The Deed (2015)

The Deer God had me saying “Oh Deer.” A game this artistically beautiful shouldn’t be so lifeless and outside of its opening moments I really can’t think of many redeemable segments of the game. It’s slow, repetitive and has no clear direction for where it wants to go or what it wants to be. Not only is it not worth your money, it’s certainly unworthy of your time.

The Deer God is promising on a first look, thanks to its unusual premise and to a visual style that stands out. Once that impression is surpassed, however, the game quickly falls into a tedious repetitive experience that makes it lose its potential interest, which is a shame as The Deer God had some potential to be much more captivating than it is.

I stared deep into the eyes of the deer, waiting for it to speak. There was no grass, no trees; just a white void surrounding me and her heavenly grace as she judged me and my actions. But she did not speak. She did not even blink. As the silence dragged on, I grew more desperate, bargaining with her to just make sense of this, please! What should I be feeling? What should I be believing!? Deer God, what lesson do I need to learn? She screamed, for she did not know. I screamed, for I did not know. Perhaps that was the lesson to learn, that there is nothing to know. Don't buy this game.

The art style is beautiful and it makes for some nice shots of the locations, but other than that, there is really no need to delve into this endless-platformer.

The technical problems that plague the game can make even the most casual player a bit leery. Even if we give the benefit of the doubt and assume that the bugs from previous versions are fixed, the problems that do exist in the Switch version are enough to make someone think twice about spending time and money in the game. And that's unfortunate because this debilitating blemish prevents The Deer God from realizing its true potential.