Poll: Call of Cthulhu anyone?
- Thread starter Rainboq
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I think this game idea sounds kind of silly. The whole idea behind Cthulhu and his minions is that they cannot be stopped physically, spiritually, or any other way that humans are capable of understanding. They exist in higher dimensions beyond ours. Such a being could probably reach through time and space and crush the hearts of every human on earth simultaneously if it wanted to. They work better as a looming threat, because actually coming face to face with them either results in immediate death or complete insanity (or both). The scary part isn't seeing Cthulhu or the others--that signals your demise. The scary part is knowing that Cthulhu is there, waiting to come to life again one day and eradicate the human race as he yawns and stretches. The scary part is knowing that, no matter how big an army you have and how advanced your weapons and technologies are, it will be the same as if there was no army and humans were still living in the stone age.
But if you base a game around fighting these creatures in a war-like setting, you would have to make them responsive to bullets or bombs or whatever weapons your character is using. And if they can be shot and killed--even if it's really hard--this indicates that it is at least theoretically possible for humans to defeat these creatures, whether or not there are enough humans or enough bombs at the present time. That undermines the terrifying cosmic horror that is the whole point of Cthulhu. And even if you're just trying to stave off destruction long enough to evacuate the planet, it doesn't matter--Cthulhu exists beyond time and space. You cannot run, and you cannot hide--you can only die and be forgotten by the universe.
If you want to make a game about some apocalyptic war against horrible monsters, I think that's cool enough. And fighting a losing battle to try to give the remaining people the chance to evacuate the planet is really cool--very heroic! But you could find a better setting than Cthulhu mythos, because the themes and ideas of the mythos are completely opposite the themes you want to make a game about. It would just be a cheap cashing in on the brand recognition of the name 'Cthulhu.'
But if you base a game around fighting these creatures in a war-like setting, you would have to make them responsive to bullets or bombs or whatever weapons your character is using. And if they can be shot and killed--even if it's really hard--this indicates that it is at least theoretically possible for humans to defeat these creatures, whether or not there are enough humans or enough bombs at the present time. That undermines the terrifying cosmic horror that is the whole point of Cthulhu. And even if you're just trying to stave off destruction long enough to evacuate the planet, it doesn't matter--Cthulhu exists beyond time and space. You cannot run, and you cannot hide--you can only die and be forgotten by the universe.
If you want to make a game about some apocalyptic war against horrible monsters, I think that's cool enough. And fighting a losing battle to try to give the remaining people the chance to evacuate the planet is really cool--very heroic! But you could find a better setting than Cthulhu mythos, because the themes and ideas of the mythos are completely opposite the themes you want to make a game about. It would just be a cheap cashing in on the brand recognition of the name 'Cthulhu.'
Well, Cthulu maybe not, but Modern Soldiers shooting the forces of darkness?
Sounds like the most epic thing since.... Well, no, there is no comparisom.
Brain... going... into... idea... OVERDRIVE!
<spoiler=Random idea barf>
So you're in a Humvee, with your squad of American Marines. Typical CoD stuff.
Speeding down the street, it's late evening. Night is nearing, street lights illuminating the eerily empty city streets of America.
"Alright men, I want you lookin' sharp for this; the Marines already at the combat zone haven't been able to give us a clear ID on these hostiles, so be ready for anything." Seargent Holmes tells you, him riding shotgun and you in the back seat with squadmates driving, gunning, and one sitting next to you.
"McCarran, I want you on comms." He finishes, handing a radio to the guy sitting next to you.
The tense silence outside is broken by screams; one human, and one unidentifiable.
All you know is that it sounds horrific, a primal screech of hunger and bloodlust.
At the same time, a loud crashing sound is heard and you look out of your window to see a large dark shape burst out of a window, with what is clearly a human figure tumbling down with it, caught up in it's form.
It hits the ground with a loud, bone-crunching thud and it's instantly clear that the figure, a woman, is dead: her spine snapped clean back, blood pouring from numerous cuts on her body.
