Dagon: Complete Edition Review (PS5) – All you have to say is “Lovecraft,” and you have caught the attention of thousands. The concepts created and interpreted from the works of H. P. Lovecraft know no end.
In this case, developer Bit Golem sought to celebrate not only Lovecraft’s work, but Lovecraft himself. Dagon tells a few of the stories Lovecraft told through both stories and letters in an interactive novel.
Dagon: Complete Edition Review (PS5) – A Grand But Brief Glance Into The Abyss
A Lot Of Love For Lovecraft
As mentioned before, Dagon is a high-end 3D interactive novel. The game depicts different scenes where you stand anchored in place and pan the camera around to see the events around you. The only gameplay experience is moving from scene to scene and listening to the narrator dictate Lovecraft’s words while you navigate the scenarios he describes.
Apart from moving the joystick around and interacting with prompts, there’s not much “game” to play in Dagon. Other than that, you use L2 to zoom in and then use Cross to interact with anything that displays an icon.
These come as either what looks like a fast forward icon, which progresses the story, or an icon of a six-pointed branch. Each branch you find gives you notes on something relevant to what you see on-screen.
At the same time, this genre of game bodes well for Lovecraft’s stories. You are along for the ride, and Dagon emulates that experience beautifully through vivid and detailed scenes.
It is worth mentioning that the entire experience only lasts about an hour or so. Considering the nature of the game and how little you interact with it, the runtime works well. While it may not be as beautiful as games like Horizon Zero Dawn, the visual quality is so enjoyable and vivid that the bare-bones gameplay never wears out its welcome.
Glimpse Into Lovecraft
As a literature fanatic, I deeply enjoyed the additional informational tidbits included throughout Dagon. During scenes, you can find hidden messages from the developer. These bring in additional information about Lovecraft himself and the life he lived, what inspired him along the way, and where some of his story ideas originated. Learning about the creator makes the material more interesting to me.
With that said, I recommend doing two playthroughs of Dagon. Use the first to just go along for the ride and avoid the hidden tidbits. When experiencing both the story and the hidden notes, the true intention of the story itself loses a lot of its intensity. This approach may take longer, but the separate experiences stick with you more.
With this being the Complete Edition, this release also comes with all of the DLC released alongside the core game. These come from other stories, poems, and even letters that Lovecraft wrote during his lifetime. Through all of these stories, all but one use a realistic style.
The Little Glass Bottle, the story DLC about a sunken treasure uses something of a cell-shaded look. This particular story isn’t a scary or tense one, so the visuals don’t bother the experience too terribly much. However, the visual contrast between that and the rest of the game feels out of place.
Short And Sweet
Dagon Complete Edition is a captivating, engaging, and informative piece of content that truly loves and respects H.P. Lovecraft.
It may not be much of a game, and it might not all be a cohesive experience, but that doesn’t keep Dagon from still generating those emotions that keep bringing fans back to the source material time after time.
To boot, Dagon also celebrates the writer himself, truly adding a great deal of heart to the mythos.
Dagon: Complete Edition is now available on PS5 and PS4.
Review code kindly provided by publisher