The Hound of Shadow is a dark interactive fiction adventure inspired by the atmosphere of supernatural detective stories and cosmic horror. The player investigates mysterious events, explores locations, gathers clues, and gradually becomes entangled in a much larger and stranger situation. Rather than relying on fast action, the game builds tension through writing, investigation, and the unsettling feeling that something is not quite right. The text-heavy presentation leaves much to the imagination, which works particularly well for horror: what you cannot see can be considerably more disturbing than a low-resolution monster. Progress requires careful reading and experimentation, and some puzzles may test the patience of players accustomed to modern adventures. Still, the atmosphere is the real attraction. It feels like stepping into a vintage horror novel where you are allowed to make the bad decisions yourself, which is both exciting and slightly irresponsible.
Zero Magazine Issue 03 (1990) - "The Hound Of Shadow combines RPG with gothic horror in a game based on the macabre stories of HP Lovecraft. It's got a fashionable click-on-the-icons front-end, but the, erm, backend is old-fashioned text adventure. The way you build up your character, creates an involvement like no previous RPG game has done. Shame the game itself's just a plain old adventure that could have been written on an 8-bit machine. The early stages are pure page-turning. If it had better parsing and less of a feel that you're reading a book, then you'd be talking..."
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