The shape atop her shrieks triumphantly, and as it does so it rears it's head, becoming more visible.
Truly, a horrific sight: The creature appears to be a large spider, but with a human-shape body where a head should be. A wolf's head replaces a human's, however, and dark fur coats it's skin. Scorched black in colour, and with four, red glowing eyes, the terrible beast lunges down on the woman and starts biting her corpse. At this, the Humvee slows as the crew look in shock at this. Refusing to believe what just happened was real, everyone stares in disbelief, before finally coming to his senses the Seargent simply lightly hits the gunner's leg, indicating to shoot.
The sound of the booming .50 Cal turret fill the air, as the powerful rounds rip into the awful beast. It screams some more, now in pain, yellow-ish blood bursting from the bullet wounds tearing through it's torso.
After a few seconds of taking this kind of pain, with a clear-cut hole in it's lower chest, the creature turns and sprints up the side of the building it just came out of, reaching the roof and then spriting away, whining in an unearthly fashion as it goes out of view.
"The HELL was that?!" The driver exclaims.
A stunned silence answers him, before, in a distressingly terrified voice, the Seargent replies.
"I don't know... but we have to keep going to the city centre..." His traumatised tones clearly show how he wishes he would rather be anywhere but the city centre right now, as more screaming becomes audible as they drive closer. [/spoiler]
Sounds like the most epic thing since.... Well, no, there is no comparisom.
Brain... going... into... idea... OVERDRIVE!
<spoiler=Random idea barf>
So you're in a Humvee, with your squad of American Marines. Typical CoD stuff.
Speeding down the street, it's late evening. Night is nearing, street lights illuminating the eerily empty city streets of America.
"Alright men, I want you lookin' sharp for this; the Marines already at the combat zone haven't been able to give us a clear ID on these hostiles, so be ready for anything." Seargent Holmes tells you, him riding shotgun and you in the back seat with squadmates driving, gunning, and one sitting next to you.
"McCarran, I want you on comms." He finishes, handing a radio to the guy sitting next to you.
The tense silence outside is broken by screams; one human, and one unidentifiable.
All you know is that it sounds horrific, a primal screech of hunger and bloodlust.
At the same time, a loud crashing sound is heard and you look out of your window to see a large dark shape burst out of a window, with what is clearly a human figure tumbling down with it, caught up in it's form.
It hits the ground with a loud, bone-crunching thud and it's instantly clear that the figure, a woman, is dead: her spine snapped clean back, blood pouring from numerous cuts on her body.
The shape atop her shrieks triumphantly, and as it does so it rears it's head, becoming more visible.
Truly, a horrific sight: The creature appears to be a large spider, but with a human-shape body where a head should be. A wolf's head replaces a human's, however, and dark fur coats it's skin. Scorched black in colour, and with four, red glowing eyes, the terrible beast lunges down on the woman and starts biting her corpse. At this, the Humvee slows as the crew look in shock at this. Refusing to believe what just happened was real, everyone stares in disbelief, before finally coming to his senses the Seargent simply lightly hits the gunner's leg, indicating to shoot.
The sound of the booming .50 Cal turret fill the air, as the powerful rounds rip into the awful beast. It screams some more, now in pain, yellow-ish blood bursting from the bullet wounds tearing through it's torso.
After a few seconds of taking this kind of pain, with a clear-cut hole in it's lower chest, the creature turns and sprints up the side of the building it just came out of, reaching the roof and then spriting away, whining in an unearthly fashion as it goes out of view.
"The HELL was that?!" The driver exclaims.
A stunned silence answers him, before, in a distressingly terrified voice, the Seargent replies.
"I don't know... but we have to keep going to the city centre..." His traumatised tones clearly show how he wishes he would rather be anywhere but the city centre right now, as more screaming becomes audible as they drive closer. [/spoiler]
Captain Pirate said:
The night air is bone chilling, the sound of waves crashing against the beach fills the night air when suddenly the sound of something large falling is heard, your sergant yells "TAKE COVER!"
