In 1997, horror game Haunted Casino tried to scare us chipless

From 2010 to 2014 Richard Cobbett wrote Crapshoot, a column about rolling the dice to bring random games back into the light. This week, when the crypt goes creak, and the tombstones quake, spooks come out for a swinging wake. Happy haunts materialise, and begin to… play video poker?

So, here’s an interesting little curiosity for you. Since pretty much the dawn of the PC, there’s been a game called Last Half of Darkness—an early horror adventure that, much like Last of the Summer Wine, has an interesting definition of “Last”. The first one came out in 1989, and while there haven’t been that many sequels, they kept coming until 2011—Last Half of Darkness 2 and 3, Last Half of Darkness: Shadows of the Servants, Last Half Of Darkness: Tomb of Zojir, and Last Half Of Darkness: Seriously, Someone Turn The Lights On. In the middle of all that darkness though, another lesser known game was released—a freebie at the time. One that asked, can ghosts and ghouls gamble with the best of them?

“IT ALL STAAAAAAHTED LONG AGOOOOOOO!” gargles a monstrous voice, introducing a) the plot, of a casino run by seven sisters and that b) this casino game has a plot for some reason. It involves a lost necklace, a gargoyle appearing as if to say “Boo!”, and then you find yourself standing in… hmm. Call me crazy, but I was expecting Haunted Casino to take place in, well, a casino. Not the entryway to a house that looks, ahem, quite suspiciously like the one from The 7th Guest , only without the promise of delicious graveyard cake anywhere to be found. Seriously. Who didn’t want to try a piece of that?