The Deer God Review – A Portable Indie Experience

<p>The PS Vita is dying a slow and painful death&comma; which makes me extremely sad seeing as the handheld is a pretty damn good console&period; I know that competing against the 3DS is nigh-impossible due to the fact that Nintendo has decades as king of the mountain in that genre&period; Thankfully there is still some life in the little console&comma; indie games are flocking to the handheld and that is generally a good thing&period; It helps the indie developers since there is nothing else to buy on the handheld&comma; and it helps the owners open up their library to new and inventive games&period; One of those indie games is from <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;crescentmoongames&period;com&sol;wordpress&sol;games&sol;" target&equals;"&lowbar;blank" rel&equals;"noopener noreferrer">Crescent Moon Games<&sol;a> and they decided to release their title <em>The Deer God<&sol;em> on the PlayStation 4 and the PS Vita&period; The title was released on Steam about two years ago and is finally making its way to the PlayStation systems&comma; which always welcomes a platformer into the mix&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In this game&comma; you play as a hunter who is hunting with his buddy&period; Your buddy turns in for the night while you sit by the fire to enjoy the evening&comma; soon you are surrounded by wolves who rip you to shreds&period; You find yourself in front of a giant glowing deer God who tells you that you must now suffer for all the pain and torment you have inflicted upon the deer&period; No message there right&quest; Good thing I was eating some Venison jerky as I held my Vita&period; I play games to escape from reality&comma; not to be reminded of problems in the world or to be preached to&period; This alone drew me out of the game because I felt like I was being talked down to as I played&period; Not really a huge fan of that&period; As the deer&comma; you must find 10 Cervidaz statues that hold the power of the deer God&period; You must solve their riddle to gain the power at the shrine&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;124271" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-124271" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-124271" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;04&sol;16004121&sol;11&period;jpg" alt&equals;"&lpar;The Deer God - Crescent Moon&rpar;" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"361" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-124271" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>The Deer God<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; Crescent Moon Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>When you first gain form as the deer you are just a small fawn&comma; progressing through the levels successfully allows days to pass which is when you begin to grow up as a deer&period; Growing up makes you a stronger and faster deer which makes more areas around the level accessible to you&period; Sometimes if you do die and get reincarnated you lose your adult status which may put you at a disadvantage depending on where the checkpoint is&period; You may have to backtrack a bit to grow up so that you can make jumps again that are impossible if you are just a fawn&period; The controls are simple&comma; X is jump and Square is charge&semi; those are the most important buttons you will need&period; There are dangers in the forest and butting them with your head takes care of those problems&period; To navigate the forest and get helpful hints there are friendly animals that will help you on your way&comma; just press down on the D-pad and they will give what little nugget of information they have to you&period; Pretty simple right&quest; These controls make jumping around the wilderness extremely easy&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>The Deer God<&sol;em> is very pixelated and reminds me of very early Atari games&comma; like Pitfall and the like&period; Which made the insanely long loading times unnatural&comma; I mean why would such a low visual quality game have such long loading times&comma; it makes no sense&period; Once the game does load it does look very nice on the little screen&comma; the colors aren&&num;8217&semi;t murky and the background is set perfectly so that the game has a hint of 3D to it&period; The only HUD on the screen are three bars&comma; red keeps track of your health&comma; green tells you how hungry you are and blue is your stamina meter&period; The one that you must keep an eye on the most is your hunger meter&comma; you can have full health but die just because you couldn&&num;8217&semi;t find an apple to munch on&period; This aspect of the game was very irritating when I was jumping all around a desert&period; Other than starving to death this game is a very good platformer when you know where to go&period; Most of the time I just hopped to the right to see what statues I could find and to see how far I could get in the game&period; A little direction would have been nice&comma; but I guess as a deer you just hop around and eat anyway&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;124279" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-124279" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-full wp-image-124279" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;04&sol;16012001&sol;21&period;jpg" alt&equals;"&lpar;The Deer God - Crescent Moon Games&rpar;" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"360" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-124279" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>The Deer God<&sol;em> &&num;8211&semi; Crescent Moon Games&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>My taste in <em>The Deer God<&sol;em> was probably soured right at the get go when it showed me that it had a huge message in it&period; Now I don&&num;8217&semi;t care what the message is&comma; whether I agree with it or I don&&num;8217&semi;t I do not like them in my games&period; I play games to escape&comma; to not have to think about my current woes for just a little bit&period; Personally&comma; I refuse to watch movies that take place heavily in a hospital&comma; like <em>50&sol;50<&sol;em> or even <em>Scrubs<&sol;em> due to the fact that this past October was a trying one for my family&period; Everything turned out for the best&comma; but they remind me of the dread of what a hospital could mean to me&period; So I stay away from that like I stay away from any type of message or preaching&period; Other than that drawback the mechanics of the game are tight&comma; no deaths from shoddy controls for me&period; The music was nice and I enjoyed the quasi-3D aspect that the artist brought to the 8-bit genre&period; However&comma; if you want to play a game to get away from it&comma; find another title&semi; that&&num;8217&semi;s what I did&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong>A Playstation Vita Review Key for The Deer God was provided by Crescent Moon Games for the Purpose of this Review<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;