It was just recently that I decided to revisit Lovecraft’s short stories. After reading through a few of them, I found myself picking up my copy of Call of Cthulhu and reading through it, glancing at the stats of characters in the stories I had just read, the details on the books I had just read about, and I was left feeling cold. Disillusioned by the product. I set it aside, deciding that roleplaying games simply aren’t the way to convey the feel of Lovecraft’s writing. I was right. And I was wrong. Kind of…
Enter: De Profundis
De Profundis is a product produced as Hogshead’s blandly named New Style line, a line seeking to revolutionize gaming. An ambitious goal, and games like Munchausen, Puppetland, Violence, and Pantheon have all been steps in a more unconventional direction. De Profundis goes further than the previous ones.
De Profundis seeks to emulate the feel and atmosphere of the Lovecraft novels, and I would argue that it goes further towards emulating the feel of literature than any game ever before it. A grand claim on my part no doubt. Reading it makes Call of Cthulhu look downright pedestrian, as well as some of my other favorite games like Kult as well. And it goes further using much less…
De Profundis: Letters from the Abyss.
De Profundis has a manipulated photograph on the cover, of a figure looking over his shoulder in a mirror, a grinning face smiling above him, with reflections upon reflections. The interior is much less appealing, having a few Victorian era prints that don’t seem to enhance the product much.
It is a thin book, 36 pages, and at that far too long!
The style of the writing… well… in its instruction it too itself seeks to emulate Lovecraft. The concept at the heart of De Profundis is correspondence. Consequently the rules are written themselves as a series of letters to the reader. While this does get you into the feel for how the game should work, the writing is far more obtuse and the content forced than need be. It is in effect, smoke and mirrors, since the game can be summed up in one sentence: “Enter into a correspondence with friends and thus duplicate the feel of Lovecraft’s stories”.
That’s it. Yet the writing goes on and on… some may view it as pretentious, others atmospheric; I doubt the impatient will ever drudge through it. I found the reading of it to be exceedlingly slow and lacking in clarity.
The Concept
At the heart of many Lovecraft stories is the confession, the story, the correspondence, as embodied by “Call of Cthulhu” and “The Whisperer in Darkness”. This book proposes that the readers embark on a similar venture. Adopt a persona (1920s or contemporary) and begin writing to friends and others interested in this. Write in character. Slowly, amongst yourselves unveil a horror that haunts humanity. Intersperse the correspondence with normal correspondence, and bring others into your web – begin corresponding with other personas – reporters, archaeologists, police officials and others. Keep duplicates of all the letters. Keep a “Se7en” type journal possibly as well… Create a web of international correspondence, where you may never be certain how and where your little story can begin and end.
The concept is novel and refreshing, reminding me of stories older than Lovecraft’s, such as Poe’s “Message Found in a Bottle” or something of that sort. The idea is intriguing, the possibilities amazing, and yes, it does emulate near perfectly the narrative of some of H. P. Lovecraft’s stories.
The Execution
As cited earlier, the booklet itself unfolds as a series of letters written to the reader. The book is broken up into an introduction of sorts. Book One looks at the correspondence aspect of the game, setting up the principles and guidelines for correspondence, suggestions on how to write your letters, to even how they should be read, this is the most effective of the chapters.
Book Two introduces us to “Phatasmagoria” concept, in my opinion a muddled and unclear book, essentially looking at the world around you as different, alien, foreign, reinterpreting the world to be much darker and then recording it in a journal of some sort. Its not about a game, its about adopting a perspective on the world.
Book Three re-invents the wheel, coining a neologism so common in gaming “Solo Pyschodrama”, or making a game yourself. The gist is that you play the game yourself, maddened little scribblings in a room. Write up tables, documents, draw maps, play alone. Apparently “Solo Psychodrama” means “play with yourself”.
Appendix A provides an Application Form to be sent to Hogshead, the games publisher, making one a member of the Society. Those sending a IRC will get a list of members and a password to the Society’s page on the net, which is nice to know the company will be supporting the product. There are a few suggestions about playing some of Lovecraft’s characters, a concept that I disapprove of.
Appendix B introduces us again to “Psychodrama”, a new term for an old term: Story telling. Some four pages, it provides a bit of advice, but nothing that one couldn’t’ figure out for themselves.
Conclusion
This product is a puzzle. At its heart is a simple and interesting concept. Much of the book feels like filler though, yet many things left untouched. With computers, scanners, and fonts, it seems like the book could have gone greater depth into how to make and present a correspondence persona, variations within correspondences, tricks and gimmicks to pull off. Examples of correspondence would have been nice as well, as would more advice, while some of the advice within the book seems artificial (put little shapes on a letter to distinguish correspondence eras). The writing is tedious to get through. This book does have its shortcomings: simply that the idea is padded out with unnecessary material.
On the other hand, the idea itself is solid, and the company appears as if it is going to work as a coordinator for the Society. It is not a revolution in itself, but appears to be to be a revolutionary step for role-playing games. Having said that, I would suggest for any looking at exploring the boundaries of role playing games to purchase this product, despite its shortcomings, it is well worth the money. An original concept like this deserves your attention.
For those outraged fans of Cthulhu, this game simply enhances your experience of the game and gives a richer feel of the world – complementing your Call of Cthulhu experience. Nor should this game be limited to just these fans: Conspiracy X, Kult, Unknown Armies and other games would easily benefit from fans organizing themselves along these lines, its not a substitute rpgs, it’s a complement to them.
Lastly, yes, I do consider this a role playing game. Not a story telling game: a role-playing game, and I suspect that this game may generate another debate on the nature of role playing games and what exactly defines them as such.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)