Death's Door Review (Best Zelda-Vania)
Death’s Door Review (Nintendo Switch)
I have never hated a game and bounced off so many times to eventually love a game like I did with Deaths Door. There are still problems with the game, but the early issues were mostly design choices that I wasn’t accustomed to and eventually grew to appreciate.
The bounce off and push back from Deaths Door felt different from Souls type games that punish you into the ground, giving you a clear understanding of the issue, which is you aren’t good at this game yet.
In Death’s Door, movement and attacks felt slow, death could sometimes be quite punishing if you haven’t checkpointed in a while, there is limited health and things taken for granted in other games like railings to fall off stairs and balconies weren’t there. However, it was clear that something was there because even after frustration kept repeating, the desire to return and overcome the challenge was strong.
On the surface you can draw comparisons to early Zelda games, which is accurate and there are similarities, but it also shares a lot of DNA with games like Dark Souls and Metroid.
Even though Death’s Door is on Xbox Game Pass, my version was on the Nintendo Switch where it felt most at home and overall the experience was great. There can be a lot happening all at once on the screen but even with the now five year old technology powering the Nintendo Switch, even the OLED model, the game ran flawlessly. It isn’t the most taxing game around as we aren’t talking about Naughty Dog level visuals or Indie top down comparisons like Curse of the Dead gods or indie games that have set the bar for visuals like Ori but it’s still worth noting that Deaths Door performs excellent on the Switch.
There is a lot to love about Deaths Door from its art style and clever writing that makes the world feel alive and bursting with character and hidden secrets to be discovered. You are a little crow who works as a reaper of souls and you have skills, which can be upgraded through a progression tree that you purchase with the souls of enemies that you have killed. Items can be discovered, different weapons that can change your play style and you can alter the way you want to upgrade your crow, whether the be with speed, strength or other options. You can also find shrines that you can upgrade your health and magic abilities but those felt few and far between. I enjoyed the journey of finding a shrine but it felt more like a drop of water in a desert.
With all of your weapons and skill upgrading it would mean much if you didn’t have worthy adversaries to battle and Death’s Door has enemies in spades. Not only are there different areas to keep your journey from getting stale but there is also a large variety of enemy types that constantly put your skills to the test. This could be with new types or different combinations or sheer quantities.
There is also the boss fights, which are a true shining star of Deaths Door. Just like Zelda, Metroid and Dark Souls, the boss battles are epic and challenging but they are always fair. Nothing is ever easy in Deaths Door including the boss fights or even little grunts that you have seen since your first few minutes. Becoming complacent with enemies of any kind can quickly turn what seems like an easy area into death.
As much as there is to gush about Deaths Door, not every design choice can be supported. The biggest offender of this group and one that would have made the biggest difference is map. There is no map in Deaths Door. You don’t need an objective arrow constantly pointing you in the right direction and you can even take the Hollow Knight direction and make me find the cartographer and purchase a map but almost all of my frustration once I got past the initial hurdle was not knowing which direction I needed to be going.
Sure, you want me to explore your world and it does beg to be explored but give your players the choice, don’t punish them and waste their time, forcing them to walk around the same area ten times before they eventually get lucky and find the one door needed.
The other gripes about the game are minor in comparison to the map problem and are likely more of a preference. Deaths Door features very limited health, both in your total health bar and how you can replenish health in the world. You need to find seed to plant in addition to finding pot to plant the seed in. Both of these are only used once and are few and far between. The silver lining is that once you plant a seed it will be a plant if you die and return to the area.
Another gripe is that enemies have multiple attacks including ranged with Aoe, it would’ve been nice if these ranged attack inflicted damage across the board. There are some large enemies that have attacks that damage enemies but this is the exception and not the rule.
Finally, the upgrade system for both your health and magic bar feels a little slow. You need to find 4 parts of a crystal to increase your magic or health, similar to heart containers in Zelda but the shrines where you find the pieces are almost non existent. With decent exploration, my first upgrade was finally found at around the 6 hour mark, which is near the back half of the game and after the majority of bosses.
My final problem is more of a Nintendo Switch problem and less of a Deaths Door problem. Playing in handheld mode is doable but the precision on the Joy-Cons is lacking. Using the Swtich Pro is a better option but I have played many games that required tight precision in handheld mode and I didn’t hamstrung as I did in Deaths Door.
Deaths Door is not a welcoming game, which is not the norm nowadays but similar to other games that initially push people away, the true magic comes from pushing through. Overcoming the challenges that once seemed insurmountable is rewarding like very few gaming experiences.
Deaths Door is a great game filled with a magical world that is rewarding from beginning to end from its setting, characters, bosses, secrets, abilities and everything in between. Death’s Door is a little Zelda, a little Metroid, a little dark souls but it is a lot of originality and heart. Deaths Door is worthy of fighting through the initial resistance