thelurkinghorror
Member
Darkmakaimura said:
Me too!
Don't forget Undying from Clive Barker!
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Lovecraft Games - The Del Toro Future, The Dyack Past, and How Can It Work?
- Thread starter Imbarkus
- Start date
Me too!
Don't forget Undying from Clive Barker!
semiconscious
Member
Imbarkus said:
while i'd never say the megaten games could be categorized as 'lovecraftian', i can easily say that the 'smt mythos' might just be the single most unusual & imaginative mythos in all gaming, & well worth any occasional grinding involved in order to experience it. hard for me to imagine someone who enjoys lovecraft not enjoying the megaten games...
& i'd strongly recommend smt: devil survivor as the point of entry game...
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Searching for Lovecraft and Cthulhu on YouTube will mostly yield you an afternoon of frustration sifting through a lot of emo crap, but here are some gems:
Hey There, Cthulhu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxScTbIUvoA
The Adventures of Lil' Cthulhu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOHJUrcVdJk&feature=related
Hey There, Cthulhu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxScTbIUvoA
The Adventures of Lil' Cthulhu
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOHJUrcVdJk&feature=related
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
semiconscious said:
Really? The DS one to start? Still have to pick it up... was going to start with Devil Summoner 1 since I heard it had an action-based battle system, more my twitch-gamer style...
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Imbarkus said:Yeah. At least you never actually saw Cthulhu, though I kind of wish there was a way to look off in some random direction in the final level, see him, and die instantly. With their sanity effect kicking in, you could blur things out so the player themselves would not go instantly mad.
Actually, I think early on in the game, you'd end up in a locked room with a Cthulhu statue that would project voices into the main character's head, sort of. If you didn't get out of the room quickly, the voices would make your character go mad, pull out his gun and commit suicide. A neat little easter egg :lol
thelurkinghorror said:Me too!
Don't forget Undying from Clive Barker!
Undying was great, and the final boss was pure Lovecraftian horror.
charlequin
Banned
Imbarkus said:
I can't.
Draft said:
Well, a game like Demon's Souls is much more coming out of the swords and sorcery tradition anyway, where Lovecraft's less depressed and psychotic buddies like Robert Howard were borrowing his creations for their violent action yarns.
NotTheGuyYouKill
Member
I've only ever read one Lovecraft story (it was... weird), but the idea behind Lovecraft stories, you know, cosmic horror, that stuff has always interested me. I always wanted to play Eternal Darkness, but I never had a Gamecube, so I never did try it out.
I do know that Dead Space and Alan Wake sorta have Lovecraft/cosmic horror overtones, but to what degree it is close to Lovecraft's original intent, I'm not sure.
Though, I am really interested in Del Toro's upcoming game. A lot of the games mentioned here I've never played cause I either never had that system or it's on PC and I don't really play PC games.
I do know that Dead Space and Alan Wake sorta have Lovecraft/cosmic horror overtones, but to what degree it is close to Lovecraft's original intent, I'm not sure.
Though, I am really interested in Del Toro's upcoming game. A lot of the games mentioned here I've never played cause I either never had that system or it's on PC and I don't really play PC games.
No way Robert Howard is less depressed than Lovecraft. You're right though Demon's Souls does look like an old Conan story in terms of setting.charlequin said:I can't.
Well, a game like Demon's Souls is much more coming out of the swords and sorcery tradition anyway, where Lovecraft's less depressed and psychotic buddies like Robert Howard were borrowing his creations for their violent action yarns.
I don't mean to threadjack, but I can't see how At the Mountains of Madness will be an appealing movie. A lot of the joy from that novella comes from Lovecraft's descriptions, not really on the events.
ANYWAYS, if you look hard enough, tons of games have Lovecraftian influences, especially the "giant crazy monster from space." Case in point:
ANYWAYS, if you look hard enough, tons of games have Lovecraftian influences, especially the "giant crazy monster from space." Case in point:
charlequin
Banned
Draft said:
You know what, somehow it escaped my memory that Howard shot himself in the head when I wrote that. :lol
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Forkball said:
I don't even find the novella to be all that enjoyable tbh. It's not bad, but it just drags on for far too long for my tastes. I'm more fond of his shorter stories, like The Rats in the Walls, The Dunwich Horror and The Haunter of the Dark.
