's here as abandonware.
larry 2021-10-24 0 point
i remember that game, coming as a successful effort to reply in kind, old school ScummVM games. now it takes effort to run it on win 10...
i think, that's what they called "nostalgia of nostalgia".
Lemon 2021-08-27 0 point
A really nice game! My only problems were the dialogue boxes seemed a little buggy and sometimes on the 5th day the game would randomly crash when using the stairs. It only happened twice but I'd recommend saving your game frequently.
Also I would highly suggest going to the developer's website under the "external links" section since he has a deluxe version of the game up for free which has some new content & bug fixes. Cheers!
Perry Rhodan 2021-08-26 0 point
How to run AGS games on Modern Operating Systems.
1. Download and install AGS: https://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/site/ags/ Copy acwin.exe to the game directory. Also, copy SDL2.dll to the same directory. Download from here if needed. https://www.libsdl.org/download-2.0.php
2.Then create a new .bat file with the same name as the game you're trying to run and add the following command and save it. For example, I created a file called 5 Days A Stranger.bat with the following command: acwin.exe --setup (don't forget to save)
3. Then run the new .bat file you created and it will now allow you to change settings for the game. Choose whatever settings you want and save, and the game should hopefully now work under Windows 7, 8.1 & 10.
hjk321 2019-01-30 4 points
How to run on windows 10:
In compatibility properties for the main exe, set it to run in Windows 95 mode, enable 16 bit colors, and run in 640x400 with administrator permissions.
Launch the WinSetup program and set it to run in windowed mode at 640x400. You are now free to play the game.
ZambiGazmzz 2018-07-31 5 points
Never played this until now, was interested because the description mentioned Clock tower and other Survival Horror games.
When I downloaded the game one of the first things I read on the readme file was "- So, don't come running to me when you expect a light-hearted runaround, and find instead insane ghosts and people being murdered in nasty ways." This only made me more excited to play it.
Game is Fantastic, and for anyone having trouble running it,
Change color resolution on your computer to 16-bit!!
Run in Window mode,
And for a larger window run in 640x400
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