Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of The Earth - Reception

Reception

Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth received generally favorable reviews, but was also often criticized for being buggy and inaccessible for many players due to its high difficulty. GameSpy ranked it as the tenth best game of E3 2004. It was also one of the six games nominated by GameSpot for the award of Most Surprisingly Good Game of 2005 (losing to Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks), with a comment that "after a development cycle that was nearing infinity, it's hard to imagine a world where this H.P. Lovecraft-based horror game turned out all right. Luckily for us, we don't have to imagine it."

According to IGN, the game "succeeds brilliantly in some areas," making "great use of the source material" and forcing player "to accept some realistic responsibility for their character" due to the sanity system and HUD-less display, but can make the players "cringe at the difficult nature of the game." Greg Kasavin of GameSpot wrote, "A thick, unsettling atmosphere fills this ambitious first-person action adventure, which makes up for some frustrating moments and dated graphics with plenty of chills, variety, and originality." Cheat Code Central called it "one of the greatest book to game translations ever" and a game "that is full of twists, turns and incredibly wonderful scary surprises. It's got a great atmosphere which is sustained by dark and grainy graphics, chilling sound effects and an incredibly improbable storyline that is treated properly as to suspend reality from creeping in and ruining your experience." GameSpy's Allen Rausch opined that "this disturbing slice of Lovecraft's America is well worth the time to visit," adding that "despite the occasional missteps, Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth is a more than fitting tribute to its literary inspiration." In 2012, retro reviewer for The Gaming Liberty called it "a game on the brink of greatness, and the most unnerving gaming experience I’ve had to date."

Dark Corners of the Earth was also acclaimed in several retrospective articles by various publications. In 2008, the game's townsfolk of Innsmouth placed ninth on GamesRadar's list of the gaming's "scariest villains ever". In 2009, 1UP.com featured it on the list of top five game worlds "where insanity is the entire point". In 2011, The Daily Telegraph listed it among the scariest games "you've never played" as second only to Amnesia: The Dark Descent, adding that this "flawed classic" was "too buggy, too tough, and criminally ignored upon release." That same year, PC Gamer ranked it as 87th on the list of top 100 best PC games of all time for its frantic hotel escape sequence and "other great, scary set-pieces," calling it, "behind the bugs and clunkiness, a genuine and admirable attempt."