NovemberMike
Member
Lovecraft wasn't actually a good writer, it was his ideas that were amazing. I'm a fan of a lot of his work, like The Outsider, the Doom that Came to Sarnath, Herbert West etc but you read him for the ideas and descriptions.
Lovecraft spinoffs tend to be horrible because they can't capture the same ideas and they try to use his stories.
Lovecraft spinoffs tend to be horrible because they can't capture the same ideas and they try to use his stories.
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Combichristoffersen said:
Yes I too am concerned at what sort of a movie Del Toro can make from that particular story. He's going to have to be a bit liberal with the source to make an interesting movie, and of course that's going to introduce a lot of contention.
To be honest, my feeling is that thebest Lovecraftian film made was John Carpenter's:
"In the Mouth of Madness."
And even that was a little overt and spot-on. Even better, really, was:
"Prince of Darkness."
I'm just assuming the game will tie in to the movie since he's tied to both projects, unless my original mistake stands and Benecio Del Toro is heading the game. :lol
It's possible for the game to be related only in that its Lovecraftian, and THQ ain't releasing anything about it.
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
NovemberMike said:
The appalling racism could be a turn off too, which S.T. Joshi correctly calls him on. Granted I love Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family.
I don't think his writing was too bad though, he was an extremely descriptive writer, he did tend to abuse the thesaurus a bit and I never understood the horror of NON-LINEAR GEOMETRY!!!
People here also need to see the 46 minute Silent Adaption of The Call of Cthulhu, it's free on Netflix Streaming!
How about people forgetting Sam and Max: The Devil's Playhouse!
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Forkball said:ANYWAYS, if you look hard enough, tons of games have Lovecraftian influences, especially the "giant crazy monster from space." Case in point:
chrono-trigger-lavos-shell.jpg
I google-imaged it, it wasn't showing up.
Yeah this is what I was saying about Shinmegaten. I guess I'm looking out a bit more for games with a Lovecraft narrative experience than ones with the odd reference here and there, ala Blood, from Monolith:
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Manos: The Hans of Fate said:
I don't think non-linear geometry was meant to be taken as literally fear of weird angles or such :lol More like it was the uneasiness of architechtural design that seemed alien and not of this world. As for Lovecraft's abilities as a writer, he wasn't bad, but he relied a bit too much on archaic words, and his language often seems deliberately 'stilted', so to say. He's nowhere near as bad as someone like Stephenie Meyer, really :lol
And yeah, his racism is appalling, but apparently he softened up a bit towards the end of his life.
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
Ah yes, it was Non-Euclidean Geometry." I should mention that my visualization skills could (and still do) suck at times.Draft said:
Yeah, I think when thought of in that way, it makes a lot more sense (and for me seeing the visuals in the silent Cthulhu (or Sherklock Holmes The Awakened). I agree about the archaic words. My wife has a BA and MA in English and her hobbies is lexicography and even she felt his writing was very archaic and abuse of the thesaurus when she read Dagon.Combichristoffersen said:
I am happy to say I lack the requisite background to make the comparison!Combichristoffersen said:
And yeah, his racism is appalling, but apparently he softened up a bit towards the end of his life.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, Joshi mentions the incident of him and a neighbor hearing about Anti-Jewish attacks in Germany from a Jewish neighbor who had just returned from living there and he was livid about it. Hell, he even married (for a while) a Jewish person, who had to remind me him of that fact when he got all North Minefield By Electioney I think a lot of it came from his upbringing and it shows in why he hated Brooklyn so much.
We forgot Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened!
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
awesome thread! i'm at work right now, but i will respond more at length when i get home.
excellent work, imbarkus. this is a guy's work who i want to see leveraged more in games.
excellent work, imbarkus. this is a guy's work who i want to see leveraged more in games.
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Manos: The Hans of Fate said:
I don't have any degrees in English or anything, but I like to believe I have a relatively good grasp of the english language, given that it's my third language (behind Norwegian and Swedish), but Lovecraft is probably the author that has made me use my English dictionary the most when reading novels in English, even moreso than Tolkien :lol
Manos: The Hans of Fate said:
You haven't missed out on anything great by avoiding Twilight, trust me :lol
Manos: The Hans of Fate said:
Aye, I've read about that incident. Seemed so out of place for a raging antisemite and racist like Lovecraft to suddenly get a hizzy fit over what was going on in Germany at the time, but I guess he broadened his views and softened up a bit as he got older. Weren't his parents and his grandfather also relatively stern racists?
