The Sinking City (Zero Punctuation)

[@theescapist]

Watch this week's Zero Punctuation on Sea of Solitude AND My Friend Pedro at the link: www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/2019/07/24/zero-punctuation-my-friend-pedro-and-sea-of-solitude/

[@Finality88]

Tried to but I couldnt unmute the media player. On an android phone if that helps. I'd look for a way to put in a support ticket but I don't care enough. And yes KZbin commenters, I tried pressing the unmute button.

[@theescapist]

@@Finality88 Sorry about that, it's pretty finnicky right now. We're launching new website design in a couple weeks and have had to update the formats of videos since this site is terrible and incompatible with everything. We'll have a modern website very soon! - Nick

[@rewritable_]

If I give in and head over to website to watch two ZPs a day, all that will follow is two weeks of no ZP. Or having to move watching habits to website altogether. It's a trap!

[@dragon8me2]

You must Blair witch to recover sanity.

[@wobblysauce]

So how is the new monthly game going? speaking of Ali Baba's cave of wonders.

[@brainflash1]

Doesn't having a sanity meter undermine the very point of Lovecraftian horror by making the player both aware, and in control, of their sanity?

[@animorph17]

To be fair, it's lovecraft horror. Just looking at a pond of water is enough to make people insane according to him. Meanwhile what he classifies as "insane" is otherwise considered "standard operating procedure" for most people who aren't lovecraft. Dude freaked out about the maniacal horrors of an air conditioner.

[@violentbeetle2441]

What if sanity meter was fake, and it would go up to make us doubt the real stuff we see, or go down to convince us fake stuff was real. That could work. But really, it's kinda dumb when a game tells me I'm scared. It's like canned laughter. Even good games suffer from it occassionally, like Alien: Isolation had Ripley whimper for some reason when she meets something spooky. I can do it on my own, you dumb bitch.

[@KitchenSinkSoup]

Didn't Bloodborne have a hidden sanity meter? That's a much better system in my opinion, leaving the player unaware and unable to control their characters sanity.

[@DarynLuna]

it's inspired by stuff like eternal darkness and CoC that have ways to track your sanity.

[@ReddwarfIV]

@@animorph17 He wasn't horrified by the air conditioner, he just had the weird idea that air conditioners could keep people alive even after their body was dead.

[@weezact7]

I'm also glad that he raised this point in the end card. Why is it always Shadow over Innsmouth or Call of C'thulu? There are so many other good stories of Lovecraft's that could be adapted. At the Mountains of Madness (which may have been adapted ONCE, very loosely) would be great. The Shadow out of Time would be fun. You could have the dark world/silent hill type of mechanic where you are constantly changing perspectives between trying to piece your regular life back together and the haunting dreams of Pluto (I think that's where The Great Race was). Any of the stories involving the Underground World, like the Nameless City or The Mound. Any of the Dreamlands stories. You could do a LOT with the Dreamlands.

[@Kasarii]

If movies are of interest to you, Huan Vu, the guy who did "Die Färbe" over "The Colour Out of Space" is doing a Dreamlands project, it's looking interesting so far.

[@weezact7]

@@Kasarii That IS of interest to me. Thank you!

[@Kasarii]

@@weezact7 You're welcome. I backed it a couple years ago, updates on his YT-channel are somewhat sporadic, but looking like progress.

[@ChileconCoke]

Now all I want is Yahtzee to make a point and click Lovecraft detective game because it would be hilarious.

[@neutralino1905]

Love the noxious staff at 2:35.

[@Koolstr]

Best sanity meter still goes to Amnesia: The Dark Descent - even though it's not a literal meter. That shit was terrifying and flawlessly executed.

[@BLZ231]

Agreed

[@Bluesit32]

Dunno about that, but the grinding teeth noise still puts me off. Just...just STOP it, Daniel. Mumble to yourself all you want, but stop that grinding!

[@Vaguer_Weevil]

I'm not worried about the fish monsters, but I am concerned about Yahtzee's obsession with Creme Eggs.

[@johnivanoplimo5172]

4:26 -- Fookin' prown.

[@SavolX]

I think the best way to approach this game is to understand that it's not a horror game. I mean, it really isn't, not in any way (and I don't think it even tries to be a horror). It's more like a mystery game. And I actually liked it despite its flaws. It's budget-y (is it even a word?) but the detective mechanics are nice and the story itself... well, I loved it too. Dialogs, too and there's a lot of them.

[@alienplatypus7712]

Well this is H.P. Lovecraft. He was less afraid of catastrophic aliens one more of odd paint and air conditioning. But those pale in comparioson to: *GASP* A BLACK MAN.

[@alexsylvian3594]

He was more about the Italians and the Jews.

[@ethanrajczak3041]

Alien Platypus plus anyone who wasn’t a rich white new England’s man. Most of his stories were him saying country people are all deranged hillbillies who’d fuck fish for money.

[@MrfnordTim]

@@alexsylvian3594 He did have some pretty terrible things to say about Africans as well, though.

[@diegowushu]

@@MrConredsX A weird kind of incel racist that *married* a *jewish* woman. Hmm...

[@StephySon]

@@diegowushu I mean his thoughts on ace and religion are explicitly clear you can't really defend that

[@paradoxacres1063]

Knowing that Yahtzee will one day review *HuniePop* it fills me with determination!

[@E1craZ4life]

Paradox Acres He already did. Together with NekoPara, Sakura Beach, and Dream Daddy.

