Pathways Into Darkness casts the player as a member of a Special Operations team on a mission to prevent an ancient god from awakening and destroying the earth. In order to succeed, the team had to enter an ancient pyramid in the Yucatan, reach the bottom level, and detonate a low yield nuclear device in an attempt to stun the Dreaming God and bury it under millions of tons of rock. However, before the game begins, during the team's deployment, your parachute fails to open, you plummet to the ground, and are separated from the others who presume you to be dead. Eventually, you reach the pyramid, only to discover that the team has vanished, leaving in their stead a stream of horrific monsters, created by the slowly waking god.