Call of Cthulhu Video Game
Media / 7/17/2009 1:29:57 AM
Yay! Another new Chicago guest writer, Brad Witzel, joins the fold. Brad considers himself a mild-mannered nerd by day and at night transforms into a caffeine-addicted fiend who rampages through town searching for fresh entertainment. He'd prefer not to discuss what happens during the full moon. We're just glad he's happy to discuss his passion for this next video game!
H.
P. Lovecraft inspires some of the most loyal literary fan-base that can be
found. Lovecraft infuses his works with tragedy, madness, action, and horrific imagery filled with insane cultists, unknowable evils, and relate-able narrators.
Capturing all of those aspects in a short story is a feat that few other authors accomplish with any grace. So what is the possibility that a Lovecraft-based video game will be able to make the grade? Call of
Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth does it! It captures all of the
ichthyic glory found in the pages of the story "The Shadow over Innsmouth" by
Lovecraft. It also manages to include details from the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game adventure, "Escape from Innsmouth".
Playing as a private investigator searching for a missing clerk in the town of Innsmouth, it quickly becomes clear that something is very wrong about the small coastal town. The residents have rather large eyes and can't seem to keep a fishy lisp from perforating their voices. They also keep trying to kill outsiders whose lone crime was asking too many questions. The ensuing chase, a tense experience, leads through a frantic maze of hotel rooms, roof-tops, factory basements, and sewers, all the while praying to the Elder Gods that the fish-men don't find them. Why is the escape from the town especially hair-raising? Unlike other survival horror games, the character in Dark Corners of the Earth doesn't find a gun until halfway through the story. That's right folks, this is true survival horror.
Tension and fear aren't only achieved by running for one's life. Dark Corners of the Earth truly grasps the feel of Lovecraft in the subtle way they apply the author's signature mechanics. With no heads-up display as a guide, current mental and physical state has to be gauged by watching and listening to the
character. Is his vision becoming blurred or zooming in and out? That happens
when you look down from a rooftop and get vertigo. Is the character limping and
seeing red? That's because he's hurt and needs a splint for his leg and bandages for his head. Does your character place his own gun at his head only to hear the click of an empty chamber and then attempt to strangle himself to death? That's because he's actually gone
insane.
It's all too rare in the modern video game industry to see a game do so well at capturing fear. From asylum to seaside cliffs, and from Dagon to Hydra, Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth is the one horror game everyone should play.
Brad Witzel
Jill's p.s. Get your own gory copy of Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth NOW in our handy online Killer-store!
p.p.s. Send Brad your thoughts at comments@killer-work.com
