>horror game
>monsters are "Lovecraftian"
When will this shit end?
>>341533151
It's barely begun, chap
>>341533151
Hopefully after they do a Lovecraft horror game right.
There are no such thing as monsters. It's a term made up by humans to label things they don't understand and/or are afraid of.
>hentai
>monsters are "Lovecraftian"
When will this shit become more ubiquitous?
>>341534071
I've never understood the tentacle fetish. Is it for guys who want to see penetration without dudes?
>>341534071
Why would floating tentacles want to have sex with humans in the first place?
>>341533151
even if this bait i want to punch your ass in the face
>>341534728
Lovecraftian horror is what shitty writers rely on when they want to seem deep.
>>341533973
t. Monster
>>341535914
How would you like it if your species was exiled from the most dominant species and was labeled monster for no reason?
Aside from Innsmouth-people, I really wish there were more Lovecraftian enemies, specifically lovecraftian dieties.
It's a nice change from all of the Tolkien-derived creatures IMO.
>Implying lovecraftian monsters aren't the shit
>>341535713
>deep
>>341536406
The unholy triumvirate of fandoms.
Tolkien, Lovecraft, and everything steampunk
>>341533151
What IS Lovecraftian? Is it just a bunch of gore and body-parts sewn together and controlled by transdimensional gods?
>>341536997
It's what lies beyond the human mind.
>>341536728
they are shit
hence the thread
>>341536817
>dark
>>341533151
Very few games actually have lovecraft-inspired imagery or monsters. The only one I can think of in the last few years has been bloodborne.
>>341537101
That's psychological horror, which Lovecraft falls under. Just because something is psychological/surreal doesn't mean it's Lovecraft.
I guess what bothers me the most is that most uses of Lovecraft horror try to throw in gore and body horror, which completely misses the point.
>>341534071
>anime
>the girls are "Lovecraftian"
>>341536835
Variety is the spice of life.
There's more Lovecraft out there than people think, but so many Lovecraft games are just flat out bad.
>>341537501
it can be good when done right like hellraiser
>>341533151
But that fad only started recently
>>341536835
What about an Orc with tentacles and a steam-powered tophat?
>>341537632
Rape a franchise to death?
>That fucking movie in space
2 hours of my life I'll never get back.
>>341537960
Don't remind me about that anon the first few were GOAT at least
>>341537632
Event Horizon did it well, too.
I want more horror like The Thing and Alien. Sppoky situations in hostile environments.
>>341533151
lovecraft is cool you uncultured piece of shit, read the short story.
>>341537340
nigga u retarded
https://lovecraftzine.com/lovecraftian-video-games/
>>341538383
Yes, Lovecraft is truly one of the greats.
>>341538432
>https://lovecraftzine.com/lovecraftian-video-games/
They key qualifier in that post, which you ignored, was "last few years".
Also
>>Lovecraftzine.com
That's going to be your reputable source? For gods sake it says SKYRIM/Fallout 3 are lovecraftian, fuck off.
I totally forgot about Darkest Dungeon and Sunless Sea though that's totes fair.
>thing has more than two hands
>"LOOK ITs LOVERCRAFTIAN"
>>341536997
"Lovecraftian" horror is essentially horror which emphasizes the insignificance of human existence
Lovecraft's stories have people getting glimpses into what's beyond our knowledge, namely gigantic tentacled monsters covered in eyeballs and all sorts of other things, and realizing they're completely powerless to stop it
For example, RE4's opening village is very reminiscent of The Shadow Over Innsmouth
In both, the main character hears about a creepy isolated town nobody likes to talk about and goes to investigate, then finds that the townspeople worship sea creatures and have been breeding with them to ascend to some higher form of being
The problem in video games is that the challenges are always surmountable
You can kill a Great One in Bloodborne
You can kill the monsters in RE4
Whereas the protagonist of Innsmouth, despite escaping the town he finds, eventually goes insane from what he's seen
Bloodborne attempts to replicate "insanity" with the frenzy meter but it's just not the same
Insight is a cool mechanic, but it's still not the same
A lot of Lovecraft's monsters are "indescribable" because the human mind can't comprehend their form without going insane
Which is SOMEWHAT done with the Amygdalas being invisible until you have a lot of insight or kill Rom, but again, they have a definitive, visible form
>>341534358
It was literally invented to get around japanese censorship.
>>341538168
>>341539008
To be fair, the Great Ones in Bloodborne aren't really like Lovecraft's monsters. Most of them are well-intentioned, and some used to be human. On top of that, the only way to defeat the Moon Presence is to ascend to its level and lose your own humanity in the process.
>>341539008
So do you think it can never truly be done right?
>>341536835
Fuck you, man, don't even associate them with the autism that is cogfop.
I work at a convention center and I can tell you for a fact that roughly half the people I see with goggles and shitty hats also have MLP buttons on their bags.
>>341538339
Why is there no horror movie set on a submarine?
>make game
>call it 'lovecraftian'
>get attention from a bunch of pseuds
>????
