The Stone of Madness | PC Review

Did you ever play RC Pro Am for the NES? Not really top down, more like a ¾ view? Later in life, I learned that this was called an isometric view. On the Genesis, the game that I loved that had an isometric view was Haunting Starring Polterguy. The point I’m getting to here is that my brain has a Pavlovian response to games with an isometric view. I believe I am going to enjoy it. Let me tell you about The Stone of Madness which I played on Steam. A gorgeously drawn and fantastically written game that happens to have an isometric view. Come along and see how the trend has continued along with a couple of exceptions.

You Found the Stone WHERE?

The year is 1799. You are Father Alfredo, a priest who was invited to a Spanish monastery to check on their activities. This monastery also became an asylum for the sick and insane. Father Alfredo found corruption. Instead of helping the monastery, he became a prisoner.

These sick and insane prisoners mostly amble around the locked-in areas of the monastery grounds, occasionally shaking their arms in an ooga-booga sort of way or making noises that imply insanity. Father Alfredo is also permitted to walk around these areas during the day, but at night all prisoners must return to their cells. At night, the monastery has ghosts which make the prisoners’ lives problematic. More on the ghosts later.

Father Alfredo wishes to continue his investigation. One day, he witnesses the guards taking a young woman away. The priest in charge of the prison knows she has The Stone of Madness which has some level of power associated with it. The young woman swears that she doesn’t. (She does, but to go any farther would include spoilers.) Once you find the stone, the game splits into two options. One option is shorter than the other. You can play either story or both of them. Individually, they are approximately 8-10 hours and 10-15 hours long. Put those together, you could conceivably spend 25 hours with The Stone of Madness. I commend Teku Studios for giving us options to make the game longer or shorter OR provide a second playthrough, if desired!

Father Alfredo begins this new investigation thinking it will ultimately lead him to the answers he needs. Along the way, he finds some teammates to help him:

Lenora – A kind woman with a vindictive mean streak. If she sees people being mistreated, she wants to attack. She also has the skills of a thief.

Eduardo – A silent prisoner who has gained the trust of all other prisoners. His strength and ability to repair things is quite handy.

Agnes – An old woman who happens to be a witch. She can cast spells on the guards.

Amelia – A very young girl who is small enough to crawl through small places and slip between the bars of the prison cells. 

The Game Plays Quite Nicely

Each day has a task to complete. At the beginning of each day, you select the crew members that you would like to accomplish the daily goal. Your group walks around the level with stealth being the top priority. Don’t draw attention to yourself and certainly don’t get caught doing something you’re not supposed to do like rummaging through chests for objects to claim. 

The nighttime is meant for planning and recuperation. You may continue trying to achieve the objective once night falls, however those ghosts that I mentioned cause trouble. Father Alfredo has the power to “Bless” the ghosts. This doesn’t defeat them, instead it’s more like a Patronus charm in Harry Potter. They get blasted back by his blessing and incapacitated for a short while. The other members of the group do not have this power, so if I planned to stay out late, I better have selected Father Alfredo to be in my group!

The Stone of Madness has quite the depth to it. I hope to do it justice. Each character has strengths and abilities, however, they also have weaknesses. Those weaknesses cause the character to lose sanity. If enough sanity is lost, the character acquires a new phobia which compounds that character’s limitations and can cause the game to get quite difficult over time.

For example, I mentioned that Father Alfredo can Bless the ghosts. He can also gain the trust of inmates with his sermons and is given slightly more leeway by the guards and nuns keeping watch. His weakness is viewing death. There are skeletons in some of the cells and searchable areas. If Father Alfredo gets too close, he loses sanity. This also becomes problematic with Lenora’s strength. She can knock out the guards or, in extreme circumstances, even kill them. If she doesn’t hide the carnage, Father Alfredo will lose sanity when he follows her. Fear not, though! Lenora has a violin. At the end of the day, during the recuperation period, you can make her play her violin which restores sanity for the group.

More Mechanics – This Game Has DEPTH

Each character’s strengths and weaknesses must be considered depending on the objective. One final word on the strength/skill: You must find the required equipment first. Father Alfredo requires a crucifix in order to Bless. Lenora requires a board to whack a guard upside the head. She also needs the lock picking tools to pick locks, no worries as they are surprisingly easy to find considering you’re in an asylum.

Otherwise, the controls are pretty standard while also being slightly touchy. A button for moving, running, climbing, and the special ability for each character like when Lenora picks locks to open up a new room for the team to explore. I found myself missing the mark a few times when trying to be precise about where I was placing the character with the controls. I found the keyboard controls to be a little more precise, while the controller was certainly more convenient. However, running from the guards was clunky. You must be aware of the guards. If you are up to no good in their eyes, which most of the time is true, they will investigate. Keep misbehaving and they will chase you down, club you in the head, and throw you back in your cell for the rest of the day. 

The gameplay in The Stone of Madness alerts you to their field of vision and that they’ve noticed your behavior. You have a short amount of time to stop and pretend like you are doing nothing wrong. That works best. The game claims that you can run away from the guards and get to safety, but I was never successful at escaping. I was clubbed in the head many times. Considering that you can have 4 team members on a given day, losing a team member to a clubbing often will restrict the ability of the other three. If Lenora gets clubbed and dragged to her cell, there’s nobody on the team for lock picking. Essentially, you have to start the level over. There was a level of frustration when this occurred. 

Stunning Visuals

Visually, the game is utterly stunning. Created with skill and care, The Stone of Madness will not disappoint when it comes to level design, character detail, and solving the “isometric view but they’re behind a wall” problem. Edges are crisp. The characters look like they’re jumping off of a comic book page. Hand drawn games always get an extra point, in my book. I was always intrigued to see what the next level was going to look like.

I mentioned in the podcast interview that the game is quite brown, which is fitting because it’s a Spanish monastery in 1799. Those browns gave me quite a few stumbles while keeping an eye on the guards; they blend into the background but they’re definitely aware of me breaking a rule. Clubbed again, right in the noggin. That is my only negative when it comes to the visuals. I’ve read some other reviews that mentioned bugs and glitches. I’m guessing that those were patched up before I played my copy because I didn’t come across anything like that.

The music fits each scenario: Peaceful, stressful, stealthy, or being chased. Nothing remarkable and it often becomes a part of the background.

Final Verdict

There is a lot to like about this game. The choice of 8 hour game, 12 hour game, or 25 hour game if you played through both stories was a great touch. The isometric view of the beautifully hand-drawn monastery was engrossing. I felt fully immersed into the world. The story was so thoroughly crafted, the gameplay had depth without being complicated. I could go on and on.

Needless to say, I am highly recommending The Stone of Madness. 

To hear me talk more about The Stone of Madness, be sure to listen to the January 29, 2025 episode of The Gaming Outsider podcast around the 01:45:25 time stamp.

This review is based on a PC copy of The Stone of Madness provided by Mark Allen PR for coverage purposes. It is also available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch.