Backrooms Model

The Backrooms is a fictional creepypasta which originated in a 2019 4chan thread about unsettling images. One of the first examples of liminal spaces — an internet aesthetic which includes usually busy locations depicted as unnaturally empty — the Backrooms are an endless maze of office rooms which are entered by " noclipping">noclip_mode.html" ;"title="nowiki/>noclip mode">noclippingout of reality in the wrong areas". As its popularity grew, internet users have expanded upon the original concept by creating different levels and entities which inhabit the Backrooms. Fanmade video games, Fandom">Fanmade video games, collaborative fiction wikis and YouTube">collaborative_fiction.html" ;"title="Fandom">Fanmade video games, collaborative fiction">Fandom">Fanmade video games, collaborative fiction wikis and YouTube videos have also been inspired by the Backrooms.

Original creepypasta

On May 12, 2019, an anonymous user started a thread on the paranormal /x/ board of 4chan, asking users to "post disquieting images that just feel 'off'". One of the submissions was the original photo of the Backrooms, a picture of a large carpeted, open room with yellow wallpaper and fluorescent lighting. The photo had a Dutch angle">Fluorescent lamp">fluorescent lighting. The photo had a Dutch angle. Another user replied with the first description of the Backrooms: "six hundred million square miles of randomly segmented empty rooms" which could be accessed by " noclipping">noclip_mode.html" ;"title="nowiki/>noclip mode">noclippingout of reality in the wrong areas". ''No Clipping'' is a video game term for commands which allow the player to walk through walls and objects.

The location of the original Backrooms photo is unknown, and it is possible that the image is a procedurally generated digital composition. Mark Frauenfelder">Procedural generation">procedurally generated digital composition. Mark Frauenfelder associated the Backrooms with ''kenopsia'', a word coined by ''The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows'' as "the eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that's usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet".

Impact and fandom

As the creepypasta grew in popularity, some users claimed to have visited the Backrooms and others shared memes about it across social media. On the subreddits r/creepypasta and later r/backrooms, users began to share stories about the Backrooms. A fandom began to develop around the Backrooms and creators expanded upon the original iteration of the creepypasta by creating additional floors or "levels" and entities which populate them. ''Happy Mag'' noted in particular two other levels: Level 1, a level with industrial architecture, and Level 2, a darkly lit level with long service tunnels, with the original version named Level 0.

The fandom began dividing into groups such as "originalists", fans who prefer the original Backrooms, and "expansionists", who continue to expand the Backrooms with new levels. A Reddit user named Litbeep created a subreddit called r/TrueBackrooms focusing only on the original version. ''ABC News'' said that unlike fandoms surrounding existing properties, the lack of a canonical Backrooms made "drawing a line between authentic storytelling and jokes" difficult. It grouped the Backrooms into an "emerging genre of collaborative online horror" which also included the SCP Foundation. In March 2022, r/backrooms had over 157,000 members and the creepypasta began to amass a following on TikTok.

Dan Erickson, creator of the television series '' Severance'', named the Backrooms as one of his many influences while working on the series.

Adaptations

YouTube

In January 2022, a short horror film titled ''The Backrooms (Found Footage)'' was uploaded to the YouTube channel of then 16-year-old director Kane Parsons (Kane Pixels on YouTube). It is presented as a 1996 recording of a young cameraman who accidentally enters the location, running from entities and entering other levels. The film employs both live-action footage and 3D Blender renderings, as well as other techniques to create effects such as shaky camera and a VHS filter. Categorized by some as "analog horror", the short received acclaim: WPST contributor Erica Russell called it "the scariest video on the Internet" while Dread Central's Mary Beth McAndrews compared it to the 2019 video game ''Control''. The first short was featured in the lineup at the Unnamed Footage Festival.

Some were surprised by what Parsons did with what he had: Jai Alexis of website ''PopHorror'' was surprised by the director's age, while ''The Awesomer'' noted that ''Backrooms'' "shows how to create tension without a budget". '' Boing Boing''s Rob Beschizza hypothesized that the creepypasta will eventually "end up in a slick but dismal 2-hour Hollywood movie", likening this prediction to the Slender Man creepypasta and its 2018 film adaptation.

Expanding his videos into a series, Parsons introduced plot aspects such as ASYNC, a "shadowy organization" which opened a portal into the Backrooms in the 1980s. His series also inspired other Backrooms creators such as David Pike. In 2022, Parsons received a Creator Honors at the Streamy Awards from The Game Theorists.

Video games

On 12 February 2022, a Reddit user showcased a ''Minecraft'' map based on the Backrooms' concept. As of , the mod is still under development, with ''Screen Rant''s Thomas McNulty claiming that "entities" will also be present on the map.

The Backrooms has also been the basis for a horror game of the same name, released in 2019 by indie game studio Pie on a Plate Productions. It was praised for its form of horror, with ''Bloody Disgusting'' writer Michael L Sandal comparing it to the works of writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Author Sigma Klim of ''Guru Gamer'' felt the game is something unique amidst what he called the "cliché and overused motifs" of most horror content, comparing it to 2004's ''Yume Nikki'', while '' PCMag'' listed it as a "honorable mention" among a ranking of the "best free Steam games" due to its "unnerving" and "maddening" atmosphere "despite being an incredibly short title."

Other released games based on the Backrooms include ''The Backrooms Simulator'' and ''Enter the Backrooms'', released in 2019 and 2021 respectively.

Reception

The Backrooms soon became popular from writers and Internet users, most of which commented on its uncanniness. The creepypasta has also been cited as the origin and most-well known example of the liminal spaces Internet trend, which are photos that evoke "a sense of nostalgia, lostness, and uncertainty"; the '#liminalspaces' tag has amassed nearly 100 million views on the social media platform TikTok.

The horror aspects of The Backrooms drew comparisons to the conspiracy theories of UFOs in Area 51, filmmaker Stanley Kubrick's work '' The Shining'', the ''Minecraft'' urban legend of Herobrine, and the 2019 film '' Us''. Its ambiguous rooms have also been noted as featuring similarities to horror stories of the SCP Foundation, especially SCP-3008 (a branch of IKEA that contains an infinite interior space within a pocket dimension), and to the vague buildings of ''Control'' (2019). '' Dazed'' called the Backrooms an example of "internet folklore".

See also

* List of creepypastas
* SCP Foundation
* '' Local 58''
* ''House of Leaves''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Backrooms, The
Creepypasta
Internet memes introduced in 2019
Internet properties established in 2019
Science fiction horror
Weird fiction
4chan phenomena
Nostalgia