>profit
>For gods sake it says SKYRIM/Fallout 3 are lovecraftian, fuck off.
Skyrim's entire Dragonborn expansion was centered around a Lovecraftian deity. Fallout 3 had the Dunwich quest with Point Lookout.
You should play more games, retard.
>monsters are "Lovecraftian"
>it's just Cthulhu again
Why is it always Cthulu?
>>341533315
>what is bloodborne
The problem with people calling things Lovecraftian is that most of the people who call things that are filthy secondaries who at most read The Call of Cthulhu and nothing else.
Lovecraft did a lot of different styles of horror, both cosmic insignificance and human-level. Compare The Color Out of Space to Herbert West: Reanimator, for example.
>>341539952
Submarines have cramped quarters and no view of the outside. It would take a really good writer to make it work. Would probably have to a psychological horror.
Eldrich abomination sounds better
>>341540173
because Cthulhu is the only Great Old One that Lovecraft described with words the average video game writer understands
>>341533151
We need more adjectives. I wish i could see all those new cool words devs are throwing around. "cinematic" "rpg elements" "intereactive".
>>341540352
I fucking love Color Out of Space but I'm struggling to think of a way it could be good in vidya format. It's just not really a story that lends itself well to interactivity, like most Lovecraft.
I mean the big climactic scene at the end with the trees is either cutscene material or else you hide behind a bush and watch, which is worse because if you run out and fuck around you'll probably die, and then those whole mystery/awe/fear of the unknown spell is broken entirely as it always is in horror games by the only penalty being strawberry jam on the screen and reloading from 30 seconds ago.
I think we need to figure out a better way to handle death in horror games first.
Fuck if I know though, get the idea guys on this.
>>341540173
He has statues made in approximation of what he looked like described.
It's hard to make a old one when it looks like the colour of fear and smells like the abyss is it's only description,
>>341539619
In an action game?
No
But I think the best example is Earthbound
Giygas is completely formless and can only be visibly comprehended as what it represents
A horribly evil-looking face and a fetus
You can't enter its domain without leaving behind your physical body because you couldn't endure the strain
And you are literally told "you can't comprehend its attacks"
It's not graceful, but it's accurate to the idea
And you don't defeat it by hitting it, you defeat it with an equally vague and formless idea
You defeat it with prayer and its conceptual opposite, love
Whereas the Moon Presence you just beat to death with a sword or some shit
>>341541039
>>341540445
This should open up a lot of avenues for artistic interpretation/freedom.
'Shame no one takes advantage of it.
No love for Eternal Darkness?
horror is probably the most creatively bankrupt genre out there OP
>>341540758
"rougelike" "hardcore"
and the classic standby "epic"
>>341541258
I'm making a little running away simulator like outlast where the nasty is a approaching eldrict abomination.
I havn't even given it a model, it just has a shit load of blur, DOF, and deliberate grafix fuckups like models warping, colours going apeshit and local chromatic abberation for anything in the vicinity going mental.
I'm hoping it does the whole 'shit nigguh even the game can't display this'
>>341536089
>How would you like it if your species was exiled from killing the most dominant species and was labeled monster for good reason?
Fixed that for you, Mr. Monster.
>>341538761
why was the last panel with Lovecraft lynching a black guy cut out?
>>341541945
So if theoretically fishmen were the dominant species of the planet, would humans technically be considered monsters?
>>341541902
So in the same vein as the smoke monster from Lost?
Sounds cool. Good luck.
I am really tired of horror game antagonists being "occult monster" or "science monster"
Why won't anyone release a horror game with a truly bizarre, nebulous creature or presence? Something that doesn't translate into a shambling corpse chasing you.
>>341533151
Has it ever been done right?
>>341542083
Nah, in the same way you don't consider bugs to be monsters. They're gross and if you see one you step on it, but they ain't monsters.
>>341541945
>>341536089
what is I am Legend
>>341542374
Dark Corners of the Earth was probably the closest thing to being done right.
Game was far too marred by bugs though. With some polish it could have been a solid game.
>>341542576
So where do you draw the line between animal and monster exactly?
>>341533315
you do realize by definition a proper lovecraftian horror game would be unwinnable, right?
>>341542780
Staving off utter annihilation at the hands of a being that is completely unaware of your existence for a few more moments could technically be considered a win in terms of Lovecraft.
>>341539952
Leviathan kinda fits.
>>341542760
You don't have proof monsters exist.
Also, they're sometimes sentient.
>>341542780
You win by making it to your gun so you can shoot yourself.
This game did the insanity aspect pretty well
>>341540208
>Bloodborne
>Horror
Like sure its Lovecraftian enough but its not horror
>>341543065
Okay but how would you know if you existed in a fantasy universe what the difference between a monster or animal is? I mean there's no way a peasant could tell between a bear and an owlbear that one is an animal and one is a monster for example.
>Also, they're sometimes sentient.
So we are the real monsters after all. LIKE. POTTERY.
