The Sinking City is a game I had been dying to play for a while now and, though it’s not perfect, it was tons of fun. The variety of monsters is a bit lacking (there’s only really four types that you encounter over and over again), but this is one of the few games that does Lovecraft right.
Sexuality: 2 out of 5: It doesn’t really come up, but there is another gay character shoehorned in which was rare in the 20s. Lovecraft was pretty racist and I imagine homophobic as well so he would not be pleased.
Gender: 1 out of 5: It doesn’t really come up. Men are men and women are women. There are some female characters who want more out of their lives, which fits for the era.
Race: 2 out of 5: The only reason I’m rating a two is that the opening of the game talks about not hiding the racism of the era, which I can totally respect. However, the only real racism comes between the Throgmortons, who are descendants of apes, and the Innsmouther “fish men.” The KKK even shows up at one point, killing some fishmen. The main issue with this was there are plenty of black people in town and there was really no racism against them, which is odd if the KKK is ALSO in town. I have no problem with killing the KKK but my issue is they’re essentially racist against a race that doesn’t exist.
Anachronism: 3 out of 5: I’m giving this a point due to the lack of real racism in the era, even though the game warns that it exists in the game. And another point for its attempts to shoe-horn in modern day politics (Corrupt mayor wants to “make Oakmont great again,” also tries to blackmail you into murdering his mother.)
Overall: 8 out of 20: Aside from the above issues and some badly forced modern politics I had a lot of fun investigating the perpetually drenched city of Oakmont.
Playing with Wokeness 