Prime crotch
Banned
I got over Lovecraft's blatant racism, calling people subhuman and such, but even so his stories are quite dull. But somehow his "offspring" managed to create something amazing with his kind of horror, even though C'thullu is so overplayed these days.
Hexadecimalt
Banned
OP really missed the mark by not including any mention of Amnesia or the other amazing Frictional games.
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Blue_Gecko said:
OP also forgot the two Darkness Within games. Heavily influenced by Lovecraft.
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Blue_Gecko said:
Would add them to the original post once I buy and play them, but then that would make the posts that schooled me on them (and yours) seem out of place.
Never fear, I have been schooled. But I still ask, is the Penumbra series as Lovecraftian as Amnesia?
Combichristoffersen said:
You are first to mention these, unless you refer to these Infograme titles:
Manos: The Hans of Fate said:
Indeed I have some catch-up playing to do, though I'm not sure if Shadow of the Comet etc will be too old for me.
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Imbarkus said:
The first Penumbra is heavily influenced by Lovecraft, the second less so, and the third one is, if I'm not mistaken, more of a puzzle game than a horror game. As for the Darkness Within games; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darkness_Within:_In_Pursuit_of_Loath_Nolder
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
English is my first and only language, and I was doing the same thing too.Combichristoffersen said:
I suspect as much. Though the Rifftrax versions of the movies are hilarious!Combichristoffersen said:
I like how one author in the documentary Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown put it. He felt that Lovecraft was essentially acting out in an adolescence way to the Red Hook section of Brooklyn and the diversity of it. I do think he believed his views, but I suspect they dissipated over time.Combichristoffersen said:
One (unintentionally) humorous explanation is that Lovecraft was essentially trolling other people:
I think it was most likely a mix of the two. I don't know about Lovecraft's ancestors as well, but I suspect they were most likely racists, or at the least very much of their time.
JasonUresti
Member
Lovecraft's racism really came from his fear of change and the unknown.
In his letters, he also wrote nasty things about Irish, Polish, and Russian immigrants. It was less about the color of their skin, and more about them being different, their language and culture not being that of an 18th-19th century English descended colonial gentleman.
Lovecraft was indeed growing as a person and being happy as he got older. He was traveling to visit some friends around the country, and enjoying seeing new sights. That is sharp contrast to his early years, where he hated living in Brooklyn because it was so different from his beloved Rhode Island.
You might be surprised, by there are photos of him hanging out with his friends on these trips, and he is smiling and laughing with them, clearly having a great time.
Lovecraft's writing was getting quite strong later in life, and he was improving up until the end. Another thing to bare in mind is that quite a number of his stories published after his death and new found fandom were titles that were rejected at the time, and some that he never thought were very good, or intended to be seen by people outside of his circle of writing friends.
Games aren't ready for Lovecraft, for an accurate take on him. Games just don't do that type of thinking/gameplay very well yet.
Some games have done a fine job of taking his concepts and atmosphere and converting them into a strong video game form, but they aren't really Lovecraft.
In his letters, he also wrote nasty things about Irish, Polish, and Russian immigrants. It was less about the color of their skin, and more about them being different, their language and culture not being that of an 18th-19th century English descended colonial gentleman.
Lovecraft was indeed growing as a person and being happy as he got older. He was traveling to visit some friends around the country, and enjoying seeing new sights. That is sharp contrast to his early years, where he hated living in Brooklyn because it was so different from his beloved Rhode Island.
You might be surprised, by there are photos of him hanging out with his friends on these trips, and he is smiling and laughing with them, clearly having a great time.
Lovecraft's writing was getting quite strong later in life, and he was improving up until the end. Another thing to bare in mind is that quite a number of his stories published after his death and new found fandom were titles that were rejected at the time, and some that he never thought were very good, or intended to be seen by people outside of his circle of writing friends.
Games aren't ready for Lovecraft, for an accurate take on him. Games just don't do that type of thinking/gameplay very well yet.
Some games have done a fine job of taking his concepts and atmosphere and converting them into a strong video game form, but they aren't really Lovecraft.
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
Combichristoffersen said:
Hmm. Will probably pick up the bundle of the trilogy on Penumbra, hope it turns out well for me!