>>341540883
Have the game encourage you to die throughout and at the end the main boss is an amalgamation of all your previous corpses, you have to watch the more gruesome deaths in more detail than what was originally shown, the big boss gains more power every time you die, well-place cutscenes or some deterrence from just fucking around. The main problem is devs lacking any understanding of horror and just wanting to sell games.
>>341542760
Monsters actively have it in for you, animals are just doing what animals do.
I fucking hate spidersread: I am a little bitch who is afraid of spidersbut they're not monsters, if one of them climbs up my leg I know it's not doing it because it likes to hear me squeal like a bitch.
>>341542925
>>341542780
Suppose you take a scenario where 'victory' in this case means diverting the thing's attention on to someone else, saving yourself. Lure it to a nearby town while it's chasing you and escape while it's eating souls or something. It's a technical victory for the protagonist but a crushing moral failure in every other respect. You 'win' but you still 'lose,' and it's still out there. You just have to change what winning means.
>>341541902
Anon follow your dreams, and is it only a little side project for yourself or you will eventually sell/share/etc? I'm curious to how that may turn out.Basically I'm asking if you have a blog or something
>>341543181
Too bad Silicon Knights patented the sanity meter and gave the rights to Nintendo. Seriously, fuck Denis Dyack.
>>341543342
That's a neat idea but unless you know ahead of time it's doing that, there's no fear part until the very end, death still doesn't mean anything. And even then it's a nuisance, not a source of fear.
The problem with horror and video games is that the unknown is the biggest source of fear, and video games and their pesky interactivity is the easiest way to make the unknown un-unknown.
The biggest unspoken question in traditional horror is 'oh god what is that thing going to do when it gets me.' Usually you don't want the answer to that question, because a) it's some variety of gruesome death and b) once you've answered it, it's no longer scary. Video games with respawning and reloading absolutely ruin that fear; you're scared up until the point where you fuck up and die and then suddenly you know what happens, you remember it's just a game, and all the fear is gone.
And gory death animations like Dead Space are just comical, the point is that your imagination will always be a far better source of fear than anything any devs or designers can come up with. That's what needs to be exploited.
But then you end up with corridor amusement park ride simulator shit where you literally can't die and you're just there to see the spoops. So yeah I really dunno, I just think that we gotta rework the whole death thing.
Game mechanic penalties probably aren't the way to do it though, those end up just being frustrating, like weapon durability or unkillable enemies (see Silent Hill 4).
>>341540883
The only real way to make death a bigger consequence is to make what you lose more significant. Maybe you only get so many deaths per game. Maybe you lose some of your accumulated resources or equipment. Maybe your deaths affect the world in some way, making later parts harder or making areas more bleak/shitty.
Imagine a game with a safe hub a la Dark Souls, but every time you die it gets a little smaller, a little less comfy, maybe the people there start getting afraid/despondent or even disappearing. That would make dying feel like a serious issue, especially if the fame did a good job of getting you attached to the hub and its characters.
>>341541075
Came here to point out Giygas as a good example. A lot of lovecraftian stuff is pretty out there.
Most people see tentacles and go "lovecraftian monster!".
>>341541902
That honestly sounds pretty damn cool, I'd pay that.
>>341545365
>especially if the fame did a good job of getting you attached to the hub and its characters
There's an idea at least, it's easy to not give a shit about your player character, but everyone except sociopaths is a sucker for good NPCs. Emphasis on 'good' though. Pitybait innocent little kids can trigger the exact opposite response though.
Have you played Silent Hill 4? It fucks up a lot of things but I really like what they did with the hub, you're locked in an apartment and you come back to it after every world and it's your safe zone to refuel and calm down, but after a few worlds it starts getting invaded by creepy shit and suddenly your safehouse isn't safe anymore.
The idea of the familiar becoming unfamiliar is a pretty old and good horror staple too.
What if your deaths drive the NPCs a little bit crazier? Make your new friends/waifus/family/party members a little bit more corrupted in some way every time they see you bite it.
If we're talking Dark Souls, everyone else hollows the more you die, since the player can't really be affected outside of frustration.
But again, everything hinges on good, likeable characters.
What if Alan Resnick wrote a horror game?
https://youtu.be/2gMjJNGg9Z8?t=218
>>341545365
>>341546452
You could even go a step further and add a guilt element. Maybe that hub and its NPCs are giving up some of their life/energy/sanity/whatever to bring you back each time. They're sacrificing themselves and their last safe haven to keep you going on your quest. Not only is that hub you've felt so comfy and safe in getting scarier and smaller, and the characters you've come to like-and maybe even depend on- getting more emaciated and lethargic, but it's your fault. And they know it.
yall niggers need to play the secret world.
I've only heard the "lovecraftian" description used when people talk about Bloodborne. The game is more victorian with edgy enemies than lovecraft. It's just that the game is so barren and lifeless that fans of the game latch on to any semblance of art to justify their love of the shitty game.