[@abhilashmessi31]

I like that you keep posting. Feels like life is worth living

[@oscarmccormack1611]

@@E1craZ4life What video?

[@E1craZ4life]

Oscar McCormack Those were the games Yahtzee used to explain the mistake that led to him reviewing Doki Doki Literature Club.

[@Shaymin0]

Knowing your talking about huniepop... Gross...

[@shrimpboom8]

5:14 Roll for SAN loss

[@kiandocherty3589]

If you want a sanity gauge just slowly have your character go mad over time and have them begin speaking in tongues etc. Have it so that the player is hearing perfectly reasonable dialogue but to everyone else he sounds positively batshit. Make it out of the players control and don`t even show the "bar". A linear path of madness where you aren`t sure if the thing you`re seeing is real or not; make your character AND the player themselves a deeply unreliable narrator, where you are totally unsure if you did something or not, where events you believed happened actually didn`t. Disco Elysium guys making this would rock.

[@MarkHyde]

Kraken cup cakes are to die for :)

[@angelartiyalvt9574]

i feel like the open world aspect of this game could have helped if, say, things happened regardless of your intervention. Take too long to get around to clearing that basement of fish monsters? Now they've killed the building's occupants. It'd be a small but noticeable step towards making the player feel properly insignificant.

[@noonenowhere877]

I like the Eternal Darkness Sanity Meter and the Bloodborne "Sanity" Meter.

[@hossdelgado626]

While watching this, I got an ad for American Secret Service wanting to recruit talented individuals.. Yatz, What has Escapist made you do to get the American Secret Service on your metaphorical doorstep?!

[@The_Scattered_Man]

Yet another one for the: "yay, I get to save my money!"-collection. Still, making everyone surprisingly mellow about the "fish-people", etc. sounds like it could actually have been quite horrific, IF handled properly. (Which I gather this wasn't.) Imagine something like "The Whisperer in Darkness" (which I didn't find particularly scary), retold with the protagonist (Wilmarth) eventually becoming sympathetic to the Mi-Go--even going so far as to try to persuade the reader that the Mi-Go are our friends and that Yuggoth is a WONDERFUL PLACE.... THAT would set off a few alarms deep in my paranoia receptors ...and "intelligent fungi" is probably just weird enough to trigger a little fear and distrust even in the least xenophobic among us. [And the harder the narrator tries to persuade us that they're just "misunderstood", the creepier it would all become. (Okay, now somebody rush THAT idea over to Frogwares! )]

[@Drimphed]

2:35 I spy a Runescape Noxious Staff

[@danielramsey6141]

Should've made an RPG featuring The table to elements.

[@thedrake5072]

A horror writer, where the fear of the unknown and of your own insignificance are central, turned into a game where you fully know the Threat and are, as Protagonist, the most important thing in the universe might not be that good of an Idea.

[@vincentmuyo]

The Last Door did this decently. But I'm fairly sure there are plenty of horror games that manage this. Just, well, don't make a power fantasy main character.

[@matteobarbato9408]

Darkest Dungeon is probably the most Lovecraftian game that i know of.

[@thedrake5072]

@@matteobarbato9408 Have you heard of Bloodborne?

[@matteobarbato9408]

@@thedrake5072 yes, but i haven't played it. It's on my list of "if i get a PS" games.

[@thedrake5072]

@@matteobarbato9408 Same mate. I'm still bitter about that PS4 exclusive bullshit.

[@theless-than-goodhunter7019]

Wow, mr kraken seems like such a stellar guy.

[@edwardnigma9756]

You could say he's cracking

[@ilikeeatingpepperspray.yes4562]

Don’t you mean Kracking

[@Eric_The_Cleric]

Wonderful cupcakes, really. Also has some real airtight Tupperware. Gotta ask where he gets it.

[@localdingus6788]

Yeah he’s pretty cool he helped me fix my tv last week.

[@SparkyRaichu]

@@MannyJazzcats: Same, might be because it's hard to get sugar that doesn't dissolve.

[@HaloInverse]

"a noir thriller about organized crime where all the factions are based around Lovecraftian monster cults" I know that's _supposed_ to have been a criticism, but firstly, _sold,_ and secondly, isn't that a bit like the Fallen London mythos?

[@matthew1882]

Ah Fallen London. The only game I know of where evil santaclause can deliver gifts to Genghis Khan while hitching a lift on a Royal navy frigate copiloted by the friendly Communist hell dwellers.

[@rayanderson5797]

There was a little visual novel called 'The Miskatonic' that had a premise that all the lovecraft stuff was all known and accepted as part of everyday life. It was a comedy, and actually pretty good.

[@matthew1882]

@Emperor Ssraeshza see you on the Unterzee lad.

[@spencers5898]

Fallen London is a PERFECT example of how a game like this COULD work. The idea of a world where everything is super weird and esoteric and surreal, while the denizens of that world treat it all as completely normal, is not a bad idea. It just needs competent worldbuilders, like the fine folks at Failbetter Games, to make it all work.

[@breeban3388]

@Emperor Ssraeshza go ahead and grab your self a copy of sunless sea, and get ready to enjoy reading more than ever before

[@proximity6631]

A game where the monsters are actually just a fact of life for the people in the town seems like a really funny idea.