As for Darkness Within, looks published only in Europe (am I right?). I'll have to scour around to see if someone has published it digitally... definitely seems worthy of the thread!
Combichristoffersen
Combovers don't work when there is no hair
JasonUresti said:
His self-professed anglophilia (and xenophobia) definitely played a part in his racism, although I still find it amusing how he's almost gushing over the Norwegian sailor in Call of Cthulhu, yet firmly disliking most people of other non-English nationalities :lol
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
JasonUresti said:
I think this is a fair statement, but I'm curious... what sort of video game gameplay would actually do the job?
We've seem Interactive Fiction, Point-and-Click adventure, First-Person adventure and FPS (DCotE qualifies as the latter IMHO), Third-Person hack-and-slash with magic (Eternal Darkness). Everyone seems to agree that conveying sanity effects is important, though they don't agree how. Many people seem to agree that feeling anything other than fragile in the face of Lovecraftian abominations misses the mark somehow.
I will have to play Penumbra and Amnesia to testify, but I get the feeling they might be headed in the right direction. DCotE really was getting close to the right vibe until it became very much a shooter...
On another tack, Arkham Horror nails the atmosphere in board-game format, and it's a bastard to actually win, so there is a sort of sense of fear there, but, in the end, it is a board game of navigation, strategy, and chance. Still, I wonder aloud (again) if an XBLA version couldn't be released, complete with sanity effects and sounds/animations that further drive home the atmosphere of unnamable dread...
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
JasonUresti said:
It's true, it's quite depressing that he died as young as he did. It's hard to think he would have stopped writing, and it's even harder to imagine where he would be growing.
I wonder if we shouldn't start a thread in the OT to discuss him as an author and his literature. No reason we can't have to vibrant subjects on the man!
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
:lolZeliard said:
I've just opened a general Lovecaft thred in the OT for discussing the man and his works not related to gaming influences:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=409244
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
SalsaShark said:
Wow. I did not mean to ignore this entirely, but the whimsical box art only as reply convinced me it was not serious, whereas, yes, this appears to be a XBox Live Indie release.
Screenshot:
Perhaps not the survival horror experience it seems I will get from Amnesai, and more of an RPG chock full of satirical references? Still might be fun to check out... especially for only $3.
Imbarkus
As Sartre noted in his contemplation on Hell in No Exit, the true horror is other members.
NotTheGuyYouKill said:
Well, if you ever get a Wii, get this game. I'd say it still rivals the Resident Evil Remake as the best horror game you can get for the system.
NotTheGuyYouKill said:
Very little, really. I need to play Dead Space to speak to it (I know, shame on me) but Alan Wake is squarely a Stephen King homage. Every enemy is a possessed human, and every manifestation of an evil entity takes a human form. Though I appreciate the game throwing in a reference to Elder Gods, it just doesn't have a Lovecraftian vibe.
Much as I love King, he simply did not have the imagination when it came to creating inhuman beasts the way Lovecraft did. The closest he ever came was It, and, when put to brass tacks in the finale, the best form he could manifest the otherworldly monstrosity into was a big spider. Tentacle, Stephen. Something with tentacles. :lol
I'm post-whoring, but in case anyone's interested, here are some thoughts I had about a Lovecraft game which I posted in the last thread we had on this subject...
This is an idea I've had rattling around in my head for a while too, and I don't think creating a successful Lovecraftian RPG would be at all difficult in terms of logistics. The player character is a scholar or detective. I prefer the former - let's say a physics professor at Miskatonic University. Set the game in a huge open world, similar to Fallout 3; but unlike Fallout 3 it's almost entirely safe for most of the game, because it's 1920s New England. The player starts out in Arkham, completely innocent of any aspect of the supernatural. However, the first few 'quests' serve to pull back the veil - not enough to drive him mad, but enough to peak his curiosity. He can then choose whether to research and approach this new mystery through the folklore of New England, the science of the various spheres of reality, the arcane mysteries of ancient tomes like the Necronomicon, or perhaps through his dreams.
The bulk of the game allows the player to follow various threads which lead to him experiencing the events of various Lovecraft tales, alongside more traditional missions that don't come so close to the horror. That way we have a satisfying balance between conventional reality and the key points where other spheres encroach on the mundane. Some quests will involve nothing more than detective work - interviewing people, tracking down books, etc. Others will involve exploration - travel to various New England locations in order to visit people like Henry Akeley and to experience the events of 'The Whisperer in Darkness', or stumbling across a hellish shack in the backwoods and encountering the old man from 'The Picture in the House'. The idea would be to give the player a chance to do something no Lovecraftian protagonist (save Randolph Carter) was ever able to do: learn from successive experiences, and develop the necessary character traits to overcome successive challenges.
