Lovecraftian?the delightful adjective we have assigned to all that borders on cosmic horror. H.P. Lovecraft wrote some of the greatest weird fiction tales of all time, yet is perhaps used as a crutch a little too often in contemporary storytelling. Call of Cthulhu is a game that does a lot of things right, but gets some other bits wrong here and there; in fact, some of its horrors aren’t all that to do with genre. However, this game?like so many others?leans toward the wrong end of the adjective Lovecraftian.
While the game does contain a lot of “Lovecraft,” it doesn’t delve as deeply into the suffixed “-ian” to be truly innovative in a worthwhile sense. Nods to Miskatonic University here and there lend themselves well to pleasing a fan of the source material, but overtly ostensible injections of Lovecraft into the heart of the game can sometimes spoil the momentum it manages to build by itself. While it’s fine to stay true to your source, many games in the past have done the exact same thing. Bloodborne springs to mind as a game that masterfully played with the “-ian;” Call of Cthulhu doesn’t get that badge of honor, I’m afraid. It does earn some other badges, though, and it is by no means a bad game.
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