Answering The Call Once Again

Call of the Sea was a 2020 gem of a puzzle game, especially if you dig Lovecraftian horror. Its creepy vibes and surrealist imagery were wrapped around the compelling tale of Norah Everhart, a clever but ill woman searching for her missing husband on a mysterious island. Doing so involved solving enjoyably brain-busting first-person puzzles that added to the game’s enigmatic atmosphere. Years later, it’s time to pick up where Norah left off, from not one, but two perspectives this time.

Call of the Elder Gods is a direct sequel, but one that developer Out of the Blue Games’ creative director Tatiana Delgado says also serves as a standalone story for those who missed Call of the Sea. Set 30 years after the original, Norah is out of the picture; how that happens depends on which of the two endings you saw in Call of the Sea, a question the sequel poses to players at the start of their journey. Delgado tells me this choice matters, as it will shape the narrative in different ways. Some moments will only occur in one game state, for example.