oh go me

oh go me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDZADFP0Px8

Is that crazy guy staying at the same asylum as the joker?

Is that crazy guy staying at the same asylum as the joker?

I missed this one when it originally came out, might have to try it out. Thanks Spoony.

This is THE best HP Lovecraft game out there. Loved it back then for my PC, oh yes, it’s still available for PC!

The PC version is a better experience. The Xbox version was rushed for Xmas, so it can have a bit of frustrating moments in it. With PC controls, the quick monsters aren’t as irritating, the checkpoint saving is still a bit flawed though. Both versions are ugly, but the PC version has higher resolution.

Hope you remember to mention Penumbra games in this series!

The PC version is a better experience. The Xbox version was rushed for Xmas, so it can have a bit of frustrating moments in it. With PC controls, the quick monsters aren’t as irritating, the checkpoint saving is still a bit flawed though. Both versions are ugly, but the PC version has higher resolution.

Hope you remember to mention Penumbra games in this series!

Well for all of you how are asking ” Hey isn’t arkham asylum form Batman”? Nope. Arkham is a creation of HP Lovercraft and the name have been incorporated in the Batman arkhana.

Ooo and Spoony you spoony bastard i have at this moment edited my one review of dark corners of the earth!
Its pistols at dawn my good sir!^^

Well for all of you how are asking ” Hey isn’t arkham asylum form Batman”? Nope. Arkham is a creation of HP Lovercraft and the name have been incorporated in the Batman arkhana.

Ooo and Spoony you spoony bastard i have at this moment edited my one review of dark corners of the earth!
Its pistols at dawn my good sir!^^

” M Murphy October 29, 2009 at 5:31 am

Is that crazy guy staying at the same asylum as the joker?”

Murphy, the Arkham Asylum from Batman is a tribute to the original Arkham Asylum from Lovecraft’s short story: “The Thing On The Doorstep”. It’s about a man who’s having his body slowly stolen from him, it’s very good.

I love this game despite the game breaking bugs, the punishing difficulty and the almost impossible end run. You can find the best moments of the game (with funny commentary by my friend) in my youtube channel. Or Spoony, just search for “attack of the fishmen” if you still want to find the hotel scene.

Arkham Asylum? What the hell was batman doing when you wre getting chased? he could have made that monster wet it’s pants just by glaring at it really hard

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-CyUOVtImc

A video of the section of the game Spoony was referring to, with the “Lynch Mob” hunting you.

One of the scariest things about this early section of the game is that you’re completely unarmed. That feeling of not being able to resist and just forced to flee really emphasizes the fear. Luckily, there are a couple of similar moments later on even when you do have weapons, but it’s this first time that stands out more than any other encounter.

I have to say this was my first game on the x-box,yea most will say it was halo for them but I am a horror fan and as such I get the most enjoyment out of games like these.

It’s called “Arkham Sanitarium” in “The Thing On The Doorstep” though it is called “the asylum” twice.

I watched my sister play this game a long while ago..I never got near it though..
The whole ‘Lynch Mob’ sequence was terrifying as hell!! I wasn’t even playing and I could feel my heart beating like crazy!! And hey! 16th of February is my birthday!!

OMG I love this game, it freaked me out sooo bad. Its an amasing game, thanks spoony for bringing it up!

The hotel escape scene was effective…the first few times I had to play it. By my 15th attempt, it had lost most of its effectiveness.

I gave up on this game when I got to the police station and I realized that the stealth/combat elements were broken- you’d sneak up behind a cop and hit him on the head, and he’d just turn around and stare at you. That destroyed any immersion for me. But maybe I’ll give it another go.

yeah, this game is superb. the pc version is quite a bit better than the xbox port. another really memorable part is towards the very end where you have to deafen your character as not to be hypnotized or whatever by the other frog fish god hydra (another boss fight), so you repeatedly have to shoot this huge gong-gong and you complete the level itself while having the humming in your ears. it’s really effective. here’s a video of that part (spoiler of course)– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvjhKHyWufs

Nice reference to The Thing That Should Not Be, Spoony.

Hehe i knew this would come on the list. It is actually quite funny since the review yesterday (I have no mouth, and i must scream) made me install this game again and start play it and then you review it today. Quite creepy actually.

Hehe i knew this would come on the list. It is actually quite funny since the review yesterday (I have no mouth, and i must scream) made me install this game again and start play it and then you review it today. Quite creepy actually.

The only way the hotel chase scene could have been worse is if it followed the Shadow over Innsmouth more than it did and had Deep Ones chasing you instead of fishmen. I got VERY tired of the damned fishmen by the ned of the game. I mean, there are so many other mythos beings they could have brought out! The worm cult (from the Rats in the Walls, though I did like the little reference to that in the form of the crazy dude in the jail), Ghouls, the cats of ulnar, ect. My only hope is that SOMEONE releases another Call of Cthuhlu game that has a wonderful story like this one, with all the good things about the gamepley that it had. (I liked the idea of more realism in terms of damaging body parts and no dot in the center of the screen to make your aim perfect for every shot) while getting rid of the bugs and lack of enemy variety.

That is the most awesome game i’ve ever seen in my fucking life.
I love H.P Lovecraft, I love shadow over innsmouth and I fucking love this game.

Arkham Asylum is btw. not from batman.. It was used by batman, but the original is in H.P Lovecrafts fictional city arkham..

I played this game when it first came out… I was 7, and I beat the whole thing. That dead little girl freaked the fuck out of me the first time, and every other time through the game.

This game is one of the best games that Assthesda have published my opinion. The only one beating it is Daggerfall.

That thing in your description… There’s something familiar about it..
*cough*the thing that should not be*cough*

Holy shit I just started playing this game like an hour ago. Scary as shit so far.

I would prefer if don’t bother keeping your self from revealing spoilers, especially for older games/movies/novels.

i loved this game, it’s not perfecr but it’s so immersive that you forget defects and love all the stron points
nice video spoony, keep it up :D

So glad you enjoyed this game Spoony. Just about everyone else I know hated it but I loved the arse out of it despite the flaws.

@22 TantricNferno: FYI it’s a famous quote from H.P. Lovecraft (the author of the Cthulhu mythos). The song is based off his works.

Tbh, I played this game last year on PC and thought it was pretty shit. I ended up uninstalling around chapter 6. The shown clip was one of the good parts, and running away from the mob was pretty intense… but really the most horrific thing in this game was the gameplay! I didn’t find it hard, just annoying; your weapons do no damage unless you’re almost standing next to them and stealth is inconsistent. A lot of bad level design, too. However I’ve still got the old saves, so I might check out this Dagon fight if I ever feel bored and masochistic.

Love this game

Quick question. Why does Spoony say, “IF I can find that sequence.”, and then tells us to check out the sequence that he hasn’t found yet? Am I missing something?

I too played this game on the PC, and do not remember it fondly. A lot of it had to do with many of the objectives being very abstract or not at all obvious (to me at least) and dying a lot without learning anything from it. For instance I never got to the Dagon boss fight because I never figured out how to fix the boat, even though I had a walkthrough on call, minimized, and read the damned instructions 10 times!
Speaking of, this is the only game I’ve ever used a walkthrough while playing which is very bad in my opinion. If you liked the story, it might have been worth it. But the cheap deaths (your character has the constitution of a true wimp) and the bizzare, frustrating objectives that aren’t at all obvious (run through the gas filled room, instead of out? Interesting game design) ruined it for me.
Now there is one scary game that I hope Spoony played and tells us all about (He refernced it in the first SWAT 4 video) is Condemned: Criminal Origions. I loved that game, the day I beat it (and you can, alas, beat it in one day) I left the light on that night.

