Death’s Door

Death’s Door was my favorite game of 2021. Coming out of absolutely nowhere, I got it on the strength of everyone’s recommendations at the time, and now I replay it once a year. Essentially a top-down but still 3D Zelda game, Death’s Door follows a crow who works as a reaper for the now bureaucratic institution of death. However, the crow begins to unravel a conspiracy surrounding a figure known as the Lord of Doors and the disappearance of the embodiment of Death. While that’s a fine enough framework for the rest of the game, what I truly adore about Death’s Door is its tone.

Death’s Door is absolutely whimsical in the face of the dark fantasy it portrays. Its world, which often feels like if Dark Souls was grafted onto a Zelda overworld, is colored in with pastels and is filled with lovingly vibrant takes on sometimes drab archetypes. That it undermines such dark material as death often feels like the point of the game, which sees both the beauty and pain in passing. Meanwhile, it’s puzzling and action are more than sufficient on their own even if it mostly plays the hits, though I’m hardly one to complain about more of a good thing. Death’s Door is genuinely charming and good fun, melding familiar experiences and inspirations into something refreshing in tone and spirit, and it can be all yours for $4 on GOG.