>>341545124
TL;DR have many, DIFFERENT enemies that function differently and show up randomly, with different deaths
>devs so busy on cinematic shit that they forget the fun
>>341551538
elaborate why bloodborne is shit without talking about the fans
>love game
>Monsters are "hatecraftian"
>>341543005
This
>>341551538
You haven't actually played the game honestly.
>>341551538
The DLC is literally exactly like the Innsmouth book detail by detail.
Have you played past the halfway point?
>>341551538
oh come on dude, I loved the whole thing about elevating human race by adding eyes, I'm a sucker for "there are things bigger than our existence, we must fear/worship them" vibe
>>341553502
>dear god Lawrence...
>fear the old blood...
>>341533151
They should make a horror game with actual lovecraftian monsters.
As in, if you even look at them or in their general direction, the game will start freaking the fuck out and you (the player) will wonder if you're going insane or not.
![893066eb3d[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/U8lli2K.jpg "893066eb3d[1].jpg")
I want to see a game successfully design a being that drives you mad at the very sight of it.
>>341554029I was JUST about to post this before your's popped up
>>341537175
>fantasies
>>341554316
I had an idea for a game where enemies make the game change in such a way that the player wonders if what they see is real or not.
It'd start off small, maybe you open a red door, but when you come back to it, it's blue now and you'd be left wondering if you just remembered it wrong.
As it gets worse, maybe the game it's self would change. Like entering a new area might trigger a loading screen than it never had before and you'd be like "wait, since when did this game have a loading screen".
At it's worst the game it's self would be completely fucked up and you'd just be like "man is this shit even real or not" and even if you tried to screenshot it to show other people, the screenshots would show the normal game so you'd just never fucking know.
>>341536089
But I'm already white.
>>341551538
Come on man. I'll give you that the game isn't nearly as Lovecraftian as many people make it out to be- there is zero feeling of utter insignificance, which is a cornerstone of Lovecraft's writing- but it's got a really cool setting and some pretty interesting lore.
>>341539952
Theres a Doctor Who episode that's on a submarine. :^)
>>341537849
You just got here from reddit, didn't you?
>>341554029
isn't this literally just amnesia, one of the most well known horror games? It's been a few years but I'm pretty sure if you try to directly look at the monsters you literally go insane and have to go to the last checkpoint or whatever.
>>341555118
I don't mean your character goes insane. I mean YOU THE PLAYER feel like you are going insane.
The game wouldn't even acknowledge weird shit is happening and you'd be left wondering if it's the game acting funny, or if it's you just not seeing or remembering things correctly.
>>341554029
that's literally Amnesia and SOMA (which has the cyberpunk element too)
>>341555118
It also has some cool effects on the video/audio of the game- it creates things like skittering/scratching noises at random times, footsteps etc. if you're insane, changes what you see in some cases, ie. paintings becoming horrific versions
>>341555396
Spec Ops: The Line does this a little too.
But it'd have to be REALLY subtle to work
>>341537175
>deepest
>darkest
>afrika
>>341555409
>literally
>that's literally these two games
>that have no lovecraftian elements whatsoever
>>341555530
Yeah, it would start of really subtle. Stuff like things changing position when you're not looking and so on. Later on maybe the layout of menus would change or even the controls themselves would slightly change.
Eventually it might end in something like the game mimicing a crash (similar to what happens Batman Arkham Asylum when you meet Scarecrow).
![Yog_Sothoth_Door[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/vjbMcio.jpg "Yog_Sothoth_Door[1].jpg")
>>341541258
Demonbane, while not a game, had Yog Soggoth appear as sort of gate-door thing, though it notes that it is just shortly appearing in a way that won't break the characters brains, and if I remember correctly, looking directly at it strained them somewhat anyways.
Cthulu shows up as a weird armored meat orb with tentacles that can apparently one-shot the titular mech.
>>341538761
Sometimes it's not what you do but how you do it. His writing can make you get inside your own head.
>>341539008
>Play Elite Dangerous
>Play for hours trying to get my "Sol" Permit
>Finally get it
>Go to Sol System
>The Sun is completely Black
NOPE NOPE NOPE NOPE NOPE!
It was very scary.
>>341539008
Eternal darkness did ok. Like 10 character die before one manages to accomplish anything and it's only with the help of other great ones.
>>341543324
BB spooked me more than any horror game has in recent memory to be honest. Maybe spooked isn't the right word. It drew me in and creeped me out a bit, made me want to know more.
>>341540208
If you can kill it, then it's not cosmic horror.
>>341555396
I had a moment like this with the colonel AI in MGS2.
>>341533151
How many can we name with that theme in mind?
I can only think of 4 that meet the basic and only 2 that are straight up Lovecraftain and one of them has "HP lovecraft's" in the name
FromSoft is now doing a Lovecraftian Survival/Horror game set in a "haunted" space station. You will see a trailer probably at TGS.You wont believe me that is why I'm writing it here.
