Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth

Officially, this game isn’t out yet, but since I’ve been playing it for two weeks, I guess I’ll review it. The thing that stands out in this game the most is that there is no HUD. To gauge your health and mental status you have to listen to your heartbeats and breathing, along with the voices in your head. The game starts you off in front of a cult house with people shooting at you for no good reason, and what really sucks is that you don’t get any weapons till level three. So you make your way through the house, and see things that eventually send you to the asylum. Years later when you’re somewhat in touch with reality, you are sent to find a missing person in the surreal town of Innsmouth. The first part of the game is basically building background and solving puzzles, some of which are real thinkers (or maybe I’m just a simpleton). Finally, after people (or whatever) chase you all around town, you’ll get a crowbar, and then you can take out a few guards and get the shotgun and pistol as well. No doubt by now you will have been injured in some way, so this is where the games unique healing approach comes in. There are no general cuts and bruises that simple require you to hit the “heal” key, you are required to assess your wounds and if you have the right medical supplies, treat them. If you don’t have enough Barbie Band-Aids you’ll slowly lose blood until everything becomes grey and you die. Or maybe you suffer from a broken leg and you’ll limp down a hallway while listening to yourself grimace in pain because you used up your last splint. The sounds and music in this game are perfect, from the voices in your head to the creepy townsfolk to the grinding of broken bones, I wouldn’t change a thing. One of the problems I have with the games is the stealth portion in the beginning, which requires you to run like hell because you don’t have your Splinter Cell photon suit on and everybody in the whole town saw you creep from one pile of boxes to the other. Besides that, the graphics could have been a little better, and the environments could be more destructible (crowbar + box = shattered box, not dust cloud). Overall, this is a great game for the pc and you should give it a try.