Nothing says romance like the imminent risk of death -- either to your crush or to whom they've targeted for their next kill.

Grave Seasons is the debut game from studio Perfect Garbage Studios, which I tried out at last year's Summer Game Fest with the briefest of looks at the Stardew Valley-like cozy farming game with a serial killer running amok. At this year's SGF, I got my second look at a new demo that revealed a lot more about how the game's more grisly mechanics of investigating and preventing future deaths work. 

Naturally, fans of the upcoming game, published by Blumhouse Games and due out later this year, clamor for more than murder. So I asked narrative director Emmett Nahil for everything he could share about what it's like to date villagers in Grave Seasons -- and yes, that includes romancing the killer.

Over half an hour of playtime, a few hours into the game, the second demo revealed a bit more of how Grave Seasons works. As was previously known, it's not a one-and-done story -- you can endlessly repeat the game, with the serial killer randomly assigned among the villagers. This demo revealed a bit more about how these runs will work, though there's still a lot that Perfect Garbage hasn't disclosed, and it's still unclear how a full run of murder, romance, farming and growing the village of Ashenridge will look. 

Through the new demo, I learned about the flow of a standard playthrough, which spans four seasons, each lasting 30 days of in-game time tracked on a calendar much like in the Persona game series. During the month, there are some large, unskippable events that round up the whole village, along with others that are optional -- and while you may miss out on chatting with someone cute, it's also the perfect time to do crime. 

The game starts with your character alluding to escaping from incarceration, and while lying low, you use a trusty crowbar to break into a vacant farm to take up residence. Thereafter, you can use that tool for other unlawful business -- namely, cracking into townsfolk's homes for some less-than-legal investigation. With a murderer abound, you can't take chances.

At this spring's PAX East gaming event, Perfect Garbage was pleasantly surprised to see that players weren't shy about shady activity, immediately wanting to break and enter, suggesting they're ready "to be a little bit spicy, a little bit amoral sometimes" for a good cause, Nahil said. This affinity for crime should distinguish his game from others with more wholesome, law-abiding tones. Grave Seasons aims to scratch a different itch.

"Everyone likes to learn things that they're not supposed to. I think that sense of eavesdropping on gossip and digging out secrets is something that a lot of people are attracted ot in a narrative," Nahil said. "We are definitely leaning into the drama, even outside of the murders."

Breaking your way into village secrets

In my demo, I met the sweet, burly man Hari right after "adopting" my farm, and then roamed into the village to break into his home, as Nahil suggested. Lo and behold, in his bathroom was a spooky-looking bathtub distillery powered by a mysterious crystal, which I stole -- I needed it to juice up the cryptic machine in my adopted farm's basement. This mechanism lets me assemble strange ingredients into arcane recipes that will ward off a killer and protect one potential victim at a time.

These "occult preventative methods," as Nahil calls them, are some of the big mechanics of the game. It's not a whodunit to figure out the killer -- it's playing to see how the town develops, especially if you opt not to save townsfolk.

"Once you see a murder or two, you might be able to identify pretty easily what kind of creature they are, and so we really want to focus on that prevention or lack thereof and how that changes the town itself," Nahir said.

What "kind of creature" is the key phrase there, as killers will be one of many varieties of supernatural beings. In the demo last year, I saw a massive wolfman-like beast in the shadows with red eyes tear into a villager. Nahir implied that some of those occult preventative methods will follow conventional mythological associations -- for instance, assembling silver, which many myths suggest is effective against werewolves and vampires -- but didn't go into specifics.

The killer will never target the player, but they can be interacted with. While you aren't playing a detective tracking down the murderer in Grave Seasons, you do have "choices and outcomes," Nahil hinted: "Confronting the killer in these moments is about how effectively you've prepared, not how effectively you can choose a certain dialog tree. You can't really roll charisma to convince the killer to stop."

"They're on a mission of their own, and they have a storyline of their own, and they have their own reasons for killing, so you aren't necessarily able to talk your way out of what's happening," Nahil said. 

What you can talk your way into are other villagers' hearts.

Love in a time of murder

When death stalks the town of Grave Seasons, romance changes depending on who the killer is -- including whether you accidentally or intentionally romance them, Nahil said. 

"We like to show off the branching and the variability that's intrinsic in our game based on who the murderer is at that given moment," Nahil said. "We like to showcase a lot of variability and a lot of reactivity to player choice, even in our romance routes."

There's a lot Nahil and Perfect Garbage aren't saying just yet, including the number of romances that are possible among the villagers -- not all of whom will be open to romance. But among those that are, they'll fall to the player character's charms no matter which gender presentation is chosen at character creation (from what I saw in this demo, there's a variety of body types, hair types and more that can be mixed and matched without restriction). This balances what's colloquially known as a "playersexual" approach that doesn't restrict romance options to specific sexualities, while also roping off some villagers who aren't available or interested.

"We've curated that pool [of romance options] to really lean into the complexity of story and to account for [variation] if you are romancing the killer," Nahil said.

And there's romancing the killer, which is rare in games -- but not in other media, like romance books, films and TV shows. The rise of enthusiasm for that flavor of twisted love has bolstered the Perfect Garbage devs.

"Dark romance is a huge draw in a variety of different games and media, so we are happy to embrace those players and folks who want to explore something a little bit more spicy, a little bit more controversial in their romances," Nahil said.