I’d say this is slightly more inspired by the later more ‘actiony’ writing of Derleth or say Lumley, than Lovecraft’s own stories.
But still it’s quite a brilliant, if rage-inducingly designed, game.

Please ignore previous comment. I just got programmed by the way Spoony spent time talking about the sequence in question to think the final reference was for that, and not the previous video.

Same thing happened with the Silent Hill video.

Okay, I’m done. Sorry.

I played this on PC as well.. It was very nice, but a very difficult game to play through. But I don’t think I would ever play it again. They really should make more games based on the Cthulhu mythos…

Hell yeah one of my favorite games !!!!

Looks like an awesome game.

You make this game sound really awesome. If you ever find yourself lacking a project, I’d love to see a Let’s Play of this sometime.

As a fan of HP Lovecraft’s works, even going back reading his stuff, I really want this game right at the time I’ve seen a little walkthrough of it.
Ia Cthulhu, Ia Dagon!

YES! I was wondering if CoC was going to get overlooked because it is probably one of the most horrific and and engaging game of all time.

Freakiest part is EASILY escaping from the Innsmouth Hotel.

And Spoony just proved that he’s the most awesome person on earth!
Call of Cthulhu – Dark Corners of the Earth is a really, really great and atmospheric game. I don’t care about the design flaws, if the atmosphere and story is compelling enough to keep me hooked.

I remember when i first got this game I had no idea what to expect. I thought it might be kind of like Undying, but oh… its so much more. Then of course I remembered I had the story and read it again. Such a great game idea, it falls flat in a few parts where they break their own intentions and the mechanics didnt work all that great but its still a creepy game.

I remember when i first got this game I had no idea what to expect. I thought it might be kind of like Undying, but oh… its so much more. Then of course I remembered I had the story and read it again. Such a great game idea, it falls flat in a few parts where they break their own intentions and the mechanics didnt work all that great but its still a creepy game.

I too do like this game. Although if someone wants to buy it: You better have Windows XP because there’s one scene on a ship were a bug occurs on vista that makes it unwinnable. (Cannon doesn’t zoom to the cliffs). The only other fix known to me would be downloading a savegame from shortly after that scene or trying to set up a virtual machine and play it there.

There might be some Spoilers from here on:

Personally i also liked the other two chase scenes, against the Shoggoth and against the deep ones later on (although you could gun them down there). But i have to admit i used cheats against dagon and the Polyp-Thingie that came shortly before Hydra. Regarding the enemies: ok it’s somewhat understandable that the Deep Ones are more resistant against bullets, but even the fishermen can take a shotgun/revolver round to the head and not die. Although one can simply circle strafe around most of them as long as they aren’t armed with Tommyguns. It’s sad that they apparently cancelled the sequels though.

I wanted to like this game, I really did. I ended up writing a short and heartfelt rant about it (spoilers):

“Simply put, this game made me weep tears of blood.

First of all, being a survival game, there are a number of places that emphasize stealth, and yet the stealth elements are so horrendously implemented that you’ll end up running around shooting everyone anyway. You have no idea how visible you are, and no idea where the enemies are patrolling. Shooting the enemies is no mean feat either: you aim by right-clicking to look down the sight, but if you’re leaning around cover to shoot, your character holds the gun at a weird angle that you have to compensate for. You end up wasting ammo just trying to figure out where to aim… in a survival game!

Another problem is that you have to monitor your character’s sanity along with his health. Lingering over disturbing imagery (a room full of corpses, for example) causes your heart to start pounding and your vision to get all disoriented. If it goes too far, you’ll either shoot yourself or have a game-ending mental breakdown. Now, for a game about Lovecraft’s work, this seems like a good idea. Unfortunately, our hero, the hard-bitten detective, is a COMPLETE FUCKING PUSSY. You’ll look down a ten-foot drop and end up with vertigo. You’ll spend two solid minutes crouched down and staring at a wall while your character struggles to find his balls so you can resume playing. Boss fights become a blurry mess while you scream at your monitor like R. Lee Ermey. Trying to play this at night with the lights off is guaranteed to make you nauseous.

Based on the graphics, I assumed this game came out in 2004 at the latest. Turns out it came out in ’06, making it even more unforgivable. The game tries to create atmosphere by having really grainy graphics instead of using the sort of shadow effects that fucking Thief was using back in 1998. I think they were trying to make it feel like the 1920’s. I guess I’m lucky it wasn’t in black and white with the dialogue featured on title cards.

Moreover, there’s a part where you need to use a ship’s cannon to shoot at targets on Devil’s Reef. Doing so requires you to have one of a small handful of approved graphics cards; otherwise you won’t be able to zoom in. I’m playing a three year old game on a machine that can run Call of Duty 4 just fine, and I can’t look down a fucking scope? Are you kidding me? I actually had to download a savegame from right after this point to finish the game.

Speaking of savegames, the game uses fixed checkpoints to save, and naturally, there’ll be an unskippable cutscene right after the save point, but before the section that kills you. How can developers think this kind of shit is even remotely acceptable?

There’s also a scene where you have to rescue J. Edgar Hoover from being lowered into a vat of molten gold at the Marsh refinery. J Edgar Hoover! The single worst American who ever lived! Just let the bastard get melted down into a series of watch bands and call it day!

Oh, and when you beat the game, your character hangs himself in the final cutscene, making your 5 or 6 hours of “survival” action an even bigger waste of time then they already were. Man, fuck this game.”

I practically abandoned the game at the time I have to get that guy out of prison. Then my old hard disk broke.

But I still have the saves so I may give it another shot.

I think this game has some of the most memorable moments in horror gaming history. The whole navy ship level is so frantic and intense, and filled with a sense of dread that climaxes perfectly with the awakening of Dagon.

Sure the game has some flaws, but the pros of experiencing a great Lovecraft journey into madness out weigh the cons of a few game play issues. My only complaint with game play was with how god-awful slow you moved in stealth mode. Although it did add to the tension as I would try to sneak past guards, because I’d find myself saying, “C’mon move faster you son-of-a-bitch, before that guard comes back!”

But most certainly my favorite part of the entire game was the lynch mob chase. This whole level was definitely inspired by the movie “Dagon”, and the game does an amazing job of recreating the fear and tension of trying to escape from a mob of crazy townsfolk.

Great pick Spoony.

I do hope you mention Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem. Not nearly enough people know about it and its really hard to explain how the insanity effects get to you during gameplay.

Nice one, Spoony. I enjoyed this game a lot for all it’s flaws – the Lynch Mob scene you mentioned pretty much sold me on it. Nothing quite like fighting for your life as a completely helpless mortal to get the blood going. Been wanting to pick it up on Steam for Halloween… Maybe you just pushed me over the edge :)

Cheers!

- Toko

While I sort of like this game, I keep getting pissed at how all these “Cthulhu” things come out, but Cthuluhu isn’t even in them. Why is it always Dagon in these things?

