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Death and Taxes
Released On: Feb 20, 2020
Metascore
Available after 4 critic reviews
6.4
Where to Buy
Where to Buy
All in all, Death and Taxes is a very enjoyable game, and fans of point-and-click games like Papers, Please will absolutely love it. The story offers us interesting routes which we can explore to get alternate endings, the emporium allows us to add some interesting features, and the quirky graphics and audio adds to the overall atmosphere. I will point out that while the game is fun to play, it does get quite repetitive after a while, as with most games of its kind. We can mix things up a little with the choices we make, but ultimately, the gameplay remains the same. Death and Taxes is probably best played in short bursts.
I had lots quite a lot of fun at the beginning, especially while livestreaming, but the feeling faded as the office remained rather empty until the end. [05/2020, p.82]
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 24 User Ratings
6.4
21% Positive
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
71% Mixed
17 Ratings
17 Ratings
8% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
User Score
Mixed or Average
Based on 24 User Ratings
6.4
21% Positive
5 Ratings
5 Ratings
71% Mixed
17 Ratings
17 Ratings
8% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
I *really* enjoyed this game. I can see where it might not appeal to everyone - it is *the epitome* of the 'casual game'.
I found it very relaxing to play, moving through the story and choosing my various options.
The interface is great ahd the wry humor is right up my alley! I think the folks scoring this down may simply not be this game's target audience!
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PC
This game should be played at least once, as it makes one ponder fatalism and free will, chaos theory and morality. It is clever, the voice acting was good, and overall it is enjoyable. However, it gets extremely repetitive, and despite the minorly different endings, you can experience most of this game in about 3 playthroughs. Also, there's no getting around certain bias. It's impossible not to. The concept is that you decide who lives and dies, and based on their actions (or lackthereof) the world is either saved or damned a little more. So maybe an unemployed guy in his mid-20's should die so as not to take up resources. Or maybe the CEO of a chemical company should die so as not to do some shady backhanded plutonium deal or something. I'm relatively liberal, and somewhat agreed with the assessment of the "value" of these characters in the game, but if you identify with any of the "bad" characters, I wouldn't blame you for getting offended. I don't like being forced what to think, even if I'm inclined to naturally agree with much of it. All that said, the game is genuinely fun and unique, and it is quite engaging and clever. Similar to Papers Please and Out of the Box.
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PC
Death and Taxes is certainly a quirky game that is distinct in the visual novel genre. It is also a management sim akin to Papers Please in that you have to choose who lives and dies based on rules given to you where in papers Please you had to choose who to allow into the country. The big difference to me was that Death and Taxes was a lot more lax with the rules in that you could choose to not follow them and the story branched into a different path rather than end with you and your family dead. You make more money by following the rules but to be honest there wasn’t anything to spend it on that affected the game. You can get trinkets for your desk but nothing that is needed. You also need money to drink at the bar on weekends but to be fair even if you don’t drink there you can talk to the bartender and patrons to learn more about the background of the reaper business. The art is great and you can make your Grim Reaper look different enough that most people should be satisfied. I will say there was a couple times where they had white text on a white background that was hard to read. The voice acting was largely fantastic aside from a couple characters. I will single out Cerri the bartender and Fate for the best voice acting. I also loved the character of Lady Pawdington, Fate’s cat and your boss in his absence. Whoever made that character must have cats because they nailed their attitude. The end of the game seemed a bit flat for it’s lead up. I expected more to happen or to be revealed but it was much simpler than expected. The end credits was also unique as you get to decide the fate of each of the team while learning who did what. The game lasts for twenty eight in game days of decisions.
I played Death and Taxes on Linux. It never crashed on me; and I didn’t notice any glitches or spelling mistakes. Alt-Tab didn’t work. The game would save on exit and there was just the one save file. One annoying thing I found was that I couldn’t advance the text with the “Enter” button, I had to press continue with the mouse.
Game Engine: Unity
Save System: Auto on exit
Graphics API: OpenGL
Game Version Played: 1.2.11
Disk Space Used: 2.5GB
GPU Usage: 0-79 %
VRAM Usage: 1088-1638 MB
CPU Usage: 2-4 %
RAM Usage: 1.9-2.3 GB
Many of the gripes I found with Death and Taxes were minor. I do wish the ending had been stronger though. Overall I enjoyed it and found it to be a great combination of management sim and visual novel that didn’t try to be too difficult on the management side and had a great number of choices for the dialogue on the visual novel side. I paid $19.03 CAD for it and finished it in three hours. I found the price to be good value for it given the combined strengths where it did well.
My Score: 7.5/10
My System:
AMD Ryzen 5 2600X | 16GB DDR4-3000 CL15 | MSI RX 580 8GB Gaming X | Mesa 21.0.2 | Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB | Manjaro 21.0.2 | Mate 1.24.1 | Kernel 5.11.14-1-MANJARO
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PC
This game was fairly enjoyable but the gameplay got a little repetitive and boring over time. It would've been nice to have some variety over the course of the 28 days. The story was a little interesting but overall this game was enjoyable mostly for the dialogue and ideas.
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PC
Score: 6.1
It's nice but gets boring after a couple of hours.
Had a lot more potential than it actually executed.
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PC
I felt that this game had a lot of potential but it was executed **** voice acting and design was pretty good but the gameplay is just a repetitive slog fest that makes you pay less attention to the game just because of sheer boredom.Your choices don't really matter which is fine for this type of game but i was expecting something more interesting from the idea of playing as a bureaucratic grim reaper.I would suggest playing papers please.
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PC
Summary In this 2D, narrative-based game, you assume the role of the Grim Reaper... on an office job. Your job is to decide which people are going to live or die. The consequences of your choices are yours to bear, while the mystery of your incarnation awaits revelation! Coming February 2020.
Platforms:
- PC
- Nintendo Switch
- Xbox One
- PlayStation 4
Initial Release Date: Feb 20, 2020
Developer:
- Placeholder Gameworks
Publisher: Placeholder Gameworks
Genres:
