It’s a sad fact that buying a house in this day and age seems like an impossibility unless a miracle happens, like winning he lottery or benefiting from the death of a long-lost and unknown relative who happens to have nobody but us left in the world. We are the forever-renters, and that’s a scary and precarious thing to be.

Renting your home definitely has its perks, but it also leaves you at risk of suddenly finding yourself being hurled out of it at the whim of the landlord. What would you do if you had a week left on your tenancy and suddenly found yourself looking for somewhere else to live? That’s the premise of Don’t Get Your Hopes Up. 

This artistic and experimental visual novel by former Yaddo fellow Krish Raghav focuses on the housing crisis in Amsterdam, although it’s not an experience that is limited to those living in the Dutch city. The lack of affordable and acceptable housing is a worldwide issue facing an entire generation of renters, so Don’t Get Your Hopes Up is staggeringly relatable, wherever you happen to live. 

A realistic portrayal

The story of Don’t Get Your Hopes Up spans the week before you need to leave the current apartment. Every morning begins with the Ritual of Applications, in which you send out dozens of applications to view houses, and then you go off to work or viewings that you already have booked. The search for a new place to call home consumes and takes over your life, which is entirely too relatable. 

Even the process of narrowing down the search is one that I’m painfully familiar with, though the specifics differ somewhat. In the game, the number of apartments drops when you lower the budget and then remove the parking spaces for rent. 

As someone in a university city, if you replace the parking spaces with student housing, I’ve had exactly the same experience. You end up with only a handful of houses, none of them in budget, and none in the location you want them to be. God forbid families have homes to live in, all of them must go to students.

Finding somewhere to belong

As someone who has spent their entire adult life entrenched in the revolving cycle of rental properties, tenancies, and moving experiences, I can safely say that Don’t Get Your Hopes Up hits home in a particular way that will ensure I will never forget the hour-long experience of playing through it. 

The daily, constant grind of trawling through rental listings and applying for them even though they’re outside of your price range, because you know more applications means a greater chance of being accepted. The joy you get when attending a viewing, only to be looked down on by the realtor because you have a child or a pet. The rapid approach of panic and the encroaching desperation to just find something make you accept things that would usually be out of the question. 

That sense of chaos and desperation is aided in Don’t Get Your Hopes Up by the absolutely insane things that happen during viewings, from a strange and future-predicting dollhouse that doesn’t really exist, to an exhibit which will have you as the stars of an exhibitionist display should you accept the tenancy. Those things you’re suddenly willing to accept purely to have a roof over your head, and I felt that in my gut, because I’ve been there.

Nothing to lose

Don’t Get Your Hopes Up is a visual novel that everyone should play through, whether they’ve spent their life renting or are privileged to own their own home – and, yes, owning your own home in his day and age should be considered a privilege. Either way, the game is entirely free, so you’ve got nothing to lose by downloading it.

For those who have been through the uncertain and worrying experience of rapidly approaching homelessness, it’s a visual novel that will stay with them forever. For those who are lucky enough to have never experienced it, the short story might offer up some insight into ‘how the other half live’. 

I dream of a day when I could even possibly own my own home and live without the constant undercurrent of anxiety that the roof over my head (not to mention my daughters) could be taken from me at any time, with little to no warning, and I know I’m not alone in feeling that way. 

Don’t Get Your Hopes Up may be a strange and fantastical tale, but it’s also a brutally honest representation of what it’s like to be adrift in a housing market that’s designed for the wealthy. The first thing you see is a note that says the game is a work of fiction, and while that might be true for the oddities faced during the viewings, the rest of the content is absolute facts that seem to be swept under the rug by those not dealing with the issue directly. 

Don’t Get Your Hopes Up was released in full on September 16, 2025, so you can go and download it right now through Steam. It’s an eye-opening experience that you can have entirely for free, so I highly recommend checking it out.