Combat would be minimal to start with, but there might come a point later in the game at which the player becomes a hunted man. His presence at the scenes of several horrific deaths would make him the suspect of serious crimes, and eventually he becomes an outlaw, regarded by the world as hopelessly insane. Gameplay will be more about survival than anything else; but I don't have a problem with sections that allow the player to fight his way out of K'n-yan or Innsmouth; and as the game progresses it could walk an interesting line with the player's sanity that makes him question whether or not his experiences are real. Build on Silent Hill 3's "They look like monsters to you?". Additionally, plenty of Lovecraftian protagonists deal with vile perversions of nature that aren't sufficient to damn the senses. The things in the pits in Joseph Curwen's laboratory, the inhabitants of Innsmouth, the ghouls, and some of the lesser alien creatures like the fungi of Yuggoth are a few obvious examples; and I don't have a problem with the player gaining the ability to fight these things. He might be able to stumble upon the farmhouse which contains the Dunwich Horror or encounter the Terrible Old Man very early on if he knows where to look, but would be driven mad or worse without the right skills and knowledge gained through less intense experiences. Several characters in Lovecraft's stories (most notably Randolph Carter) learn enough to triumph where the majority of his protagonists barely survive, and there are several instances in which they make use of technology or magical formulae. As long as the idea is treated with restraint, I don't think the game needs to shy away from giving the player the tools and skills Lovecraft's protagonists never have the time to develop.
With regard to death: every time the player 'dies' or descends into madness, he wakes up in hospital, questioning whether or not the experience was real. As the game progresses, the hospital room becomes a sanitarium, and eventually he wakes up in a padded cell, weaponless, and without many of the right kinds of abilities to be of much practical use in facilitating an instantaneous escape. At that point he has to break out every time, and while there can be various different scenarios to keep things interesting (waking up in a wheel chair; in the middle of a therapy session; in the grounds of a secure unit; in a straight jacket) and different ways in which he can escape, it's enough of chore that the player will really feel the repercussions of death. No clicking a point on a map and warping right back into the attic of Asenath Waite's mansion, or the lowest level of a vast, cyclopean city the second the game reloads - although in the latter case, it would make sense to have the player black out and wake up in the city somewhere utterly random on the map, having perhaps escaped mortal peril in a fit of madness. That said, I could imagine a skill or item that allows a player to resurrect a few hours later on the same spot, aided by certain forces for certain purposes. The overall gameplay idea is that the more power the game gives the player, the more the world regards him as insane, and the tougher it becomes to exist in what was initially a safe, mundane reality. This could even play into a morality system or a levelling/experience system: one player might choose to delve into science and mysticism that gives him power but pushes him outside society. Another might eschew this lore in order to appear more sane and use stealth or persuasion to avoid association with crime scenes. The former will have a significant advantage when dealing with otherworldly forces, the latter will have a significant advantage when dealing with other humans in the real world.
So to summarise: a professor at Miskatonic encounters strangeness. Events such as 'The Thing on the Doorstep' and 'The Dunwich Horror' inaugurate him into Lovecraftian reality. He slowly develops his skills as a detective and researcher via less intense missions (working in stories like 'The Haunter of the Dark', 'The Case of Charles Dexter Ward', etc) and learns to defend himself with firearms in order to survive fights with Cthulhu worshippers in Louisiana swampland or experiences in places like Innsmouth. He'll discover the secret of the Delapore house from 'The Rats in the Walls' and deal with figures like Inspector Legrasse, Richard Pickman, Herbert West and Joseph Curwen. He might stumble on the apartment of Erich Zann or the cliffside shack from 'The Strange High House in the Mist'. He'll slowly gain bizarre magical and scientific knowledge that grants him new abilities and access to stranger, more terrible experiences. He'll travel to Egypt in search of the nameless city of the accursed, wander under the great mound through subterranean caves until he finds K'n-yan, and accompany a university expedition to the Mountains of Madness in Antarctica where he'll survive conflicts with the star-headed Old Ones and narrowly escape from a Shoggoth. He'll eventually try to get to the bottom of the cult's machinations and search for R'lyeh. The world will view him as a genius, a criminal, or a madman depending upon the player's actions. The potagonist - and the player - won't know which of these descriptions is accurate until the end of the game, and perhaps not even then.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=402026
This is an idea I've had rattling around in my head for a while too, and I don't think creating a successful Lovecraftian RPG would be at all difficult in terms of logistics. The player character is a scholar or detective. I prefer the former - let's say a physics professor at Miskatonic University. Set the game in a huge open world, similar to Fallout 3; but unlike Fallout 3 it's almost entirely safe for most of the game, because it's 1920s New England. The player starts out in Arkham, completely innocent of any aspect of the supernatural. However, the first few 'quests' serve to pull back the veil - not enough to drive him mad, but enough to peak his curiosity. He can then choose whether to research and approach this new mystery through the folklore of New England, the science of the various spheres of reality, the arcane mysteries of ancient tomes like the Necronomicon, or perhaps through his dreams.