I’ll be dissapointed if Eternal Darkness doesn’t make it to the list. I’ve played all of the games you’ve mentioned so far, but Eternal Darkness is probably my favourite. Very clever and awesome game. A hidden and underated gem.

I watched the scene where the main char is being followed by the “lynch mob” on youtube. That scene was magnificent, and it made me buy the game 2 minutes later.

Everyone knows about Eternal Darkness LOL…stop acting like it’s the lost arc of games.

Mistah J:

Cthulhu should never, ever actually be in a game, or indeed any visual medium. Cthulhu is madness incarnate, and something that makes you go mad even by simply walking into its room should never be represented. Once you give old Chtulhu a face, you take away a lot of his horror. Same as you should never ever create a picture of a Shoggoth. These things are partly so firghtening because they are, in the normal world, simply wrong. They should not be. And yet, in the whole of the Lovecraftian universe, these gods, their actions, their creations are right. With lovecraft, what happens is always according to the rules of the greater universe, even if it involves you going mad. Thats the real horror of HPL, his universe actually _has_ verisimilitude.

And the man, and the interview I stole most of this pararaph: Niel Gaiman talking about HPL: (damn, cant find it anymore on Youtube)

There exists a PC version of this, and in a few ways it’s far better than the Xbox cut.

Regardless, it’s a doozy of a title. Quite skilled at climbing into your brain and rooting about in there, really. And yes, I somehow figured it’d be the run from the townspeople that would be your choice–it’s complex, but it’s epic.

I’ve made it as far as the mines, which is the point when you finally get armed a little bit better. I’m told your weaponry is largely useless, though, just a bit of metal to prop up your failing confidence and push you forward.

Damn shame that the developers went bankrupt not long after this released, and a sequel is not likely.

Yeah, this game is awesome, but it was so bugged that i couldn’t get past the first or second mission.

Yeah, this game is awesome, but it was so bugged that i couldn’t get past the first or second mission.

Mistah J October 29, 2009 at 10:34 am
“While I sort of like this game, I keep getting pissed at how all these “Cthulhu” things come out, but Cthuluhu isn’t even in them.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e24tkBx4mNQ

He was kinda wimpy all things considered.

i remember playing this game and loving it, but my hard drive crashed while i was in the factory, so i dont know if i’ll ever play it again. ):

Concerning the history of Arkham Asylum:

H.P. Lovecraft first used the town of Arkham in his 1933 story The Thing on the Doorstep. In his writings, it was primarily called the Arkham Sanitarium and was named after the town. Arkham Asylum was first used in the Batman mythos around 1974. It’s located in Gotham and named after its founder, but it’s an obvious homage from some dark comics to darker stories. I think they used Arkham Asylum in this game because A) people know what Asylums are better than Sanitariums and B) the name’s catchier.

i rented this game once and really liked it cause it was the first horror game i played that was actually scary. it was also very visually wrong like the part where you go behind the desk in the hotel and find the body parts hanging out of drawers and shoved in jars. to see gore used in an a effective way to actually scare some one was a nive change of pace than where other games its like “dude i just blew his head off thats fucking awsome”. for me the most memorable scen i got to was when they threw the guy into the meat grinder it was great.

Suddenly interested. Maybe I’ll play it.

Speaking of sanitariums, you should check an old game going with that name “Sanitarium” it has a great dark and gritty history.

Wait, there’s a call of cthulhu GAME? How’d I miss that?

Awesome game, a shame the studio went out of business.

This is another one Ive heard about and have been wanting to give a chance. I hope ya make one of these for fatal frame 2

You know, at a film festival I was recently at, I saw what was supposed to be an adaptation of one of Lovecraft’s stories, “The Colour of Outer Space”. Without wanting to go too much into it, the film just reminded me why, to my knowledge, we have never seen a truly decent Lovecraft adaptation.

If I can find this game anywhere, I might check it out; the videos I’ve seen looked promising.

That game had some great moments, like when your character got frightened out of his mind and just started gibbering and hearing voices…
And while those chase scenes (the one mentioned above, and later one where you escape from an angry shoggoth) are cinematic and truly frightening, they’re also _friggin’ hard_! And no way to turn down the difficulty or, say, skip them after the 39th attempt.
But overall I have to agree, it’s one of the few games that got “scary” right, and it’s a shame there aren’t more of this genre around.

You really need to do a lets play on Call of Cthulhu…that would be awesome…

Jack Walters kinda looks like Spoony after watching Transformers 2

Wow…..did that remind anyone else of “WARRIOR” #1?

“…a real fear…a fear of myself, of what I am….and of what I have always been.”

Hmm, there is something fishy about that town.

…Don’t worry, I slapped myself.

Another really memorable game that I only heard about recently. It is definitely worth tracking down.

why did they never put Cthulhu in the game not saying its bad that they didn’t but kinda seems wired to me

I’ve got to get myself a copy of this. Just that one clip was enough to frighten me! (I get scared easily)

Hey spoony if you want to find that moment of being chased search up these guys called 4 player podcast
they are on Jtv which has the archive of Call of cthulu in the beginning the “break the door down you dam fool” sequence all the way to the end

Reminds me of the old DOS adventure game, Call of Cthulu: Shadow of the Comet. For a 320×200 in 256 colours with MIDI music and sparse sound effects, that game was easily as creepy. The whole town oozed scariness.

My most favorite moment of being freaked out were those “things” in the cave on last level. Passing through a natural stone-bridge, when suddenly wind inside the colossal cave picks up, and I check behind me….

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, WHAT THE FUCK ARE THOSE?!

Too bad this game is somewhat glitchy and buggy. But its great game overall.

My most favorite moment of being freaked out were those “things” in the cave on last level. Passing through a natural stone-bridge, when suddenly wind inside the colossal cave picks up, and I check behind me….

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, WHAT THE FUCK ARE THOSE?!

Too bad this game is somewhat glitchy and buggy. But its great game overall.

Wow other people remember this game? Excellent, I love your taste Spoony, I loved this game purely for the story as a Lovecraftian fan.
“Mummy Bites.” D:

Also I pronounce Cthulhu as “Kuh-thull-hoo”, I wonder if anyone else says it that way.

Oh snap, if you know about this game, have you played Penumbra? :D
I mean, c’mon, who doesn’t like running from naked zombies in an abandoned, frozen base?
(It’s what The Thing game should have been done like!)

& Apathetic One:
I completely love you for saying that. Just sayin’.

Either way, I totally agree that you should do a Let’s Play of this, Spoony!

Oh snap, if you know about this game, have you played Penumbra? :D
I mean, c’mon, who doesn’t like running from naked zombies in an abandoned, frozen base?
(It’s what The Thing game should have been done like!)

& Apathetic One:
I completely love you for saying that. Just sayin’.

Either way, I totally agree that you should do a Let’s Play of this, Spoony!

Well, I still get annoyed that they put Cthulhu’s name in the title when it’s got little to do with him. Out of the 3 films titled Chthulhu, only one is about him. The other two are about Shadow Over Innsmouth. It’s not that I don’t like Shadow Over Innsmouth (“Dagon” is probably my favorite horror movie), it’s just that I wish they would stop teasing me by using Cthulhu’s name.

