Housekeeper: Anomaly

Housekeeper: Anomaly follows Valentine, a lonely merchant trying to survive in a broken world after a Soviet megastructure suffered “The Fall.” She scavenges an abandoned apartment complex, trades with settlements and fights anomalies while searching the floors for answers about what happened and deciding why she should keep surviving.

Explore the complex

The apartment complex is confusing and exhausting to explore, and anomalies fill its abandoned floors. They include shadows of former tenants, space funnels that rip your skin and mimics. Valentine must also manage her own condition, including thirst, hunger and panic.

Scavenge for supplies

You search shelves and drawers for anything that could help Valentine survive, while dealing with hazards such as shattered glass, locked drawers, tick infestations and blinding darkness. Time between settlements is limited, and anomalies take up some of it, so you must weigh cautious scavenging against moving quickly.

Trade with settlements

Trading can provide missing items, food and tools, but trash and broken flashlights are difficult to sell. You use merchant gambits and a keen eye to spot others’ fouls and negotiate better trades. Choices can carry moral costs, such as deciding whether to eat canned beans or trade a proper weapon to someone who needs it for defense.

Make choices

As Valentine, you uncover what happened in the abandoned floors and decide what to do in a world struggling with famine and anomalies. People have little time to talk, so conversations focus on what matters for practical use or for their sanity.

Handle every item

The tactile inventory gives you control over your belongings and the actions available for each item. You carry out tasks manually, including lighting candles, writing notes and cleaning a knife blade. You also organize goods for trade; for example, you can erase the expiry date on canned stew to try to sell it for more.