Developer ACE Team and publisher Nacon have announced that 40-player co-op horror game The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu will be coming to PC (via Steam and Epic Games Store), PS5 and Xbox Series X/S on July 15th. The announcement was made with a brand new trailer, showing off some gameplay footage from a beta build with various streamers attempting to survive the title’s horrors. Check it out below.
The trailer shows off many of the more horrifying features of The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu, like the elaborate hallucinations that players can suffer from. Among these are seeing an ally being completely covered by thousands of small tentacles, and the sudden appearance of strange creatures like a gigantic millipede. Regular enemies will also seemingly come in all shapes and sizes, from simple zombies and skeletons, to more fearsome foes like one that can seemingly make use of long tentacles to disable players.
Along with the release date, ACE Team has also revealed more details about the title, including its story setup and the motivations for players to explore the horrifying island. The players have a simple goal: gather as much wealth as they can get their hands on from the island. Along the way, they will also have to find a missing person and locate an ancient fort. However, from the moment players set foot on the shores of the island, a vague feeling of dread starts creeping in.
In gameplay terms, players will get to choose a contract to complete before setting off for the island. However, they will also need to ensure that the objectives are completed as soon as possible, since staying on the island for longer will also lead to more horrifying things showing up. Inventory space is also limited, and the combat system revolves more around defending oneself rather than being aggressive when enemies show up.
The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu also has a sanity system. Players facing too many horrifying things will start feeling their mind chip away. Effects of lowered sanity start out in simple ways, like hallucinations. However, these effects can escalate, with players seeing their allies as enemy monstrosities, or seeing solid ground that, in reality, is a deadly pit.
The title features a gameplay loop similar to extraction-styled games like ARC Raiders, with players needing to make their way back to their boat to successfully turn in all the treasure they found during their excursion. As you would expect, this also means that players will lose anything they were carrying if their return trip wasn’t successful.
The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu is based on H.P. Lovecraft’s novella The Mound, which revolves around a haunted mound that leads the protagonist into an entirely new, horrifying subterranean world filled with ancient inhabitants.
The game was first unveiled back in November 2025 during an Xbox Partner Showcase. It was revealed with a trailer giving us our first look at its gameplay and world. The title seemingly taps into the sense of dread that many of Lovecraft’s stories are famous for, with powerful hallucinations that can bend a player’s reality.