Okay, while I will give you that the first part of the game was pretty awesome what with you hiding from the Tainted and rest of the town, once you got a gun the atmosphere kind’a gave out. Now I’ve Let’s Played the PC version of the game, and I have to say Spoony you forgot to mention one Very important and irritating aspect of the game. THE F***ING SANITY SYSTEM!!! You can’t even look at what your supposed to shoot with out your vision blurring up, and several times during the Dagon fight (which for me lasted over a total of 40 minutes) I committed Suicide! I will say though that in it’s deffence the story line and characters are Amazingly well done and very true to Lovecraft. Jack Walters is Still one of my Favorite Protagonists of any game, though I found that his “Hard boiled Dick” sort of awkwardly clashed with the insanity, I mean one moment he’s swapping Quips with a Naval Lieutenant, and the next he’s tripping balls at the sight of a deep one, even though he’s already been fighting them for a day or two of game time.

Here’s a little tribute to the game if you want to see it, it mostly involves the battle with Dagon but it’s not bad. There’s about a minute or two of my Crappy LPing before had though. 8P You are Warned.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oVa7EuGRB0

Okay, while I will give you that the first part of the game was pretty awesome what with you hiding from the Tainted and rest of the town, once you got a gun the atmosphere kind’a gave out. Now I’ve Let’s Played the PC version of the game, and I have to say Spoony you forgot to mention one Very important and irritating aspect of the game. THE F***ING SANITY SYSTEM!!! You can’t even look at what your supposed to shoot with out your vision blurring up, and several times during the Dagon fight (which for me lasted over a total of 40 minutes) I committed Suicide! I will say though that in it’s deffence the story line and characters are Amazingly well done and very true to Lovecraft. Jack Walters is Still one of my Favorite Protagonists of any game, though I found that his “Hard boiled Dick” sort of awkwardly clashed with the insanity, I mean one moment he’s swapping Quips with a Naval Lieutenant, and the next he’s tripping balls at the sight of a deep one, even though he’s already been fighting them for a day or two of game time.

Here’s a little tribute to the game if you want to see it, it mostly involves the battle with Dagon but it’s not bad. There’s about a minute or two of my Crappy LPing before had though. 8P You are Warned.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oVa7EuGRB0

…So is the Pumpkinhead review canceled?

One of the best horror games i’ve ever played truly a gem of atmosphere and trying to save your own life.

You should’ve also mentioned the fact that if you look at bodies for too long or seeing something out of the norm that it stresses out the character and makes the vision blurry, him talking to himself etc.

Just because of that i love this game it really feels like you’re him.

One of the best horror games i’ve ever played truly a gem of atmosphere and trying to save your own life.

You should’ve also mentioned the fact that if you look at bodies for too long or seeing something out of the norm that it stresses out the character and makes the vision blurry, him talking to himself etc.

Just because of that i love this game it really feels like you’re him.

I guess I just haven’t seen enough to make much of a judgement.

But the helpless feel, and the fact that you’re him and are experiencing it as he is seems good.

It’s kind of disheartening (though not unexpected) to see all the Batman references. I really wish Headfirst just went with “Arkham Sanitarium” just to avoid the Arkham Asylum connotations.

“Also I pronounce Cthulhu as “Kuh-thull-hoo”, I wonder if anyone else says it that way.”

Lovecraft pronounced it a number of different ways, but he transcribed it as “Khlûl’-hloo” in a letter:

“the first syllable [of Khlûl'-hloo is] pronounced gutturally and very thickly. The u is about like that in full; and the first syllable is not unlike klul in sound, hence the h represents the guttural thickness.”

I quite enjoyed “Dark Corners”, especially the secret final level you get with all Mythos points (won’t spoil it for anyone, but it’s awesome). I’m generally forgiving of bugs and gameplay if the story’s good enough, and I played it on PC, where it was a lot easier to navigate (IMO), and a lot of mods address the real gamebreakers.

If DC was more successful, and if Headfirst wasn’t liquidated, maybe we would’ve gotten more Lovecraft-based games like it, not necessarily by those developers. I can imagine “The Shadow Out of Time” being a really cool Myst-style puzzler, “At The Mountains of Madness” would be like “The Thing” (well, except it doesn’t suck, and has a vast undiscovered city, and Shoggoths, Flying Polyps and Giant Penguins to contend with). Heck, one could make a whole game based around Arkham, with “The Thing On The Doorstep”, “The Dunwich Horror”, “The Colour Out Of Space”, “Dreams in the Witch-House” and others forming chapters of the story.

Most of all, though, I really, REALLY want a Dreamlands game. An RPG, perhaps, or a point-and-click adventure like The Longest Journey. Imagine descending the Seventy Steps of Light Slumber, where you must prove yourself worthy to survive the Dreamlands to the Judges: via puzzles, combat, platforming and the like. Then you enter the Dreamlands, visit the port of Dylath-Leen, cat-ruled Ulthar, glorious Celephais, and mysterious Sarnath. Explore the dark, dangerous realms of the Underworld, the Moon, the Forbidden Lands and the Plateau of Leng. Battle Ooth-Nargai, Gugs, Moon-Beasts, Zoogs and Bholes. Eventually you can become a Dreamer so powerful you can create entire cities and populations, and finally visit Unknown Kadath to meet the gods themselves.

Yeah, that’d be epic.

It’s kind of disheartening (though not unexpected) to see all the Batman references. I really wish Headfirst just went with “Arkham Sanitarium” just to avoid the Arkham Asylum connotations.

“Also I pronounce Cthulhu as “Kuh-thull-hoo”, I wonder if anyone else says it that way.”

Lovecraft pronounced it a number of different ways, but he transcribed it as “Khlûl’-hloo” in a letter:

“the first syllable [of Khlûl'-hloo is] pronounced gutturally and very thickly. The u is about like that in full; and the first syllable is not unlike klul in sound, hence the h represents the guttural thickness.”

I quite enjoyed “Dark Corners”, especially the secret final level you get with all Mythos points (won’t spoil it for anyone, but it’s awesome). I’m generally forgiving of bugs and gameplay if the story’s good enough, and I played it on PC, where it was a lot easier to navigate (IMO), and a lot of mods address the real gamebreakers.

If DC was more successful, and if Headfirst wasn’t liquidated, maybe we would’ve gotten more Lovecraft-based games like it, not necessarily by those developers. I can imagine “The Shadow Out of Time” being a really cool Myst-style puzzler, “At The Mountains of Madness” would be like “The Thing” (well, except it doesn’t suck, and has a vast undiscovered city, and Shoggoths, Flying Polyps and Giant Penguins to contend with). Heck, one could make a whole game based around Arkham, with “The Thing On The Doorstep”, “The Dunwich Horror”, “The Colour Out Of Space”, “Dreams in the Witch-House” and others forming chapters of the story.

Most of all, though, I really, REALLY want a Dreamlands game. An RPG, perhaps, or a point-and-click adventure like The Longest Journey. Imagine descending the Seventy Steps of Light Slumber, where you must prove yourself worthy to survive the Dreamlands to the Judges: via puzzles, combat, platforming and the like. Then you enter the Dreamlands, visit the port of Dylath-Leen, cat-ruled Ulthar, glorious Celephais, and mysterious Sarnath. Explore the dark, dangerous realms of the Underworld, the Moon, the Forbidden Lands and the Plateau of Leng. Battle Ooth-Nargai, Gugs, Moon-Beasts, Zoogs and Bholes. Eventually you can become a Dreamer so powerful you can create entire cities and populations, and finally visit Unknown Kadath to meet the gods themselves.

