Death’s Door

[Maf]

You ever play a game where the game doesn’t do everything well, it does everything excellently. And from the perspective of people who have played a lot of video games, maybe too many video games, you can look at it and go ah! This is a video game and it does everything excellently. I can recognise and acknowledge this. But at the same time, despite how good you know it is, it doesn’t really hit.

 

 

I played 2 hours of this game and beat the first real boss and so far that’s what I would say about this. Everything I’ve seen this game do so far, it does excellently. Combat (Simple but demanding), exploration and puzzles (Nice balance of being quite linear but with lots of not obvious secrets with a little side of some obvious secrets), music (great tone setter), art design, characters, animation, story (Tim Burton x Sesame Street). The game is so like other games that it’s immediately comfortable but still really original and has some good surprises and subversions. 
 

Etc, etc

 

But at the same time it’s not really exciting me. It kept me playing for 2 hours, it is definitely a good video game. But I’m finding it hard to get to “Yeah, Death’s Door!” and I’m more like “Yeah, Death’s Door”. It has everything without having that certain thing. So far.
 

In case you don’t know what the game is. It’s like Bastion. Isometric camera, melee combat, lots of rolling, got to be on the move. But not as complex. But it’s also really got a lot of 2D Zelda level/hub/dungeon design. Maybe not quite as puzzle heavy but still a nice amount of them to balance out the combat. 
 

I really quite like it and will play more of it. But the way people had talked about it I thought it was going to be a really big thing. I can see why critics like it. Definitely comes across as a “critics kind of game” to me. Maybe even now I’ve cleared the first area the game will spring in to action and I’ll love it too.

 

But so far I recognise it but not really connecting with it. 

[Maf]

Finished the game tonight. 92% at 9 hours. It’s really good. I think the game doesn’t do enough with what it is. 9 hours, + definitely more secrets I haven’t found yet, there’s enough content. But there are only 4 powers, and each one only has one usage.  Which leads in to the game has a couple of neat puzzles but, with so little ways to interact with the world the puzzles and exploration is very simple. So it relies heavily on very simple combat. Which leads in to the bosses that are very easy and like Dark Souls bosses that can be anti player, the bosses have huge holes in their patterns which makes you very anti boss. 
 

So when I say the game doesn’t do enough with what is is I’m saying the game needs more complexity and variety. What is in the game is fun to do and I enjoyed it a lot. It’s also very much a indie game so I don’t expect it to be as expansive or as complete as a Zelda game. But I’m just not quite satisfied. 
 

This will be an amazing Gamepass game when it inevitably gets on the service. 

[Nag]

16 minutes ago, Maf said:

This will be an amazing Gamepass game when it inevitably gets on the service. 

 

After hearing good things when it launched this is exactly what I'm waiting/hoping for.

[mfnick]

I’ve made a start now it’s on Game Pass. I’m enjoying it so far. In the first proper dungeon at the moment with the Witch. I love the graphic style and music. The couple of bosses I’ve fought so far have been fun too in a similar way to Metroid Dread, where it’s pattern recognition which leads to you being able to destroy them when you get it down. I love that shit. The level design is really smart too, it’s all well defined and the variety is high so you know where you’re going and where you’ve been without the need for a map - so far anyway. The way it’s constantly opening short cuts is very welcome too.
 

However, like Maf. It’s not really grabbing me yet. It’s all well made but he put it really well when saying it’s just not exciting me. I feel the exact same. Only a couple of hours in so hopefully it does click with me more. 

[Nag]

I made a start today too... I've made my way to the first proper boss (Grandma) but could I fuck beat her, it takes an absolute age to damage her so I decided to go get the third power instead from King Frog. I'm probably making my life more difficult than it needs to be by trying for the Umbrella achievement this run so my melee output is pathetic.

 

Like mentioned above though, it's nice having shortcuts opened up but I'd kill for a map, there's no way I'll remember all of these places that I could return to when I have new abilities.

[Maf]

The only place that's hard to remember is the jungle area. The rest of the game is quite distinct. Also for the umbrella only run I would recommend doing that on a second playthrough and rushing through it. Some of these bosses get nasty and take some learning so you might want to do get familiar first then umbrella later. 

[Nag]

47 minutes ago, Maf said:

Some of these bosses get nasty

 

I'm hoping that beefing up my stats can help, it's more damage output and the time it's taking than anything else... and me making stupid, unnecessary mistakes like rolling off the fucking ledge.🙄

[mfnick]

When beating Grandma I’m pretty certain most my damage to her was from hitting projectiles back. Beating her with the umbrella shouldn’t be too bad even with low damage output. 

[Maf]

I think if you max out strength on the umbrella it gives you .25% more damage than the sword does at 0 strength or something like that. I found the best thing was the arrow and bombs and concentrate on levelling those up. 

[Nag]

I'm concentrating on levelling up the magic stat... I'm only really hitting things to get magic power back.

[Craymen Edge]

The bosses generally only took me 3 or 4 tries each to beat, there were other things in the world that caused me much more problems.

 

The first time I fought one of those huge knights it battered me, and took a lot of tries to figure it out. Also, the guy you fight to upgrade the fire spell kicked my ass loads of times. Once I had the upgrade for fire to do damage over time though, it was so useful in those boss fights.

[Nag]

2 hours ago, Craymen Edge said:

Also, the guy you fight to upgrade the fire spell kicked my ass loads of times.

 

He's another reason I went heading off to try and find the bomb ability, I really want that fire damage upgrade.

[Maf]

Those guys cheat a bit because if you use a sub weapon they immediately jump at you. But you can use that to bait them. Use a sub weapon, put it away and dodge, and then hit them. Also they're sword attack is easy enough to dodge if you roll around their butts like Dark Souls bosses.

 

But I also didn't beat them with an Umbrella lol 

[Nag]

Made a little progress today, got the bomb ability, managed to upgrade both the bomb and fire abilities and also maxed out my magic stat so at least those are hitting harder now... and that resulted in one dead Grandma.

 

Left off for tonight about to face Frog King.