Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth

Details

When playing Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth pay close attention to your surroundings, especially during the first hour or so of playing. Look on rooftops, peek through the occasional cellar window and so on. There are a lot of little "details" in the environments and you might catch a glimpse of something you didn't expect, and it might even be a bit disturbing. These can range from quick glimpses of some inhuman horror as it passes by a window to seeing a dead body that's been hanging from the ceiling for weeks.

Development

The March 27, 2006 release date of the PC version ended a six-year cycle of development hell. Headfirst began developing Dark Corners of the Earth for a German publisher named Fishtank. Fishtank was taken over by JoWood and JoWood wasn't interested in the title. Headfirst continued development while searching for publishers. Bethesda ended up with the publishing rights, but they wanted it as an Xbox title, not a PC game.

The Xbox version was released in October of 2005. Shortly after that, Headfirst entered into financial difficulties which affected their ability to pay their employees, leaving many of them to find employment elsewhere. Headfirst was forced to sell their Simon the Sorcerer license to Silver Style and put their offices up for sale. The remaining Headfirst employees completed the port of Dark Corners of the Earth. As of 2006, plans for additional Call of Cthulhu games, Destiny's End and Beyond the Mountains of Madness seem to be dead.

German version

The Xbox version (when having the console set to German) misses all blood effects when hurting enemies. All other blood effects are untouched.

References

Take a look at the posters of Brian Burnham, which are scattered through the game, on these he has a striking resemblance to H.P. Lovecraft.

Usenet

The development of Dark Corners of the Earth can be traced back to a 1999 Usenet post where Headfirst's Andrew Brazier asked alt.horror.cthulhu readers, "What would you want to see in a Cthulh (sic) computer game ?"

Awards

• GameSpy
  • 2006 – Level of the Year (PC) (for Hotel Escape)

Information also contributed by MasterMegid and Robstein