Yeah, that’d be epic.

Mst3kforever: I think thats the whole point of the sanity system and its atmosphere. You are supposed to be warped by the things you fight. It also makes the game more difficult, and thus negates the “I’ve got a gun, now everything is alright” feeling.

Taraniach: “Most of all, though, I really, REALLY want a Dreamlands game. An RPG, perhaps, or a point-and-click adventure like The Longest Journey. Imagine descending the Seventy Steps of Light Slumber, where you must prove yourself worthy to survive the Dreamlands to the Judges: via puzzles, combat, platforming and the like. Then you enter the Dreamlands, visit the port of Dylath-Leen, cat-ruled Ulthar, glorious Celephais, and mysterious Sarnath. Explore the dark, dangerous realms of the Underworld, the Moon, the Forbidden Lands and the Plateau of Leng. Battle Ooth-Nargai, Gugs, Moon-Beasts, Zoogs and Bholes. Eventually you can become a Dreamer so powerful you can create entire cities and populations, and finally visit Unknown Kadath to meet the gods themselves.”

I shiver run down my spine just by reading this. Damn, smoe indie developer could become a sensation overnight if they made such a thing. Kadath awaits!

That’s a brilliant little sequence.

On a side note, these sections are getting a little old – you don’t riff on them, you’re not playing them and you’re not exploring them in any great detail.

It’d be nice to see you do a lengthy “interactive” piece (like SWAT 4 or like the Vlog’s) on a game you really enjoy. I’d like to see how you handle it on camera instead of just tearing crap material to shreds.

That’s a brilliant little sequence.

On a side note, these sections are getting a little old – you don’t riff on them, you’re not playing them and you’re not exploring them in any great detail.

It’d be nice to see you do a lengthy “interactive” piece (like SWAT 4 or like the Vlog’s) on a game you really enjoy. I’d like to see how you handle it on camera instead of just tearing crap material to shreds.

I have the PC version, and yeah, this game is awesome.

I always wondered it there was more then one ending though, the one I got was very confusing.

There is a really great subtle horror adventure game out there called “The Dark Eye”. It’s essentially a compilation of a few stories by Poe held together by a greater storyline. The visuals are very unusual, caus it’s all claymotion. It’s quite “artsy” and buggy as hell but the atmosphere is simply astonishing.

There is a really great subtle horror adventure game out there called “The Dark Eye”. It’s essentially a compilation of a few stories by Poe held together by a greater storyline. The visuals are very unusual, caus it’s all claymotion. It’s quite “artsy” and buggy as hell but the atmosphere is simply astonishing.

I suppose this is one of those games thats only scary if you play it, because watching it was dull. I even looked up the fight with Dagon on youtube and it was far from nail biting.

And what was up with Ramona? She acted and sounded like a 5 year old girl but looked like she was 12.

that dagon guy looks like the kraken from clash of the titans great review

that dagon guy looks like the kraken from clash of the titans great review

Spoony left out the part about the insanity levels, something I thought made it really stand out. Looking at items which are horrifying, like Elder gods or mangled corpses, make your heart pound and your vision shaky. Too much and you basically go mad–I think if you’re holding a gun there’s a risk of shooting yourself.

“I shiver run down my spine just by reading this. Damn, smoe indie developer could become a sensation overnight if they made such a thing. Kadath awaits!”

That’d be freaking awesome. There are a lot of talented indy developers who’ve made pretty damn good point-and-clicks: I’m sure someone could do a Lovecraft one. Actually, something like Psychonauts would work great too. You could even employ the “leap into someone’s brain” mechanic to explore someone else’s dreamworld for a level: Pickman’s brain as a nightmarish landscape of running paint and labyrinthine graveyards, Kuranes’ an empire of hobos, Herbert West’s a weird mix of Trauma Center and Pikmin with zombies instead of carrots.

Really, this stuff writes itself. Though nobody steal my “Weird Tales Investigations” thing, that’s mine!

“And what was up with Ramona? She acted and sounded like a 5 year old girl but looked like she was 12.”

Or, like a case of arrested development brought on by having a really monstrous mother (so to speak). :P

“I shiver run down my spine just by reading this. Damn, smoe indie developer could become a sensation overnight if they made such a thing. Kadath awaits!”

That’d be freaking awesome. There are a lot of talented indy developers who’ve made pretty damn good point-and-clicks: I’m sure someone could do a Lovecraft one. Actually, something like Psychonauts would work great too. You could even employ the “leap into someone’s brain” mechanic to explore someone else’s dreamworld for a level: Pickman’s brain as a nightmarish landscape of running paint and labyrinthine graveyards, Kuranes’ an empire of hobos, Herbert West’s a weird mix of Trauma Center and Pikmin with zombies instead of carrots.

Really, this stuff writes itself. Though nobody steal my “Weird Tales Investigations” thing, that’s mine!

“And what was up with Ramona? She acted and sounded like a 5 year old girl but looked like she was 12.”

Or, like a case of arrested development brought on by having a really monstrous mother (so to speak). :P

I fucking love this game,despite how rage-worthy it often is. I had to put it on the back-burner for now due to moving,but I’ll definitely come back to it. For a long time,I’ve been meaning to seriously dive into the Cthulhu mythos,and this game became my gateway. =)

Of all the things people complain about so far,I’m genuinely shocked that no one mention THAT MOTHERFUCKING DRIVING SEQUENCE. YOU ALL KNOW THE ONE. I raged like I never raged before. Despite being fucking impossible and almost entirely luck-based,it’s also bugged up the ass.

And,of course,I shat a million bricks during the hotel escape sequence,goes without saying. It also took me like 15 fucking tries to get through,but goddaymn.

So I guess the Pumpkinhead video isn’t going to happen?

So I guess the Pumpkinhead video isn’t going to happen?

doesn’t this game have what is known as the giant spook man?

“what are you doing, snooping around here? get out!”

Hooray for The Thing That Should Not Be!

Hooray for The Thing That Should Not Be!

Gotta say, I agree. Mind, I couldn’t go on after it became a FPS, as I died every two seconds and… well, I flat-out got 100% stuck.

But GOD, that hotel scene. I thought I blocked the door behind me, but something went wrong at one point… and as I was about to perform a jump that I had died from just before, I hear something, turn around, and THERE’S A MAN RUNNING AT ME WITH AN AXE.

I was so startled that I literally jumped so hard that the controller flew in the air. This caused my character to jump. Out the window. To my leg-crunching death.

sigh.

Being on top of tall things, I will add, was incredible. I am not afraid of heights. At all. But the sanity effects that imitate the feeling… made me sortof experience the symptoms. Top-notch job there.

Sanity effects were done way back in Eternal Darkness, in 2002. They weren’t a new feature.. and.I don’t know why people are claiming it’s the godsend of this game since it was done 2x better in ED. It fucked with your mind; you’d get messages that your controller was disconnected when it wasn’t, tell you that your saves has been deleted, make the walls bleed, draw insects on the screen, turn you into a zombie, make you walk on the ceiling…Seriously, play ED is you thought this was good.

Also if I remember correctly, “Cthulhu” can’t even be pronounced correctly by human tongues.

