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by Demian Katz
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<img src="/reviews/mansions_madness.jpg" height="259" width="200" alt="Mansions of Madness"
align="right"><b>Mansions of Madness</b> (second edition)<br>
Published by <a href=http://www.chaosium.com>Chaosium</a><br>
Written by Michael DeWolfe, Wesley Martin, Mark Morrison, Keith Herber, Fred Behrendt, Penny Love and Liam Routt<br>
Cover Art by Lee Gibbons<br>
Interior Illustrations by David Lee Ingersoll, Janet Aulisio and Sam Inabinet<br>
160-page perfect bound softback<br>
$21.95
<p>
&nbsp;
<p>
First published in 1990, <i>Mansions of Madness</i> is a collection of
1920s-era <i>Call of Cthulhu</i> scenarios centering on a variety of
dangerous homes, including a plantation and a sanitorium, along with
several slightly more conventional buildings.  This 2007 reissue
includes the original five adventures from the 1990 printing and adds a
lengthy new scenario as a bonus.  While the new adventure may not be
enough justification to repurchase this if you already have the original
edition, all six adventures are of quite high quality, and this is
definitely a worthwhile investment if you haven't already encountered
it.
<p>
<b>The Adventures</b><br>
The opening adventure, "Mr. Corbitt", provides one of the investigators
with a kindly old neighbor that has a dark past and dangerous secret. 
Though the shortest adventure in the collection, this has the potential
to be used as a subplot in a campaign, so keepers may be able to get
quite a bit of mileage out of it.  The short length means that some
elements of the story feel slightly underdeveloped, but a little
creativity can patch the gaps, and it's not a bad start to the
collection.
<p>
Next up is "The Plantation", an action-oriented adventure for
experienced investigators, in which a chance run-in with the child of
Southern sharecroppers eventually leads to encounters with a voodoo cult
and a disturbing number of snakes.  There's a bit more combat here than
you find in the usual <i>Call of Cthulhu</i> adventure, but that doesn't
get in the way of a good amount of role-playing and exploration as well.
 Despite much of the action being set in South Carolina, this adventure
could make a good complement to the recently released <a href="/reviews/secrets_new_orleans.shtml"><i>Secrets of New Orleans</i></a>
with minor adaptations.  It also includes a fairly detailed appendix of
game mechanics for dealing with snakes and snakebites that keepers
should continue to find useful long after they finish the adventure
itself.
<p>
The third adventure, "The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse", deals with the
search for a missing millionaire.  It is the oldest story in the
collection, dating back to 1984, when it was used in a slightly
different form as a tournament adventure at an Australian game
convention.  It has aged well, and is particularly well suited as an
introduction to the game.  Clues and red herrings are liberally placed
throughout the scenario, offering the keeper means of helping newbies
who get stuck or delaying experienced players who get too close to the
truth too quickly.  Executed correctly, the adventure has a great slow
build, growing from simple mystery to atmospheric horror tale to all-out
fight for survival.  It's hard to pick a favorite in this collection,
but this would probably be mine.
<p>
In "The Sanatorium", the investigators are invited to an exclusive
island sanitorium run by a friend only to find that, quite literally,
the inmates are running the asylum.  In addition to an urgently need to
learn the nature of the horrors afflicting the island, the players are
likely to get involved in day-to-day management of the patients just to
keep things from getting completely out of control.  There's a lot of
potential for role-playing with quirky characters here, and there's also
the possibility of an interesting "game within a game" feel if the
keeper emphasizes the need to balance running the sanitorium by day with
battling horrors by night.  This one could be a fair amount of work to
run, but if done right, it's likely to be a memorable experience.
<p>
The next adventure, "Mansion of Madness" is another missing person case,
this time involving the investigators with the Boston art scene, a
decidedly unusual gangster, and an old house in western Pennsylvania. 
Even though this adventure has some good elements, they didn't really
fit together in an entirely satisfying way for me, making this the low
point of the collection for me.  However, that's not to say it's a total
waste of time &ndash; the fact that the backstory isn't entirely well-realized
doesn't reduce the creepiness of some of the events that occur in the
scenario, and the players may not really care (or notice) if all the
details fit together with perfect logic.  If nothing else, I was happy
to see my home state featured in a <i>Call of Cthulhu</i> scenario for
once!
<p>
The collection closes with "The Old Damned House", in which the
investigation of a jewelry theft introduces the players to an old family
with an old house and an old secret.  In some ways, this scenario is
like a cross between "The Crack'd and Crook'd Manse" and "The
Sanatorium", mixing the investigation of a creepy home with interactions
between a whole cast of eccentric characters.  Although reasonably
satisfying, the adventure isn't quite as good as these earlier two,
mainly due to slightly haphazard organization and a rushed finale. 
You'll probably get a few good sessions out of this one, but it may take
a bit of extra preparation to get all the information you need at your
fingertips and lead the story to a satisfying conclusion.
<p>
<b>Conclusions</b><br>
Without a copy of the original edition at my disposal, I can't compare
the new layout to the old.  However, the fact that this version of the
book contains a lot of mistakes that resemble software character
recognition errors (particularly in sidebars with shaded backgrounds)
suggests that some problems may have been introduced as a result of
scanning an old edition to create the new one.  There are some visible
inconsistencies between the old material and the added scenario &ndash; the
first five scenarios contain particularly excellent cartography, with
most maps showing a lot of tiny room details that can help the keeper
set the scene and improvise on the fly during play.  The added
scenario's maps are bare and bland by comparison.  Conversely, I found
the small character portraits included with the new scenario a bit more
attractive and evocative than those taken from the earlier edition.
<p>
Fortunately, none of the flaws in this book detract too much from the
overall quality of the adventures.  Even the least satisfying scenario
has some merits, and there should be something here to appeal to most
styles of play.  If you need ready-to-run <i>Call of Cthulhu</i>
material, you could do a lot worse than to invest in this collection;
you should get quite a few enjoyable horrifying nights in return.

<p>

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