Now this is the stuff: Grimrock Isle (1992), an ambitious and unusual scenario — a solo and group scenario in one, contained in a folio folder full of booklets.
It’s a solo first, starting with the Dove’s Bay booklet that details the town and the mansion on the titular island. The player is hired to solve the mystery of Grimrock Isle and rid the manor of ghosts; they have a timetable and a budget they need to track. The job is a ruse, though — the player is really meant to be the latest victim in a cycle of horrible sorcery. As the investigation unfolds, leads may draw the player out of town, to other booklets: Thompson’s Bridge, McKiernan’s Lighthouse, Palmer’s Orchard, Hutchin’s Cave and Bleakmoore Cemetery. Each has their own secrets, some connected to the main story, some not.
Grimrock Isle suffers from the kitchen sink of Cthulhu, meaning many disparate Mythos factions are all operating secretly, but in close proximity, at Dove’s Bay. Oh, there are ghouls in the cemetery and deep ones in the sea cave and Mi-Go in the orchard? You don’t say. It strains belief, but it’s also not uncommon in Call of Cthulhu solos. And this one often seems like its tongue is firmly in its cheek.
Anyway, once the solo is done, the player can turn into the keeper and run it as a group game. The Book of Terrible Knowledge presents the material in a more conventional scenario framework, using the solo booklets as guidance. There are three additional scenarios that reveal other residents of the island have dark secrets — the lady who runs the boarding house has a lesser god in the basement, the local antique dealer is in cahoots with the Mi-Go and there’s a headless horseman ghost to contend with. It’s like a stack of sinks, really, but it also reminds me of Sutter Caine’s hometown Hobb’s End in In the Mouth of Madness.
The cover is by J. Wallace Jones and I like it. R. D. Sanford does the interiors and they are on average, well, average. However, he also did the covers of all the booklets, which, holy crap, they are so good. Just, so detailed, so atmospheric, they drive so much of my interest in the module, and sustain it when I start to drift. How did this guy just…disappear from the scene?
