As noted here, Shirley Jackson’s original setup of would-be psychical researchers and test subjects, kept for the 1963 film, is more readily game-friendly as close family connections are harder for players to take up than strangers with a share adventure-ish purpose.
(The 1999 version with a blind study pretending to be about sleep disorders adds a twist and sense of betrayal for the characters, but the audience or in our case players would be signed on already so just waiting for such a reveal. A game that appears to be about a possibly spooky sleep study before confirming just how spooky it is could work though. Though then as a player I would expect dream hauntings rather than regular hauntings.)
I would hesitate to play at putting kids in danger and a lot of players would decline, but we could use it as a flashback setup, playing bits and pieces but not as much. Playing the previous generation, maybe?
I’d want to be clear about how the haunting works, and whether the characters can affect it.
The sudden swing happy ending cutting the obvious setup that it was all really happening in the Red Room works if Nell has power to fight the House as a ghost, explaining why the House tormented her for so long but which led her to understand it, as well as Hugh being able to talk Olivia down.
As is, it feels like a swerve.
(After going for it I kind of wish they’d pushed it even further and had Nell be able to walk out with Steve and be alive again. It might take some explaining a day after her funeral, but hey.)
I also wouldn’t want to introduce a late Big Bad like Poppy without more foreshadowing.
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