Crypt Custodian (2024)

As someone who sucks at metroidvanias, this was a perfect one for me on easy mode. I'd fail but make progress when I really locked in.

The story is sad and adorable, and I would cry often, but it doesn't try to linger in the sad moments for too long. It's about baby innocent animals dying and going to heaven/the afterlife so it'll be sad by nature, but they aren't being harmed and the tone is overall light.

It feels great to play and is beautiful. I reccomend this for someone who is bad at metroidvanias but wants to play them anyway like me LMAO. Im sure the harder modes are satisfying as well though!

Losing our loved ones suck. No matter how much the pain subsides with time, we still miss them every day and would do anything to see them again, even for just a few seconds. All the philosophy around death, all the books written about accepting death as a natural part of life, nothing get around that simple fact.

Crypt Custodian has the courage of presenting death in this raw form. Under the façade of lovingly hand-drawn animal friends, it hides that undeniable fact and punches you in the face with it in the first two minutes and never lets up.

You play as a cat that was run over by a truck and has just arrived to the afterlife and is sentenced to clean-up duty for eternity. On your journey you befriend other little dead animals with similarly sad stories, like the smol frog that misses her partner, or the weeping wolf that is al alone without his pack. Characters are not suffering --the afterlife is pretty chill-- but they openly talk about how much they miss the ones they left behind and are trying to get into The Palace to use a mirror that lets you see them one more time.

The sad music, cutesy visuals and the thought that I am playing as a dead kitty trying to see their humans again wrecked me. I spend the whole first hours crying and just writing about is is making me tear up again.

It is surprising for a small metroidvania to make you face the fact that part of accepting death is accepting that it scars us.

With the melancholy music and the sad themes, I was constantly crying through the first hour or more. I tried to explain to my girlfriend why it was so hard to play and I started sobbing. I could barely tell her that it was about a dead cat in the afterlife. She gave me a tissue. I'm tearing up as I write this.

I don't know why it affected me so much.

Gosh, I love this game. I adore the stylized characters and lush environments. Encounters provide just enough challenge without sacrificing the game's more mellow tone. I was worried about the top-down combat, but the UI affordances for telegraphing Pluto's relationship to the ground are outstanding. I had so many satisfying "ah-ha!" moments as I explored every inch of this map.

As with the developer's previous game, Islets, I am amazed that this was designed and programmed by one person. What a fun and special addition to the "search action" genre!

Ultimatley, Crypt Custodian is a fun and simple metroidvania.

The characters are super cute, the world is mostly enjoyable to explore, and the visuals are cartoony and sweet. The combat can get a little repetitive, especially once you find a "build" that suits you. The bosses are unique and well-designed - some even offer a challenge.

I liked it, but it won't go in my "hall of fame" so-to-speak. However, considering this is all done by a single person, I have to admit it's really impressive.