The Alighieri Circle Demo Review - Atmospheric Horror Walking Sim Impressions

The demo for The Alighieri Circle is available as of February 19, 2026, and it is a great introduction to what the full game will entail. I absolutely recommend that fans of the horror walking sim genre try the demo out for themselves.

The Alighieri Circle demo begins with our protagonist Gabriele returning to his ancestral home, which we can explore at our own pace. The demo does not last very long - roughly 40 minutes - but I spent around an hour exploring every nook and cranny of the spooky, dusty mansion. I found a few elements that I want to highlight, which have me excited for the release of the full game.

Most importantly, The Alighieri Circle clearly has a lot of talent behind it when it comes to building tension and atmosphere. Audio design in this genre is very important, and every minute of play is blanketed in a thick soundscape that complements the liminal emptiness of the mansion. Each room has an ambient tension to the audio, which is occasionally accompanied by creaking or what sounds like scurrying around every dark corner. The audio direction is incredible. A lot of the cutscenes are in-engine, which helps to keep the player immersed, and the voice acting during these is very effective. The writing leans into some heavy topics of self-actualization, and the acting on display raises my expectations of the final product.

The visual design is likewise high quality. Every inch of the mansion is rich with furniture and decor in a way that helps to establish the eerie nature of an abandoned old house. The game is not necessarily hyperrealistic, but every part of the environment is rendered with good enough detail to aid in immersion. The standout in this regard has to be the lighting system. The lights would often flicker in sections, and some corridors would have very strong lighting to draw the eye. A later section of the demo expertly uses color and otherworldly design to create striking visuals.

Typical of the genre, there aren't any combat encounters or pulse-pounding chases shown off in the demo. However, what is featured shows more potential than any of those elements could. The main task of this demo is straight out of Resident Evil's playbook: explore to find three statues that fit on an altar to unlock the contraption. I took it slow and spent about an hour, but these were relatively easy to find. Iconic in Resident Evil games, these kinds of scavenger hunt segments encourage the player to pay attention to notable objects throughout the game. The puzzles in Resident Evil are often used to pace the player and can be expertly applied to make for a creative and remarkable adventure. From the tiny slice of The Alighieri Circle we get to see, I think that the gameplay design will most likely match the impressive quality of the audio and visual elements. All that is to say: Keep your eye on this one! Fans of the genre, take note.