In addition to being a harrowing horror experience, Masks of Nyarlathotep created a revolution in adventure campaign design. With adventures you could play in any order, and with each setting essentially a sandbox full of alligators, Larry DiTillio [the campaign’s original writer] and his collaborators made a connected story feel like a deep dive into chaos, an investigation and not a succession of acts in a narrative. The open middle of Masks allowed and encouraged Keepers [gamemasters in Call of Cthulhu] to build their own nightmares without feeling tied to one vision or one structure. I’ve tried to live up to the amazing example Larry and company set in my own work like the Zalozhniy Quartet and the Dracula Dossier.
Ken Hite, RPG designer
I wanted the same campaign with the same plot – anything else would not have been Masks. Larry DiTillio had created a wonderful plot, which I didn’t need to change. So the work involved checking the clue links, the flow of information, and how information is structured and relayed to the Keeper. In doing that, identifying out of date, extraneous, or problematic text became easier. Key to the revision was updating the campaign for modern play styles and also the portrayals of diverse cultures in historical settings.
Mike Mason, 7th edition Masks writer
Cults don’t discriminate on racial or ethnic grounds, they’ll take whoever is crazed enough to follow alien gods – thus, anyone from anywhere can be in a cult. Also, we made sure in the current edition that all ‘foreigners’ were not the bad guys.
Mike Mason, 7th Edition Masks writer
