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Just someone who loves games and hopes to have a place within the industry someday soon.
Just someone who loves games and hopes to have a place within the industry someday soon.
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This review contains spoilers
Acid Nerve's Death's Door is a game that I found myself immediately taken with the moment of its reveal but unfortunately it was a timed Xbox exclusive and as such, it had a staggered release schedule and arrived to PlayStation platforms in November 2021.
After purchasing the game some time after its eventual release due to work, the sheer breadth of anticipated releases and the time it took to make my way through them, I finally got around to playing Death's Door…
…And then Tunic released and Death's Door was once again put on the backburner. However, after recently completing Final Fantasy 16, I felt that I needed a palette cleanser and something that wouldn't occupy 100+hrs of my time and so I erased my previous save of Death Stranding and started anew.
And I'm glad that I did.
Though the game seems like senseless fun, it presents the player with some powerful existential questions, ones that I wouldn't expect to find in a game with its cute and simplistic aesthetic.
Death's Door sees a little crow working in the employ of the Lord of Doors, as an overworked retriever of souls that need to be culled. In his journey, he encounters all manner of characters and creatures, many of which he befriends and assists during his quest to retrieve 3 large souls to open the titular Death's Door.
He is mentored by the Grey Crow, a beleaguered crow who has been trapped within The Lost Cemetery, in search of a soul that lies behind Death's Door and due to his old age, asks our protag to help him open the door by retrieving the souls of three beings - The Urn Witch, The Frog King, and Betty the Yeti.
These beings have lived well beyond their natural lifespan and have grown corrupt in the absence of death.
Retrieving the three souls will take players across a vast array of biomes ranging from cemeteries, snow-capped mountaintops, flooded ruins, dense forests, a labyrinthine mansion, and more. Players will also come to know the history of the game's world, the Lord of Doors, and the disappearance of Death.
The game has simple mechanics that both seasoned and casual players will have little growing comfortable with. Attacks are basic, with a standard three hit combo, a plunging attack while falling, a more powerful charged attack, and a rolling overhead strike.
In addition with the basic sword attacks, there are a number of other sub attacks like casting fireballs, conjuring a bow that shoots magic arrows, a magic bomb that can also destroy environmental obstacles, and a tether that can be used to quickly traverse areas or snag enemies. The tether can also be used in conjunction with the sword to deliver a devasting lunge.
The game also makes use of invincibility frames when rolling, so anyone who has played a Soulsbourne game will feel right at home. Enemy attack are well telegraphed. If you take a moment to understand enemy patterns and behavior and avoid simply rushing into a confrontation, you'll never be overwhelmed. Difficulty never feels unfair and death is generally the fault of the player.
Aside from these things, the game is very much structured like a Metroidvania in the sense that progress and optional are gated, and you must acquire a skill or tool to access those aforementioned places or fully explore them.
Level design is very reminiscent of Dark Souls. I really enjoy how the levels fed into one another in sensible ways that help you intuit your location in the world and central landmarks would help if you couldn't orient yourself.
While initially an annoyance, the absence of a map helps players gradually memorize the world and understand what path leads to where. This helps the game retain its sense of discovery and considering that narratively, our protag has never explored the locations they've now found themselves in, it makes sense that there's no map.
As mentioned previously, the game has simple yet attractive visuals. The visuals shine due to how distinctive the artstyle is. Environments are readable; it's clear what can be explored or interacted with. Colors are muted but pop due to the contrasting nature of how they're paired, so if something catches your eye it's likely intentional. The game never feels busy visually so there's no worry of visual effects occluding you from seeing what happening on-screen.
Likewise, the sound design in the game is phenomenal as well. The music is pleasant and complements the environments and battles well. As great as that sounds, I think the highest complement that I can pay the sound design is that attacks can be avoided purely based on audible cues. Many games struggle with conveying danger to the player visually, for Death's Door to achieve that both visually and sonically is a true feat.
Death's Door is full of secrets, whether it be shrines that increase the player's health and magic capacity, hidden weapons, documents that clue you into more of the game's backstory, combat arenas that empower your magics, or an entirely hidden true ending. There's a lot to do in this game but it never outstays its welcome.
Beyond the cute aesthetic lies a story that's relatable to most everyone. Death's Door takes aim at the hustle culture that we find ourselves caught in; how we spend most of our lives doing work that we don't necessarily like and to what cost?
If you were told the exact moment of when your death, would you live your life differently? Would you try to lengthen the time you'd been given somehow or would you enjoy the remaining time you had left to its fullest? What if you spent most of your life in pursuit of something, only to learn that you'd never be able to achieve the goal of that pursuit, how would you respond to that truth?
These are some of the questions that characters within the game grapple with and are realities many of us find ourselves living - doing a job we actively hate or that brings unnecessary stress and pressure to our lives solely for money versus pursuing what really matters to us and that brings happiness and a sense of fulfillment.
Death's Door tells us that we'll all die someday and there's nothing to fear of death, it's a natural conclusion to life but maybe the one's who do not go gentle into that good night are those who were regretfully too afraid to live life on their own terms.