Sanity effects were done way back in Eternal Darkness, in 2002. They weren’t a new feature.. and.I don’t know why people are claiming it’s the godsend of this game since it was done 2x better in ED. It fucked with your mind; you’d get messages that your controller was disconnected when it wasn’t, tell you that your saves has been deleted, make the walls bleed, draw insects on the screen, turn you into a zombie, make you walk on the ceiling…Seriously, play ED is you thought this was good.

Also if I remember correctly, “Cthulhu” can’t even be pronounced correctly by human tongues.

Not much to say that hasn’t already been said. Great atmosphere with some awesome moments (fleeing the hotel while trying to block the doors with furniture and locking doors), but ridiculously frustrating and difficult at certain points that make you want to rage quit.

Great horror game, mediocre FPS. I loved the sections where you were defenseless, for me that IS the Cthulhu experience, running away from elderbeings that want to eat your soul. Running around blowing things away with you guns, eh not so much. The fishfolk don’t hold the same kind of terror when you can kill them from afar.

The sanity effects were awesome, I don’t care what anybody says. Sure shit didn’t drip from the walls and it didn’t go meta on you, but when you are trying to fight things where even looking at them for more than a few seconds gets your vision blurry and your character having a panic attack, it adds to the atmosphere and makes you feel afraid.

I played through it for the first time not that long ago for the first eat-sleep-game.com gameclub and had a blast. It’s not without its flaws, but its still got some good scares.

Great horror game, mediocre FPS. I loved the sections where you were defenseless, for me that IS the Cthulhu experience, running away from elderbeings that want to eat your soul. Running around blowing things away with you guns, eh not so much. The fishfolk don’t hold the same kind of terror when you can kill them from afar.

The sanity effects were awesome, I don’t care what anybody says. Sure shit didn’t drip from the walls and it didn’t go meta on you, but when you are trying to fight things where even looking at them for more than a few seconds gets your vision blurry and your character having a panic attack, it adds to the atmosphere and makes you feel afraid.

I played through it for the first time not that long ago for the first eat-sleep-game.com gameclub and had a blast. It’s not without its flaws, but its still got some good scares.

Much as I hate to be accused of granting ‘armchair praise’ which might influence anybody, I have to say, thanks for including my favorite video game of all time.

I think that this is the chase that you were talking about.Skip to about 5:09
http://www.youtube.com/user/helloween4545#p/c/4BBEACE3E4B5873A/10/IuW2W-OoKMU

I think that this is the chase that you were talking about.Skip to about 5:09
http://www.youtube.com/user/helloween4545#p/c/4BBEACE3E4B5873A/10/IuW2W-OoKMU

wow I can’t believe other people have played this game!!! I always though this was one of those little oddities that made gaming store clerks cock their heads to the side and make a confused little grunt like a dog watching fireworks. I LOVED this thing, no matter how many basically game breaking bugs would crop up (control being a huge problem, and as i think someone mentioned, the collision detection and sneaking stuff was basically non existant and the sanity meter, while a very interesting concept, usually just bugged out and resulted in you randomly shooting yourself in the face, which got REALLY annoying especially later in the game when you would have to see a rapid succession of “spooky shit’ at one time) but it was one of the first…maybe only games i ever played that really captured the essense of lovecraftian horror. especially that early scene in the hotel, the “attack of the fishmen” i think it’s called, it is one of the most intense and genuinely frightening sequences i’ve ever played in a game. in fact, the parts without a weapon are some of the best, not only because they provide you with genuine fear and helplessness, but they were actually a little easier. as when you didn’t have a gun, you pretty much knew “well, i better beat cheeks outta here and be quiet about it” which is what you were pretty much meant to do 9 out of every ten times anyway, but when you had a gun, the temtaption was too high to start blasting fishmen for making you wet your pants earlier and it almost always resulted in you getting mauled by all his buddies.

though i must admit, the very first thing i did upon getting the pistol and shotgun was to save my game, prepared to shortly reload later, cocked my boomstick and marched outward into the streets and expended every round i could find into those bug eyed gill neck bastards. my brother watching me do this asked just what the hell i thought i was doing to which i replied “I’m going…to sort it out..I’m going to show those sturgeon faced commies what for!!!”

though as a side note, i would reccomend seeing the movie “Dagon” that came out around the same time, if not a little before the game. they are both based heavily on the shadow over insmouth and though it’s not nearly as awesome as the game (it’s a little too close to the older “full moon productions” style of it’s predeccessors at times, and that really can’t be helped, but it doesn’t sink the whole movie), it stays true to a lot of the lovecraftian elements that made the game so awesome (plus that awesome lynchmob chase is in the movie and it’s pretty much as awesome as it was in the game)

I honestly think there has never been a “good” lovecraft movie, but dagon is as far from bad as they will get for now, so give it a look if you haven’t already.

I loved this game, BUT one thing I hated was I could’nt finish it, this was’nt due to lack of skill or difficulty, this was an inherint problem with the PAL EU version, when I reached the boat level and had to sneak into the captian quarters, it’d ALWAYS crash and I had heard you can load an older save to get past it, but you can’t it just seems to keep crashing over and over. A pity really, I’m a huge HPL fan and would give my right arm to finaly get a copy of this game I can complete.

I loved this game, BUT one thing I hated was I could’nt finish it, this was’nt due to lack of skill or difficulty, this was an inherint problem with the PAL EU version, when I reached the boat level and had to sneak into the captian quarters, it’d ALWAYS crash and I had heard you can load an older save to get past it, but you can’t it just seems to keep crashing over and over. A pity really, I’m a huge HPL fan and would give my right arm to finaly get a copy of this game I can complete.

I remember the part with the mob really well.
But another memorable moment was when you were at the Marsh Refinery and you have just escaped a room where a Shoggoth was placed by a member of the Marsh family, as you walk down this long corridor, you hear the heavy metal doors behind suddenly burst open like if they were paper and right behind you is the Shoggoth!
That part really really made my pulse go through the roof, it was that tense.

Wes, CoCDCotE and Eternal Darkness (love that game too, btw) had quite different sanity systems going on.

CoC’s was entirely character based, in that everything that was happening was making the character go insane. Things like vertigo, desecrated corpses, mosnters and eldritch abominations. ED’s was more insidious, in that it starts to make the player go a bit insane. If CoC had error messages, hard drive deletion fakeouts, control rearrangements and others, yeah I’d say it was just based on ED. However, CoC’s sanity system isn’t a fourth-wall breaking one, it’s all entirely within the context of the game itself.

So although ED did have a very innovative and powerful sanity system, it isn’t fair to call CoC’s a direct ripoff, since the mechanics and style are fairly different.

Wes, CoCDCotE and Eternal Darkness (love that game too, btw) had quite different sanity systems going on.

CoC’s was entirely character based, in that everything that was happening was making the character go insane. Things like vertigo, desecrated corpses, mosnters and eldritch abominations. ED’s was more insidious, in that it starts to make the player go a bit insane. If CoC had error messages, hard drive deletion fakeouts, control rearrangements and others, yeah I’d say it was just based on ED. However, CoC’s sanity system isn’t a fourth-wall breaking one, it’s all entirely within the context of the game itself.

So although ED did have a very innovative and powerful sanity system, it isn’t fair to call CoC’s a direct ripoff, since the mechanics and style are fairly different.

I liked this game.

Terribly difficult, but very well made.

I really love this game, but at the same time, there’s much I hate about it too.

