 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(June 2023) |
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | 1998 [1] |
| Founder | Mike Woodroffe Simon Woodroffe |
| Defunct | 2006 |
| Headquarters | Canwell, Sutton Coldfield, West Midlands, UK |
| Website | headfirst.co.uk |
Headfirst Productions was a British video game studio established by father and son Mike and Simon Woodroffe (Adventure Soft) in 1998. The studio was an independent developer of games for both the console and PC market.
After having published Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth , Headfirst had problems with publisher Bethesda Softworks regarding finances. Some time after that, about half of the company left, so the second project's team (Call of Cthulhu: Destiny's End), along with some people from the Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth production team, stayed on board trying to keep working on the project, porting it to the next-gen consoles, while the directors were trying to secure a publishing deal for the game. After several months of struggle the company went into administration.
Most of the staff went on to other West Midlands game companies, namely Codemasters, Eurocom and Sega Racing Studio. In February 2006, Headfirst Productions went into administration in an effort to pay off outstanding debts owed because of production costs associated with the many years of Cthulhu development, and other unsigned projects. Assets were liquidated, employees were laid off, and the company was dissolved less than a month later. [2]
Call of Cthulhu is a horror fiction role-playing game based on H. P. Lovecraft's story of the same name and the associated Cthulhu Mythos. The game, often abbreviated as CoC, is published by Chaosium; it was first released in 1981 and is in its seventh edition, with licensed foreign language editions available as well. Its game system is based on Chaosium's Basic Role-Playing (BRP) with additions for the horror genre. These include special rules for sanity and luck.
Simon the Sorcerer is a 1993 point-and-click adventure game developed and published by Adventure Soft, for Amiga and MS-DOS. The game's story focuses on a boy named Simon who is transported into a parallel universe of magic and monsters, where he embarks on a mission to become a wizard and rescue another from an evil sorcerer. The game's setting was inspired by the novels of the Discworld series, and incorporates parodies on fantasy novels and fairy tales, such as The Lord of the Rings and Jack and the Beanstalk. The lead character's design was inspired by that of the fictional British television character Blackadder, with the character voiced by Chris Barrie in the CD re-release.
Cthulhu is a cosmic entity created by writer H. P. Lovecraft. It was introduced in his short story "The Call of Cthulhu", published by the American pulp magazine Weird Tales in 1928. Considered a Great Old One within the pantheon of Lovecraftian cosmic entities, this creature has since been featured in numerous popular culture references. Lovecraft depicts it as a gigantic entity worshipped by cultists, in the shape of a green octopus, dragon, and a caricature of human form. The Lovecraft-inspired universe, the Cthulhu Mythos, where it exists with its fellow entities, is named after it.
"The Call of Cthulhu" is a short story by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. Written in the summer of 1926, it was first published in the pulp magazine Weird Tales in February 1928.
Rare Limited is a British video game developer and a studio of Xbox Game Studios based in Twycross, Leicestershire. Rare's games span the platform, first-person shooter, action-adventure, fighting, and racing genres. Its most popular games include the Battletoads, Donkey Kong, and Banjo-Kazooie series, as well as games like GoldenEye 007 (1997), Perfect Dark (2000), Conker's Bad Fur Day (2001), Viva Piñata (2006), and Sea of Thieves (2018).
Adventure Soft is a British video game developer and publisher established by Mike Woodroffe, initially as an importer and reseller of Adventure International games as Adventure International (UK), and later using the names Horror Soft, Adventuresoft UK and Headfirst Productions. The firm operates out of Sutton Coldfield, and is best known for the Simon the Sorcerer series of games.
At the Mountains of Madness is a science fiction-horror novella by American author H. P. Lovecraft, written in February/March 1931. Rejected that year by Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright on the grounds of its length, it was originally serialized in the February, March, and April 1936 issues of Astounding Stories. It has been reproduced in numerous collections.
Prisoner of Ice is an adventure game developed and released by Infogrames Multimedia for IBM PC compatibles and Macintosh in 1995 in America and Europe. It is based on H. P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos, particularly At the Mountains of Madness, and is a follow-up to Infogrames' earlier Shadow of the Comet. In 1997, the game was ported to the Sega Saturn and PlayStation exclusively in Japan.
The Shadow over Innsmouth is a horror novella by American author H. P. Lovecraft, written in November–December 1931. It forms part of the Cthulhu Mythos, using its motif of a malign undersea civilization, and references several shared elements of the Mythos, including place-names, mythical creatures, and invocations. The Shadow over Innsmouth is the only Lovecraft story that was published in book form during his lifetime.
Lovecraftian horror, also called "cosmic horror", is a subgenre of horror fiction and weird fiction that emphasizes the horror of the unknowable and incomprehensible more than gore or other elements of shock. It is named after American author H. P. Lovecraft (1890–1937). His work emphasizes themes of cosmic dread, forbidden and dangerous knowledge, madness, non-human influences on humanity, religion and superstition, fate and inevitability, and the risks associated with scientific discoveries, which are now associated with Lovecraftian horror as a subgenre. The cosmic themes of Lovecraftian horror can also be found in other media, notably horror films, horror games, and comics.
Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth is a survival horror video game developed by British studio Headfirst Productions for the Xbox in 2005 and for Microsoft Windows in 2006. It combines an action-adventure game with a relatively realistic first-person shooter and elements of a stealth game.
James Daniel Lowder is an American author, anthologist, and editor, working regularly within the fantasy, dark fantasy, and horror genres, and on tabletop role-playing games and critical works exploring popular culture.
The Whisperer in Darkness is a 26,000-word novella by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. Written February–September 1930, it was first published in Weird Tales, August 1931. Similar to The Colour Out of Space (1927), it is a blend of horror and science fiction. Although it makes numerous references to the Cthulhu Mythos, the story is not a central part of the mythos, but reflects a shift in Lovecraft's writing at this time towards science fiction. The story also introduces the Mi-Go, an extraterrestrial race of fungoid creatures.
Denis Dyack is a Canadian video game developer and the CEO of Apocalypse Studios. He is also the former president of Silicon Knights, and is a video game designer, writer, director and producer. Dyack directed Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain and Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, and is directing Deadhaus Sonata. Dyack was inducted into the Canadian Gaming Hall of Fame by the Canadian Game Development Talent Awards in November 2011.
The H. P. Lovecraft Historical Society or HPLHS is the organization that hosts Cthulhu Lives!, a group of live-action roleplayers for the Cthulhu Live version of Call of Cthulhu. Founded in Colorado in 1984, it is now based in Glendale, California. Their motto is Ludo Fore Putavimus.
Simon the Sorcerer 3D, is an adventure game released by Adventure Soft on 13 April 2002 for Microsoft Windows. It is the third game in the Simon the Sorcerer series.
The following is a timeline of tabletop role-playing games. For computer role-playing games see here.
This article provides a list of cultural references to the work of author H. P. Lovecraft. These references are collectively known as the Cthulhu Mythos. For works that are stylistically Lovecraftian, including comics and film adaptations influenced by Lovecraft, see Lovecraftian horror.
Call of Cthulhu is a role-playing survival horror video game developed by Cyanide and published by Focus Home Interactive for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch. The game features a semi-open world environment and incorporates themes of Lovecraftian and psychological horror into a story which includes elements of investigation and stealth. It is inspired by H. P. Lovecraft's short story "The Call of Cthulhu", while also being an adaptation of the 1981 role-playing game of the same title.
Escape from Innsmouth is a 1992 role-playing game supplement published by Chaosium for Call of Cthulhu. Large parts of this scenario would also be adapted for Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth by Headfirst Productions in 2005.
