

In trotting out these well-worn tropes though, The Innsmouth Case doesn't take any of them particularly seriously. As you dig further into this missing person's case, things only get stranger, and all the things you can expect from a conventional Lovecraftian tale rear their heads.

The town citizenry are odd folk that follow a strange religion, and spaces beyond the quaint town square give off a sense of bizarre foreboding. Every once in a while though, you get to make a choice about what to do or say next, with the idea being that your choices can lead you to the truth behind this missing person's case and reveal more about what's going on in Innsmouth.Īs a game inspired by Lovecraft, it's easy to predict where The Innsmouth Case heads. This sets you off on adventure to the sleepy little fishing town, where you quickly realize that not everything is as it seems.įor the most part, this narrative unfolds simply by you tapping through walls of text that describe what's going on in your character's head as he conducts his investigation. A mysterious woman saunters into your office toward the end of a long day, asking for your help in locating her daughter, who disappeared in the small town of Innsmouth. The Innsmouth Case is a text-based game where you play as a private investigator. Luckily, the game is more of a lampoon of Lovecraft than it is anything else, and-although I wish it went further in tearing down the author and his beliefs-it makes for a more palatable exploration of the occult unknown than I was expecting. This is what was floating around in my head as I booted up The Innsmouth Case, a choose-your-own-adventure style narrative adventure where you head to a small fishing town to investigate the disappearance of a young girl. Ignoring or papering over the most overtly bigoted pieces of work just so you can play make believe with New England blood cults and tentacle monsters is at its very best a bit tired, and often serves as a tacit endorsement of horrific beliefs that pervade his entire body of work, even when not explicitly acknowledged or stated. Lovecraft's virulent racism and homophobia, I've found it difficult to approach pieces of media that use his body of work as inspiration.