First is the respawning. There are moments in the game where there is clear that the developer wants you to sneak even if you have tons of guns. But instead give you the choice of fighting or sneaking, they force you to sneak by making the enemies respawn like 5-10 seconds after you killed a guy!

Second thing is the technology(Speaking from a guy who played the PC version). If you turn up the screen-resolution more than 640*480, the character will walk/run/sneak slower. This make some sneaking part almost impossible to beat. It also makes the end part of the game unbeatable! Fortunately some fans created an editor where you could change the walknig speed(And a lot of other stuff) so you could make the character walk at normal speed.

Even with the flaws, it’s still one of the best horror game on the market and the best Lovecraftian game.

I really love this game, but at the same time, there’s much I hate about it too.

First is the respawning. There are moments in the game where there is clear that the developer wants you to sneak even if you have tons of guns. But instead give you the choice of fighting or sneaking, they force you to sneak by making the enemies respawn like 5-10 seconds after you killed a guy!

Second thing is the technology(Speaking from a guy who played the PC version). If you turn up the screen-resolution more than 640*480, the character will walk/run/sneak slower. This make some sneaking part almost impossible to beat. It also makes the end part of the game unbeatable! Fortunately some fans created an editor where you could change the walknig speed(And a lot of other stuff) so you could make the character walk at normal speed.

Even with the flaws, it’s still one of the best horror game on the market and the best Lovecraftian game.

Man, I really wish the sequel didn’t get canned. This is pretty much the only game I ever played that truly scared the piss out of me. Shame it got so ridiculously hard near the end, if only due to the lack of savepoints.

This is no doubt one of my favourite games. Also the song in the intro is awesome.

This is no doubt one of my favourite games. Also the song in the intro is awesome.

That was simply one of the BEST games i have ever played. There was a ton of annoing bugs and impossible driving stages but the rest of the game, especially the first “no weapon” part were great!

I Loved this game. And that’s as simple as I can put it. A True Horror Game Classic.

Cool Side-Note: HB Lovecraft actually based Innsmouth (The setting of the game) off of my hometown.

P.S. My hometwon is NOT as cool or twisted as Innsmouth.

I Loved this game. And that’s as simple as I can put it. A True Horror Game Classic.

Cool Side-Note: HB Lovecraft actually based Innsmouth (The setting of the game) off of my hometown.

P.S. My hometwon is NOT as cool or twisted as Innsmouth.

*** HP Lovecraft***. Sorry Lol

I love the sanity system in both ED and CoC, each as different flavors of the same principle. In ED, sanity was a resource, somewhat like health, and it was particular enemies which took it from you, aside from some special areas and scripted sequences (It’s been a very long time since I played it, so forgive me that much). The sanity effects, while crazy mindbending, ultimately didn’t affect the gameplay too much. You could play for a long time (as I did) with next-to-no sanity left, and still manage to play the game. Further, as a third person game, the sanity effects weren’t as often felt as part of the character as part of the game itself.

CoC, on the other hand, as a first person shooter, meant that the sanity was much more ingrained into the game mechanics itself. I remember one point when fighting a truly frightening boss that your character would basically quake at they very _sight_ of the thing, making even running away from the thing difficult. I had to purposefully _look away_ from the the boss as I ran to safety, making for some really interesting gameplay. You really had to keep your characters sanity, otherwise you could not act. I think it gave a much more personal and powerful version of Lovecraftian horrors: Creatures which were almost as dangerous to look at as they were to interact with directly.

To some degree, I think that ED’s fear effects were far more clever and interesting, but both truly have different ways of operating, and are awesome in their own right.

I love the sanity system in both ED and CoC, each as different flavors of the same principle. In ED, sanity was a resource, somewhat like health, and it was particular enemies which took it from you, aside from some special areas and scripted sequences (It’s been a very long time since I played it, so forgive me that much). The sanity effects, while crazy mindbending, ultimately didn’t affect the gameplay too much. You could play for a long time (as I did) with next-to-no sanity left, and still manage to play the game. Further, as a third person game, the sanity effects weren’t as often felt as part of the character as part of the game itself.

CoC, on the other hand, as a first person shooter, meant that the sanity was much more ingrained into the game mechanics itself. I remember one point when fighting a truly frightening boss that your character would basically quake at they very _sight_ of the thing, making even running away from the thing difficult. I had to purposefully _look away_ from the the boss as I ran to safety, making for some really interesting gameplay. You really had to keep your characters sanity, otherwise you could not act. I think it gave a much more personal and powerful version of Lovecraftian horrors: Creatures which were almost as dangerous to look at as they were to interact with directly.

To some degree, I think that ED’s fear effects were far more clever and interesting, but both truly have different ways of operating, and are awesome in their own right.

wow, I gotta check this out if I ever get the opportunity

I bought that gmae when i head to the shop to buy a new ventilator for my PC since the old one broke and LOVED the game. I should give it another spin some time.

I bought that gmae when i head to the shop to buy a new ventilator for my PC since the old one broke and LOVED the game. I should give it another spin some time.

I remember my brother having a game called ‘Full Throttle’… for some reason, the main male voice from this clip reminds me of the lead character voice from that game. The voicing sounds very similar.

I’d like to see a ‘let’s play’ of Full Throttle, while I never got to play it, I loved the story an music from the watching point of view.

One of the, if not the best horror game I know of. I think it was really ambitious, using a FPS style to do something rarely done (especially at that time), a more realistic and immersive game. No HUD, sanity effects, more adventure-style parts in the game, etc… A shame they never did iron out the bugs of the game or corrected the problems, and an even bigger shame that no one tried to do anything similar. I don’t know why most game developpers make horror games with a third-person view (like the Silent Hill and Resident Evil series), horror is immersive and the best way to do that is with a first-person POV, otherwise everything that happens just happens to that character on the screen.

One of the, if not the best horror game I know of. I think it was really ambitious, using a FPS style to do something rarely done (especially at that time), a more realistic and immersive game. No HUD, sanity effects, more adventure-style parts in the game, etc… A shame they never did iron out the bugs of the game or corrected the problems, and an even bigger shame that no one tried to do anything similar. I don’t know why most game developpers make horror games with a third-person view (like the Silent Hill and Resident Evil series), horror is immersive and the best way to do that is with a first-person POV, otherwise everything that happens just happens to that character on the screen.

Well first off, good little review, and while I say that the game had some decent scares, was a fairly faithful adaptation of an H.P. Lovecraft game, and was a bit original for it’s time I couldn’t play too far, mostly for the fact of the technical difficulties on the PC as stated before. I will have to say that Zack Dolan really encapsulated what that game was like for me, the shock scares of seeing a Deep One or a Polyp for the first time was honestly scary, but then you die. Then you die, again, and again, and about the third time about it goes from fear to anger, then to hate, as a wise little green guy has stated. You just wanted to be able to DO something semi-intelligent than just gibbering, especially after you’ve been running into Deep Ones for several levels, you’d think the guy you were playing would be used to it by now. With a game like this you had to put in a sanity mechanic, but the way it was implemented was fairly ham fisted.

