The Horror at Highrook is an occult card crafting narrative RPG. Explore a haunted mansion with your team of investigators, summon dark entities, craft powerful protections, uncover the fate of the missing family, and choose your own path through the darkness.
Developed by: Nullpointer Games
Played on: Steam
Length: 10 hours
A review key was provided by LudoNarraCon 2025.
I’m not this game’s usual customer, but I have played games like it. I’ve experienced my fair share of management sims and strategy games, and a sprinkling of deck builders thrown in for spice, but I haven’t played a game that is quite as uniquely compelling and mechanically intuitive as The Horror at Highrook.
Our quest begins like all good stories, with the mysterious disappearance of a noble family on a dark and stormy night. You commandeer a team of four occult investigators who take up temporary residence at the Highrook estate, each offering unique skills to aid in the investigation, and their own motives to explore behind closed doors. Your goal is to keep them safe from hunger, injury, madness and disease, while facing the ancient horrors lurking beneath the floorboards.
Playing out like a true blue tabletop role-playing game, The Horror of Highrook takes place entirely on one “board”. Its gameplay follows a non-linear crafting system that sees you pairing locations, characters, and task cards together to find clues and craft items. But its real-time system is what elevates this game from a digital TTRPG to an experience crafted specifically for its medium. With certain cards being timed, and each card expiring at different speeds, the pause button is going to become your best friend as you master this unique approach to crafting and time management.
Despite the intimidating text wall of instructions at the beginning, The Horror at Highrook is best explained by playing it. The game may be about ancient demons and nightmarish consequences, but it doesn’t punish you for taking a wrong turn. There are no deadlines to chase, nor death screens to avoid, and while it doesn’t hold your hand, it definitely nudges you along the way if you ever get stuck.
For players who delight in experimenting and min-maxing, this game is the perfect playground to test the limits of its mechanics; while its game design is intuitive enough for players who are taking a step outside of their comfort zones. There are also Easy, Normal, and Hard modes that scale the impact on hunger, injury, madness and disease. Personally I found Normal Mode erred on the easy side for my tastes, so more seasoned players might want to start immediately on Hard mode.
Interwoven into the gameplay is a gothic narrative heavily inspired by the likes of HP Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe and Bram Stoker. The chapters move pretty quickly and the story itself doesn’t take any big swings, especially for veteran TTRPG players, but it will go down smooth with most fans of these themes. It’s worth disclaiming that the game doesn’t contain any voice acting, but that feels like a minor facet to the overall experience. (People should read more anyway.)
The writing is particularly evocative, bringing a haunting world to life even as the playing field in front of you barely changes. The inclusion of individual character quests is an inspired choice, adding both gameplay challenge and narrative depth to the overall experience. Although these side quests are completely optional, completing them does lend to a fuller ending where we get to follow everyone’s fate after the events at Highrook.
With all that said and done, The Horror at Highrook isn’t a replayable experience which makes its RM49 price tag a little on the steep side. Still, if you’re a fan of eldritch entities, cosmic mysteries, and a good brain teaser, this is a game that’s worth picking up when you have the spare funds and time.
Verdict: Made For Fans of Cosmic Horror
The Horror at Highrook is eight chapters of cosmic challenges, four distinct character side quests, and the next best ten hours of your week. Anchored by an intuitive, nonlinear crafting system, the game combines elements of real-time strategy and management sims into one highly addictive package. Although the story itself doesn’t take any big swings, the character writing and world building is particularly evocative, bringing the gothic setting of Highrook to life.
Wishlist The Horror at Highrook on Steam, and top up your Steam Wallet on Codashop to earn bonus rewards.
