First Impressions - Servant of the Lake

Has it only been two years since the last Rusty Lake game? It feels like an eternity since Underground Blossom graced our computers, which is testament to how memorable their games are. A demo of their latest adventure, Servant of the Lake, places you on the staff at the Vanderboom estate to help out for a few days. The first job is actually getting into the house. 

If you have played any of the developer’s games before, diving into this world is like putting on a comfortingly macabre blanket: warm, and possibly containing a dead mouse in its folds. The art style hasn’t changed much since their first game a decade ago. Voice acting is sparse and eerily delivered, and the jobs you have to do are mundane on the face of it (make breakfast, get your master out of bed), but with their own twists. 

Puzzles are a mixture of the logical and surreal. Combinations to locks or sequences you need to discover can be found in everything from moving paintings to toy soldiers, while the residents of the Vanderboom estate are delightfully weird. Few games let you casually lop off a man’s earlobe before feeding it to a crow, but here, that barely registers as strange.

The demo will only take about twenty minutes to complete — shorter if you’re familiar with Rusty Lake’s eccentricities — but it provides an intriguing introduction. Fans of the series will know that the line of succession is fraught with unfortunate incidents, so the promise of a gathering may flesh out the Vanderboom family’s backstory even further.

It’s a short but engaging return to a kooky world, and it seems like Rusty Lake has not yet exhausted the Twin Peaks-esque weirdness it kicked off ten years prior. Who is hiding in the floorboards, dropping off animal carcasses for you to use? We may never find out — but exploring the estate will be a pleasure when the full game arrives next year. 

Servant of the Lake is scheduled for release in Spring 2026 on PC and mobile. Check back with Jump Dash Roll for a full review!