Congrats to Acid Nerve's Mark Foster and David Fenn (and anyone else who had a hand in building this game). Death's Door is one my favorite releases in recent memory. I can't wait to see what the team imagines next.
9/10
After purchasing the game some time after its eventual release due to work, the sheer breadth of anticipated releases and the time it took to make my way through them, I finally got around to playing Death's Door…
…And then Tunic released and Death's Door was once again put on the backburner. However, after recently completing Final Fantasy 16, I felt that I needed a palette cleanser and something that wouldn't occupy 100+hrs of my time and so I erased my previous save of Death Stranding and started anew.
And I'm glad that I did.
Though the game seems like senseless fun, it presents the player with some powerful existential questions, ones that I wouldn't expect to find in a game with its cute and simplistic aesthetic.
Death's Door sees a little crow working in the employ of the Lord of Doors, as an overworked retriever of souls that need to be culled. In his journey, he encounters all manner of characters and creatures, many of which he befriends and assists during his quest to retrieve 3 large souls to open the titular Death's Door.
He is mentored by the Grey Crow, a beleaguered crow who has been trapped within The Lost Cemetery, in search of a soul that lies behind Death's Door and due to his old age, asks our protag to help him open the door by retrieving the souls of three beings - The Urn Witch, The Frog King, and Betty the Yeti.
These beings have lived well beyond their natural lifespan and have grown corrupt in the absence of death.
Retrieving the three souls will take players across a vast array of biomes ranging from cemeteries, snow-capped mountaintops, flooded ruins, dense forests, a labyrinthine mansion, and more. Players will also come to know the history of the game's world, the Lord of Doors, and the disappearance of Death.
The game has simple mechanics that both seasoned and casual players will have little growing comfortable with. Attacks are basic, with a standard three hit combo, a plunging attack while falling, a more powerful charged attack, and a rolling overhead strike.
In addition with the basic sword attacks, there are a number of other sub attacks like casting fireballs, conjuring a bow that shoots magic arrows, a magic bomb that can also destroy environmental obstacles, and a tether that can be used to quickly traverse areas or snag enemies. The tether can also be used in conjunction with the sword to deliver a devasting lunge.
The game also makes use of invincibility frames when rolling, so anyone who has played a Soulsbourne game will feel right at home. Enemy attack are well telegraphed. If you take a moment to understand enemy patterns and behavior and avoid simply rushing into a confrontation, you'll never be overwhelmed. Difficulty never feels unfair and death is generally the fault of the player.
Aside from these things, the game is very much structured like a Metroidvania in the sense that progress and optional are gated, and you must acquire a skill or tool to access those aforementioned places or fully explore them.
Level design is very reminiscent of Dark Souls. I really enjoy how the levels fed into one another in sensible ways that help you intuit your location in the world and central landmarks would help if you couldn't orient yourself.
While initially an annoyance, the absence of a map helps players gradually memorize the world and understand what path leads to where. This helps the game retain its sense of discovery and considering that narratively, our protag has never explored the locations they've now found themselves in, it makes sense that there's no map.
As mentioned previously, the game has simple yet attractive visuals. The visuals shine due to how distinctive the artstyle is. Environments are readable; it's clear what can be explored or interacted with. Colors are muted but pop due to the contrasting nature of how they're paired, so if something catches your eye it's likely intentional. The game never feels busy visually so there's no worry of visual effects occluding you from seeing what happening on-screen.
Likewise, the sound design in the game is phenomenal as well. The music is pleasant and complements the environments and battles well. As great as that sounds, I think the highest complement that I can pay the sound design is that attacks can be avoided purely based on audible cues. Many games struggle with conveying danger to the player visually, for Death's Door to achieve that both visually and sonically is a true feat.
Death's Door is full of secrets, whether it be shrines that increase the player's health and magic capacity, hidden weapons, documents that clue you into more of the game's backstory, combat arenas that empower your magics, or an entirely hidden true ending. There's a lot to do in this game but it never outstays its welcome.
Beyond the cute aesthetic lies a story that's relatable to most everyone. Death's Door takes aim at the hustle culture that we find ourselves caught in; how we spend most of our lives doing work that we don't necessarily like and to what cost?
If you were told the exact moment of when your death, would you live your life differently? Would you try to lengthen the time you'd been given somehow or would you enjoy the remaining time you had left to its fullest? What if you spent most of your life in pursuit of something, only to learn that you'd never be able to achieve the goal of that pursuit, how would you respond to that truth?
These are some of the questions that characters within the game grapple with and are realities many of us find ourselves living - doing a job we actively hate or that brings unnecessary stress and pressure to our lives solely for money versus pursuing what really matters to us and that brings happiness and a sense of fulfillment.
Death's Door tells us that we'll all die someday and there's nothing to fear of death, it's a natural conclusion to life but maybe the one's who do not go gentle into that good night are those who were regretfully too afraid to live life on their own terms.
Congrats to Acid Nerve's Mark Foster and David Fenn (and anyone else who had a hand in building this game). Death's Door is one my favorite releases in recent memory. I can't wait to see what the team imagines next.
9/10