PINEGRAVE

Pinegrave: A Cryptid Hunt

The legends are real, and somebody has to prove it.

You arrive in Pinegrave, a small mountain town where everyone has a story and nobody has proof. Armed with a camera, a flashlight and a plaster kit, you set out to document the creatures the world says don't exist.

Days are short. Nights are long, and they're dangerous.

Use the daylight to stock up at the gas station, follow tracks, pour footprint casts, collect samples and talk to locals who swear they've seen something. When the sun goes down, set your trail cams, kill the engine and wait in the dark.

Five cryptids, each true to its legend.

Bigfoot shadows you through the campsite woods, knocks on trees, throws rocks and hides behind trunks to watch you. Mothman haunts the town. The Chupacabra stalks the farm edge, a beast lurks under the lake, and the Yeti waits up on the ridge.

Evidence is everything.

Snap handheld photos, cast footprints, catch trail cam footage and record witness interviews in town. Sell junk to the tabloids for quick cash, or build real credibility until the museum will take your work seriously. Your reputation unlocks new ground, from town and campsite out to the swamp, the lake and the snowy ridge.

The woods notice you.

The forest goes quiet right before contact. Wood knocks and howls echo out of the dark, fog rolls in over the swamp, and your flashlight flickers as static and whispers creep into your gear. Something stands just past the edge of your light. Town rumors grow from whispers to full-blown gossip, and a low dread builds the closer the danger gets.

Push too far and you pay for it.

Get caught at night and you wake up at the trailhead, minus that night's unsaved evidence and a piece of your gear.

Scary, but not a gore-fest. It's survival tension built on real folklore.

Coming soon to Windows PC.

Field guide

Day and night

A default 21-minute cycle divides the expedition into a 7-minute day and a 14-minute night, flanked by short dawns and dusks. Day and night lengths can both be adjusted in the settings.

Gear & evidence

You begin with a flashlight, camera, 3 plaster kits, 2 trail cams, an air horn, and $150. Evidence takes five distinct forms:

  • Handheld photos: checked for whether the cryptid was in frame, how visible it was, distance, and flashlight lighting.
  • Plaster casts: poured into fresh ground footprints.
  • Trail cam captures: automated photos left along travel paths.
  • Physical samples: hair tufts, shed scales, and dropped feathers.
  • Witness statements: first-hand accounts recorded from local townsfolk.

Banking & buyers

Evidence carries risk until you return to camp and bank it at the tent door. Three buyers purchase your findings:

  • The tabloid (payphone): pays fast and buys anything, but passing junk hurts your credibility.
  • The museum: requires credibility 25 and quality 60%+, accepts casts, photos and samples, and pays the highest rate.
  • The online channel (laptop): takes photos and trail cam clips, pays modest money, but builds fame.

The cryptids

Every cryptid is dangerous and visible only at dusk and night. By day they stay hidden and leave physical signs.

A large hairy figure half hidden behind a pale tree trunk in a flashlight beam at night

Bigfoot

Home zone: Campsite woods

Hides behind tree trunks and peeks out, ducking back when looked at or lit. Shadows you along the treeline. Wood knocks, whoops and howls, and sometimes answers your air horn. Throws sticks and rocks near you as warnings. Avoids flashlight and campfire light, retreats when photographed, and escalates to a charge only if pushed or lingered on.

Evidence: Footprint plaster casts, hair samples, photos.

A dark winged figure on a pole lit by a flashlight

Mothman

Home zone: Pinegrave town

Perches atop utility poles, street lamps, and the gas station roof. Drawn directly to flashlight beams. Menace builds while illuminated or looked at; at full menace, it swoops. Based on Point Pleasant lore: it watches, follows, and telegraphs before a provoked dive, with omens filtering through local residents. Air horns and flares drive it to the farthest perch.

Evidence: Shed feathers, photos. Leaves no footprint casts.

A wooden pen and shed lit by a flashlight at night

Chupacabra

Home zone: Swamp & farm edge

Circles the goat pen and is lured by deployed bait. Fast, twitchy, and skittish; bolts when struck by flashlight beams or sudden movements. Screeches sharply when launching an attack.

Evidence: Tracks, hair samples, photos.

Ripples and a dark shape breaking the surface of a misty lake

Lake beast

Home zone: The lake

Submerged in the depths, breaking the surface with ripples more frequently the longer you remain still on the dock or in a rowboat. Can lunge at players standing at the end of the dock at night. Yields the highest photograph payouts in the game.

Evidence: Scale samples washed up by day, photos. Leaves no casts.

A pale figure standing on a snowy ridge under a purple sky

Yeti

Home zone: Snowy ridge

Watches and stalks across the snow, leaving tracks. Blizzards and whiteouts lower visibility at night, and an avalanche chute can catch players after dark. Roars when stalking or attacking. The Yeti draws from Sherpa and Tibetan belief and is treated respectfully.

Evidence: Footprint plaster casts, hair samples, photos.

The zones

All zones are reached by driving the pickup truck from the trailhead. Each environment features its own lighting mood and synthesized ambient sound bed.

Campsite woods

Unlocked from the start alongside Pinegrave town. Dense birches and pines surrounding your base camp and tent banking station.

Pinegrave town

Unlocked from the start. Features the gas station gear store (flashlights, headlamps, plaster kits, trail cams, batteries, bait, night vision, thermal, flares, air horns) and resident homes. Store, witnesses, and buyers are open by day only.

Swamp & farm edge

Requirement: Credibility 15 and 2 banked evidence. Bald cypress, rolling fog on some nights, and the farm edge goat pen the Chupacabra circles.

The lake

Requirement: Credibility 25, fame 8, and 4 banked evidence. Oaks at the water's edge, a dock and a rowboat.

Snowy ridge

Requirement: Credibility 40, fame 20, and 6 banked evidence. Snowy spruce, blizzards and an avalanche chute.

Townsfolk

Pinegrave is inhabited by ten named residents, each with their own home, job, and day/night schedule. During the night, residents may observe a cryptid event or endure a false alarm. Speaking with them the following day yields a one-time report delivered in their own words—complete with when and where it took place, along with a reliability rating. Speaking to them adds a lead to your field journal, a map marker, and witness evidence.

Your Field Journal (J) tracks active leads with direction and distance, banked evidence organized by cryptid, and a full zone map detailing unlock conditions.

Atmosphere

An Eerie Intensity setting (Low, Medium, High) scales eight dynamic systems:

  1. Quiet woods: The ambient forest bed goes quiet 20 to 40 seconds before a cryptid makes contact.
  2. Directional knocks & howls: Wood knocks and distant vocalizations come from a real direction, with a subtitle naming it, and are sometimes answered from the other side.
  3. Rolling fog: Fog rolls through the swamp and lake on some nights.
  4. Mothman static: Proximity produces heavy film grain, flashlight flicker, and faint whispers.
  5. Peripheral eyeshine: Glowing eye pairs appear just outside your flashlight cone, vanishing the moment you turn toward them (maximum of one per night).
  6. Trail cam near-misses: Trail cam captures that barely missed the subject provide directional hints on where to re-aim.
  7. Town rumors: Whispers evolve into talk and then outright gossip across successive nights.
  8. Dread swell: A low-frequency drone and rising heartbeat swell with threat level, snapping back when tension breaks.