All The Way Down

Lovecraft is one of the most popular horror writers of all time, thanks to the fact that he managed to create a universe of his own with all sorts of monsters that are quite famous to this day. Even if Lovecraft himself was not a nice man, his work is something special, which is why people take inspiration from it to this day.

All The Way Down is a retro point-and-click adventure game that takes it’s inspiration from Lovecraft’s writings and presents you with a creepy story about a mining village with a secret. It’s not a very long adventure, nor is it very complex, but the writing is good enough to keep you engaged and maybe even cause you to go to bed with a worried look on your face.

Speaking of which, the story starts with the main character being caught off-guard by a vicious snowstorm that almost kills him. Luckily, he stumbles on a small village where he hopes to find shelter, except that everyone is being very cold with him. People keep asking him if he’s a local or not, not to mention the fact that they refuse to provide him with a place to stay.

As for the gameplay, things go as usual if you are familiar with the point-and-click genre, which means that you have to pay attention to the environment in order to pick up objects and use them together to solve puzzles. Unfortunately, this bit is not as brilliant as it could have been, but then again this was not a major production with years of development. Thus, at least you get to keep the story moving at a fluid pace.

The retro graphics are not bad at all, on the other hand, even if they seem to lack detail most of the time. Hence, the environments are quite moody overall, but the fact that there’s nothing to catch your eye might invite lady boredom to the party, although not for long. Thankfully, the voice acting is pretty decent, especially when it comes to the few NPCs you interact with along the way.

Despite its flaws, All The Way Down is quite capable of creeping you out for a while, especially if you happen to play it at night. However, it clearly needed more content and slightly more interesting puzzles.