Moons of Madness

Cosmic horror has been making a huge return over the years in gaming and I couldn’t be any happier, thanks in part to games like Call of Cthulhu and The Sinking City being major releases in the past year. Moons of Madness by Funcom Games is the latest game to have its shot at the genre and might possibly be my favourite title of its kind so far.

Moons of Madness delivers an intriguing and terrorizing story of Shane Newehart stranded in Mars, where he walks on a thin line between reality and fiction. Once you overlook its shortcomings, the game makes a solid case for itself as one of the best Lovecraftian titles.

While very linear and completely devoid of replayability, Moons of Madness scratches that Lovecraft itch, melding science fiction and horror together extremely well.

Have you been checking out every new game that has the potential to spark joy similar to the original Dead Space game? It seems like I’ve spent the last decade chasing that dragon. When I first saw the trailer for Moons of Madness I thought, “Finally! This might be it!” Thinking about a Lovecraft-inspired horror game set on Mars got my adrenaline pumping. But would this adventure fill the hole in my heart? Let’s find out together.

In the end, Moons of Madness was an interesting game that certainly fed my psychological horror hunger. The game was great at building chilling atmospheres that play with the themes of isolation and paranoia, but small changes to some of the game mechanics would have made this game even better.

Moons of Madness is a first-person horror game that starts off strong with its Lovecraftian space vibes. The opening segment, while not delving into spoilers, invokes a sense of dread and set me up for an experience I thought would carry forward with its own momentum. Wow, I thought to myself, we’re already deep in the scary stuff! Can’t wait to unravel this plot.

Moons of Madness might have its tense moments and a couple of cheap jump scares that made me react to what was going on, but for the most part, it plays like a mostly well animated and passable adventure game. Lovecraftian only in name, it fails to instill a pervading sense of dread, as it never manages to make its monsters and cosmic threats actually feel implacable. No matter how many tentacles you add to a misshapen creature, if evading its slow walk only requires mildly sprinting on the only linear path ahead, that leaves little room for terror. Being an occasionally competent thriller onl...

Nothing about the Lovecraftian horror of Moons of Madness is outright terrible, but its slow, chore-heavy gameplay doesn’t conjure up a lot of reasons to forgive the fact that there’s just not a lot of incentive to visit its haunted corner of Mars. Although there are moments of cinematic flourish, the basic puzzles, insubstantial gameplay, confusing storylines, and a lack of genuine scares make it a hard sell. As it stands, you’re better off avoiding this Mars expedition.

I went into Moons of Madness hoping for a Lovecraftian story, and it delivered. It has that Lovecraft-inspired tone through and through, so if cosmic horror is your thing, you should be pleased with the way Moons of Madness develops. A few parts of the story feel a little disconnected from the rest–possibly because Moons of Madness is set in the same universe as the publisher’s MMO Secret World Legends–and I was disappointed in how similar the two endings were, but overall it was a dark, unsettling journey that hit all the Lovecraftian notes I went into the game hoping to see.