You rush to a slit trench and dive in as a massive framework of steel and metal work crashes into the beach, a sign is propelled into your lap, reading "
".
You rush to a slit trench and dive in as a massive framework of steel and metal work crashes into the beach, a sign is propelled into your lap, reading "
Code:
Eiffel Tower Café
The problem would be that Call of Cthulhu is supposed to be horrifying in the sense that you can't fight back worth a damn. Sure if you removed the Cthulhu from it so you actually could fight back against the supernatural forces, you are left with Halo (the levels with the Flood), Doom 3, that Jericho game or Reistance. A game like that could work, but not with the Call of Duty moniker.
I'd like more games featuring Lovecraftian lore. I think it'd be a great theme for a dark action RPG.
But not Call of Duty. Not Call of Duty.
But not Call of Duty. Not Call of Duty.
Well if you couldn't fight back, then the majority of the people seeing the game will be pissed since you can't win. The only people that would enjoy it and buy would be the people that actually get the point, which is a very small sliver of the population. Or you could make a game where you can't fight back and can only run from the horrors and try to survive, which would be Amnesia Dark Descent with a different setting.Rainboq said:
Except of course that Shoggoths are formless protoplasmic masses of roiling flesh infinitely divisable 15 feet across and monstrously strong ... oh yeah and are so tough and pernicious they defeated the Old Ones. ¬.¬Double A said:You could probably kill some things, like Shoggoths. But that's assuming they don't kill you first.LondonBeer said:You realise of course that 99% of the mythos creatures are immune/incorporeal or would care if you shot them with anything less than a low yield tactical nuke. The nuke would tickle the other 1%.
The game BTW is called Delta Green, a CoC 'expansion' that dealt with special forces dealing with 'special' forces
I think youll enjoy the next X-Com game though, shame I wont :/
Conventional military forces versus a vastly superior unknown enemy... that sounds a lot like the last act of Crysis. It's a cool experience fighting against an unstoppable enemy, but not for long, then it just becomes irritating and unfulfilling, because you're not really beating back the attack, the game just lets up for a minute to let you flee to the next checkpoint to do it all again.
As a FPS/RPG hybrid like Deus Ex... maybe. As a straight shooter - no.
As a FPS/RPG hybrid like Deus Ex... maybe. As a straight shooter - no.
That's weird, because every time I've seen a Shoggoth mentioned in a video game it was defeatable. Guess it's so the game could get finished. I need to read up on my Lovecraftian lore.LondonBeer said:Except of course that Shoggoths are formless protoplasmic masses of roiling flesh infinitely divisable 15 feet across and monstrously strong ... oh yeah and are so tough and pernicious they defeated the Old Ones. ¬.¬Double A said:You could probably kill some things, like Shoggoths. But that's assuming they don't kill you first.LondonBeer said:You realise of course that 99% of the mythos creatures are immune/incorporeal or would care if you shot them with anything less than a low yield tactical nuke. The nuke would tickle the other 1%.
The game BTW is called Delta Green, a CoC 'expansion' that dealt with special forces dealing with 'special' forces
I think youll enjoy the next X-Com game though, shame I wont :/
1. Opps Sorry, did not realize your a female, and gaming tend to be male dominated, so that is my fault. I hope you are not offended. it is obvious when I looked now at your Profile.Rainboq said:
2. Awesome, I just felt that Extra Credit would help someone who might be developing a game.
3. I try : ) . I did realize from the start I will be missing parts of the concept, it would be something I would need to see more than read about if you know what I mean. I do realize at the end the fight against the unknown ancient evils be futile, I was thinking at least in the beginning the player has the hope/delusion that his fight would make a difference regardless if it would or not.
Over all If this game is made (like I said before) expect me in line to buy a copy (or 2).