>>341539619
>>341541075
If making an accurate lovecraftian game is impossible because fighting atrocities beyond this plane of existence is futile why not have a game where you are on the side of the monsters ? Imagine Being a Cthulhu worshipper doing rituals and shit to bring back your master to the surface.
>>341558397
>FromSoft survival/horror
Hmmmm
>>341558397
that pic gives me the willies. have any more?
>>341559563
There are different Lovecraftian beasts with different levels of power above humans. For example, the Elder Things themselves aren't that much more powerful than humans and are within our scope and exist within our dimension. Their creations -the shoggoths- are just as tangible but much more horrible. Things like the Mi-Go are also pretty physical, and they like to come down to Earth to harvest brains. Stepping up a little, the Great Race of Yith exists throughout time, hopping from person to person in order to gain knowledge. Interacting with them could be neat. A few steps up from them are the things like Cthulhu, beings with power like gods to us, but not really that strong overall. We are like ants to them, but they occasionally engage with us in some way. Above them are the top-tier Gods. Among them are Shub-Niggurath - the Black Goat of the Wood with a thousand young, who constantly spews unholy life from "her" disgusting and amorphous physique, Azathoth - the dreamer that must never wake, for if he does all shall be undone, Nyarlathothep - the only god that really interacts with humans, and when he does he likes playing cruel jokes, also is an aspect of Azathoth's subconscious, and Yog-Sothoth - the great entity that exists within and without, and is the only thing that exists outside of Azathoth's dream. Even though the gods (save Nyarlathothep) don't really know of us, they can still interact with us if we summon them.
>"Lovecraftian" monster
>It's just a big blob with tentacles that maybe can make people go insane, no other distinguishing qualities
>>341558397
>FromSoft
>Survival/horror
DS/BB memeing aside, they have really good atmosphere in them. I reckon they could nail a spooky atmosphere, but I'd need convincing they'd be able to pull off gameplay right. Maybe if they made you fight basically like Souls games but either removed or made your roll and attacks really really shitty so you feel much weaker.
>>341560884
I've always liked Yogg-Saron. Not as a "lovecrafting monster" but more just as a big monster that sounds really, really angry.
what stories could be adapted to vidya format?
I could see At the Mountains of Madness. Exploring the lost city, the shoggoth, the plane rides etc.
>>341561381
There'd be nothing to do in terms of gameplay, though. What puzzles would you solve? What enemies would you fight? And so on. AtMoM is more suited to a movie.
>>341560754
lol u said niggur
>>341561593
i guess you're right
it would literally just be the narrator talking to danforth and walking around and drawing pictures
>>341561621
So did Lovecraft. Read "Medusa's Coil" and I guarantee that you'll get a kick out of the ending.
>Reading lovecraft lately
>have no idea of anything really creepy out there
like alright theres cults and shit, like the horror of red hook and then there was the one about a guy descending downward and then riding toad monsters..Or the submarine getting stranded at the bottom of the sea and the guy puts on a diving suit to go explore a ruined temple after everyone else went insane..
>>341561381
Horror of Red Hook. Investigator game.
Lovecraftian is good for description but bad for show, since it's in the mind of the observer to determine what your mind can't comprehend. I prefer more psychological and visceral horror myself
Who would win in a fight?
Cthulhu or Stinkmeaner?
>>341540173
>Why is it always Cthulu?
Same reason every fantasy world needs to take a look at Tolkiens work as word of god on what fantasy races need to look like; lazy fucking designers.
>>341561340
I don't know, from a lore perspective I find the Old Gods pretty boring. It's just "corruption LMAO"
>>341562709
Not talking about lore, though. I just meant just straight up presentation. Especially the voice.
https://youtu.be/1_n1An8buCQ?t=50
>>341562709
It's WoW, EVERYTHING is literally "LOL CORRUPTION"
>>341533151
>game monsters have tentacles
>everyone calls it lovecraftian
bloodborne im looking at you
>>341563152
Bloodborne is actually full of Lovecraftian themes, you dingus.
>>341541902
That's an eldritch abomination done right anon. Keep up the good work.
>>341560884
>having blood that solidifies into a super strong metal isn't a distinguishing quality
>>341539619
Although not exactly Lovecraft, Penumbra did a pretty good job.
>>341542349
It's easy to say that, but do you have any ideas or examples?
>>341563312
It's too late at night to deal with your shitposting man.
>>341563152
>Require an example
>Out of plenty of examples available
>Gave a wrong example
KYS senpai
>>341542576
Except spiders of course. Spiders are monsters.
>>341563659
Majestic, A Shitposter is a Shitposter even in a dream.
>>341563631
Except Odeon and the concept of the mingling of blood between man and those above man is a recurring motif in Lovecraft's work that is seen in Bloodborne. Also, the attempts to glean greater knowledge from observation of powers much greater than man are seen in each.
>>341555812
There was this one moment near the beginning of a Machine for Pigs where I was exploring one room and then when I came back one small eagle statue was in a different place than before (not that you can't move objects like you could in The Dark Descent). It really boggled my mind and made me question if I was going crazy. It worked because it was subtle change of one object so I wasn't sure if I was remembering it wrong. Once you go bigger you can its just the game fucking with you.
