Read The Horror at Highrook review to find out why this methodical, atmospheric blend of tabletop and video game RPG will drown you in cosmic horror goodness.
The meshing together of the worlds of video games and tabletop games has never been tighter than it is now. The resurgence in popularity for tabletop games certainly plays a part in that, but also it’s just become a bit easier to blend the two in ways that take the benefits of both and put them into one package.
Nullpointer Games’ The Horror at Highrook is practically intertwined with the world of tabletop board games, and the developer clearly understands where the two worlds should meet. The tactile nature of a physical board game is married to the audiovisual extravagances of the video game world.
Basking in the Gothic dread found in the works of Lovecraft, Poe, and Stoker, The Horror at Highrook makes itself known right from the title screen, as the titles features a cutout of the Mike Mignola-inspired artwork depicting the titular Highrook Estate in ominous stormy weather.
You play as a team of investigators out to discover what happened to the Ackeron family. A murky history with sinister forces seems to have culminated with their disappearance from Highrook, and the powers that be are concerned, so you go in as a party made up of different aspects of the elite guilds of the city. A Mechanist, a Plague Doctor, a Scholar, and a Brawny beefcake. Together, they must use their skills to get to the root of what happened to the Ackeron family.
This is a cosmic horror game, though, so naturally, it’s not long before there are attacks on your sanity and mortality. As the days go by, your job is to find the balance between keeping them focused on the job and keeping them sane. Something any middle manager will appreciate is difficult in a menial job, let alone in a haunted mansion with unspeakable horrors lurking somewhere.
The Horror at Highrook Review: On Board
You view Highrook and its ground like a game board, with each room a cutaway top-down viewpoint with markings to place your game cards within. Only a few places are open to use at first, which gives you a chance to get familiar with the systems.
Nullpointer has done a fine job trusting players in this opening part of the game. There are light tutorials on the absolute basics, and the game points you to a more expansive in-game manual if you want to learn more. Still, you can ignore the expansive stuff and get stuck in without really suffering for it (well, beyond the suffering you’re meant to do when dealing with eldritch nightmares and the like).
The game explains how cards connect with rooms and characters thanks to a set of easy-to-follow attributes symbols. Rather than make players think in narrow terms of what actions should work in what area, vaguer wording opens up more options. So the clifftop, for example, could logically just be labeled as a place for foraging, but that would put it into a box it doesn’t need to be in as it serves much more purpose, even if that might be its primary function.
Each team member has their specialist field of expertise, so you plonk them down in an area best suited to them and get them started on the task. That might be deciphering ancient texts or cooking something from the foraged ingredients you found, but whatever they do, time goes on, and fatigue sets in. So you end up managing their sleep schedules, making sure they get fed, and that they’re being generally productive, which, as I’ve mentioned, is made a lot harder by the weird and worrisome things going on around Highrook. Not to mention, the team isn’t exactly the best of friends to begin with, so the growing terrors and labors of the task exacerbate tensions.
The Horror at Highrook is so methodical and hands-on with its actions and character development. That means it ensures you actually invest time in them and subsequently get invested in their fates. This is cosmic horror, and unpleasant things happen to people in cosmic horror. While the consequences grow heavier, the game doesn’t go full-tilt on your crew. It always feels like a challenge, but not an overwhelming or daunting one. The illusion of heavy danger is enough, though, and it feels dread-inducing to clock that you’ve made a bad choice that could destabilize your run. That’s part of the excitement, though. Can’t really avoid the horrors in a horror game, can you?
The Horror at Highrook is an engrossing horror RPG experience that taps into the tactile nature of tabletop games whilst utilizing the strengths of a video game’s audiovisual flourishes. It might seem like overwhelming madness at first, but you’ll soon succumb to its dark delights.
Score 8/10 – Great
Developer: Nullpointer Games
Publisher: Nullpointer Games/Outersloth
Reviewed on: PC
The Horror at Highrook review code was provided by the publisher.
