[Disclaimer: I received a review key for Skelethrone: The Prey through Keymailer, a third-party website/company that connects publishers and developers with content creators. The game was given without promise or expectation of a positive review, only that the game be played and content be created through the playing of the game and the experience. Unless otherwise noted, all content in the following article is from my own playthrough of this game.]
Systems: Windows, Steam OS, Linux
Release Date: July 14, 2024
Publisher: Deep Dive Project
Time Spent: 2 Hours 42 Minutes
.png)
Before I get to the actual game, let me share with y'all a little story. While playing on the Steam Deck, I recorded my entire playthrough over the course of a couple of days and nights, and you can watch it over on YouTube (link above). During my last playthrough, I played for about an hour and didn't remember to break up the recording into 15-20 minute sections. Instead, I divided it into two roughly 30-minute files, which I combined into a single video about an hour long. Because of this, the video files became corrupted and the video stalls frequently throughout, while the audio can be heard uninterrupted. If I were a professional video game journalist and video producer with extra time on my hands, I would simply replay the entire game, as it's only about two hours long, and begin recording where the last video started and upload that. But I'm not, and honestly, the thought of replaying that last level again with all of its literal twists and turns, and locating three star-shaped keys does not at all sound appetizing.
So, what does it mean when not wanting to play a 40-minute section of a two-hour game is what holds me back from having a complete walkthrough? It means, I think, that Mountains of Madness was a visually appealing game and a bold attempt at somewhat faithfully adapting one of H.P. Lovecraft's quintessential stories of cosmic horror, but that the maze-like structures in the second half of the game were not particularly fun to play through which sadly taints the entire game. But only somewhat.
.png)
Adapting any of H.P. Lovecraft's stories is going to be a chore in terms of gameplay and achieving the right tone while convincing the player that what they're witnessing is so utterly maddening that simply surviving an encounter might be the best outcome, although you might likely go insane in the process. And as is often the case with a lot of Lovecraftian cosmic horrors, how do you create an accurate representation of a creature that in nearly any other game you could kill with a gunblade or a fire spell after appropriate leveling? The general outline for At the Mountains of Madness, the short story that this game is based on, is that Dr. Dyer recounts the events of an expedition to Antarctica where he saw evidence of a ransacked camp along with corpses of otherworldly creatures. Along with a graduate student, Danforth, they fly a plane and discover massive stone structures/ruins among the mountains. During an exploration of the ruins, the history of the buildings and the Elder Things who lived there is revealed. The men come upon a "pen" of albino penguins presumed to have been raised as food for the shoggoths that the Elder Things raised. Dyer and Danforth are chased out of the ruins by a shoggoth, and upon reaching the plane and flying away, Danforth sees something that drives him mad.
.png)
For the most part, Mountains of Madness does a pretty good job of recreating the story without tacking on a lot of extras that feel out of place in the poor brief I just related. There are no enemies to fight. There are "keys" of a sort to get to certain areas, but they're presented as ropes to rappel down cliffs, a ladder to cross gaps too wide to jump, and ice axes to break through ice walls. There is one instance where you are required to locate three star-shaped objects that unlock a door to the final section of the game, but at least it visually fits in with the rest of the game. The fluff in this game is the cave systems and confusing labyrinthine mazes at each stage of the game. Before you are able to get to your colleague Lake's camp, you have to navigate through several large cave systems where you have to locate rope and an ice axe. After discovering the camp, you're flown out to the ruins where you once again enter a maze of hallways, ladders, and ropes, trying to get to somewhere that's never made 100% clear. After unlocking the three-star door and locating the bodies of the remaining members of your original expedition, you enter another series of long hallways created to make the player feel turned around and lost.
.png)
My last two criticisms are somewhat minor. First, scattered throughout the ruined city are carved murals depicting the history of the Elder Things and the shoggoths. In-game, these are represented by large reliefs carved into walls with odd-looking gold markings that could best be described as scratches and dripping paint. There's no actual image here that goes along with anything that the narration talks about. I get it, though, since creating this kind of original asset would likely be time-consuming, but at least it's somewhat obvious while exploring the hallways that a wall is supposed to have a relief or a mural on it. The last criticism is that the "pen" with the albino penguins is represented by a single penguin. Granted, the design and look of the penguin is pretty creepy with its blind and pink eyes, and strange puss-like lesions over its body, but there's only one.
.png)
Okay, I lied, one last criticism. Before I put together my "Found Footage" video, I had liked the brief look of the shoggoth from my first playthrough attempt. Granted, I never got a good look at the creature, but I recall there being a black mass with a dozen eyes and writhing tentacles. In my first playthrough, the shoggoth had almost caught me as I was running down the hallway towards the stairs as the tentacles were wrapping around the screen, and I was convinced that I was going to die. However, upon closer look at the creature as it scuttled down the hallway after Danforth sprints past you, I thought that the creature looked more like a giant arachnid. I get it though. You're not supposed to hang around and watch as the massive creature descends upon you, you're supposed to run away which means you won't be looking directly at the design of the creature long enough to get a good look at the thing. The moral of the story: don't look too hard and overanalyse shoggoths when you're supposed to be running away from them.
.png)
What I find odd about having written what I've written, is that I did enjoy Mountains of Madness. I liked the feeling of isolation. I liked the feeling of not understanding the logic behind the structure of the ruins and why the layout and hallways were constructed as they were. I liked the uneasiness of the narration and that it was a real person and not a text-to-speech program. I liked how the various items were used and solving these types of environemtnal puzzles that wouldn't've made sense considering that someone else (Gedney and Danforth) had already been through the area. I liked all of the moments of narration over still images rather than trying to make animated sequences that might not have panned out. I'm very glad that I played it because I love when a developer takes the risk and actually tries to make a faithful adaptation of a Lovecraftian short story. And maybe it's just a play once and done kind of experience? I'm glad I played it, but I don't know if I want to get turned around in those winding hallways again.
~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
I Hope You Find Some Time to Drop a Note
P.S. I should also mention that while I liked the idea of having a compass to help you navigate during any time in the game, I really found it useless. But it would really make sense for Dr. Dyer to have a compass at the ready when exploring the Antartic, so I can't really be mad at its inclusion.
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
.png)
