Death May Die’s two-foot-tall Cthulhu ‘miniature’ is a true monster

Cthulhu: Death May Die is a massive game in every regard. It has two of the tabletop’s most revered designers – Blood Rage creator Eric Lang and legacy godfather Rob Daviau – attached. It deals with the impending doom of the whole of humanity at the hands (tentacles?) of a Lovecraftian army of cosmic horrors. It’s already made well over a million pounds on Kickstarter in a matter of hours.

But the mammoth co-op action game might find itself overshadowed – literally – by its first expansion, which includes a staggeringly sized statue of the titular sea monster itself, Cthulhu.

R’lyeh Rising is available exclusively through the Death May Die Kickstarter, where you’ll currently have to add on an extra $150 (£113) on top of the $100 (£76) base game to get your hands on it. And that's without shipping, mind.

The set includes an extra episode for the scenario-based game described as Death May Die’s “epic finale”, complete with a unique collection of tokens, cards and gameplay rules.

It also includes an alternate Cthulhu ‘miniature’ created by sculptor Remy Tremblay, which towers 57cm high – almost two feet. The model replaces a more reasonably-scaled Cthulhu figure included in the standard Death May Die’s elder box for the nightmarish creation, which joins King in Yellow Hastur as two of the final confrontations in the game.

The R’lyeh Rising figure is so enormous that its 44-by-44cm base actually replaces the normal Death May Die board when playing the extra episode, with the game’s team of investigators clambering around the rocky base.

Cthulhu: Death May Die will arrive with backers next July, with the R’lyeh Rising expansion rollout staggered to account for the time-consuming production of the Cthulhu statue – current pledges to the Kickstarter campaign won’t see the expansion arrive until spring of 2020. At least that gives you a couple of years to clear some room on your shelf.