Combining action-RPG traits with roguelite gameplay, and inspired by the works of the famous writer, Lovecraft's Untold Stories is launching on Nintendo Switch next week.
Based on H.P. Lovecraft’s stories, the game has you experiencing cosmic horror first-hand. Said to contain "all sorts of myth monsters and all kinds of challenges that will test your sanity", it'll take you through randomly generated levels that vary depending on the character you're playing with.
The game has received "very positive" user reviews on Steam since it launched on the platform earlier this year. We've got a list of main features for you to check out below if you're interested in learning more.
Main features:
- Fight hundreds of different monsters from the Cthulhu Mythos in this intense action roguelite.
- Explore Lovecraft’s stories: every character has a storyline that crosses randomly generated levels set in different locations from Lovecraft’s stories, such as the hospital, the jungle, or the port city just to name a few.
- Face the Great Old Ones: Great Cthulhu, Nyarlathotep, Dagon, Shub-Niggurath, and Azathoth await you in special levels.
- Investigate thoroughly: explore every corner to find secret levels and knowledge about the Great Old Ones
- Learn about the Mythos to fight them: to have a chance at fighting the Great Old Ones you need to acquire knowledge about them, or their mere presence will drive you insane.
- Madness awaits: in the course of your adventures you will have to make some decisions, and taking the wrong ones will shake your sanity. If it gets too low, you will start losing your mind – and if you go mad you will take your own life to escape the horror.
- Pick your hero: Choose between 5 different characters, detective, the thief, the professor, the witch, and the ghoul.
- Different playstyles: every investigator has a different combat style and skills, but levels also vary depending on who you’re playing them with – so the gameplay experience is totally different.
- Collect and improve weapons, items, and artifacts. Each character has a set of weapons and items, and there are hundreds of other items you can find and use!
- Look for clues and special items to unlock secrets and new stories.
It'll be available from the Nintendo Switch eShop on 10th May, just one week from today.
Does this look like it could be your kind of thing? Have you already tried it out on Steam? Tell us below.
Comments 32
Imagine having a trailer that doesnt show a single second of the game or even in game graphics...
My sympathies for the developers who have had the misfortune of getting published by Bad Land Publishing (formerly Bad Land Games).
When I read the title I was sold. After seeing the screenshots that enthusiasm died a bit.
As per the majority of above comments, SHOW SOME DAMN GAMEPLAY!!
Then saw screenshots, erm no thanks
I hate when they do stuff like this. It's even worse when it's phone games and the ads don't have footage from the same game.
That actually looks neat, from the article thumbnail I thought it would be one of those horrible item find games.
Double dipping. Really like this on PC, but I rarely have a chance to play it.
I really enjoy Lovecraft lore. It would have been nice to have had some gameplay footage in the trailer though. I'm interested, but not completely sold yet.
Edit:
Ok. I just watched a video on youtube from the PC version of this game, and it looks really good. The screenshots above do not do it justice. This game is now a must buy for me.
@Cissero Yeah, after reading the headline I was imagining all sorts of cool atmospheric visuals. Then I scrolled down and (sound of record scratching) More pixilated garbage! Not saying that single handedly makes it a bad game, but I REALLY don't like this trend of games looking like a pixilated mess. And thanks to the tv's with small fuzzy screens we were using with our 8 and 16 bit systems, that not really how they looked back in the day anyway.
@TheFox I like my fair share of pixelated games tbh, but this just doesn't look good. I'll wait for some reviews and highly likely consider picking it up when it's on discount.
Inspired by the man himself? God forbid if you’re a member of a ‘lesser race’ then. I can appreciate his writing and his contribution to horror but the man was insanely racist.
The scary part is that they show no gameplay footage to let us know how crappy it'll be but the voice narrator seems decent.
If anyone wants to know what this game is like then there are four reviews of the PC version on Metacritic and 162 reviews on Steam. I doubt the Switch version will be wildly different to the PC version.
https://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/lovecrafts-untold-stories
https://store.steampowered.com/app/871420/Lovecrafts_Untold_Stories/
Big fan of indies, but hate so many of them go for that 8/16bit retro look.
As much as I love Lovecraft's works of fiction and gorgeous writing style, I won't purchase this game strictly because of the atrocious and immoral publisher after what they did to Tom Happ - the creator of Axiom Verge - and his special needs son. BadLand or Bad Land or whatever they are now will never receive a penny from me again.
Another 2D game >_< I’m sure it’s good but it’s not for me. I’m burned out on pixel games. I’ll Just get Call of Cthulhu cause that one is in 3D and looks nice.
