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The Tabletop Game
- Clueless Aesop: The setting clearly aims for a more progressive take on the cosmic horror genre, but suffers from making its setting too prejudice-free (Newfaire is multicultural, there's little racism, sexism, homo- or transphobia) despite claiming to encourage Humans Are the Real Monsters stories. And despite portraying the three pillars of Newfaire's authority (the government, police and religion) as corrupt, it offers little development into how or why and its stories instead focus on Candela's efforts to prevent otherworldly incursions into society, meaning the heroic organization is essentially fighting to preserve the status quo, with humans as unconfronted Greater Scope Villains in most assignments.
- Don't Shoot the Message: While many Critters agree that addressing and discussing the history of problematic tropes in the Cosmic Horror genre is important, some take issue with how much of the core rulebook's page count is dedicated to this, at the expense of leaving the gameplay rules underdeveloped. Some feel the rulebook focuses more on how not to play the game than how to play it. Many players also noted that the Actual Playsnote don't always follow this advice, for example the guide calls roleplaying insanity unethical while the cast of the show did it during their own games. The rules are also have no problem encouraging gamifying and roleplaying physical disabilities.
- Scrappy Mechanic: The lack of rules for PvP is commonly criticized, especially since the situation cropped up frequently in the Actual Plays and forced the GMs to improvise. In a setting rife with Sanity Slippage and The Corruption, inter-party fighting is practically inevitable, yet no rules cover it.
The Actual Play
- He Really Can Act: Initial reactions to Spenser Starke GMing the Needle and Thread chapter were mixed, as he's a game designer and screenwriter who never GM'd for the show before, in addition to not being Taliesin (see below). Once the chapter aired his cinematic style earned high praise (especially the first episode's Action Prologue, feeling like something out of a real adventure movie) and created one of the show's most well-received story arcs.
- Questionable Casting: Many were confused and disappointed that Taliesin doesn't GM any of the first four chaptersnote , instead only narrating the trailers, given how incredible he was at running horror-themed oneshots in the past. Some feel he would've done a better job selling the system.
