The Horror at Highrook is thematically excellent. The music, art, mechanics and story are all finely tuned to the Lovecraftian horror concepts of mystery, investigation, unknowable horrors and madness. It all feels right and helps immensely with immersing you in its tale. However, despite this fantastic cohesiveness, The Horror at Highrook reveals all its tricks in a single playthrough, and while it can add up in hours, its setup feels like it means to entice you back for another journey through its board game-like adventure, but it is just not able to mix things up to support that.
This is, however, pure conjecture about the replayable drive behind The Horror at Highrook. It is entirely possible it was only ever designed for a single run, in which case it does a great job. It is the board game design elements that make it feel like it should be infinitely replayable. The Horror at Highrook presents you with a set of characters all possessing their own motivations and backstories that led them to this spooky mansion, which is itself a board of rooms, some revealed immediately, while others are shrouded in shadow to be discovered later on. It looks like a board game and it plays like a board game, and this works well to control pacing and give a chance to analyse and consider options, as well as read and immerse players in the lore provided. It gives the illusion of choice but it is in fact a linear experience in disguise.
This actually works splendidly to further enhance the theme. This is your character’s fate and there’s no stopping it; it can only be delayed through choices. You may occasionally delay things on purpose to stock up on certain items, but most of the delay comes from trying to figure out what it is you’re supposed to be doing.
The tutorial gives enough information to get started, and written hints and tutorial notes can be viewed at any time to reinforce knowledge, but some aspects are simply not explained. The Horror at Highrook is a mystery game, though, so some of this feels intentional and part of the fun is figuring it out. However, as characters get tired and injured, and their sanity begins to fade, it can feel like a real struggle to continue. That is until you discover the guest room can be used to relieve fatigue, and the dining room to relieve hunger. It makes sense when you think about it, and perhaps these are omitted from the tutorial because they should be obvious, but a little more handholding would be appreciated.
Once you get to grips with what you’re supposed to be doing, it all flows very nicely. Each room has a specific use, whether that’s to study documents, tinker with mechanisms, prepare food and drink, analyse and concoct chemicals, etc. It is up to players to use the best characters for a job in the right rooms to complete tasks and unlock more of the mansion and more of the mystery. It is a clever loop.
You will analyse what skills characters have so as to best ultilise them in these rooms, then from some rooms you’ll gather resources, others will refine them, and finally others will consume them in some way to reach a result. In its most basic form this could be raw ingredients found in one room by a character completing a repeatable task, those ingredients being prepared in the kitchen by someone with cooking skills completing a task to produce a meal, then that meal being consumed in the dining room by all characters placed in there with one completing a task.
Each character can be used to complete tasks in any room they have the right corresponding skills to ultilse in that room; for example, the study requires a character with research skills. You will often find that you’ll need to complete tasks in one room to discover a resource that needs to be used in another with a different skill, and so on until you discover key items to further the plot and/or unlock more of the mansion.
Meanwhile, you need additional items to boost characters’ skills to allow them to solve the harder mysteries, forcing the farming of resources from certain rooms and refining them elsewhere to build a stock to provide aid. This also includes farming health potions and food to keep characters healthy, as the act of completing tasks wears them down and injures them over time. It is an enjoyable management of resources and characters that treats you with story beats and additional lore often enough to keep you engaged.
Eventually key items will be unlocked that reveal significant elements of the plot, propelling you forwards and adding complexity to the board. A friendly cat is discovered that can boost characters’ skills but also takes up a space in a room when they arrive in one, and sometimes even occupies the resource space preventing you from using that room for a short while. Later, unspeakable horrors will manifest and hurt the sanity of all those nearby unless you can avoid or banish them. It is all split into chapters, which helps to pace the experience and gives a chance to understand each mechanic gradually as they are introduced.
It is also forgiving enough to allow you to work characters hard to the point of near collapse if you forget to feed them or let them rest, although their chances of succeeding in a task are greatly diminished whilst they are suffering. It wants you to discover the mysteries of the mansion and those of each character; it’s not looking to put you in a fail-state. This doesn’t mean it’s easy or straightforward, though. Players will need to farm for certain items to have a chance at discovering the next important piece of the overall puzzle, soft locking you in place potentially whilst waiting for the RNG to grant the skill boost needed to complete a task, but the story is intriguing and well written enough to drive you forwards.
The Horror at Highrook delivers on the atmospheric and mysterious horror and intrigue of its inspirations: HP Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe and Bram Stoker. The hand-drawn visuals, haunting music, compelling characters and story all work together to keep engagement high as you uncover the secrets of the mansion and battle the horrors and revelations you discover. Its clever board game-esque design gives plenty to do but at a manageable pace, and whilst there’s a few moments of RNG reliance or small leaps in logic, it is still overall an accessible and rewarding experience in this gothic horror genre. 