Will wait for a review... I cannot stand when devs release trailers with no gameplay. I like the sound of it though
Voice over sounds like Malcolm Ray from Nostalgia Critic using his “devil” voice.
trailer has no gameplay.
And wow, those screenshots do not do the visuals any favors
So, how much racism are we talking here?
@nessisonett So was Walt Disney.
I love this game, played it aplenty on Steam/PC and will definitely give it another whirl on Switch. If you're remotely into lovecraft and Pixelart, this game is a loveletter to both!
@Scollurio Exactly...? Another person who's contributions to arts are massive but is a big old racist. That's why Saving Mr Banks was so galling, it portrayed him as a kindly old man (Tom Hanks). As much as Disney had a lot of racist cartoons in the early days, I still don't think his work was as steeped in his own racial biases as Lovecraft's work was.
@nessisonett Separate the art from the artist that's what i always do.
@nessisonett Have you read the entirety of Lovecraft's work? I have. The racist undertone is really underrepresented compared to what hyper sensible gospel preachers nowadays want you to believe. Racism is ripe these days, maybe even more so than in Lovecraft's time but I can acknowledge an artist for his art and don't turn into a racist by reading his attitudes towards certain subjects. This is getting ridiculous. I'm from austria, you know, where hitler came from. And we're so OVERBOARD with anti-racism that we recently had a lady, she's a logopedic, that had to change her license plate. See, she's living in the 18th district of vienna, and has a logopedic practice. So her business name, as well as her license plate was "LOGO18" - in orange colours, totally harmless. She had to change business name and license plate because 1 is the first letter in the alphabet, A, and 8 corresponds to H. It COULD mean Adolf Hitler. Facepalm moment for our whole country.... Condemning Lovecraft, a dead person, because of his racist tendencies, which really don't show up in 80% of his work, is just plain stupid. What about with all the greek philosophers, mathematicians and politicians of ancient greece? Many of them may have had intercourse with minors as it was par for the course in ancient times, well accepted in their society. Should we stop use pythagoran principles altogether now? Societies change, world views change but art and knowledge SHOULD be eternal. As an intellectual individual one should be perfectly capable to "filter out" subject matters too sensible for todays society.
@XXIV not as much as everyone makes you believe really. They're just parroting without having read much of his work, mostly. And besides, why even bother? I'm pretty sure if you're just looking for an enjoyable game in sweet pixel graphics with a dense atmosphere, none of his racism will show up. He had a cat though with a rather "unconventional name". It was a black cat...
@Scollurio I’m assuming the one who hasn’t read his work is you then. Ever read ‘On the Creation of Ni**ers’? This was 1912, where his views were extreme even for that time so there’s no justifying it based on his environment. It’s not a long poem.
“When, long ago, the gods created Earth
In Jove's fair image Man was shaped at birth.
The beasts for lesser parts were next designed;
Yet were they too remote from humankind.
To fill the gap, and join the rest to Man,
Th'Olympian host conceiv'd a clever plan.
A beast they wrought, in semi-human figure,
Filled it with vice, and called the thing a Ni**er.”
There is absolutely no separating the art from the artist here. When the art itself is maliciously racist, how can you separate it? These views are prevalent in all his major Cthulhu stories too, he really seemed to think POC were ‘full of vice’ and ‘savage beasts’. He repeatedly uses the monsters as a metaphor for anything that isn’t WASP. It’s hard to separate anything when those views are so tied up in his work.
Smh at people who continue to talk about past historical figures with today's modern standards. The world stretches well beyond the borders of the USA
I love Lovecraft but has there ever been a game that isn’t crap?
@nessisonett I'm aware of that poem and a few other instances where his racism is blatantly obvious. But those works are few and far inbetween. I'm perfectly capable of disagreeing with an artists (or anyone's) opinion and still value his joyful play with fear of the unknown, his construction of sentences and description of scenes (the latter one might be an acquired taste however). Lovecraft surely is, in a technical sense, for sure not the most versatile writer out there, but this is not the focus here, the focus is his racism. Yes he was a racist. I never denied that.
To each their own. Ever saw "Song of the South" by Walt Disney? Or ever paid attention to the crows in Dumbo? While I don't subscribe to those ideas, I get the impression that "racism" was quite "envogue" at a time, especially if you were a white, racist, colonialist pig living off your privilige, which I assume, we both do, if you want to view it that way.
@stvnorman The latest "Call of Cthulhu" and the upcoming "Sinking City" are pretty solid. I also am irritated on a regular basis, because videogames and films alike fail to capture the essence that makes lovecraft so interesting and we just end up getting turd after turd.
@zonks Well put, that sums up my last 3 postings sir!
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