Lovecraft & Poe: Board Game

What Sort of Investigator Braves the Impossible?

Defeat darkness before you go insane - a Gothic horror strategy game steeped in the literary worlds of Lovecraft and Poe. Every game brings a new combination of evil forces, character powers, and shifting streets - so each new setup demands a different strategy. You must defeat the Evil together before you go insane.

Boston. Present day. 
Evil has taken hold of the city. It spreads fear and drives people to the brink of insanity.

You feel how it manifests, catch fleeting glimpses of shadowy devotees. One can only speculate about its mysterious origin.

In Lovecraft & Poe, you and your partner are descendants of two architects of cosmic horror: Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft. Two incredibly different men, but both consumed with the world of darkness.

As their descendants, you and your partner can feel in your bones the ever-present call to battle the same darkness that surely haunted your ancestors.
To succeed, you must eliminate all three aspects of the EVIL: its ORIGIN, its MANIFESTATION, and its DEVOTEE.

If you’re a fan of creeping dread, shifting pathways, occult artifacts, and unraveling mysteries, then this is your world.

Choose your Investigator

When the game begins, each player will choose a character card, explaining:

• A unique ability that overrules standard rules
• A personal weakness that shapes your strategy
• A Fear Tolerance 
• A Sanity Meter

If either descendant becomes INSANE, you both lose.

Meet the
Descendants

Here are some of the psychological profiles for Poe and Lovecraft:

Each different version of Lovecraft and Poe will alter your experience, changing how you are able to fight Evil.

POE PROFILES 

-Heartbroken Poe: Can dispel fear from afar once per turn
-Charismatic Poe: Excels at acquiring Gossip Knowledge
-Obsessive Poe: A master of Book Knowledge but vulnerable to spiraling sanity

LOVECRAFT PROFILES

-Paranoid Lovecraft: Moves around the board differently and cannot learn Gossip Knowledge
-Sickly Lovecraft: Fragile but potent in Science Knowledge
-Doomed Lovecraft: Gains power at great personal cost

Which Poe or Lovecraft descendant would you play first?

Gameplay 

Each time the two of you come together, you battle different forms of evil while trying to dispel your fear and keep your sanity. Each evil has different powers based on its origin, manifestation and devotee.

With 4 Manifestations, 4 Devotees, and 4 Origins, you can create 64 unique horrors, each changing the board, the fear, movement logic, and how you’ll ultimately conquer evil.

This creates wildly different play experiences, strategic identities, and varying roles from game to game.

1. Manifestations

Each Manifestation determines how FEAR spreads. Examples:

• Plague – Only removable by Science Knowledge
• Madness – Fear erupts across numbered rooms via dice rolls
• Paranoia – Fear placed through paired grid indications

Every Manifestation completely changes the puzzle of movement, cleansing, and survival.

2. Devotees

Your primary antagonist—each Devotee is effectively an enemy class with its own rules of pursuit, insanity effects, and confrontation requirements.Examples:

• Lover – Moves through walls directly toward you.
• Nemesis – Sabotages rooms — if all rooms are sabotaged, you lose.
• Mad Scientist — Moves unpredictably and changes your fear economy. 

Are you the stealthy investigator who hides and manipulates alleys? The fearless confrontational type? The long-range fear-removal strategist?

3. Origins

Examples:

• Watery Depths – Adds water tiles that block movement unless you Bridge them.
• Occult – A roaming Shadow marker alters movement costs and drives insanity.
• Cosmic — Continuously replaces the tiles you step on with new ones — the board becomes unstable.

Origins alter the geography of Boston itself.

Play Your Way

You can tailor each experience by mixing:

• Character abilities
• Actions 
• Evil combinations
• The modular tile-shifting environment
• Insight Cards

Will you rebuild Boston’s twisting alleys? Master the occult geometry of the Shadow? Stand your ground against the Nemesis in a sabotaged room? Or hoard just enough Science Knowledge to cure a city drowning in Plague-born Fear?

The Board

This game contains a full setting experience built directly into its mechanics: shifting alleys, dangerous rooms, occult geography, and emergent narrative hooks arising from your struggle to survive the night.

A City That Changes Every Time You Play

Unlike static fantasy continents, Boston in Lovecraft & Poe is a living labyrinth—a puzzle-box that reorganizes itself to reflect the nature of the evil you’re facing.
Your setting guide isn’t hundreds of pages of lore.