[@bencox3641]

That's the plot/joke for "Welcome to Night Vale" a podcast about a made up town where everyone is either a member of a Lovecraftian cult or just knows that gods and monsters exist. But the joke is that everyone acts like its a normal part of daily life.

[@mixusup]

​@@bencox3641 I think thats probably why i liked sinking city. If you play it like its not a horror and think of the sanity meter as a vestigil gameplay mechanic its actually pretty fun.

[@digitaltoaster4956]

What about a game like Mafia where the gangs are anthropomorphic sea life?

[@BlackLegion12621]

If you want Lovecraftian Horror to work in your media, don't label it as Lovecraftian. Ironically enough, that label tells people exactly what to expect, whereas Lovecraft's style of horror relies on fear of the unknown.

[@HiddenEvilStudios]

You're not wrong.

[@alexsandroggfilho1697]

Like Bloodborne

[@cal971]

Ooooooooh. So like Doki Doki Literature Club?

[@ericemigh3869]

Wouldn't that logic imply that every work by H.P. Lovecraft is a failure of Lovecraftian Horror? After all, it's immediately obvious that it's Lovecraftian.

[@BlackLegion12621]

@@ericemigh3869 Not quite. Lovecraft cannot be held accountable for his style being absorbed via cultural osmosis, and replicated by an army of hack writers over the course of a century.

[@imageez]

In conclusion, not bad detective game, but bad horror game. Ah well,

[@ryanpeacock9004]

That's enough of a recommendation for me to buy it tbh. I wouldn't mind a half decent Detective game and I wouldn't have been all that horrified anyways.

[@supervamp78]

@@ryanpeacock9004 Yeah same I'll take what I can get when it comes to mystery stuff

[@bretginn1419]

I mean, hey, at least they try doing something that's not just Cthulhu with the Mythos. That's enough for me as well.

[@livonata]

@@ryanpeacock9004 The cool thing is, you can adjust the difficulty of the detective stuff and combat seperatly. The combat is clunky as hell and, for me, just gets in the way of the good parts of the game so I made it a little easier (and less frustrating) while still having to use my brain for the rest of the game. It sure has it flaws but it's a nice detective game with an interesting setting!

[@DavidJoh]

Honestly I'm fine if someone wants to use Lovecraft's crap without trying to convince me to be horrified by it because I think that boat sailed when I saw my first Cthulhu plushie.

[@jib6760]

Always a treat to hear your ramblings 9am on my Wednesdays

[@seag7432]

11am for me, so I get to listen to them with lunch!

[@SPM0717]

Around 5pm if you watch them on The Escapist website lol.

[@abhilashmessi31]

Better when its 11pm and you are drunk

[@zeuswaterman4598]

1 am for me

[@dunadan1995]

"Always Shadow over bloody Innsmouth, why doesn't anyone ever adapt that one Lovecraft story about the violin from space" I would actually play an adaptation of The Music of Erich Zann over another Shadow over Innsmouth adaptation, not going to lie.

[@brainflash1]

There wouldn't much to do.

[@Corpseplower]

@@naransolongoboldbayer8030 Stage Fright and in case anyone's curious - it isn't a good game.

[@Merlewhitefire]

The violin in that wasn't from space, to my knowledge it was never clear where Erich or his music came from or where he went, like a cosmic-horror-themed Cotton-Eye Joe. I assume Yahtzee was deliberately conflating Erich Zann with the Colour Out Of Space, the latter of which I actually think is his best story anyway.

[@diegowushu]

Or, just hear me out, stop trying to make action games out of HPL's stories. It just doesn't work. If you do, don't show the monster ffs. Look at Carpenter's "Mouth Of Madness" and work something around those lines.

[@Merlewhitefire]

@@diegowushu I think horror games can and do work, we have examples that were very effective. The problem is that Lovecraft themed games appeal to Lovecraft fans, who already know Lovecraft's stories and therefore just blindly replicating those stories isn't going to be very effective.

[@ethanrajczak3041]

Sanity meters should be a hidden game mechanic that’s close to unfixable, and impossible to gauge unless you break the game.

[@candlestone5397]

Wouldnt that be beyond frustrating? If they did that everyone would hate the game because they keep arbitrarily dying for no apparent reason

[@madformuser]

@@candlestone5397 well the answer to that is simple The punishment for losing all your sanity shouldn't be death

[@demondays3956]

@@candlestone5397 no, because one of the key points about lovecraftian horror is that you're not aware of, nor in controll of, your own sanity. a visible sanity meter contradicts that.

[@xenasBS]

The way you're describing this I kinda love it. Just kinda "yeah no Lovecraft was wrong, the fish peepz are totally normal, weird habits left aside, and the big scary monsters are more like a kinda pest which pest control can take care of for a few bucks."

[@GabeSweetMan]

Kraken: "Well you see I don't over mix the batter so the ingredients aren't fully incorporated resulting in a fudgier consistency." INSIGHT GAINED

[@МихаилПенев-ф6с]

But now it's no longer a Lovecraftian recipy, since it is known :/

[@balibee91]

Is "Alibaba's cave of wonders" will be the next one-month-game you make?

[@christianschweda2530]

I thought the same... Maybe a typing game? ^^

[@cynthmcgpoet]

Make it so.

