Deathbound is an indie title that bills itself as Soulslike with Baldur’s Gate-style party building. While I can definitely see the inspiration, it may not be the most accurate comparison, as there are areas in both formulas where Deathbound feels wanting. What can certainly be said about the game is that it is unique, flavorful, and surely developed with passion, and it is sure to appeal to RPG fans across genres.
Deathbound has an incredibly strong opening.
We hard cut to a grim paladin dressed in armor that beckons imagery of death and religious fervor, looking like a catholic bishop who adopted a skull motif. As this warrior speaks a prayer to his goddess, Death, we quickly learn that he is part of the Church of Death, a cult laying siege to a city built in the ruins of our modern world, defended by children and the elderly with nothing more than sticks and quivering arms. The deathly crusaders quickly defeat them.
In a bid to hide their research from the Church of Death, three scientists trigger an explosion, toppling much of the city and unleashing mutant horrors from their laboratory tanks. We cut again to the death knight-paladin from before, who survives the explosion that takes out his villain-coded compatriots. It is to my surprise and glee that we then take over the role of our deathly crusader and begin the game properly.
Deathbound is a post-apocalyptic fantasy set in the ruins of our modern world, where feudal societies and strange mixtures of magic and technology have taken over. It’s a world of religious tension, as the cults of Life and Death feud against each other, with the fanatical Death Cult having the distinct upper hand in their crusade.
Setting-wise, Deathbound gets a big A+ from me. Though I don’t always love the game’s dark, damp, gritty look, it’s a unique premise, especially for the Soulslike genre, which tends to focus on high fantasy or even Victorian settings.
For every criticism I have of Deathbound, I think of the game’s cinematic presentation, which makes me like it just a bit more.
That being said, the characters themselves, which the game wants you to be heavily invested in (hence the “Baldurs Gate party” comparison), mostly failed to win me over. As early as the second character introduction, I started to feel that the characters were a bit generic in both story and personality.
They failed to capture my imagination and felt more like dummies used to throw out unique mechanics than beloved teammates, certainly not to the level of the Baldur’s Gate party feel. This opinion is obviously going to vary from person to person, with some finding the game’s cast more charming than I did. Still, I’ve played so much D&D that I’ve seen Deathbound’s characters in the near exactly so many times that I couldn’t find them interesting.
Gameplay-wise, Deathbound is sort of like a Soulsborne title, but with such significant changes to the flavoring, I would say it stands out as its own thing more than it invites comparisons.
Your typical combat mechanics from a Soulslike game are all there: gathering XP from enemies, dropping it on death, using “bonfire” waypoints, and fighting difficult bosses. The main change to the formula is the introduction of morphing, which is how the game accounts for its party of four characters within the Soulslike formula.
You play as four characters rather than one, all occupying the same space in the game at once. This is done by morphing, which is switching out your current character for another at the press of a button. You often weave the swap into an attack or dodge for bonus effects.
Each character has their own health bar, as well as their own mechanics. This is sort of how Deathbound handles the typical character builds of a Soulslike. Rather than having one character who can do everything, the game’s different mechanics are spread out among its cast; Parrying is restricted to one character, backstabbing to another, spells to another, etc. Leveling up is done through a skill tree that affects all or specific characters, but since the skill tree is just number bonuses, it would have been better presented as just an attribute system.
If you’re a Soulsborne fanatic, you will either like or outright hate the morphing system. It certainly takes away a lot of freedom in character-building that the genre is famous for, and it can certainly trivialize the game a bit.
Something else Deathbound does differently from the Soulsborne genre is tie health and stamina together. When your health bar falls, so does your max stamina. This is certainly an interesting, if at times frustrating, way to raise the tension in fights, as the lower your health gets, the harder it is to fight back.
However, morphing then lowers this risk quite a bit, as each character has its own separate health bar and restores the health of idle characters through attacks. There are times when I definitely found myself just tanking hits until I was near death on one character and then swapping to another for a free second chance at the fight.
Not every Soulslike game needs to be hard, but I will say that how the genre is typically difficult is not present here. The enemies in Deathbound have incredibly slow, easy-to-predict, and dodge attacks that can make running through them super easy if you’re familiar with the series at all.
Because of this, how the game is the difficulty feels cheap, even outright unintentional. Enemies have a habit of backing into corners where attacking them is actually impossible due to your weapon colliding with walls. Basic, early-level enemies can imply entire status effects with one attack, seeing you frozen in place for upwards of ten seconds on a loop. Bosses are easy to predict and slow-moving but have such massive health pools that fighting them can feel like trying to cut down a tree with a water gun.
Deathbound is an interesting concept and worth trying if it seems interesting to you. However, it feels like it falls pretty short of the standards it hopes to mimic, lacking in the interesting character writing of Baldur’s Gate and missing some of the nuances of what makes a Soulslike game fun to play. It is not a bad game, but some of the Soulslike audience it hopes to capture may not find it living up to their standards.
The Final Word
Deathbound is a unique entry into the Soulslike genre, with a cool, grim setting and unique ideas that set it apart from other titles. Ambitious as it may be, its character writing leaves something to be desired, and aspects of the mechanical design keep Deathbound from its full potential.
7
Try Hard Guides received a PC review code for this game. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles on our Game Reviewspage! Deathbound is available on Steam, GoG, Xbox, and PlayStation.
