Army of Tentacles: (Not) A Cthulhu Dating Sim

Cringe. Just so much cringe.

Full review here.

Got past the 1st 'battle' then clicked on something & the game started over!
No main character voice. i'm done. check out summertime saga.

Even though I know what a "visual novel" is supposed to be, the pieces just didn't come together the way I thought they might. What brought me in was the humorous take on H.P. Lovecraft, but the voices were just too amateurish, if I had to point out one very specific problem. If a visual novel is just going to be something that you sit there and watch and listen to... it's also got to be something you'd actually want to listen to. Unfortunately, many of these voices just sounded way, way, off (not in a good way).

I'm a huge Mythos fan and as such I feel myself implored to own everything there is, even remotely connected to it.

But this game... I never thought the mere presence of a virtual product can make me that angry!

Chance is, the developer thought it to be funny, this "game" that is, but all it does to a Lovecraft fan at heart is insult every inch of my psyche...

All in all, this is one of the shittiest things I've ever seen concerning the Mythos (and I played a lot of Mobile Apps).

If you want a reason to kill yourself, just buy this game and play the Intro - you are welcome

I like weird, quirky games. I wanted to like this one. I got 13 minutes in, just past the intro.

The fourth-wall-breaking lampshade-hanging 'jokes' and the extremely disparate artstyles got to me. Probably the worst of it was the protagonist's eternal unchanging vague smile that never fit with what they were saying/doing. Nothing quite fits, really, and not in a 'sanity-questioning' way that feels like a deliberate choice, but rather like a bunch of assets got lazily thrown together. Is it really that hard to add a few expressions for the character that near-constantly takes up 1/4 of the screen?

Maybe it gets better? Like I said, only made it past the intro. It didn't hook me. There were hints of some unfolding plot, some different mechanics, maybe some intrigue and misdirects, but I just wasn't motivated to stick around for any of it. I'm not mad I bought it but I'm certainly glad I only bought it on sale.

Pros: The voices were decent and the uncle's design was pretty cool.

Humorous game based on the Cthulhu Mythos. Worth a playthrough or two. Fight with words and trivia. I enjoyed it.

A forth wall breaking romp through Cthulhu lore. It is filled with unique characters and entertaining dialog. The voice acting is great but the editing is a little rough. The writing and humor is spot on, I enjoyed every bit of it. The throwbacks and references to old school rpgs had me grinning every time. The UI is a little bare bones but gets the job done. I'm excited to give it another playthrough or two to explore some of the branching paths.

I´ve written a longer review for this game on the version with the DLC included.

This is basically the same game but I assume the DLC has a few more quests.

However...

This is a fun game where your partwise human character is kinda supposed to do the typical "save the world" thing.

It is fully voice acted (except your own character who doesn´t like to talk).

In this game you´ll have to do various quests and fight some foes. The battles are done in words and lots of them are

funny because they go very deep into "nerd culture" and stuff.

However you can check out my other review about the game if you want but I do definately recomend it. You can´t do

anything wrong for the cheap prize. And the game also let´s you feel that there has lots of work been put into it.

Ah and one thing aside - it´s an RPG game where you have stats and can buy equipment on stores.

But it´s not to bad because you basically can finish the battles without having any equipment bought just by replying to

the questions with the right answers.

If you liked that game you might also look for the 2nd game (which is called a 3rd game but that´s a joke I assume)

the follow up game does not have voice acting but it´s very long and even better than this one but for a start you definately want to get this one as the game explains lots of lore to you in a good funny way.

I don´t recall how long it took me to finish the first game but I think it was more than 2 hours over all (also with

sometimes failing in the word fights)

Honestly, I'm only playing this game so I can play what seemingly much better second (third) game. And I'm not sure if it's worth it. But I guess I can recommend it with caveats.

+Interesting premise, both in story and gameplay.
-very randomly uneven and amateurish art style.
-heavily dependent on dank jokes

So get it when it's heavily discounted, only if you can stand the two warnings above, and/or you want to play the sequel but can't stand the idea of jumping straight into a sequel.

If there's an "eh" rating, this is one of the very few games I review where I would use that review.