[@BlackStarGabusGaben]

"It has more the vibe of a noir thriller about organised crime where all the factions are based around Lovecraftian monster cults" There it is Yahtzee, your new book concept :D

[@LOTR22090able]

@wesleythomasm that book shows off his best skill as a writer, characters that are so frustrating that you want to burn them to death with a bic lighter

[@volodymyrbilyk555]

I went for the interview to this company in 2017. The thing fell apart when we started discussing Lovecraft because folks were missing the point real hard. As if they had no story consultants or something. They liked the monsters but not the subtext that made them work. It was really weird.

[@andreasahrlund-richter2289]

Haha my feeling exactly! Its like mass-effect or more like WoW even, the innsmouthers are just another playable faction, like a reskin that doesent matter in the story whatsoever.

[@MizukiStone44]

I never took the game as an actual horror game, more an adventure game with some horror trappings, much like how Bioshock was a shooter with horror trappings.

[@cats-hv2lm]

Being a lovecraftian story/game that isn’t centered around horror is like making a sandwich with bricks tho. Technically possible, and abides by some people’s definition of “sandwich”, but it’s certainly not what you expect, not very palatable unless you load it with spices, nor what you’re here for.

[@prpwnage9296]

You can't use never in this context. Never implies several times or a long time. This is neither.

[@insaincaldo]

@@prpwnage9296 Never, implies at no point ever

[@CrystalTrudel]

@@cats-hv2lm That sounds like something Yahtzee would say in a review. Do you secretly write for him? LOL.

[@CrystalTrudel]

To clarify, that was a joke.

[@UnlimitedFlyers]

"How DO YOU make them so moist? Actually, DON'T ANSWER THAT!" And *that* was when Yahtzee's sanity meter was perilously close to zero. XD

[@1krani]

Why always Innsmouth? Probably because the story was Lovecraft's crack at Treasure Island, where the horror was interspersed with suspense and action and cunning rather than something like Dunwich Horror, where the 60% is spent doing nothing but building to the titular Horror's rampage. That being said, I wanna see a game about the Mi-Go or the Elder Things, maybe stumbling upon a nest of flying polyps and having to make nice with a cabal of winged tentacle-heads to ensure the polyps don't do to humanity what they did to The Great Race of Yith. Addendum: I said "about", not "including".

[@Medytacjusz]

flying polyps were in Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth, probably my favourite scene from that game. It starts with Innsmouth but then expands into a sort of a "best of lovecraft" mixtape that surprisingly doesn't end up in disaster but quite the opposite, if you forgive bugs and not-quite-ideal savepoint placement and a few sequences that were a bit too shooter-y.

[@nshady16]

The Mi-Go brain cylinders are in the Sinking City.

[@Garviel-Loken]

@@Medytacjusz not only flying polyps, the great race of yith, deep one's, star spawn, a shogoth, mother hydra and father dagon.

[@Snacker6]

To answer the question in the credits: My favorite sanity meter is definitely the one in Eternal Darkness. So much can happen with it, and it is all aim at the player, and not the character. It is absolutely great!

[@shannonrks4036]

eternal darkness so deservers a remaster and sequel had so much fun with it and the sanity meter was very unexpected.

[@ianstewart-vital]

Made the same comment and completely agree. I loved that game and would love a sequal ans/or remake.

[@Scud422]

"Oh no! My save files!"

[@Snacker6]

@@Scud422 That one was even better when my friend was playing it, and he thought that he accidentally deleted all of my save files. Playing the game is great, but watching others play it is even better!

[@Bluesit32]

@@Snacker6 That's a funny bit, but the fact the choice is "Delete all save files? Yes or yes?" kind of makes it clear it isn't real.

[@clementl.7688]

Fun fact about The Sinking City & Call of Cthulhu 2018 : Frogwares used to work on CoC from 2014 to 2016, then left to work on Sinking City while Cyanide finished CoC between 2016 and 2018. So these 2 games used to be the same project, which is the reason why we got 2 Lovecraft horror games in 2 years. And which is also the reason these 2 games are shit.

[@wes8723]

They aren't shit.. gameplay wise they are average, but for a fan of Lovecraft's work they are a must.. both have pretty decent stories and dialogs, atmosphere in both games is pretty good, there are nice themes in them (not just Cthulhu, Dagon and Innsmouth related), just the overall gameplay isn't that special - in the case of Sinking City the worse things are combat and lame openworld like city

[@hauntedheathen2732]

wes8723 Nah. They miss the entire point of lovecraftian horror. Fear of the unknown, the limits of mankind's mind, and how small we are in the universe. The only scary part of both games are the horrendous facial animations

[@Bluesit32]

@@hauntedheathen2732 Never understood that. So humanity is just a dust mote in the cosmos. Why is that scary? It's mildly depressing, certainly, but there are worse fates than being unimportant.

[@DarienCaldwell]

@TheBlues32 because most people think humans are the center of the universe, and a big benevolent cloud guy dotes on our every need via prayer.

[@Bluesit32]

@@DarienCaldwell Anyone who thinks that didn't pay attention in Sunday school. Humans are here to worship and serve God, not be waited on by him.

[@brainflash1]

This game would've been a much better Lovecraft game if it wasn't trying so hard to be a Lovecraft game. Get rid of the 'Vanishing of Ethan Carter' connect the dots ghost images and base crime scene investigation on actual forensics. Get rid of the fucking sanity meter and stop making the effects of madness so damn obnoxious (like have momentary random 'glitches' in the environment to unnerve the player rather than a screen filter that says "you ARE crazy") Lose the crafting mechanics because all those do is waste time. And stop putting monsters everywhere because it's a stupid waste of ammo and this game shouldn't be focused on combat in the first place.

