...Iru! (…いる!; titled "...They're Here!" in the fan translation) is a First Person Survival Horror game developed by Soft Machine and published by Takara for the PlayStation. The game was released in 1998, but only in Japan. The game draws heavy inspiration from H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos and even borrows several creatures from it.
The game follows a bunch of high school students and faculty who are preparing for an upcoming School Festival, when they find they've been locked in overnight. And they soon discover that they aren't alone.
Now, the protagonist, an upperclassman named Tatsuya Inaba, has to explore the school, solve puzzles, and find a way out before he's killed by the mysterious forces in the building currently stalking them.
After twelve years in development; a complete fan-translation of the game has been completed, and is now possible to play in English for the first time.
...Iru! contains examples of:
- Big Bad: There are two main villains, depending on the ending: in one, student Hikawa; in another, teacher Ms. Hojou.
- Cassandra Truth: When Inaba goes to Houjou-sensei and tells her about Rie killing Kyoka, and then coming after him, she doesn't believe him.
- Darkness Equals Death: The characters don't start dying until the power goes out.
- Dwindling Party: Characters tend to die over the course of the game.
- Eaten Alive: Nakamura's fate.
- Eldritch Abomination: A couple appear in the game.
- Hirose looks into a mirror that summons a hound of Tindalos that sucks out his innards with a proboscis-esque tongue.
- A shoggoth is summoned in the hallway and eats Nakamura.
- A deep one will run into Rm. 3-5 and maul Inaba if he breaks open the crate there with the wrong tool.
- Going Native: A student named Hiroshi was thrown to the ghouls in the caves under the school, but was spared by them and slowly became one. When Inaba/the player meets him, the Ghoul-Hiroshi seems quite content to live among the creatures.
- Half the Man He Used to Be: If Inaba approaches the shoggoth in the hallway, he'll be knocked to the ground and dragged toward it. Then the camera shows Inaba missing the lower half of his body.
- Heroic Sacrifice: In one sequence, Ms. Hojou shoves Inaba under a metal shutter, preventing him from being devoured by a monster. This only happens in the sequence where Ms. Hojou is not the Big Bad.
- The Many Deaths of You: The protagonist Inaba can die in several ways. He can look into the same mirror that Hirose did, which summons the hound of Tindalos anew to suck his innards out. He can approach the shoggoth in the hallway and get bitten in half by it. He can break open the box in Room 3-5, summoning a deep one to maul him. He can not bother about running or hiding when a possessed human or monster comes after him and get his neck broken, stabbed, or mauled or eaten.
- Missing Child: Mochizuki comes to one of the teachers near the beginning of the game about his brother going missing three years ago when he was enrolled at the school.
- Multiple Endings: There are three endings to the game, two of them in shades of bittersweet, and the third a Bad Ending.
- Neck Snap: After beating Kyouko up, a possessed Rie lifts her by the neck and kills her by snapping her neck. Inaba witnesses this and if he fails to hide from Rie, she repeats the technique on him.
- One-Word Title: Japanese allows for a sentence to be just the verb if the subject is deducible. "Iru" means "to be" or "to exist", often taking the form of "there is", and on its own in this context indicates the presence of something alive but undefined nearby, comparable in sentiment to English expressions such as "it's here" or "there's something out there" or "did you hear that?". Due to its shortness, "...Iru!" packs more of a punch.
- Our Ghouls Are Creepier: Ghouls are bulky and hunched creatures with purple skin that looks as if ravaged by mange and yellow eyes. They live in the caverns below Kirigaoka High, but possibly their underground territory extend to the whole island. For the most part, they're hostile towards humans, which they consider food, but they may also decide to spare an individual human and let them live with them. Over time, said human will turn into another ghoul physically but retain their human personality. This fate befell the student Hiroshi after he was thrown into the caverns to keep him quiet three years ago. He's quite content nowadays and prefers the simpler life of the ghouls.
- Shout-Out: ...Iru! makes many references to classic stories within the cosmic horror genre.
- Both the first monster and the last monster encountered are hounds of Tindalos from "The Hounds of Tindalos".
- The De Vermis Mysteriis features in the plot both as a clue to Hiroshi's disappearance and a source of arcane knowledge. The grimoire is from "The Secret in the Tomb".
- Three years ago, the student Hiroshi was left with the ghouls and instead of getting eaten, was accepted among them. Eventually, he became a ghoul. This plot point is inspired by Richard Pickman's fate in "Pickman's Model".
- Ms. Hojou is from a family native to Innsmouth for many generations and at a proper age she'll become a Deep One. This is a reference to "The Shadow over Innsmouth".
- Spooky Painting: All over the school is one that looks like two purple faces being pulled apart, with some kind of sideways mouth full of sharp, yellow teeth between them.
- Tears from a Stone: When Inaba places the porcelain vase in the arms of goddess statue in the forbidden room, the statue starts crying red-dyed tears into the vase.
- Tears of Blood: When Inaba places the porcelain vase in the arms of goddess statue in the forbidden room, the statue starts crying red-dyed tears into the vase. Though not actual blood, the substance that makes it red has valuable magical properties
- Total Eclipse of the Plot: There's a lunar eclipse occurring on the night you get locked in the school.