Worshippers of Cthulhu Review

The city-building genre came a long way from the likes of Pharaoh, Caesar, and the original Settlers. Within its eras of rise, fall, and revival, the genre took deep roots with the spiritual successors in Tropico, Anno, Banished, and many, many more. The games mentioned above, too, found a resurgence with the likes of Pharaoh: A New Era, Caesar IV, Builders of Egypt, and so on, with varying levels of success.

Undoubtedly one of the most technical and hard genres in the industry, city-building games have had a very strong core following. However, the genre started to grow stale, with newer games disappointing fans with similar or lackluster mechanics and little to no innovation in terms of gameplay. Titles such as Surviving Mars, City Skylines I & II, and Timberborn attempted to diverge from the Banished and Anno-like model and sought to set themselves apart, often being welcomed despite any bad qualities they might possess.

Worshippers of Cthulhu is one such game that has all the qualities that make Anno loveable while offering many divergences that make it stand out. The developers at Goat Games definitely knew what they were doing, with their previous works being in a similar space. And with the publishers over at Crytivo, who produced games like Prehistoric Kingdoms, the game seems to have reliable support for the future.

Most gamers have heard about the 2018 horror game Call of Cthulhu or have played it themselves. The otherworldly Lovecraftian Horror game has earned a place in the hearts of many. Worshippers of Cthulhu evokes the same mysticism and atmosphere, albeit here, you are the bad guys.

That's right, in Worshippers of Cthulhu, you take control of a cult that has found its way to an island where the Dark God himself potentially resides. As the High Priest, you need to tend to your flock, attract new followers, expand your reach, and complete tasks for Cthulhu.

You start off on the island of Dreamshroud, with your ship moored on rocks and your followers strewn about on the island. You have to build a lumberjack and a lumber mill as your first buildings around a strange central storage structure. These structures need to be connected by roads, and with you being on an island, there is limited space.

So, careful planning is necessary for playing Worshippers of Cthulhu, especially heightened by the needs of each follower. Your followers stay 'homeless' until you build a house that houses exactly one person. A random follower is assigned to it and is now ready to work. You can then build various goods and services buildings to fulfill the needs of the people.

The main currency of the game is Faith, which you earn from your followers. They generate Faith on their own, but the higher their fulfillment, the more Faith you will generate. At the start of the game and for a while afterward, you'll be losing Faith a lot. Luckily, you start with a lot of it. Once you fulfill their needs, such as through clams, robes, cooked corn, and the Elder's Temple, you will gain more Faith. You should try to get a positive income really quickly.

You will also need to build supplementary buildings to convert 'semi-products' to proper goods. These include things such as turning sheep into robes, corn into cooked corn, and so on. These chains are fairly simple and intuitive. This is the core of the game, as you have to increase production as your followers increase.

The Lovecraftian flavor slowly seeps in with the Sacrifice Altar, where you build effigies using materials or goods to earn Eldritch Favor- the game's currency for techs. You can boost the Eldritch Favor gained from them by using more materials or, later on, sacrificing followers. These effigies need some time to be built and require Faith to be constructed. Once they are done, you complete the ritual and watch as tentacle-like tendrils rise from the deep and claim the sacrifice.

Worshippers of Cthulhu eventually unlocks many such Altars, such as the Ascension Altar and Festival Altar, each giving you a new way to do something evil. You access this through the tech tree in the game. Many of the techs are locked behind quests, and others are tiered. These are only progressed when you have unlocked a prerequisite number of techs and faith generation. Each tech unlocks a building, costing increasingly higher amounts of Eldritch Favor.

Eldritch Favor is also used to construct buildings, so you'll need to make sacrifices constantly. Events and quests will slowly increase your Fanaticism, while sacrifices will decrease it. The Fanaticism your people have will give boosts based on staggered tiers. The higher the tier, the better the boosts and bonuses.

The Lovecraftian God is not a forgiving deity, and as you progress through the quests, you will unlock a patience meter. This represents how long you have to fulfill the tasks of the Old One. Completing quests and certain events and tasks will add to the timer.

Each of your followers has a specialization, a calling to say so, where they excel. These specializations make them good at a certain job. Once you match the specialization with the job, the production time will decrease, and they will slowly gain levels in that specialization. You can build the Ceremony Hall where, out of many different rituals, you can carve sigils onto the back of your followers to change their specialization.

Your followers arrive in droves of waves; these waves come every few minutes and add to the global homeless pile. You may wonder why it is global; so, you see, in Worshippers of Cthulhu, the map is large and staggered through many different islands, which you unlock as you progress through the story.

The manner of doing so involves summoning otherworldly creatures to do your bidding as they travel through the waves and wreak havoc on the non-believers. Once they are wiped out, or better, taken captive, you may set up a new base on that island. Each of these islands has its own unique structures and quirks, so you'll never really be bored.

This game is a hidden gem, offering an unexpectedly rich experience that many may not have heard about. It's a blend of genres that works together beautifully, creating an unforgettable gameplay experience.

At its core, Worshippers of Cthulhu masterfully combines economic strategy, similar to titles like Frostpunk and Anno, with real-time strategy (RTS) combat, where you command monstrous units in epic oceanic battles against rival factions.

What sets it apart is how seamlessly these mechanics integrate, providing a smooth and captivating experience despite the complexity. The synergy between managing resources and engaging in tactical warfare feels flawless.

The game offers a much-needed shake-up to the Anno formula of city-builders, keeping much of the core elements similar to the old city-building game, all the while offering a breath of fresh air through the Cthulhu Mythos.

The resource management within the game is complicated enough to remain interesting but not too in-depth, as in Ara: History Untold. The production chains are also not too complicated; you don't have to worry about running out of resources, and you have a shared resource pool between your islands.

Worshippers of Cthulhu could use some polish, like, a lot of it. Being able to exchange followers amongst each island would be nice. And almost every system could use some work to expand them. The later stages are very fine-tuned and tedious; you get attacked a lot, and it almost feels like you're a fragile tribe, not the followers of the Dark God.

You will never really feel bored, with each of the three missions having many objectives that bump up the playtime to 20-30. Each of the missions has large maps with lots to do. And places to explore. To top it off, the gameplay loop is kept interesting with all the Lovecraftian flair.

The setting and overall atmosphere are phenomenal, and the mechanic doesn't detract much from the main city-building aspects, all the while adding to the game's Lovecraftian nature. None of them feel over the top or out of place, and none of them are particularly tedious.

Visually, Worshippers of Cthulhu might not be too much to look at, but your cities feel alive. People walking through the streets, the builders at work, the occasional god snatching up sacrifices, the usual. The events also do a good job of leaning toward the sinister nature of the game.

What sells it in the end is the game's sound design and music. Eerie, simple, and probably ten other words describe what essentially is 'Lovecraftian' undertones. This applies to the voice acting, too, which is a bit rare but does everything to bring the experience together. There's some work needed here as well. There could be a little more to the music, and the voices of the followers upon clicking a building can get annoying after the 50th time it happens.

Worshippers of Cthulhu is, at its heart, a great concept. The foundations are strong with this one, and the little mechanics and mini-games are fun. All of those features never get old or tiring; it's always fun- in an evil way. That's another thing that it does to sell it.

The evilness isn't just there in the name. You have to make horrible decisions and be truly evil, lest your patron abandons you. The game has a long ride ahead and could use a lot of polish, but so far, it is definitely a worthwhile experience.