[@ValCherCh]

"why doesn't anyone adapt that one Lovecraft story about the violin from space" Well technically, Darkest Dungeon did it.

[@Garviel-Loken]

Because the violin wasn't from space!

[@thesupremenecroticdakimakura]

Nah, DD did The Color Out of Space, he's referring to the Music of Erich Zann.

[@LabrnMystic]

Consuming Shadow had great sanity mechanics. Keep yourself straight with drugs, sometimes the enemies are illusions and hallucinations. what could be an interesting mechanic, if you have a game that shows health bars of enemies, would be having them appear over various characters as your own character becomes more paranoid that everyone is out to get them. so it is up to the player to not shoot everyone on screen and figure out who the actual enemies are.

[@XescoPicas]

That sonds very interesting indeed. You could also make the real enemies attack by surprise at any time, to increase the paranoia.

[@LeQuack147]

LabrnMystic MK well, Yahtzee -made- that game, which would certainly explain it.

[@hossdelgado626]

Now make the game start as a walking simulator or something where the main character is put into a false sense of security just to be dragged off their bed and out of their safety blanket and thrown into a fucking tornado and you got yourself a great premise

[@XescoPicas]

Joshna Frank I don’t think that’s a great idea, not everyone is capable or willing to play an horror game, so the true genre of the game should be clear from the start. I, for example, am a huge chicken who can’t handle a jumpscare, so if a game pulled a “surprise horror” at me, I would feel like sh*t. But, to be fair, I research a game before buying it, so I’m probably safe.

[@hossdelgado626]

@@XescoPicas Being scared has nothing to do with it. Some stories are so good they keep you reading long after you may or may not have peed yourself. Games could do the same, and movies. The reason books do so well is they establish a setting before telling you your in for a horror show. They hook you, and reel you in. I love horror stories so much, and yet I'm a blubbering baby when it comes to fear. If Deadspace and a shitty AI tracking simulator dressed as a Xenomorph are considered good horror games, then I think anything could be an improvement.

[@TheNextDecade244]

I'll be honest, I actually like the idea of a serious nonchallant Lovecraftian setting where people got used to all that quackness. It's refreshing and, for one thing, reflects our current age better than actual Lovecraftian horror.

[@benhramiak8781]

So like shape of water, where the loving the fish people is a good thing

[@antonioscendrategattico2302]

@@albertzinger7132 Pls no. It's... really not fun.

[@antonioscendrategattico2302]

Btw there IS such a setting. It's Trail of Cthuhlu.

[@Ett.Gammalt.Bergtroll]

Albert Zinger Might want to play the very first Quake, then. Because that’s pretty much that game.

[@countesschewi2399]

I know I'm a year late, but look up Fallen London, and the spin offs Sunless Sea and Sunless Skies. Victorian London gets dragged underground into a giant cave that functions on its own strange laws and conventions, but Londoners just act like a squid person, talking cats and spiders that steal your eyes are parts of every day life.

[@Zbyhonj]

This was a pretty positive review for Yahtz's standards. I still look forward to playing this in a year or two. And I'll tell you why nobody ever adapts _The Music of Erich Zahn._ Because they'd have to compose the music for it and it would have to be some excellent fucking music or otherwise the whole story wouldn't work. Maybe Stuart Chatwood could take this on?...

[@ianstewart-vital]

Best Sanity Meter: Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. That game straight up messed with the player hard.

[@Ward1706]

"Always the Shadow over bloody Innsmouth, why doesn't anyone ever adapt that one Lovecraft story about the violin from space." And lo, Yahtzee did.

[@DinsRune]

I do kinda like the idea of a setting taking more of an Urban Fantasy approach to Lovecraft than a Horror one. Having the eldritch elements be an accepted part of life rather than a grand reveal.

[@BaconHer0]

A mob game based around fish-gangs sound pretty cool actually. I hope someone makes that one day

[@AlexOlinkiewicz]

LOL... surprisingly I really love The Sinking City, I do fully agree on the flaws that Yahtzee has mentioned like it's not much a horror game, the open-world is mostly filler and tons of copy/paste, etc. but like Yahtzee said the actual Detective aspects of the game along with the Story more the makes up for the flaws the game has at least for me.

[@Bluesit32]

There really is something satisfying about piecing together a location rather than being shown it on your map.

[@coltonjones6191]

Thought it was rather strange when I saw you could talk to a man who resembled a fish and you werent speaking buck shot

[@zanrakey4140]

5:31 "Why does no one ever adapt that one Lovecraft story about the violin from space?" I don't know Yatz. I personally would rather have the one about the evil air conditioning or the one about deadly colors.

[@blakedoubrava1149]

I want someone to adapt a different lovecraftian tale, like the crypt or at the mountains of madness

[@OckhamAsylum]

The Haunter of the Dark would make for a pretty fucking creepy one too. Imagine a game where something is making hellish noises in the dark just outside of town, and there's a storm coming that threatens to knock out the city's power and kill the lights that keep it at bay. It could be like a survival type of deal where your goal is to survive in the chaos of town with everyone absolutely terrified out of their minds. Perhaps the player's objective to be to find enough non-electric sources of light to keep the thing away or something while you wait until daylight when you can escape. I'm just throwing shit at the wall here, but I definitely think that developers need to lay off the Dagon shit.

