The Gray Painter

Hosted Games

Contains adsIn-app purchases

About this game

In this unsettling, mature story with a set main character, help average office worker Ash gain the confidence to make new friends in an exclusive nude painting group. "The Gray Painter" is a 145,000-word, 20-chapter interactive novel. It’s entirely text-based, fueled by the vast, unstoppable power of your imagination.

You can select Ash’s sex, gender, and orientation. Ash begins the game in a relationship with Harper, a gender-selectable partner. The option to break up with Harper becomes available in Chapter 9.

Praise for the Gray Painter:
* "I haven't been able to stop thinking about it."
* "I came in without expectations and was pleasantly surprised. The characters feel deeply flawed but still understandable. My first impressions of everyone were all totally wrong."
* "What just happened, I was utterly not expecting that, stop messing with my head!!!!"

"The Gray Painter" depicts drug and alcohol use, smoking, inferred suicide, explicit sexual content, horror, and high-impact violence and gore. The story also features themes of body insecurity and dysmorphia. This is a story for adults aged 18 and up.
* Play as straight, gay, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, or all of the above.
* Meet seven complex, flawed, human characters.
* Immerse yourself in the sprawl of New Jersey in 2012.
* Turn a mild-mannered accountant towards a life of sex, drugs, and rock & roll.
* There are no secrets in this game. And if there were any secrets, it's best not to look for them.

Ratings and reviews

Really weird game. Very unique plot. Love the horror elements lying underneath a story which felt benign but slightly off, and the ability to play through the "real" story afterwards. Some uncomfortable content in this one (even beyond the gore) but maybe I'm just a prude. I didn't always love the dialogue between characters, which at times felt very unnatural (especially the excessive swearing at weird times which came across as forced.) All in all an interesting read.

This was... incredibly unsettling. And it was FANTASTIC!! I was tense and left overthinking about things while playing. Little details or dialogue here and there would only add to that unease, that sense of *wrongness* I'd get sometimes but lack the proof to justify the feeling. All of the story threads tied together beautifully, in the end. I still have questions and I immediately went back to find what I'd missed. Very, very well done! One of the best IFs I've read, honestly!

Very unique experience. I really like all the characters, especially Harper. Also, definitely play it a second time. The second playthrough feels more like an extension of the first, and that's where it all really comes together. It's also fun reading the change in dialogue as Ash grows and understands more overtime.

What's new

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