Remember 'Weekend at Bernie's'? This game channels the same dark humor, and it's better than the movie

So there I was, alone in a diner with the corpse of a man I've never met. Before I could get my bearings straight, I heard the police on the scanner announcing that a murder had been called in and they'd be at the diner in 4 minutes. I panicked.

Before I knew it, the body was stashed somewhere I hoped no one would find it. With seconds to spare, I cleaned up my fingerprints, stashed the mystery man's belongings, and slowly opened the door to greet two officers who had weapons drawn on me.

Just 30 seconds later, I was pronounced innocent and allowed to go on my merry old way. Except, I found that hiding this guy's corpse was more fun than I had anticipated and, apparently, the universe was giving me an unlimited number of times to replay this scenario. It was like the movie Groundhog Day with a dash of Weekend at Bernie's thrown in for good measure.

If you hadn't already guessed it, the game is called Hide the Corpse, and it's available on the Meta Quest platform for just $15. It'll give you several hours of dark comedy goodness, and PSVR 2 players will soon get to join in on the fun on August 18 when it launches on the PlayStation Store.

A puzzle game like no other

Hide the Corpse is sort of an elaborate game of reverse hide-and-seek. The game has over half a dozen levels, each with at least six different places to hide the mystery man Gus's corpse.

Despite what the subject matter might make you think, Hide the Corpse is a strangely family-friendly title that has no foul language, no violence (other than dragging a corpse around, I suppose), and little else that might trigger you to hide its existence in front of your kids.

That, of course, meant that my son and I spent hours laughing until we cried as we struggled to drag around Gus's insanely heavy corpse without running into the furniture in our real living room. Seriously, it's a hilariously good time that's guaranteed to make you laugh.

Dragging Gus around is entirely physics-based, and since he's supposed to be the weight of an average full-grown adult, that means Gus is quite challenging to move around. Even more so given that you only have four minutes to somehow bring him to a legit hiding spot and cram him into whatever dimensions said spot allows.

The intro level takes place in an apartment where you can hide Gus in strangely conspicuous places like the bathtub, the armoire, under the bed, and three other spots I don't want to ruin. You'd think the cops would find him in these places, but they're, thankfully, no Sherlock Holmes.

The goal is to just hide Gus's corpse from plain sight, a goal that becomes zanier and zanier as you progress through the levels. And I promise that you never realized how heavy a corpse could be in zero gravity until you get to the space level!

Gus isn't the only object you'll need to hide, though. The man somehow has several of his belongings scattered randomly in each level, including his comb, wallet, favorite record (this is 70s themed), driver's license, and a few other nicknacks. Each of these also needs to be hidden from plain sight to get the best score.

Oh, and don't forget to erase every single one of the fingerprints you left along the way. Seriously, those little blue fingerprints appear on anything you've touched, even if you didn't realize you'd touched it. It's an almost overwhelming amount of stuff to do in just four minutes, but it results in some gratifying gameplay in a short span.

When the time is up, either at the four-minute mark or when you open the door for the cops, you'll get graded on your performance. I'm not sure who grades someone on their ability to hide a corpse, but I hope I never run across them in real life.

Once you find enough hiding spots in each level, you'll unlock a new level to play in. The scenarios are incredibly varied, ranging from the apartment you start in to the diner I spoke of earlier, a zero-gravity space station, an art museum, and more. The latest update in mid-July added a ton of new modifiers, including a heavier Gus and the ability to double the hiding time.

Alone or with friends, it's a riot

While it's a single-player game, I found it to be the most fun when casting the gameplay to a TV while others in the room were watching. This always elicited people asking to try it and then spending multiple sessions in the game until someone pried the headset from their cold, not-dead hands. Definitely not dead. That only happens in the game.

It's the kind of zany, whimsical, unique fun that I love seeing from indie developers and a reminder of the late 90s and early 2000s era of gaming, where just about any theme or concept could make a game, no matter how surreal or ridiculous. Plus, at just $15, it's tough to say no to for a few fantastic hours of entertainment with friends and family.