Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of The Earth

Story

After the introductory sequence set in the Arkham Asylum psychiatric hospital, the game begins on September 6, 1915, when police detective Jack Walters (voiced by Milton Lawrence) is called to a rundown mansion in Boston, Massachusetts. The mansion is inhabited by a small, bizarre sect called the Fellowship of the Yith, led by one Victor Holt, who has specifically requested that Walters come and talk to him. When he runs to safety from a firefight, he is separated from the police and held captive in the mansion. When the rest of the police finally break in, they find the cultists dead by mass suicide and Walters obviously insane. He is committed to Arkham Asylum, where he remains for several years. Six years later, Walters is released and becomes a private detective. On February 6, 1922, he takes on a missing persons case in Innsmouth, a xenophobic seaside town where Brian Burnham, an employee sent there to set up a branch of the First National Grocery chain, has recently disappeared. When Jack arrives in the remote town, which seems to be depopulated and in a state of collapse, he unsuccessfully asks for Brian. He stays at a hotel where he narrowly escapes an assassination attempt and then flees from a chase by an armed mob. From now on, Jack is forced to sneak through the alleys, buildings and sewers of Innsmouth to avoid the murderous patrols of the corrupt police and the cultists looking for him. He gets weapons to defend himself and meets undercover agent Lucas Mackey, who tells him that the town is under government investigation. Jack eventually finds Burnham and his girlfriend Ruth, but their car crashes as they flee Innsmouth, killing Brian and injuring Jack (whether Ruth was killed or not remains unknown). Jack recovers from the incident and, after a brutal interrogation, is taken in by the FBI, led by J. Edgar Hoover himself. On February 8, Jack helps Hoover and the FBI raid the Marsh gold refinery, where he is attacked by an ancient creature, the Shoggoth, and discovers a Cthulhu shrine. The refinery is then blown up using explosives. After the refinery raid, the U.S. military begins a combined land and sea invasion of Innsmouth on February 9. The only thing that proves problematic in the large-scale assault is the headquarters of the Esoteric Order of Dagon, a religious organization centered on two undersea demigods and Cthulhu that has the entire town in its grip. The building is impregnable to the Coast Guard and Marines, but Jack finds a way through an old smuggler's entrance (guarded by a starspawn of Cthulhu). Inside, Jack frees Agent Mackey, who has been kidnapped for a ritual sacrifice, and disables the building's magical shield. After discovering a secret chamber, he falls through the floor of a tunnel that leads to the sea. Jack is rescued by the USS Urania, a Coast Guard cutter that is part of a group heading to Devil's Reef on February 10 to follow an FBI lead. Along the way, wizards on the reef summon powerful tidal waves to destroy the flotilla, but Jack captures the ship's cannon and kills them. The humanoid fish-men known as Deep Ones launch a mass attack on the Urania, killing most of the crew and disabling the engines. Jack manages to reactivate the engines, but is then attacked by the gigantic Father Dagon himself at the bow. Jack manages to defeat the demigod with the cannon, but not before he causes the Urania to sink. Jack survives the encounter and finds himself on Devil's Reef, where he discovers ancient smuggling tunnels beneath the ocean floor that lead him to the underwater city of Y'ha-nthlei. It turns out that the city is under Devil's Reef and is home to the Deep Ones and members of the Order. Navy submarines attempt to torpedo Y'ha-nthlei, but are stopped by a magical barrier that protects the city. The Temple of Dagon is the source of the barrier, but the entrance is sealed to prevent any interference. Jack finds another way through ancient tunnels, feared by the deep dwellers, in the foundations of the city. Apparently, this passage leading to the temple is an ancient prison for flying polyps, the enemy of the Great Race of Yith. Jack manages to defeat them with the help of a Yithian energy weapon. Jack then enters the Temple of Dagon and kills Mother Hydra, whose song creates the barrier, stunning some of the Deep Ones with her song so that he can take control of them. After the barrier falls, the subs attack the city while Jack escapes through a portal back to the Order's headquarters. In the end, it turns out that a Yithian switched minds with his father during Jack Walters' conception. In the flesh, Jack Walters is human, but he inherited the Yithian's psychic powers, which was the reason for the cultists.