Release Date And Cast Announced For FMV Psychological Horror-Thriller, Hello Stranger
Aviary Studios and Paul Raschid (Deathtrap Dungeon: The Golden Room, Five Dates, The Gallery) have announced a new FMV (Full-Motion Video) game, Hello Stranger. It features top acting talent including George Blagden (Vikings), Sir Derek Jacobi (Gladiator II) and Christina Wolfe (FBI: International) and is coming to PC in May 2025.
Hello Stranger puts players in the shoes of Cam, a young man who lives and works entirely from his smart-home. Signing up with a social app called Hello Stranger to meet new people, Cam soon comes face-to-face with a malevolent masked individual. Cam quickly cuts the connection only to find that the stranger has hacked into the smart-home. Players, as Cam, need to complete three games to make it out alive or risk meeting a grisly end.
Aviary Studios notes that Hello Stranger contains “four hours of filmed content, 16 mini-games and 10 endings.”
Choice-Based Mechanics
Hello Stranger features two story modes: Cinema and Game. The first limits game interaction to strict decision-making, thereby creating something closer to an interactive movie. The latter incorporates a wide range of mechanics into the stranger’s games to present players with a complete FMV experience.
Players can also pick between Timed or Paused choices, to tailor Hello Stranger into something more intense, or better suited to group/live play.
FMV Meets Real Life
A unique strategy being used by Aviary Studios to promote its games is group gameplay movie theater screenings. Hello Stranger was shown in this way in 2024 to sold-out audiences at the prestigious Dinard Film Festival, as well as at the Red Sea Film Festival.
The studio’s previous title, The Gallery, was also shown in this way in movie theatres in the UK, China and France.
The writer/director of Hello Stranger, Paul Raschid, previously worked as a feature filmmaker. He wrote the sci-fi thriller White Chamber, which stars BAFTA award-winning actress Shauna Macdonald and was released on Netflix, after being screened at 10 notable film festivals.
Hello Stranger is published by Aviary Films, which is run by Paul’s father, Neville Raschid, who has decades of experience in the film industry with companies such as Warner Bros., Paramount and Village Roadshow.