>>341533151
True, they should be called "Derlethian" games because they miss the point as badly as he did.
![Cthulhu[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/2AOll2Z.jpg "Cthulhu[1].jpg")
>>341555914
heres how cthulhu looks like
>>341555914
How can Cthulhu one shot Demonbane? I thought Demonbane is the absolute ultimate maximum power level bullshit ever achievable (something like Saitama) and Cthulhu isn't even that strong in his own universe.
>>341568019
>I thought Demonbane is the absolute ultimate maximum power level bullshit ever achievable
That's at the end of the VN, anon.
>>341568019
Demonbane has a multiverse thing going on, and there are two particular Demonbanes we know about that get ultra busted, one from a prequel novel, and one from the end of the VN.
One is the one that grew to the point that it popped the universe it was in, and then destroyed a bunch of other ones by brushing against them in a fight with another mech that was just as big, and the other is Elder God Demonbane, which itself is pretty strong, but what makes it busted is its ability to summon an infinite amount of any alternate Demonbanes from any other universe or timeline, including those that do not/can not exist.
Those two Demonbanes would probably wipe Cthulhu easy, but the one that actually fights Cthulhu is basically regular old Demonbane, which is really only as strong as the pilot and his grimoire, who both progressively get stronger over the course of the story.
>>341540883
You have to make the player fear death. Make checkpoints few and far between, make the game different when you come back after dying, make the death screen something truly horrific that changes each time you see it. Make death disturbing, unpredictable, and packaged with serious consequences.
The ideal horror game will make death rare, but danger common. It'll make survival technically not that hard but present it in a way that demands quick reaction so that near misses happen a lot, causing stress to build over time. Making the death screen unique to the method by which you're killed helps. Giving a moment of hope or panic where the player can try to escape before dying helps more. Make the player think that one more monster encounter, one slip of a button, one wrong turn, means they'll have to start all over.
They'll go hours without dying once and be scared every minute because they know that letting their guard down means the end.
>>341543324
Upper Cathedral Ward is pretty scary.
>>341569557
Alien Isolation is like this, which is why it's really good.
You're equipped with a wide variety of weapons and tools. You can handle anything, but it's not easy and if you fuck up just a little, you're done.
>>341556342
You're just a huge pussy mate.
>>341569921
Dead Space should have been more like that game, in the sense that enemies weren't fucking everywhere, and even the weakest ones could still fuck you up if you weren't on top of your game.
Horror games cannot have cannon fodder enemies.
>>341537541
That anime is the worst abuse of the public domain yet created.
>>341558397
I really, really want to believe.
>>341562709
They were good before le void lords retcon.
>>341562127
You could do a Lovecraftian story where the monsters and otherworldly effects are virtually never shown, and the only things directly observed are the people behaving differently as a result. It worked for Event Horizon.
>>341545478
>>341541075
>The final battle dialogue with Giygas was based on Itoi's recollections of a traumatic scene from the Shintoho film The Military Policeman and the Dismembered Beauty that he had accidentally seen in his childhood.
>The film is perhaps well-known because of its association with the SNES game Earthbound. Its creator, Shigesato Itoi, mistook a murder scene for a rape scene, inspiring the eerie presence of the game.[2][3]
The fact that it's inspired by a case of having stumbled upon something which one misunderstands or can't understand makes it more genuinely Lovecraftian than it first appears.
>>341542780
>I haven't read the Call of Cthulhu or the Dunwich Horror, please rape my face
>>341569921
I don't think that one quite met all the criteria. It was good, I agree, but it didn't offer many options for death, and everyone knows everything about the Alien. While the time of death wasn't predictable, the cause and method of it was. There needs to be an element of the unknown. I'm actually fond of how Dead Space used different animations for each cause of death, and while I wouldn't do it exactly the same way, keeping the death screens varied is a step in the right direction.
I disagree with >>341570117 about cannon fodder. A horror game can have small, weak enemies as long as they still pose a legitimate danger. If they die in one hit but also kill (or nearly kill) in one hit, you'll panic whenever you see one. If they cause a nasty status effect, same idea. See also: poison headcrabs. The opposite end of the spectrum, a slow and predictable enemy that eats half your ammo and keeps coming, can be frightening as well.
Something I've realized recently is that horror games need to have parts you don't want to go through. That means enemies that make you flinch because they're so goddamned risky to deal with- enemies that make you take other risks, ones you normally wouldn't, to avoid them. The need to avoid making mistakes causes anxiety, which makes scares more effective.
I wonder, could an open-world horror game work if it was made hard enough? Open worlds are boring when you're frolicking from one quest to the next and fights are a momentary distraction. If you're constantly hiding and trying to save ammo, maybe it's not so dull anymore. But that's just an idea.
