Death or Treat Review

Welcome to my review of Death or Treat which is out soon on PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One and Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and PC. For the purpose of this review, I was given a code for the Steam version of the game on PC. The game is brought to us by developers Saona Studios and publishers Perp Games (Moss, Apex Construct), Perpetual Entertainment (Close Encounters Down Under, Koala Rescue), and Hawthorn Games (Death and Taxes, GROSS).

I Ain’t Afraid of No Ghost!

Death or Treat is a 2D Hack n Slash Indie Platformer with roguelite elements.

As always, continue reading to see what I thought of this game. You can read our previous reviews when you’re done here.

The Game

In Death or Treat, players control Scary who owns Ghost Mart. Ghost Mart is the leading manufacturer of candy for Halloween. There are some humourous moments in this game, such as the names of some of the characters in the game. For example, the main antagonist is called Clark Fackerberg and he is in the final world which is called Faceboo! There are quite a few worlds for Scary to fight through before he reaches the final world,

In your humble overworld named HallowTown, there are a few familiar names. For example, there is a pumpkin man wearing a turtle neck with round glasses and he’s called Jobs. There is a skill shop called Necrosoft which is run by Pumpkin Gates. We also have Joe Bite Them’s shop, he’s a vampire. One of the other stores is called Detox Bucks which is run by Marley.

Each shop has its own benefits for each run you take on in Death or Treat. One offers weapons, another upgrades your skills such as the ghost bomb, and another gives you drinks to increase your health and regeneration. Of course, it’s not as simple as just having to enter the shops and choosing an upgrade. You need to have enough candy as well as a set amount of other items such as pumpkin seeds, bat wings, metal nuggets, pieces of wood, and more. You also need to restore each building to its former glory before you can enter and buy the aforementioned upgrades.

Lots of Things to do!

Each run is loaded with lots of rooms for you to explore. Every run sees a new map and brings a new challenge for you whilst trying to survive the hordes of enemies. There are many different types of enemies, each of which has its own style of attacking you. So make sure you use all of your provided skills such as dashing. Starting each run you will travel to the world of Darkchat. Later worlds include those such as Riptok and Deviltube.

The gameplay itself is really fun regardless of where you’re playing. I enjoyed the game on the keyboard and mouse, controller, and the Steam Deck itself. I much preferred playing on the PC with a controller. It felt more natural for some reason. Of course, it feels very similar on the Steam Deck but the real glory is on a larger screen where you can appreciate the hard work even more.

And yes, even though it says up top that this game is unknown with the Steam Deck, it works an absolute treat.

Look & Sound

Death or Treat has 2D handpainted environments and traditional animations. Some of the designs in the game are borrowed from some very well-known franchises. One of these is The Nightmare Before Christmas. You will instantly know what I mean as the candies in the game literally look like Jack Skellington’s head. I will add that the design of the enemies is actually brilliant. I love the style chosen for the game.

The audio in the game is actually really good. It has a rather catchy soundtrack as well as some very good sound effects that will bring pleasure to your ears when wearing headphones. The game sounds fantastic even when listening through the speakers on the Steam Deck or even a set of desktop speakers.

Conclusions

Death or Treat is great fun for all. I love the little inspirations the game takes from real work icons as well as movies we all know and love. The game works very well, has gorgeous looks, sounds fantastic, and runs perfectly on the Steam Deck. If you want to Wishlist the game on PC you can visit the official Steam page for the game. There is also a free playable demo on the Steam store!

I score Death or Treat a very well-deserved 9/10.