The other thing wrong is that the game does stick close to the H.P. Lovecraft stuff, which I know I’ll probably be burnt at the stake for but just don’t really get most of the stuff. Yes there’s some gems in there, but there’s a lot of silly stuff and purple propose to wade through to get to it, as well as the fact that I think that I might not come from the right cultural background/time period/mindset to get some of his stuff. I will admit that he did come up with some really weird aliens, it’s sort of hard to find things weirder than the Elder Things, Yithians, or Mi-Go that you know function on some sort of logic but different from your own. When you get into things more complex than that…. well… I honestly don’t know what’s so horrifying about Cthulhu. I mean yea, if you see him, you’d crap your pants, but no more than seeing King Kong or Godzilla because it’s a big thing going to eat you, and in the end is incredibly anthropomorphic. I mean, all you got to do is put an octopus on Ken Davitian’s head, paint’em green, and put some wings on him, and boom, you pretty much got the gross anatomy of Cthulhu, which is really a shame when you compare it to the things that I listed earlier. Not to mention the fact that the writer was coming from a very prim and proper New England xenophobic direction, hell the man freaked out just by finding out his Grandma was Welsh. Personally I think that whole ‘corruption by the blood’ thing that comes into his stories quite a bit is well worn out and just a bit more like a cop out to drive the story along.

That is just my opinion, and sorry if I went a bit off base here, but that’s just my opinion on the subject.

This game is A LOT easier with a PC than XBox. Most of the control issues stem from the fact that it wasn’t designed to be played with a pad to begin with, and that can make instances almost impossible.

“I mean, all you got to do is put an octopus on Ken Davitian’s head, paint’em green, and put some wings on him, and boom, you pretty much got the gross anatomy of Cthulhu, which is really a shame when you compare it to the things that I listed earlier.”

That’s not Cthulhu – that’s just what artists have been passing as Cthulhu for decades, based on the much more vague description given in the actual short story. I’ve seen Cthulhu-statuettes that are much, much more alien, and suit in the description far better than this theme park-version you’re describing. Four limbs, two wings, and vaguely octopoid head don’t necessarily make a humanoid-Godzilla – do the proportions right, and any silliness that you may find in the design dissapears. Also, I think you’re concentrating on the entirely wrong aspects of Lovecraft’s literature. I’m the first one to admit that his prose had some huge faults, but he also pretty much single-handedly invented modern existential horror. His execution was flawed, but his ideas were ingenious.

This game is A LOT easier with a PC than XBox. Most of the control issues stem from the fact that it wasn’t designed to be played with a pad to begin with, and that can make instances almost impossible.

“I mean, all you got to do is put an octopus on Ken Davitian’s head, paint’em green, and put some wings on him, and boom, you pretty much got the gross anatomy of Cthulhu, which is really a shame when you compare it to the things that I listed earlier.”

That’s not Cthulhu – that’s just what artists have been passing as Cthulhu for decades, based on the much more vague description given in the actual short story. I’ve seen Cthulhu-statuettes that are much, much more alien, and suit in the description far better than this theme park-version you’re describing. Four limbs, two wings, and vaguely octopoid head don’t necessarily make a humanoid-Godzilla – do the proportions right, and any silliness that you may find in the design dissapears. Also, I think you’re concentrating on the entirely wrong aspects of Lovecraft’s literature. I’m the first one to admit that his prose had some huge faults, but he also pretty much single-handedly invented modern existential horror. His execution was flawed, but his ideas were ingenious.

you know if that were me and i went up to a door with the sound of an ailen queen behind it i would tend to not look in there

Awesome fucking game, thought. Also pretty fucking impossible to beat without help.

Awesome fucking game, thought. Also pretty fucking impossible to beat without help.

You know, this one is a good game, but I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a classic. Penumbra series are far more creepy than this one for me. Those games catch Lovecraft’s atmosphere way beyond this one. Sanity loss and panic are far more effective there than they are in Dark Corners (heart beat and breathing as your character panics, are more realistic to me than just blurry screen). Also, here are not that many monsters or encounters, but when they do happen, you just want to hide somewhere in the dark corner and look away. The game system forces you to do this, because monster can hear you breathe when you panic, and more clearly you see them as your senses sharpen in the dark… well, enough about that.

I really enjoyed this and I agree with Lightice, it’s a lot easier with the PC.

I loved the sanity system (very well implemented from the pen and paper RPG). Oh and I died from my first battle with Dagorath by loosing so much sanity that it killed me. I really want to experience where you loose enough sanity that you can hallucinate (the friendly NPC’s turn into monsters and attack you).

I really enjoyed this and I agree with Lightice, it’s a lot easier with the PC.

I loved the sanity system (very well implemented from the pen and paper RPG). Oh and I died from my first battle with Dagorath by loosing so much sanity that it killed me. I really want to experience where you loose enough sanity that you can hallucinate (the friendly NPC’s turn into monsters and attack you).

Not to sound like an ass or anything, but I think you should do a 100% full review with playthrough like all of your other games. I mean I loved this little review,but I think a full review will do this game more justice.

holy shit it killed the little girl

As much as I love the Lovecraft Mythos and I could appreciate everything that this game tried to do I had to hang it up and call it quits. I was never able to figure out exactly what I needed to do in the canning factory after the Shoggoth was let out.
It’s a shame I never got to finish it because I would have loved to have seen what it had in store, but the actual game design kept fighting back to the point that it just wasn’t fun to play anymore.

I love this game, maybe because I’m a hardcore Lovecraft Fan, who knows, haha.

My boyfriend is in the middle of playing this game….Wish it had been given a sequel :(

Arkham Asylum? Does that mean Batman is an elder god?

CoC is one of my favorites, one that has really good pacing for a video game. It starts of with this level of dread that grows and grows until the horror begins and you’re running for your life, facing greater and greater horrors. I’m not a fan of Lovecraft, but this game brought his creations to life in a way that I feel no movie has or can.

Aww man, I wanted to see more!

very eerie…i probably would have liked this game back around the age when I played Alice & other similar games
super creepy

ha arkham asdylum …… nah nah nah nah nah nah nah batman!

I love this game! Escaping the hotel freaked the shit out of me!

You should really do a let’s play on this one! Think about it playing a game that you actually like; and on top of that a game viewers will enjoy watching you play! 

 Abstracting, I’ve been trying to adapt sanity into a game of my own of sorts.

One side of it would be mania – so if you’re too afraid, you kill yourself?  Well, maybe you can trade fear for mania once you’ve descended down the path of mania a bit.  IF you descend too far down mania however, it becomes impossible to keep calm.  you are always on edge.  you can never sleep.

The other side is dementia.  Forget about everything.  Just live for the moment.  You will destroy that demon that’s pursuing you, no matter what.  It’s great for being competent, at maybe, one thing.  But you suck at everything else.  You’re depressed, you move slowly, and you don’t care about anything, so maybe communicating with NPCs becomes impossible because you can’t help but idley mention that one thing that’s on your mind!

The third side is the middle.  Equilibrium.  It helps you keep calm.  And eventually recover from ‘fears’.  Trauma is basically lasting fear, or lasting damage to your sanity that you are trying to recover from (maybe you’re trying to be less manic or less dementiatic).  Of course, once you get to the final boss (or whatever), you need to have a certain level of mania or dementia to win.  Or else, it’s impossible – maybe he’s invisible and you can’t see him, so your character has to ‘hallucinate’ to win. 

Very profound way of going about a game, but a pretty cool system, right?

Bad graphics are a design flaw?  Oh, Spoony, never change.

Damn you Spoony! Now i want to play both want to play Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth and Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem!

whoa, is this set in the Batman universe?

Nice picture.Grow up kid