Well, this is a hard position I’m in right now. As of writing this article, the Epic Games store has a bug where it might not launch a game installed. It is a crapshoot, as some people have not had this issue. In the interim, I’ve found that the easiest way to fix this while Epic work on their launcher is to reboot it once or twice until it works. Now that I’ve proven I would not be a good fit for the I.T Crowd (the UK one, not the American mess), I think it is time to do as the KKK member said to the police officer and, “get to the racism.”

That’s the strangest thing about the horror of recent years: it is either jump-scare nonsense or “Lovecraftian horror.” Which is particularly funny when you are to explore the ruins of something, go outside, or see a shadowy figure in the distance. The lazy git would never leave the house, well until late at night; not to mention both his parents were sectioned under mental health, and unsurprisingly, he was a massive racist. All the shadowy figures might as well read, “He hated black people you know!” Or at the very least, that’s what “a chilling Lovecraftian game,” should be followed with.

Conarium is “a chilling Lovecraftian game,” and luckily is the only game I had to play this week for this Epic Games store article. What is it like? This is the question I always try to answer before sending you off for another week as I look down the barrel of the following week’s article. The thing is, I don’t know how to sell you on Conarium because it is just a bit crap. It doesn’t feel as if someone sat creating something special to be shared, it feels more like every other game with shadowy figures in the distance. Often pulling control away from the player every few minutes to show someone in the distance.

The easy argument against this would be that if you want to pull control then make a movie. If you want to make a game, then possibly design the map to force me to look in that direction. The rest of the time you are listening to the dozy git you play as, Frank Gillman, while he narrates everything you find. To that effect, he has none, as Jonathan Cooke delivers each line with the vigor of a dead sloth. Though I don’t fully blame him as the writing is walking the line of endlessly verbose (something I’m partial to myself, I’ll admit) and vague for obvious reasons.

As I’m not a fan of this type of “horror,” it was always going to be a hard sell when it came down to it. If you enjoy distant figures walking down a hallway, then you may enjoy Conarium. Conarium is free until September the 19th at 10:59 AM eastern daylight time, or EDT for short. From then on well it is just a bit of a mystery, there are several pictures of Batman looking sad about something. I like to think it is about that dead parents business.

Since there are no Batman games currently available on the storefront, this may be the first instance of the famed caped crusader on the store. What is interesting about the image used as a placeholder is the link to DC’s 80th-anniversary celebration image, but parts of the image are altered. The original (seen here) features Adam West’s incarnation, the comic book bat, the video game bat, the Lego Batman, and a few others depending on the usage. Well, this usage by Epic features three lego bats and what appears to be three Arkham bats as well.

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