I originally gave this review a recommendation, despite all that, but after I played it a bit more, I decided I can't stand all these, and can't recommend this thing

I always love fresh takes on classic literature, so this is turning into a surefire favorite.
Can't wait for the dating sim ;D

Alright, so first of all, I enjoyed this game! It was a fun little story about a person (pick your gender) who happens to be a half breed of the old gods from Lovecraftian lore that needs to amass an army to destroy Innsmouth. However this game does it in a Visual Novel type presentation that also happens to be an RPG, cause you have a few stats here and there that affect the game. Also there are multiple branching paths you can take depending on your choices throughout the game. You can tell a lot of time and thought was put into the design of the overall product and how it functions. Also the humor reminds me a lot of the sarcastic, trope ignoring, 4th wall breaking, pop culture referencing, snarky humor you'd find in a game like The Bard's Tale, and I enjoyed that quite a bit actually. It's what kept me playing to the end.

That being said, this game isn't going to appeal to everyone. The humor type alone may put off some people, while amusing others. Also you have to get past the art. The way it's presented is with photo backdrops with artistic renditions of the characters that are talking. The art and characters aren't bad though, you can just tell it's done with multiple artists with different art styles (which strangely works for the type of quirky game this is). This can be jarring at first but I was able to quickly look past it.

Overall I was looking for a fun story with Cthulhu/Old Gods type mythos in it, and I got it! Also the price point is cheap enough that even if it slightly piques your interest in it you should go for it!

TL;DR
Fun Visual Novel/RPG Hybrid game with qwirky Bard's Tale type humor which you may love or not that suggests multiple plays due to branching story paths. Also if you can get over the inconsistent art style and photo backgrounds and see the charm in it then you'll enjoy it. There are worse ways to spend $5.

Good sense of humor and a clever concept, I also very much liked the voice acting.

Okay this review gets an up-front disclaimer from me. This game is well made. Very well done. But it is a comedy set in the Cthulhu Mythos. I realize that there is a lot of fatigue going around for those right now. This game had an extended development time, so I am not going to be holding that against it. Games like Cthulhu Saves the World weren't out when the writing on this game was started, so I am not going to sling mud about the concept. I am evaluating the game on its own merits not as an entry in a crowded field.



The good: Great humor, seriously laugh-out-loud at times. The humor ranges from broad to very sophsiticated, from generally funny to pop-culture referential and frequently stretches into the surreal.
The combat "system" involves arguing with enemies and their weaknesses force you to try to figure out what answers are likely to stymie them, either by patterns in their dialogue or knowing their personality. These refer from triva contests ranging from 80s television to shakesperian insults to classic riddles to your knowledge of tabletop gaming. A tremendous amount of content for the price, including a DLC that has a decently long campaign. Creative story that coasts about the Lovecraft Mythos without ever getting too serious. Also manages to do Lovecraft without accidentally importing Lovecraft's endemic racism, which can be hard to excise from his works. The battle system offers plenty of allies with skills that can help out if you just can't figure out what the enemy wants you to say to beat them, which lowers what might otherwise be a high difficulty bar without encyclopedic knowledge.

Fully voice acted, with some great VO work for an indy game, seriously good. Nice variety of VAs too, which avoids the "wait which one is Chigara again?!" syndrome some visual novel VOs suffer from where it's hard to tell people apart.

The bad: I feel almost bad writing a bad section, because they're all forgivable especially in light of the price point here and the fact it's an indy developer. Some combats are difficult to figure out the pattern of answers the enemy is looking for, some tip you off with their dialogue, some do not. Some of the combat takes seriously broad cultural knowledge from 70s sitcoms to Shakespere to tabletop roleplaying games. This is made easier with ally abilities that give you hints or lessen the penalty for wrong answers.

The Ugly: If a bug-free game release eludes AAA devs like Bethesda and Bioware, what chance does an indy have? especially when they're pushing the boundries of what their engine can do? I did have bugs but the developer was very responsive in fixing them. So I'm not taking off points here, I forgave Skyrim, I forgave Fallout: New Vegas and I sure as hell can forgive an indy dev.

