37) Cult of the Lamb (2022)

As the fourth game created by studio Massive Monster, Cult of the Lamb began development almost as if in response to the general perception the studio had garnered. With previous works including The Adventure Pals, Never Give Up, and Unicycle Giraffe, the studio had gained a reputation for its cutesy, kid friendly artstyle. While their earlier games had received generally positive critical reception, they had been, for all intents, commercial failures. Deciding to go in a different direction, they decided to look to horror and the occult, beginning work on a rougelite dungeon crawler with base building elements, the core premise bounced around until the idea of leading a cult solidified.

The game opens with our protagonist, the titular lamb, being sacrificed as an offering to the Four Bishops of the Old Faith. Upon death, we meet The One Who Waits, an imprisoned deity, we are tasked with starting and leading a cult in His name, and find ourselves resurrected. We are assisted, at least to start, by Ratau, the previous prophet of The One Who Waits, who helps us settle in at the ruins of a temple. We are then introduced to the basic gameplay loop, which consists of going out on crusades in randomly generated dungeons, recruiting followers, maintaining our holy site, and eventually confronting the four Bishops of the Old Faith, partially for revenge, and partially to free The One Who Waits.

The game is divided into two primary modes. When at camp, we can collect resources, build structures, and interact with our cult members. At the outset, our members are very, very stupid, thus it is up to us to guide them and meet their needs. As we proceed and grow our flock, we can hold sermons and even set forth our divine edict, giving us options on how the cult will act and respond to various acts. I named my cult Reagonomics, and thus chose to primarily focus on the most important of doctrines, commerce. I was able to "encourage" (extort) tithes and preach the holiness of materialism before moving on to far more trivial matters, such as the existence of an afterlife and the benefits of cannibalism. I also laid down the virtues of ritualistic fasting, polyarmory, and nudism. You know, the normal stuff.

When not interacting with our followers, we go out on crusades to fight against the Bishops of the Old Faith. As we progress through randomly generated dungeons, we learn that there had once been five such Bishops, but one had grown too powerful, and was thus sealed away. As we kill the other Bishops, the chains restraining He Who Waits weaken, eventually allowing us to free our master. It's at this point we're given a few choices which I won't go into detail about, but really, they should be pretty obvious.

The dungeon sections are a mixed bag of incredible fun and, sometimes, frustration. At the start of each run, you're presented with a randomly selected weapon and spell. As you progress, you can unlock better and more powerful versions of each, but this random choice can often make or break your run. Some of the weapons and spells just feel better or more powerful though it does come down to preference. As we start the game by dying and being brought back, there is very minimal at stake should we fail a run, but it can be frustrating if you fail due to equipment. That said, the controls are remarkably tight and fluid, and I can admit that the problem was usually with my skill and not just the RNG.

Cult of the Lamb is an absolutely brilliant experience that succeeds in utilizing its cutesy artstyle to make even some of the more questionable actions you can perform come off as funny and borderline wholesome. There's something darkly humorous about forcing a cute elephant person to eat literal shit all so that your fish headed follower can have a good laugh that, when you stop and think about it, is pretty messed up. It's hard to think of any other game getting away with instructing your followers to sacrifice one of their own, all while the one being sacrificed is absolutely stoked about it. Everything about Cult of the Lamb seems as though it would be at odds with itself, yet it comes together in an incredibly fun and adorable package.