[@FrabascooSauce]

Eternal Darkness definitely for my favorite sanity meter

[@michaelolson7626]

Honestly though, isn't all Lovecraftian work summed up by some bloke who goes down into a place, emerging, and writing some letter essentially saying "blimey, bit weird down there isn't it?"

[@noodlecat_]

It just sounds like he had a trip to Nightvale :') A friendly desert community where the sun is hot , the moon is beautiful , and mysterious lights pass overhead while we all pretend to sleep. Welcome to Nightvale

[@mrkrunch4340]

Coming soon: Mr Kraken's Moist Cupcake recipe

[@lok3kobold]

I have to say my favorite cosmic horror for the modern person is the Vogon construction fleet from Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy. They care about as much as a road worker would care for an anthill seconds before he flattens it with his bulldozer.

[@blankfrankie3747]

Sinking City? More like Stinking City, eh lads? Eh? Eh? Bah humbug.

[@leeoliver9322]

Is your name a Marilyn Manson reference?

[@TuffMelon]

Well, it probably did get pretty stinky once the fish people turned up.

[@pierre-andrelecomte9384]

"nominate your favorite video game sanity meter" *eternal darkness* for how creative they were with it. my favorite was one when you play the fat ancestor that discover the underground city. its a painting, when your sanity is high, it's a pretty landscape, when low its a hellscape.

[@TuffMelon]

Amnesia the Dark Descent did a similar thing with some paintings. But of course, Eternal Darkness beats it by 8 years.

[@CryCrow]

If Lovecraft was alive today he would play bloodborne over this.

[@tylermiller5904]

If he was alive today he would immediately kill himself.

[@nobodygoodfr9556]

@@tylermiller5904 too many black folk around

[@diegokaqui60]

@@tylermiller5904 yeah...pretty much.

[@AlwaysSomeone]

If he was alive today and saw video games, he’d immediately think they were sinister portals to dimensions man was not meant to tread and then write a story about games that devour the minds of people who play them.

[@Gorbz]

Sherlock Holmes vs Megatron? Sign me up for that!

[@IronicCliche]

I feel like this is an accurate way people would react to Lovecraft monsters. I mean the fish people were a metaphor for other races, so it's a pretty good commentary.

[@shaesullivan]

Maybe an ironic point to Sinking City is how mankind will come to, not to much embrace what was once thought to be cosmic horrors, but to tolerate them as any other foreign entity that can be assimilated into what we know of as society.

[@JimAdventures]

I love it at the end when Yhatz takes the mermaid home to be scolded by her mother. Take family ties from that as you will.

[@iambicpentakill]

Thank you, I wasn't sure what was up in that final panel

[@Mr..Malice]

That is probably the best credits bit you've done, absolute genius

[@robertwinsor8481]

Best sanity meter was obviously from Eternal Darkness. (Care to do a retro review???)

[@BJWeNeedUDefendingUsWithZeMG42]

The Sinking City? Can't sink fast enough.

[@paulrus-keaton439]

Nomination for best Sanity Meter: The Course Completed percentage in Mario Maker 2.

[@azimnazlen8564]

I want a cathulu game that makes me feel like the first time I encountered the ghost ship in AC4. It was night in game and IRL, I didnt know legendary ships existed. When I stumbled upon it, it felt like something I was not suppose to see. It came out and my first response was to run away. No fight, not explore, run fast. It should be something like that, like something you were't suppose to see.

[@user-wj6eq1cx7x]

That's an excellent idea actually. I remember running into a legendary ship too (also had no idea), it was absolutely panic-inducing lol.

[@pointly]

Reed: Why do you look so fishy? Fishman: Because I'm from Insmouth and I worship Dagon. Reed: Well ok then. Apeman: Did you figure out who murdered my son? Reed: Yes sir I did. Apeman: And was it difficult to figure out? Reed: Actually it was super easy. Barely an inconvenience. Apeman: Oh really? Reed: ye ye yeah... it was the Fishman. Apeman: Makes sense!

[@Longlius]

Lovecraftian stories/movies/shows/games that immediately introduce the weird shit completely miss the point. You're supposed to be slowly introduced to the horror of the setting and the big bads should either not appear at all or appear only at the climax of the story. This sounds more like Lovecraft-themed Assassin's Creed than it does anything actually written by the man.

[@Icantdecided]

After Jim loved this game, and Yahtzee was gleefully making fun of it, I desperately need to play this game.

[@Kutulhu]

I got passed most of the it's issues to enjoy the experience more or less, but the three endings are so poor and anticlimactic. That's what really killed it for me. So, good thing it's at the end, I guess.

[@NoobLord9001]

"Weird" isn't scary anymore.

[@TitusWasBorn]

"Well forcibly marry me off to a fish" is probably one of my favorite lines he's ever written

[@008TheDen]

Judging by this review I think Sinking City managed to reconstruct Lovecraft's corpse and somehow end up with Kafka.

[@alexahegao842]

4:04 does yahtzee know about miles edgeworth investigations?

[@oscarmccormack1611]

Yeah, honestly, that mention of a mechanic may have sold me on the game.

[@DPCP-h9u]

The day it goes overseas maybe. Unless you know japanese, you may mever heard of it.

[@oscarmccormack1611]

@@DPCP-h9u The first game came out overseas about ten years ago.

