Red Room

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This page details the urban legend based interactive Adobe Flash horror animation; for other uses see The Red Room

Red Room is an interactive Adobe Flash horror animation, entirely in Japanese, about an urban legend called "the Red Room". The protagonist searches on the Internet for proof of its existence, only for the results to go horribly awry. It can be considered a prank flash because of an unexpected occurrence that takes place after the video ends.

This flash video became notorious when it was discovered to be the favorite of Girl A, the Japanese schoolgirl who slashed her classmate to death on 1 June 2004 in Sasebo, Japan. Her personal website was designed using the same colour scheme.

[edit] Summary

A still from the Red Room animation.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Two friends discuss a rumour about an Internet pop-up ad that asks "Do you like it?". If you dare to close the pop-up, you die. The more skeptical friend does some investigation. At home, he looks it up on the web, but nothing happens, and he goes on to visit his own favorite sites... Suddenly, out of the blue, the message pops up. He tries to call his friend, but there is no answer...

After he clicks to close it the first few times, it keeps re-appearing. It then starts automatically reloading. Each time, a new part of the message is revealed, finally displaying "Do you like the red room?". Then a website with the names of all the people killed shows up, with his friend's name at the bottom. He feels that there is something behind him.

The next day, some people in school talk about two boys from the next class who committed suicide, painting their rooms red with their own blood. Then, we see the protagonist's computer, still on the website with the names. The protagonist's name is now at the end of the list, after his friend's. It then shuts off, along with an eerie sound.

After the video ends, if the user's browser has not disabled pop-ups, an exact replica of the killer pop-up ad from the story will then open on the user's own machine.

[edit] See also

Computer prank
Kairo, a movie about a website that pops-up a message asking "Would you like to see a ghost?", and that ends up making people kill themselves.
Suicide Circle, a movie where a website (featuring a sectioned circle very similar to the Red Room loading animation) warns people about a suicide wave that strikes Japan.
FeardotCom, a movie about a website that, when accessed, kills its visitor 48 hours later.