The bulk of the game allows the player to follow various threads which lead to him experiencing the events of various Lovecraft tales, alongside more traditional missions that don't come so close to the horror. That way we have a satisfying balance between conventional reality and the key points where other spheres encroach on the mundane. Some quests will involve nothing more than detective work - interviewing people, tracking down books, etc. Others will involve exploration - travel to various New England locations in order to visit people like Henry Akeley and to experience the events of 'The Whisperer in Darkness', or stumbling across a hellish shack in the backwoods and encountering the old man from 'The Picture in the House'. The idea would be to give the player a chance to do something no Lovecraftian protagonist (save Randolph Carter) was ever able to do: learn from successive experiences, and develop the necessary character traits to overcome successive challenges.
Combat would be minimal to start with, but there might come a point later in the game at which the player becomes a hunted man. His presence at the scenes of several horrific deaths would make him the suspect of serious crimes, and eventually he becomes an outlaw, regarded by the world as hopelessly insane. Gameplay will be more about survival than anything else; but I don't have a problem with sections that allow the player to fight his way out of K'n-yan or Innsmouth; and as the game progresses it could walk an interesting line with the player's sanity that makes him question whether or not his experiences are real. Build on Silent Hill 3's "They look like monsters to you?". Additionally, plenty of Lovecraftian protagonists deal with vile perversions of nature that aren't sufficient to damn the senses. The things in the pits in Joseph Curwen's laboratory, the inhabitants of Innsmouth, the ghouls, and some of the lesser alien creatures like the fungi of Yuggoth are a few obvious examples; and I don't have a problem with the player gaining the ability to fight these things. He might be able to stumble upon the farmhouse which contains the Dunwich Horror or encounter the Terrible Old Man very early on if he knows where to look, but would be driven mad or worse without the right skills and knowledge gained through less intense experiences. Several characters in Lovecraft's stories (most notably Randolph Carter) learn enough to triumph where the majority of his protagonists barely survive, and there are several instances in which they make use of technology or magical formulae. As long as the idea is treated with restraint, I don't think the game needs to shy away from giving the player the tools and skills Lovecraft's protagonists never have the time to develop.
With regard to death: every time the player 'dies' or descends into madness, he wakes up in hospital, questioning whether or not the experience was real. As the game progresses, the hospital room becomes a sanitarium, and eventually he wakes up in a padded cell, weaponless, and without many of the right kinds of abilities to be of much practical use in facilitating an instantaneous escape. At that point he has to break out every time, and while there can be various different scenarios to keep things interesting (waking up in a wheel chair; in the middle of a therapy session; in the grounds of a secure unit; in a straight jacket) and different ways in which he can escape, it's enough of chore that the player will really feel the repercussions of death. No clicking a point on a map and warping right back into the attic of Asenath Waite's mansion, or the lowest level of a vast, cyclopean city the second the game reloads - although in the latter case, it would make sense to have the player black out and wake up in the city somewhere utterly random on the map, having perhaps escaped mortal peril in a fit of madness. That said, I could imagine a skill or item that allows a player to resurrect a few hours later on the same spot, aided by certain forces for certain purposes. The overall gameplay idea is that the more power the game gives the player, the more the world regards him as insane, and the tougher it becomes to exist in what was initially a safe, mundane reality. This could even play into a morality system or a levelling/experience system: one player might choose to delve into science and mysticism that gives him power but pushes him outside society. Another might eschew this lore in order to appear more sane and use stealth or persuasion to avoid association with crime scenes. The former will have a significant advantage when dealing with otherworldly forces, the latter will have a significant advantage when dealing with other humans in the real world.