[@alexahegao842]

there’s the fan translation

[@quinton1630]

Ah, but Yahtzee! A memory palace is an actual thing! It is a method of memory enhancement which uses visualizations and the use of spatial memory and familiar information about one's environment to quickly and efficiently recall information. It's like visualizing that all of your memories about trout are in a musty drawer in a cabinet in the basement and when you open the drawer all of your trout knowledge comes flooding out.

[@denyslalande9234]

There's a thought: "_Guitar Hero: Erich Zann Edition_". >;)

[@Kasarii]

With an Oscar Zahn DLC, because money.

[@24YOA]

Probably the closest thing to cosmic horror recently was Chernobyl, although after a few episodes it kinda lost the beat of being an unstoppable menace that could only be buried under concrete and left to wait as it has been for decades now.

[@abloogywoogywoo]

Dreamwork's Prince of Egypt is technically the most recent (I wish I was fucking kidding). An evil god murdering innocent first born children, yet all the fuckwits love him and worship him anyway like dumb sheep being led to the slaughter, is the stuff of cosmic horror and makes Cthulhu look pretentious in comparison.

[@BlueSun_]

@@abloogywoogywoo That actually makes me want to see some kind of fantasy series with reflavoured bible-like stories that are not immediately recognisable and allow for fan speculation on the nature of this Being that keeps messing with humans.

[@Abir-cb4ii]

I love you Yahtzee , is what I feel after getting the notification

[@SnuSnuDungeon]

How does a Kracken get it's cupcakes so moist? This question will haunt me to my dying day.

[@BadAnalogy91]

*gurgling* "Damnit, I keep telling those cultists next door to stop leaving their interdimensional harmonizers on!" lol

[@Daysed.and.Konfuzed]

A rich idiot eats a wild animal on the other side of the planet and a short time later my uncle dies and I lose my job. And there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. I really don't need space monsters to feel helpless, hopeless, and worthless.

[@XDRONIN]

A good Sanity Meter would be if game developers watched Yahtzee's videos on a loop and see which one of them calls to Cthulu first.

[@CinosTheHedgehog2000]

Hello from the future! Nice to see the video with the credit gag that inspired the Life of Eric Zann

[@christianschweda2530]

I can't get over the fact, that I watched hundreds of these videos, and his writing / wit / sarcasm is always(!) on point. Like perma-sharp, just not wearing off... How does he do that? What is he...?

[@Pikminiman]

+

[@Exsulator2]

He starts the day with a nice ice cold shower, before eating a couple lemons for breakfast with an entire salt shakers worth of salt on top. Finally he gets outside and engages his usual staredown with the sun, which ends when the sun needs to look away. Then he can begin making the video. You see, he never prepares a script; he simply reaches for the mic, then sucks in all the oxygen in the neighbourhood (which usually causes a medium sized fire tornado somewhere) and begins to record the review. He only needs one take. He’ll then slow down the recording by a factor of 4 so that people will be able to follow it. Once edited and uploaded, he’ll spend the rest of the day playing games.

[@christianschweda2530]

@@Exsulator2 I'm in tears, this is brilliant! :D It even sounds a bit like he could've written it himself - I read it again, in his voice, and it fits nicely.

[@Exsulator2]

@@christianschweda2530 Now that you mention it, I tried reading it with "his voice" and I see what you mean :D glad you liked it!

[@khfreak5531]

I think the point of everyone treating everything like it’s no big deal is a part of the horror aspect. As the player you’re looking at everything and wonder if your protagonist is sane due to the fact that he has no problem with all the weird stuff going on. Almost as if he’s choosing to ignore it. That’s my thought though. It’s pretty mediocre anyways.

[@Bluesit32]

I figured the townsfolk were just used to it.

[@khfreak5531]

TheBlues32 I was thinking that as well.

[@Archone666]

I would play the hell out of a game that had a sandbox environment and a Cthulhu-esque setting, if they went with the "everyone's casual about it" concept on purpose. Where people are completely okay with the fish people, and the main problem people have with that tentacled guy who lives down the street is that he's racist towards colored folks, and people are protesting the sushi bar because they find it offensive. Maybe have one or two characters who wander around all aghast at how everything is different and scary... and everyone else just shrugs and rolls with it. "Yeah, that guy's kinda weird. You know, he doesn't even have much of an education? He says his "constitution is too fragile for math." Anyway, that lady across the bar just ordered you a drink... think you might get to taste something fishy tonight..."

[@johnsimmons3160]

So, better or worse than call of cthulu?

[@karenpojar2514]

Better gameplay, worse story. Larger world, not much to do in it. Longer length, but most of it is walking from place to place. Has combat, but it is done poorly. Injects a dose of current day politics towards the end like Vampyr did, complete with "orange man bad" references. Consciously deconstructs problematic lovecratian tropes, and has a loading screen apologizing for even using Lovecrafts work due to racism. Whether that is good or bad depends on how "woke" you are. I prefer CoC for the story. But the detective mechanics are better here, most of the decisions you have to make are interesting and not clear cut despite the virtue signalling, and the story isn't bad per se: it just more DnD than cosmic horror. Get it on sale: it isn't worth $60. And the DLC is one side quest they cut out of the story so they could sell it for $15. Skip that.

[@fazzle7788]

This truly does show that people don't want Bob chipman since it takes home to get the same amount of views that yahtzee gets in 2 hours

[@theULTIMATElife50]

Well guess it's back to Bloodborne then.