>>341538184
event horizon isn't lovecraft you oaf, it's a prequel to 40K
LIBERATA TUTAME EX INFERNIS
>>341539008
So theoretically, you could have a Lovecraftian horror with no tentacle monsters but like... I dunno, robots taking over and just being vastly superior to anything a human can do? Robots on the path of technological singularity and developing technology so advanced that to us it's just incomprehensible magic?
>>341572020
yes, this is what Reapers were supposed to be
>>341542780
And? Tons of horror games have you die in the end
>>341533151
What horror game does this?
I can only think of call of cthulhu and maybe Clive bakers undying. Both were great.
>>341540208
A game about tentacle and stuff monsters that look a bit like lovecrafts deliberately very vague descriptions but have no connection to what their described effect is like.
If you can fight it, it is not lovecraftian.
Lovecraftian horror is about the realization that everything that you are and that you can do is utterly futile, and if said horrors decide to eat you, the best you can do is kill yourself.
Bloodborne could not be much further from that.
There's nothing wrong with Lovecraftian horror/monsters as long as the execution is good. Most of the time this is ruined since
A) You can kill them with normal weapons
B) They look like a bunch of tentacles with eyes everywhere.
>>341573271
Bloodborne does have an element of futility though.
You can either let yourself die at the end and be done with the dream yourself, but this changes nothing. Everything you did changed nothing.
You can fight Gerhnam and then get wrecked by Moon Presence. Now you take his place as the host for the hunter's dream. Everything you worked for led to nothing.
Or you can kill the moon presence and become an elder god yourself. You'll probably just be the next moon presence and do the same shit, so everything you did changed nothing.
>>341573870
Wont you be able to do whatever you want after becoming an old one though?
>game is lovecraftian
>it's just tentacle monsters
>>341573972
Theoretically, but probably not. There are several human turned great ones around and they seem powerless to fight the fate they have. All the great ones seem rather predictable too, which is how the scholars were able to study them.
>>341533151
At least horror is a viable genre again. I remember it was only a few years ago that everyone in the development community was pronouncing it a dead genre and that the only way forward was to transition into "horror-themed action games."
>>341574321
Why though? Do you become retarded when you transcend into an old one? I thought you become enlightened and super intelligent.
Maybe you just give up when you know the truth?
Also why does the Hunter literally turn into tiny squid? Will he grow eventually? Where did his body mass go? Wouldn't it be better if he just mutated into an old one?
>>341573972
>>341574927
Along with what the other anon said, I think it is implied that there are higher beings than even the great ones.
One of the biggest hints, from what I understand, is the doll in the hunter's dream bleeds a notably pale white blood that is unique to it and cannot be killed permanently, along with a few things implying that some sort of greater may be inhabiting the doll.
The great ones may very well just be another etch on some greater cosmic ladder that we barely get a glimpse of.
The biggest mistake games make in horror titles is that they become really predictable after a while. You should do things that aren't following the rules of the game and expectations of the player.
>>341574682
As long as they're not youtuber bait I'm fine.
>>341562709
>>341563128
Worst kind of writing.
>>341534071
Would you Shub-Niggurath?
>>341543324
>>341556342
>>341569790
Horror is not a synonym for scary you twats.
Something does not have to be fear invoking to be horrifying. Learn what words actually mean.
>>341579640
Well then what the hell defines a horror game?
>>341578406
Tell me if this is porn and if so the sauce
My searches are coming up nothing
>>341579810
There's both, porn and regular manga.
>>341539097
tentacle fetish existed way before
>>341579730
it's horrifying. did I stutter?
>>341533151
Call of Cthulhu is the only game to my knowledge that did Lovecraftian monsters right because if you stare at them long enough your mentality starts to deteriorate. Now if it was in true lovecraftian fashion you would become insane the second you glanced at a lovecraftian monster but that wouldn't make much sense in a video game.
>>341579640
By your definition Lovecraft isn't horror. Horror as a genre is usually used to describe feelings of both terror and horror (and gross out if you include Kings classification).
>>341579997
How is Bloodborne not horrifying?
>>341539952
Dude, the Abyss
serious shit man.
>>341542780
>Cthulu died by having a fishing ship rammed into his cock
are you serious m80
>>341539952
>He hasn't played SOMA
>>341560884
That's the point.
If the monster has distinguishing qualities, we can describe it, thus it's no longer lovecraftian.
>>341542780
sealing them away or bringing them back to their slumber also works.
>>341556176
Eternal Darkness was such a fucking great love letter to Lovecraft.
Will we ever get a game like it again /v/?
>>341543324
>Upper Cathedral Ward
>Vicar Amelia screaming "YEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWW" at you after that disgusting transformation
>Finding Alfred after sending him to Cane Hurts
>Bloodlickers
Fuck you Bloodborne had some genuinely unsettling moments.
>>341580661
Underwater station and the surrounding area isn't a sub
>>341543324
>Ludwig
>Not, by definition, horrible
>>341538761
Cthulhu wasn't that eldritch compared to a lot of his other stuff.