Buy this if: If you enjoy fourth wall breaks, if you enjoy parody. If your favorite part of Mystery Science Theater 3,000 was when you got an obscure theater reference they made ("don't talk about our son, Martha!") and feeling really clever about it. If you enjoy visual novels with a light strategy game coating to keep things interesting. If you're not SURE if you like games like this, then pick up a copy and see, it's worth the price and a good representative of the better parody games.

Don't bother if: If you think Cthulhu Mythos has jumped the shark beyond the point parodies are funny. If you were expecting a tentacle hentai, this one is PG-13 at worst.

I bought this VN as soon as it was released. In my opinion, it’s not for everyone since everything’s so silly and the game itself is aware of that. Some people enjoy that, others don’t. Being honest, I liked this game. It was fun and I enjoyed the battle system. The story has a lot of possibilities, and that caught my attention. You just really need to save your playthrough a lot, to avoid problems.

The only thing that I found annoying was the VA. It was supposed to be bad (at least I think that), but it got somewhat over the edge here. It started to bother me after a while, so I turned the sound off. Overall, it was a fun ride!

6/10.

In a word, what an odd game.
There might be a little spoiler ahead.



The structure or system of this game are all mysteries to me:
1.Exp. & Equi.:
It seems it introduces Exp. and Equi. systems, or at least it tries to. But it barely makes any difference as one answer wrong, boooo~you gotta start from ever beginning. So not quite sure about the point why Exp. and Equi. system even exist.
You might change your Equi., but as there is no inventory system, you'd better try to remember where to find every item——once changed, you have to go back to get it again if you wanna change back.


2.Battles:
Basically, if you wanna win a battle fluently, better pray you have a sound knowledge span from how to greet your opponents' mother properly to what Shakespeare said in his famous books. Not even a challenge for a good Googler, I guess.


And there are also many other points make me feel like I just waste too much time on this. Among them, the block of save/load function in conversation and the lack of logic in arranging answers annoyed me most.

I suppose this game is built on renpy and I belive renpy could do much more and better than this. So guess there still has a lot to do before it could really worth your money and time on this game.

I can't even get passed the beginning! I enjoy silly things now and then, that's why I bought this. However I just can't get passed the poor quality of this one. Bummer though, since the concept is so creative.

I'm keeping it in my library for a 'rainy day', but I recommend passing on this one.

I purchased this game and played it all the way through to boot.

AoT is an RPG point and click game that uses a conversation battle system. Aside from the silent protagonist, this game is nearly fully voiced. It's well acted and adds to the games humor. I haven't read any of Lovecraft's works; fans of the author may find some references more droll. That does't mean that someone who is unfamiler with lovecraft won't enjoy the game. It's fun and zany like Animaniacs. The game is more enjoyable when watching someone else unfamilar with the mechanics and overall references play. Watching my teenage nephew try and fail with the games opening battle (a simple child's nursery rhyme) was worth the games price.

I used to look around for Cthulhu-inspired games to tease my wife, whom her son and myself lovingly refer to AS Cthulhu. Now my search is at an end. I can only hope that by watching me play this game, her Cthulove will grow even stronger than the tentacle-grip she has on my heart!

tl;Dr

Cthulhu/10
Would fall in love again!

Interesting game with RPG elements. The game breaks the 4th wall many times and keeps a light mood. Few critisisms but will list them below:
-There are no aspect ratio options even though you can go full screen (still includes black bars)
- You can go to a lot of places even though there's nothing there
- No apparent way to see your current quests.
- It'd be nice to be able to rest for more than 1 day at a time (like a slider to sleep for 10 days to get full health or something)
- Inventory system is unintuitive. If you equip an armor piece, it replaces the one you have (no purchase neccessary) unless you put it in your empt slot first. You cant keep a collection to swap out for later

I'm sure there are some others, but feel free to watch my video on the game! :D

https://youtu.be/U0dYqAsR7Os

Army of Tentacle is a fun, fourth-wall-breaking romp, combining C'thulhu, Shakespear and a Monkey Island 1 inspired combat system.
It also is not a dating sim! That is always a bonus, no?