The Deer God Review

Here we go again. Another platformer for me to review. I think I'm actually punishing my self for doing it over and over again.

The first thing I'm going to say about this game, its pretty much standard of my reviews, after playing just over an hour of the game, I didn't see the appeal of it. I tried my hardest to like it and to find its appeal, but I couldn't. I didn't understand what was going on other than I was a Deer running through the world and every now and then some other animals would join and help me and I would get attacked by others... Oh and eat apples and grass...

Everyone must think that I'm just being harsh for the sake of being harsh, and I can honestly from the bottom of my heart say I'm not. I would love for a platformer to change my mind and WOW me... but non do, and I respect the fact that people love this genre and enjoy playing them. There just not for me.

Anyway, enough blabbing, back to the game. I struggled with what I was doing on this game as there was no clear marker or indicator of what I had to do. Missions were picked up by meeting people who were in need of help. You then had to figure out what to do and how to do it, the world would then keep going as you're running through until the quest was finished. It could end up like a never ending story type thing, because if you didn't understand what you had to do then round and round you go... Even if you press start to see if there is a hint of what to do, there isn't anything, will just say 'Resume' or 'Return to Menu'... So don't expect the game to help you out... Just keep running Forest Gump.

I wouldn't say the missions need skill either, I think its the games test of patience and how many times can you go around breaking stuff before you find it. They do say that good things come to those who wait, and when you do finish missions etc you are rewarded quite handsomely with upgrades... You can become the ultimate fire shooting deer... Ahem...

Also, the longer you survive within the game the stronger your deer gets, growing bigger etc. When you die, you go small again. Eating grass and apples helps to keep your meters up in the corner. I struggled to understand the green meter, Red was for health, Blue was stamina... Green was hunger? It went up when I ate something which is why I'm guessing its hunger :D One problem again I ran into with this was that there were points where I couldn't find anything at all to eat and my deer died twice because of this... It might have been me not noticing the food, but I couldn't see any as I was running through.

The game is an 8 bit game where you are a Deer... (If the title wasn't obvious enough)... and you're running through a world which brings different environments, Forests, Snow, Mountains etc. Most of the worlds that your running through look good but the animals to me because of the 8 bitness look a pixelated mess. I know its 8 bit, but I think more effort should have been put in to create some realism to the animals.

Example being that when you or the other animals move, it looks as though most of them are just sliding across the floor rather than walking, and this is the problem that I get with games like this. There seems to be a lack of effort on part of the devs, no care for realism or to make the animations realistic.

Overall, I found this more of the same when it came to 2D platformers and its currently free on Xbox's Games with Gold programme. I think free is a fair price for the game as it wouldn't be a game I would opt for. However I know there are people out there who love platformers and this will probably appeal to you, but its not for me.

Game gets a 6 from me. :)