A point ‘n’ click adventure and sequel to Call Of The Sea is one of the month’s best indie games, if you have the patience for its old school puzzles.
Call Of The Elder Gods occupies a totally distinct niche in the gaming world – no mean feat, considering how many of them are published every year. But then again, how many other Lovecraftian narrative puzzle adventures are out there? Only one, given that this title is a direct sequel to 2020’s excellent Call Of The Sea.
In that, we were first introduced to Norah (a wonderfully wry Cissy Jones), a woman suffering from a mysterious disease and tracking down her missing husband, Harry, on a remote Polynesian island in the 1930s.
In Call Of The Elder Gods, we’re reunited with her once more. Although she’s technically dead (that or transformed into a fish person, depending on the first game’s two endings), she becomes the narrator, watching over the two protagonists as they attempt to unravel another mystery in one of many interesting meta touches.
Our new hero is Evangeline Drayton, a student at Miskatonic University in the 1950s. She’s searching for answers about why she inexplicably lost her memory for three months and that search leads her to a much older Harry Everhart, a grouchy professor who lives alone in his massive, draughty Gothic mansion.
Naturally, Harry is hiding a compelling backstory of his own (which will be familiar to players of the first game) and as the two dive deep into the world of the Elder Gods, they’ll unearth more secrets – about the Yith race, the history of the Earth, and even Evangeline herself.
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Similarly to its predecessor, Call Of The Elder Gods draws directly from the work of H. P. Lovecraft, the 1920s sci-fi author whose work gave us the tentacled monster Cthulhu, as well as the book The Shadow Out of Time, which forms the basis of the plot for this.
The scope is broader here than Call Of The Sea, and the storytelling more ambitious – although it steers clear of true Lovecraftian horror, instead embracing the more dreamlike elements of Lovecraft’s work: alien races, forgotten worlds, and flying saucers.
Rather than Norah and Harry, the burgeoning relationship between Harry and Evangeline forms the meat of the action here, with players able to switch between characters at points in the game to solve its puzzles, as well as dive into their shared history as the game goes on.
And what puzzles. Be warned: this is not a title for the faint of heart, or short of attention span. The levels are lovingly crafted, and each one forms a complex escape room with multiple layers of clues to find and mysteries to solve.
It demands your complete attention – whether that’s figuring out how to open Harry’s greenhouse, donning a diving suit to wander around some gorgeous underwater caves, or stumbling across an old Nazi base in the middle of the Norwegian tundra (‘I’m not sure which I hate more, kooks or Nazis,’ Harry complains at one point). Each level feels distinct, and each feels gorgeously designed, with its 1930s style graphics, haunting score and hundreds of small objects to pick up and comment on.
Fortunately, there’s no sense of urgency (as if to illustrate this, all the characters move at a snail’s pace throughout the game). None of the puzzles are timed and there’s no countdown clock.
Call Of The Elder Gods gives you as much space as you need to figure out the answers on your own, which is good, because while trekking around these levels looking for clues can be surprisingly meditative, they’re also challenging. Dust off that GCSE Maths knowledge; it will be needed. On the flipside, every breakthrough and puzzle solved feels genuinely rewarding.
Fortunately, developers Out of the Blue Games know this. There are two different difficulty option, one of which involves a handy notebook that automatically logs clues as the player finds them and provides hints about where to look next.
The other features no notebook or clues, which is a fiendishly difficult playing experience. Thank goodness, then, for the ‘hints’ section, which provides some much-needed guidance for those who get stuck.
As events build to their conclusion, the narrative stumbles somewhat, ladling in Nazis, secret cults, and forgotten alien races until the whole structure begins to creak, but that doesn’t really matter. The game’s key strength are its puzzles, and on this, it delivers solidly. For old school graphic adventure fans, it’s a mystical treat. For everybody else… well, there’s always the hints section.
Call Of The Elder Gods review summary
In Short: A fiercely imaginative puzzle solver that builds on all the best elements of Call Of The Sea to deliver a genuinely challenging, Lovecraftian-flavoured adventure.
Pros: The puzzles strike the sweet spot between being fun and rewarding to solve; the graphics evoke a gorgeous, 1930s style sense of time and place. The relationship between Harry and Evangeline (as well as Norah) is surprisingly affecting.
Cons: The characters sometimes move achingly slowly, which at times makes the adventure drag. The plot stumbles towards the end under the weight of its own ambition.
Score: 7/10
Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC
Price: £19.99
Publisher: Kwalee
Developer: Out of the Blue Games
Release Date: 12th May 2026
Age Rating: 12
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