Ah, so many memories, I'll never forget the '90s and the widescreen home video format so characteristic of that time :p

It looks interesting, though.

I dunno, the whole point of The Backrooms meme is how creepy empty fluorescent-lit office buildings are in and of themselves, and how much creepier to be stuck in one that never ends.

Cutting down the lighting and adding gross out elements like roach swarms or blood-dripping abattoirs kinda misses the point, IMO.

These features (quotes taken from gamepage accessed just now) sound especially awesome to me:

[i]Stamina System: You won't be able to outrun it. It will catch you as it never gets tired.

Mark-Your-Paths: Tools that can be used for path-marking such as a spray gun to help you to mark your path so you don't get lost.

Doors, crawl spaces and more: Roam around hallways, passages, crawl spaces and rooms. Be sure to close the doors behind you, or it can notice.

Changing Environment: The environment may change with your sanity in The Backrooms. That's why it's vital to mark your path.[/i]

The problem is that a completely empty place may work for a short video or story, but in a video game you have to include something to do and new threats if you don't want to bore the player to death.

I'm glad this game made it to GOG, it's one of the most promising ones born on this recent trend about the Backrooms.

Yep. The original idea is isolation from the real world and the feeling of loneliness in a world that felt unnatural and disquieting.
By adding monsters, it became just another typical labyrinthine world that's been overused for a decade. It was scary during Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It was scary when it was Cry of Fear, it was scary when it was Penumbra. but they're all old games that pioneered the labyrinthine horror genre. It might work for those games but The Backrooms is completely different horror altogether.

Social isolation is a thing. Fear of loneliness and fear or at least disquieting feeling of seeing manmade places that don't have people in it is a real thing. We're all social animal, even the introverts still want to have social interaction even if it only once a week. So surprisingly the majority of humanity have the same shared fear.

So "Backrooms" is the new horror meme to replace Slenderman I guess.

I don't think it needs much to do, as long as the environment is well executed.

I found Anemoiapolis (the beta) super interesting despite -- or perhaps even thanks to -- being very very empty. https://q-andrew.itch.io/anemoiapolis

That said, the setting is definitely richer than the typical backrooms corridor maze, and I don't know if it scores very high on "horror" as such. It's beautiful, dreamlike, surreal, but it can feel a little unsettling too. After all, you are alone, you don't know what's out there, and there are dark places..

I fully agree. There are a lot of different Backrooms games out there and the interpretation of The Complex: Found Footage is much closer to the original idea of The Backrooms theme:

https://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/the_complex_found_footage

They made a game based off the YouTube series? Erm sure...why not? Ha, ha!

It was all started from one pic and a post from 4chan. People creativity drive is amazing.
If you think it's rare, it's not. Bobba Fett was prime example. From short appearance in early Star Wars to a full blown TV series.

Yeah but Boba Fett was created by Star Wars, not by the Internet. Very strange.

Survival Horror... no guns... Something is not right there. Even the Silent Hill series has guns and is terryfing... so no, guns are not there to make you feel safe. How we've fallen with all these "hide and run" horror games (some are great, don't get me wrong, but I for once don't care if I can't defend myself).

It was an example about how a small thing, seemingly unimportant element can become a big thing in entertainment media no matter what the source is.

Okay I get that.