A few days ago, while walking in the woods, I allowed a mosquito to suck blood from my hand for about 20 seconds. Holding my arm extended like a sweaty middle-aged messiah, I watched as the insect tapped methodically at my skin, watched as it pushed its needle nose into the flesh between my smallest knuckles, watched as its hitherto-imperceptible belly bulged and turned a shiny, jubilant red.
Later, I googled West Nile disease and felt like a fool. I’ll not be making a habit of this. Still, it was fascinating to see another creature treat my blood like a resource, to see my vital fluids coalesce into a tiny crystal outside my body and fly off to (eventually) form part of some waterborne larvae, deep in the forest. If you get bitten by a mosquito near Watford in the next few days, apologies – there’s a non-zero chance that was “one of mine”.
Watch on YouTube
This is my overlong, wince-worthy introduction to Worship, a mix of Pikmin and Cult Of The Lamb in which you can wreak all kinds of havoc with your casually dispensed body fluids. Devised by Chasing Rats Games, the game casts you as a hooded zealot roaming a usefully colourless realm of warring eldritch gods. The core mechanic is slicing your hand so that you can paint the ground with your blood trail. The shapes you draw with your gore have supernatural properties.
Scrawl a circle around a clump of villagers and they’ll be converted to your cause, their pale, unbelieving bodies turning a bold, occult black. Other shapes let you prep and fire off spells to smoosh enemy cultists and shatter obstacles. The catch, of course, is that your character will eventually run out of blood, aka life, but don’t worry, you can hold a button to hoover up all of your claret doodles without, it seems, exposing yourself to a cocktail of bacterial infections. Say what you like about occultists, but they’re both surprisingly hygienic and thrifty.
Once converted, villagers serve much the same purpose as Pikmin. You can lob them at things you want beaten up, and have them carry things such as the sinister gemstones you need to sow the land with your cursed altars. You can also slash them open and use their victory wine for sorcery, if you’re feeling a touch anaemic.
Find a demo for Worship on Steam. The full game – out 16th July 2025 – includes four-player support, and I will absolutely give a prize to whichever co-op team can write out the URL for the UK government advice on mosquito bite avoidance in their own gore. For more insanitary forest shenanigans, check out Roots Devour.