His best stuff is when it's mostly about a long gone civilisation of a far mightier species
>>341581123
I'm still fucking unsettled by that scream the Orphan constantly does.. maybe not because it's terrifying per se but because I died so many fucking times to that fucker.
>>341540173
because rendering most of his monsters would be impossible without raytracing in order to bend and warp space and time.
>>341581342
Orphans screams are scary because it's blurring the line between angry and afraid. You can't tell if he's attacking you because he's scared or because he's furious.
>>341578406
>manifesting as something other than the goat with 1000 young
Haram
>>341579640
>Horror is not a synonym for scary you twats.
I guess every game where you play as a character is a role playing game then.
>>341533151
>"Lovecraftian"
>Usually just means they're a talking pile of eyeballs and tentacles.
>>341581883
Name atleast one game that does this
>>341581945
Eternal Darkness and Soul Reaver come to mind.
>>341582030
And it was SPECIFICALLY called "lovecraftian"?
>>341582523
They have both been described as such, yes.
>>341582748
By the devs?
>>341539008
Hey George, like your stuff.
>>341550761
Oh man. That game had one of the best settings I have ever seen. There was just so much. Horror elements from all over, zombies, secret organizations, witchcraft, Lovecraft, demons.
>>341559816
>>341560989
Look up Kuon niggers.
>>341554029
Amnesia and Eternal Darkness do this.
>>341555409
>SOMA
>cyberpunk
The fuck you smoking
>>341542780
incorrect, you can win battles; but the end message should always be that you can't win the war
there are a few lovecraft protagonists who win battles (call of cthulu, dunwich horror, dream-quest), but in the grand scheme they have no way to completely win, so the best they can hope for is that the sleeping monsters forget about them over time, but they usually go mad from paranoia and stress
>>341584746
to be fair, it explores some themes common in cyberpunk and has that kind of aesthetic
>>341536997
it's things so far beyond us physically and mentally that we have trouble even comprehending how they exist
Lovecraft's signature type of horror usually involves someone seeing something so impossible that their brain just shuts down upon seeing that something like that can exist
and it's usually typified by a cross between magic and science (in the sense that magic is just a way of harnessing the natural power of the old gods, but they are so beyond our understanding of a "lifeform" that it defies all science we know)
human insignificance plays a large role as well; one story describes a man trying to recount a number of years where he had amnesia, and it turned out it was because in that period a highly advanced alien lifeform had swapped consciousness with him (from a completely different point in the past; they freaky-friday'd through time) as part of a reconnaissance for alien's species
while the guy is trapped in an alien body in earth's past, he can go through their records (because his brain will get wiped when they swap bodies back anyway, so the aliens let the mind-swapped captives read all the things they've recorded), and he reads all about the various lifeforms that rule earth through various times
he reads when humanity will completely die and how a race of sentient beetle-people will rule earth after us (and for much longer too)
whilst captive, he finds out that not only does humanity get wiped out int he future, they get wiped out SO HARD that nothing will remain, literally everything any human has ever achieved will be pointless
that's kind of sucky news on top of finding out that religion is probably bullshit as well (because the bible didn't really cover all that shit)
humanity has no future, and no afterlife
naturally it makes him a little fucking crazy
>>341585735
>>341536997
completely forgot to mention, in addition to all the cosmic smallness, there IS body-horror in lovecraft
here is a passage describing a shoggoth to give you an idea about what the characters are seeing that makes them go fucking mental at even seeing a creature like this exists:
>It was a terrible, indescribable thing vaster than any subway train—a shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly self-luminous, and with myriads of temporary eyes forming and un-forming as pustules of greenish light all over the tunnel-filling front that bore down upon us, crushing the frantic penguins and slithering over the glistening floor that it and its kind had swept so evilly free of all litter.
>>341558397
So something kind of like Echo Night?
That'd be pretty neat
>>341571314
Not the same guy, but..
>Call of Cthulhu
Not only is Cthulhu the weakest of the old ones, but he wasn't even properly awake when they rammed him, which barely phased him in this weakened state and he just said "fuck it" and went back to sleep.
All you can do against these beings is to delay the inevitable, until the stars align and the world ends.
>Dunwich Horror
The horror was a half-human minion meant to awaken the old ones, not a cosmic being. It's barely more of a threat than a Shoggoth.
Lovecraftian horror consists of 2 things:
1. Disgust
2. Awe
Disgust is the fear of touching something unclean, of becoming infected (mentally or physically). Finding out you are a descendant of horrible monster/human unions, getting tainted by a color out of space, swapping minds with an alien being, etc.
Awe is the sense of being in the presence of something greater than yourself. Beings to whom humans are like insects, things that are older than humanity and will continue to exist after humanity is gone, the vastness of the cosmos, etc.
Make a game that evokes disgust and awe in the player and it will be Lovecraftian.
>>341580625
He got rammed in the head, which burst and immediately began reforming.
>>341539952
>horror movie set on a submarine
you dont watch many movies, do you.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Below_(film)