So to summarise: a professor at Miskatonic encounters strangeness. Events such as 'The Thing on the Doorstep' and 'The Dunwich Horror' inaugurate him into Lovecraftian reality. He slowly develops his skills as a detective and researcher via less intense missions (working in stories like 'The Haunter of the Dark', 'The Case of Charles Dexter Ward', etc) and learns to defend himself with firearms in order to survive fights with Cthulhu worshippers in Louisiana swampland or experiences in places like Innsmouth. He'll discover the secret of the Delapore house from 'The Rats in the Walls' and deal with figures like Inspector Legrasse, Richard Pickman, Herbert West and Joseph Curwen. He might stumble on the apartment of Erich Zann or the cliffside shack from 'The Strange High House in the Mist'. He'll slowly gain bizarre magical and scientific knowledge that grants him new abilities and access to stranger, more terrible experiences. He'll travel to Egypt in search of the nameless city of the accursed, wander under the great mound through subterranean caves until he finds K'n-yan, and accompany a university expedition to the Mountains of Madness in Antarctica where he'll survive conflicts with the star-headed Old Ones and narrowly escape from a Shoggoth. He'll eventually try to get to the bottom of the cult's machinations and search for R'lyeh. The world will view him as a genius, a criminal, or a madman depending upon the player's actions. The potagonist - and the player - won't know which of these descriptions is accurate until the end of the game, and perhaps not even then.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=402026
Manos: The Hans of Fate
Banned
Imbarkus said:
I think it's only Lovercraften in the sense it's similar to In the Mouth of Madness by John Carpenter, which isn't really an adaptation of any story, but an homage (as The Thing is in many ways) to his themes, more so with In the Mouth of Madness.
Safe Bet said:
When explained like that it makes a lot of sense, but when you just say Non-Euclidean Geometry, it feels very nerdish and hard to get freaked out by.
Melchiah
Member
Imbarkus said:
If I Were a Deep One:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFzdIaBnckg
I Saw Mommy Kissing Yog-Sothoth:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSvsy11PHxM
I'm Dreaming of a Dead City:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rflsHvtTTGw
Enjoyed the Darkness Within games for my taste of Lovecraft gaming.
Dark Corners of the Earth was not too bad.
People who talk about the racism, I can understand the distaste for it but the world was a different place at the time and that is the reality of it and while you may want to believe that your other favorite writers of the time were all open minded and whatnot they all had their skeletons.
For music not to be taken seriously, I would suggest peeking at "Darkest of the Hillside Thickets" who are a band who is all based on the works of Lovecraft.
Nox Arcana I believe also did an album based on the works.
Would really love to see more PC love given to Lovecraft.
Also give some love to the HP Lovecraft Historical Society http://www.cthulhulives.org/ before raiding the torrent sites.
Dark Corners of the Earth was not too bad.
People who talk about the racism, I can understand the distaste for it but the world was a different place at the time and that is the reality of it and while you may want to believe that your other favorite writers of the time were all open minded and whatnot they all had their skeletons.
For music not to be taken seriously, I would suggest peeking at "Darkest of the Hillside Thickets" who are a band who is all based on the works of Lovecraft.
Nox Arcana I believe also did an album based on the works.
Would really love to see more PC love given to Lovecraft.
Also give some love to the HP Lovecraft Historical Society http://www.cthulhulives.org/ before raiding the torrent sites.
Imbarkus said:
Yes, very much so. The first one is really the only one I'd classify as truly Lovecraftian, and that's probably due to the fact that it started out as a Call of Cthulhu game.
Nah, don't even bother. One of the worst games I've played this gen. There are far better ways to spend your horror gaming time.
Melchiah
Member
Hex said:
Endura's Liber Leviathan album was pretty much based on Lovecraft's works, and their dark ambient fits the mood of the novels quite well.
The Devil's Stars Burn Cold:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ga0uhiUso
The Left Hand of the Dead:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5tI1sYQYcc
The Finnish doom metal band Thergothon also based their works on the mythos:
http://www.myspace.com/thergothon