It’s the board itself, which transforms through:

• Alley Tiles
• Room Tiles 
• Insight Cards for moment-to-moment tactics
• Origin effects (Cosmic, Occult, Watery Depths)
• Manifestation patterns (Plague, Madness, Paranoia)
• Devotee movement logic (Lover, Cultist, Nemesis, Mad Scientist)

Movement becomes a psychological ordeal. Rooms partially swallowed by shadow force you to calculate every step. 

Each game features five Room Tiles, selected and arranged uniquely:

• The Library – source of Book Knowledge
• The Newspaper Office – critical paths and doorways
• The Bookstore – rotates on setup to avoid sealing the board
• Science Labs – home to Science Knowledge
• Social Spaces – hubs for Gossip Knowledge

Only one question remains:

When the final NIGHT comes, will you conquer the Evil — or succumb as your ancestors did?

Pledge Levels & Rewards
$1 or more — A Whisper in the Dark: support only, no product reward.
$15 — Forbidden Folio: Digital Art Collection. Art-book, lore and spellbook PDFs, wallpapers, and literary anthology PDF. No physical game.
$50 — Miskatonic Bookseller: retailer deposit toward a proposed minimum six-copy order; balance and terms to be finalized.

• $45 — The Raven’s Invitation: Core Game with basic meeples. Planned retail MSRP: $49.99.
• $70 — The Midnight Covenant: Deluxe Edition with basic meeples, upgraded terrain, velvet pouches and storage trays.
• $100 — Beyond Madness: Gameplay Bundle. Deluxe Edition plus the gameplay expansion, with basic meeples.
• $140 — Nevermore Reliquary: Collector Edition. Gameplay Bundle plus premium sculpted miniatures, metal artifacts, selected foil, art cards, two posters, a pocket anthology and spellbook.
• $200 — ParanormalX: Eldritch Archive. Collector Edition plus the physical comic Weed, Ink & Quantum Physics #1, playmat, art print, pin, keychain and stickers. Premium miniatures are exclusive to these two collector editions.

Shipping and Delivery

Physical rewards ship to the destinations listed on your selected reward. The current draft adds shipping separately at checkout. Final shipping rates must be verified against each bundle’s packed weight, dimensions and fulfillment cost before launch. Applicable taxes and import charges are additional.

Digital and support-only rewards have no shipping charge. The current estimated delivery is August 2027; manufacturing, freight and customs may affect this estimate. Final production specifications and expansion contents are in development.

Early-access prices are $40 / $63 / $90 / $126 / $180 for the five physical consumer tiers. Sign-ups are intended for the three days before launch. Eligible early-access supporters can redeem their private reward link during the first 72 hours after the Kickstarter campaign goes live. Core is approximately 11% below its standard pledge; other early-access tiers are 10% below their standard pledges.

Support

Questions about the campaign? Contact Paranormal X Media, LLC at paranormalxsocial@gmail.com.

• Email: paranormalxsocial@gmail.com
• Community:
• Discord: 
• Reddit: 
• Bluesky: 
• Instagram: 

The Team

Handmade Game Artwork by Ruth Marks

All game artwork is handmade by the epically talented Ruth Marks, with the help of graphic designer Paul Ko. The beautiful illustrations on the game’s cards, board, and box are created by people, not generated by AI.

Game Mechanics and Gameplay by Wild Optimists

The award-winning game makers Wild Optimists designed the game mechanics and gameplay of Lovecraft & Poe.

Intellectual Property and Story Universe by Mark Victor

Mark Victor created the intellectual property and story universe of Lovecraft & Poe. He is the co-writer of Poltergeist and other Hollywood films.

Risks and Challenges

Creating Lovecraft & Poe has been a meticulous process, and while we have planned carefully, there are always variables lurking just beyond the threshold of foresight.

Manufacturing timelines, material availability, proofing and freight can affect delivery. We will verify the production schedule and communicate changes to backers as development progresses.

We are also actively monitoring the evolving tariff landscape in the United States, as well as global shipping fluctuations. Depending on conditions closer to fulfillment, we may need to adjust aspects of shipping or tariff-related costs to ensure the project is delivered smoothly and responsibly.

All physical components — the board, tiles, cards, tokens, and deluxe items — will undergo multiple rounds of proofing with our manufacturing partners. While this process can introduce brief delays, it ensures the final product meets the standards our players expect (and deserve).

International freight, customs processing, and regional restrictions may shift unexpectedly. We are prepared to adapt as needed to maintain the integrity of the project timeline.