What a wild videogame “The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath” would make. The plot summary just says “game” all the way…
Dream three times.
Find and negotiate the seventy steps.
Get past the priests.
Get through the Enchanted Wood.
Encounter the Zoogs.
Travel to Ulthar
Talk to Atal
Travel to Dylath-Leen.
Negotiate the Black Galleys.
Battle the Moon Beasts
etc
So far as I can discover, there’s not even a table-top RPG text adventure for the story, or even an interactive fiction. Which is kind of amazing.
I always felt a direct adaptation wouldn’t be the way to go. It would be far better to do a Western RPG set in the Dreamlands. Not only would it allow you to actually EXPLORE the Dreamlands and such, but the whole “design your character” mechanic would fit in nicely at the start when Your character enters the Cavern of Flame. It’s a shame nobody’s tried, because I hear Jason Thompson is really interested in the idea….
It would be interesting to know if any of the key early tabletop RPG guys have ever spoken about being influenced by Lovecraft. Ideally, in a big videogame of Dream-Quest, you would have both the ability to explore the Dreamlands (and add fan mods, like Skyrim etc) by free-roaming and the ability to play through a straight recreation of Lovecraft’s story. Yes, I saw Jason Thompson’s semi-animated movie, and enjoyed it. But for a real videogame (not just a point n’ click toon) I’d want a Skyrim or Nehrim style realistic land with superb lighting, wind, sounds etc – albeit with perhaps some stylised 1930s filter over it, so it looked somewhat like a moving 1930s pulp illustration.
Actually, Thompson didn’t make the film. It was a fan-made adaptation of His wonderful Graphic Novel adaptation of Dream-Quest which He provided numerous high-quality versions of the illustrations for. Anyway, the reason I feel Thompson should be involved in such a venture is because His map of the Dreamlands is, by far, the best one I’ve seen. Specifically the Second Version that includes the entire thing, even the South Pole. Plus, His creature designs are fantastic. The quasi-arachnid stylization given to the Gugs is almost perfect. I say almost only because I think the Gugs would looks cooler and creepier if Their heads split open completely, rather than Them just having the cliche type of ostium that resemble part of the female anatomy. As per the visuals, it really wouldn’t matter if it’s ultra-realistic like Skyrim (or the new Zelda) as long as it looks good. Even though it’s a touch old now, Morrowind still has a very nice look to it. Oh, and one of the reasons I think making it more of an RPG would be better (aside from an added layer of replayability) would be because one of the options in the character creation would be for Your character to have a strain of the non-human, such as a touch of Ghoulism or some Deep One ancestry, which affects Their stats and abilities. Of course, that’s just some ideas that’ve been rattling around in the back of My head for quite a while….