Try your luck at the creepiest party of the year in The Council

YouTube YouTube
Watch On

The episodic narrative adventure The Council begins in the year 1793, when a secret society whose members include Napoleon Bonaparte, George Washington, and you, Louis de Richet, holds a meeting on a private island off the shores of England. But it's not just a friendly meet-and-greet. The whole thing is highly competitive, as each member jockeys for a position over the others. Complicating matters further, your mom was recently on the island and has since gone missing. 

The setup sounds an awful lot like a Telltale take on The Seventh Guest, but the gameplay will be about more than just choosing from a list of preset conditions. Players will need to understand the "psychological vulnerabilities and immunities" of the other party guests in order to properly take them on, and the outcomes of interactions can leave physical or mental scars that can hinder—or, possibly, help—in future encounters.    

"Solve issues with diplomacy, delve into occultism to expand your historical and scientific knowledge, or play detective and see what others do not perceive. Your skills will have uses that extend far beyond your conversations with fellow guests," publisher Focus Home Interactive said. "With 15 diverse skills to use and invest in, players are free to uncover The Council's mysteries how they see fit, with wildly varying consequences depending on their methods." 

The first episode of The Council, called The Mad Ones, will be out in February, and I really hope it's good. 

Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.

Latest in Adventure
Inside
Limbo and Inside studio demands compensation from co-founder Dino Patti for alleged 'unauthorized use of Playdead's trademarks and copyrighted works'
Two characters sitting on a bench talking
Wanderstop review
Zoe showing off in front of Mio
Split Fiction review
Rusty Rabbit chomping a carrot like a cigar
Rusty Rabbit turns Yakuza's Kazuma Kiryu into a fluffy bunny
Pathologic 3 screenshot
Get ready to get weird in Pathologic 3: Quarantine, a free 'prologue chapter' about a young doctor looking for immortality in the world's most miserable town
A young woman's face bathed in light
Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1 review
Latest in News
Storm trooper hero
Another live service shooter is getting shut down, this time before it even launched on Steam
Possibility Space concept art.
Possibility Space owners sue NetEase for $900 million over allegations it spread 'false and defamatory rumors' of fraud at the studio that ultimately forced it to close
Valve soldier man on a pc.
2024 was Steam's 'best year ever' of users buying newly released games—but I wouldn't celebrate the end of the forever game era just yet
Money money money.
Valve tracked 1.7 million Steam users who joined in 2023 to see if they stuck around—they did, and they spent $93 million
Closeup of the new Copilot key coming to Windows 11 PC keyboards
Microsoft co-authored paper suggests the regular use of gen-AI can leave users with a 'diminished skill for independent problem-solving' and at least one AI model seems to agree
A lolporrit squeals in excitement while being driven in a moon buggie in Final Fantasy 14: Dawntrail, patch 7.2.
Final Fantasy 14 patch 7.2's trailer has me finally hyped to get stuck back in—and to go to the moon and pilot some mechs, because why not