[@sebastiancintron29]

I'm kinda sick of developers using the Cthulhu mythos in such a lazy way. Like can we stop now. Nobody is going to give those stories justice, so just stop.

[@diegokaqui60]

bloodborne kinda did. They combined the cosmic horron and the oniric cycle of lovecraft quite nicely even to the point were you can become a godlike entity at the end.

[@Astraldragon0]

I think this quote is fairly relevant. (Again) "This is another hurdle in the way of having a real Cosmic Horror these days. People today are just too fucking optimistic. I blame Star Trek. The idea of a universe in which the unknown may be weird and dangerous but ultimately something that we can triumph over, coexist with, or, failing either of those, meaningfully oppose, is baked into modern sensibilities to the point that Lovecraftian madness is a punch line. I've lately introduced my board gaming group to Arkham Horror, and for them, the notion of someone ending up in a lunatic asylum after seeing a Byakhee in the street is both confusing and funny; they just do not have the Victorian paranoiac frame of reference necessary to understand that different is dangerous. Granted that Arkham Horror sucks donkey balls, so whatever thematic content is in there will be tarnished by association, but even a superior game, such as Mansions of Madness 2e, that does a better job of portraying the Mythos in an appropriately spooky light still falls short of showing the players why they should be any more afraid of the Mythos goings-on than any mundane physical threat to the investigators and the townsfolk. The disintegration of the Victorian rational worldview was, I think, half the reason why anyone gave two shits about Lovecraft's writing in the first place. The Great War showed everyone, Victorian white men especially, their own futility in the face of a soulless, mechanical war machine set in motion by men and fueled by men but seemingly beyond anyone's control. If Lovecraft hadn't been such a space case I'd call it a slam dunk that his Mythos writing was inspired by WWI, but I'm not going to say that because from what I've read, Lovecraft's inspiration was completely internal and his gloomy-ass thoughts on the futility of human endeavor just so happened to coincidentally align with what everyone else had just found out thanks to machine guns and mustard gas. I haven't studied his letters at very great length, but from what I have read, Lovecraft didn't seem to be much of a guy to dwell on the horrors of war; rather, even after it was over and everyone who went (who came back) came back shattered, he still regretted having missing out. But, regarding those who did come back - they would certainly be receptive to fiction that could put to words their newborn suspicion that history had somehow slipped the reins of men, that the comforting old ways of thought no longer held and indeed were never true in the first place. Throw in the Great Depression, another World War, and the subsequent and perpetual threat of atomic global holocaust, and you have two or three generations of people who were actually living out a cosmic horror story. I think this is probably why Derleth was able to keep on finding collaborators for Arkham House and readers for its products; it's inconceivable to me that Lovecraft's ideas wouldn't have had the ring of truth to them in the Cold War world. Cthulhu rising, Cuban Missile Crisis, same difference we all die anyway. A funny thing happened on the way to Doomsday, though - while everyone was supposed to be cowering in existential terror of the nightmare the world had turned into, all these fuckers got used to the idea! It turns out that people can, in fact, get used to anything. Lovecraft was supposed to be showing people exactly how and why the only reasonable course of action is to just lay down and die and get it over with, but instead he ended up playing suicide hotline operator! Fucking Sartre. Today if I say to the man on the street, "Did you know that the world you live in is a fragile veneer of normality over an uncaring universe, that we could all die at any moment at the whim of beings unknown to us for reasons having nothing to do with ourselves, and that as far as the rest of the universe is concerned, nothing anyone ever did with their life has ever mattered?" his response, if any, will be "Yes, of course; now if you'll excuse me, I need to retweet Sonic the Hedgehog." What do you even do with that? How can you even begin to get someone to be afraid of the Big Unknown when we've been living under the Big Unknown for three generations and our entire culture and philosophy have evolved to keep us sane and smiling under circumstances that would almost certainly have sent old Howard into a months-long depressive malaise? When Lovecraft's own works may have contributed to helping us get over that hump? I think the trick to modern cosmic horror is to attack people's sense of individuality rather than their sense of belonging - I don't want to put in another photo from The Thing but John Carpenter fucking nailed it.

[@AdrenalineJunkieXL]

Hah good luck adapting the road to a game. Grey ash covered woods where everything's dead dirty, grey, and brown... amazing

[@deathsyth8888]

So is Yahtzee for or against knobbing otherworldly fish creatures? I can't tell.

[@Johnnygrafx]

I'm liking it quite a bit actually. Which isn't to say that your criticisms aren't valid, I just don't think they drag the overall experience down as much as you do. Plus I give credit for them trying some interesting mechanics of putting clues together and creating your own objectives.

[@jcace13]

Shouldn't sanity meters just never replenish? Not unless when they empty and you spend a considerable amount of time with doctors and therapists to get it back to where it was.

[@VertSecretStash]

That's how it works in the original call of Cthulhu tapletop

[@Bluesit32]

It should have required the anti-psychotics, rather than have them be a quick fix to an already replenishing meter.

[@Nitrinoxus]

...Of course, now that I think about it, an organized crime noir thriller centered around Lovecraftian monsters might actually be kinda fun, in a Vampire: The Masquerade sort of way. Get on that, urban fantasy game developers!

[@a.dennis4835]

5:30 Why do video games keep adapting “The Shadow Over Innsmouth” while ignoring the rest of his stories? A lot of his other stories are two or more guys talking before discovering the unbelievable horror. That type of story is difficult to adapt to a video game.