Bethesda

No, I Haven't Heard Of Substance. Why?

HIGH Sliding into a wallrun into a dive and scoring five headshots in the process is as cool to watch and perform as it sounds.

LOW "Learning" how to use a shotgun for the third time.

WTF Seriously? You put the plot twist in the manual?

Nevermind, Scotty... Don't bother beaming me up.

HIGH Thawing out the anachronous survivors.

LOW The repetitive, needlessly bloated mission design.

WTF The amount of wasted potential on display here.

"The absence of death in most people's early years creates a psychic vacuum of sorts. For many, thoughts of a nuclear confrontation are one's first true brush with nonexistence, and because they are the first, they can be the most powerful and indelible." The Wrong Sun, Douglas Coupland.

HIGH It's Oblivion... with guns!

LOW It's just—sigh—Oblivion with guns.

WTF How does putting on a lab coat make one better at science?

Think it can't get more oppressively dismal than D.C.? Welcome to Pittsburgh.

HIGH Going to a completely different area of the destroyed nation.

LOW The 100 item collect-a-thon quest is a tedious drag.

WTF It's not clear where your stolen stuff can be retrieved at quest's end.

Bringing the fight to a much colder, less radioactive wasteland

HIGH It's more Fallout, for players like me who couldn't get enough.

LOW Getting warped out of an area before I was done searching.

WTF The battle near the end could have been a bit more epic.

Despite the minor nitpicks, this is a great game that has sleeper hit written all over it. The guys at Headfirst Productions certainly did their homework and researched the material before making the game. The end result of their labor is a rock-solid videogame that almost perfectly captures the dread, majesty, and sheer abject terror of Lovecraft's world.

Game Description: Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth is a spine-chilling story with classic survival/horror gameplay, where you face evil that seems impossible to stop. Set in the 1920s, you'll be thrown headfirst into the world of H.P. Lovecraft's famous Cthulu mythology. The storyline brings to life all the unthinkable evils, psychic possessions, and mythical worlds it pioneered. Draw upon your skills in exploration, investigation, and combat while battling evil incarnate.

According to ESRB, this game contains: Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Use of Drugs and Alcohol