Death of the Reprobate
Released: November 7th, 2024
Developer: Joe Richardson
Publisher: Joe Richardson
Systems: PC Review copy provided by publisher
If you commit to your mischief with enough shameless audacity, you might just get away with it. This is something Joe Richardson knows all too well, since he’s been getting away with it for years.
That’s a good thing, by the way. Audacious mischief or not, his games are funny as fuck.
Death of the Reprobate is the third installment in a series of point and click adventures that includes Four Last Things and The Procession to Calvary. Each one has taken imagery from classical paintings and taken the utter piss with them. Obligatory Monty Python reference goes here.
Procession to Calvary is easily among my favorite adventure games ever, featuring some truly eloquent vulgarity and scenarios so gloriously stupid as to become a unique flavor of brilliant. While Death of the Reprobate doesn’t quite reach the heights of its predecessor, it’s still an utter riot.
I mean, you get to help out two guys engage in furious fisting by crafting them a modesty skirt to more tastefully pound ass in public, and that barely makes it into the top ten wildest encounters. You could say this game is right up my alley.
Death of the Reprobate had me loudly cackling within the first minute of playing. That is quite genuinely not hyperbole, either. I won’t repeat the dialog that got me, because out of context it might sound horrific, but suffice to say any internalized shame has been worth it for the giggle.
That said, this is not a game that sets out to offend. It’s more naughty than nasty, delightedly dancing right up to the line without crossing it. In doing so, it manages to be shocking in a number of ways while avoiding content that one could deem “edgy.” That’s no easy feat to pull off, especially for a game that involves feeding a baby strawberry milkshake made from cow shit.
The script is witty when it wants to be, witless when witless is funnier, and most importantly it knows exactly how entertaining it is to make people from Ye Olde Worldy Times say the fuck word a lot.
Death of the Reprobate starts with players dishing out cruel and unusual punishments as Malcolm the Shit, an interim ruler whose father, Immortal John, is hypocritically dying. In this intro, you may sentence a man to have his flaccid genitalia encased in malachite before being shown a picture of a tit, or if you’re feeling really sadistic you may instead order him to be reminded of the joys of his youth.
I felt that one. You hit 40 and you really start comprehending the brutal bleakness of nostalgia.
Anyway, John is displeased with Malcolm’s capricious antics. As punishment for such twattery, he threatens to deny his son the throne unless he proves his capacity for kindness with seven good deeds. Thus unfolds a simple setup that serves as a fertile bed for nonsense, the occurrence of which is immediate and ceaseless.
Gameplay is pretty standard throughout, the usual adventure game fare. You interact with things by choosing to talk, look, or touch, though - as is standard for this series - touching a thing usually means slapping it or giving it the bird. Every screen is filled with interactive stuff, pulled right out of existing portraits and landscapes for recontextualized shenanigans.
Characters in need of a good deeding are helpfully - and literally - pointed out by God holding a sign on a stick, and solving their problems is the key to progression. One man has lied to his kids about being able to fish and needs to catch one so they don’t hate him more than they already do. A woman wants a husband but won’t accept anything less than a man with clothes that match hers, a circlet on his head, a ring already on his finger, flowers identical to the ones in her hair, and an existing prepaid honeymoon.
Other than that, she’s not too picky.
Aiding these people will require plenty of dialog to figure things out as well as some good old fashioned item puzzles. Many solutions involve using objects found in one place to solve issues in another, dragging them from the inventory bar to wherever they’re needed. Most of the puzzles are pretty logical, with a few being particularly clever - resolving an argument over whether it’s worse to be shot with loads of arrows or nick your leg on a thorn is a favorite of mine.
The only major problem I have with all this is the inventory bar itself, a long row which swells with objects both crucial and trivial in short order. While plenty will cycle out, the inventory bar is in a constant state of clutter throughout. Still, this is hardly a dealbreaker.
Should one ever get stuck on a puzzle, there’s a soothsayer in the middle of town who can outright tell you what you need to do. While some might find this a little too hand-holdy, I found it incredibly useful as someone who struggles with short term memory deficiencies. Forgetting where to go is an ever-present risk when I play adventure games, so features like this are invaluable.
Death of the Reprobate is about as mechanically straightforward as a point n’ click gets, but the mechanics are mostly there to act as a joke delivery system. You might have guessed from the tongue bath I’ve already given it, but the writing is the absolute star of this show. Every puzzle is a gag that’s stuffed with more gags and supported by gag-laden conversations with gag characters doing lots of gags.
As I said earlier, I laughed a lot while playing this. The scenarios are so ridiculous I had to keep showing it to my husband. The anachronistic dialog hits just right - there’s something inherently funny about a guy from Renaissance times wanting to slap “that magnificent booty,” or being called a “narc” by forest people.
The game’s rife with vulgarity, a parade of constant swearing, full frontal nudity, and piles of puerile humor involving poo and wee. None of what I’m saying is meant as a negative, by the way. Swearing, tits, and poo jokes are pretty much a lifestyle choice for me at this point.
Amidst the cursing and butt stuff, however, is a vein of sharp satire that pokes fun at politics both historical and contemporary. There’s also a dash of lighthearted commentary about the economics of creating art, as well as some nice digs at the wealthy, which I always appreciate.
One aspect of the satirical content could be accused of offensiveness, but that depends on how untouchable you believe religion and certain Christian figures to be. Before you roll your eyes at the prospect of tryhard atheism however, I must stress that the merciless ribbing is performed within the same refuge of audacity as everything else.
Honestly it’s all too preposterous to be a source of outrage, even as The Lord himself is snarking at you. Then again, I’m no believer, so I love this shit.
Once again, I must talk about the difference between biting humor and “edgy” humor. As much as this game’s content can be outrageous, it’s not looking to outrage people, or at least I don’t think so - it wants to make people laugh. It’s not mean-spirited, it’s suitably acerbic, and it’d be great if more comedy learned the difference between being offensive and being, y’know, funny.
With visuals that continue the style seen in Four Last Things and Calvary, it’s hard to really talk about the “graphics” as such. One can at least discuss how the appropriated imagery has been animated, taking the aforementioned Monty Python approach and getting some amusing slapstick out of it. Backing this up is a soundtrack of classical tunes, the classiness of which wonderfully contrasts everything else.
This has been a lake’s worth of words to say what I could have summed up in two - I lol’d.
Comedy games are considered notoriously difficult to pull off, but ones like this demonstrate that the challenge isn’t inherent to the medium - it really just comes down to how many people making games are actually good at comedy. Death of the Reprobate, with humor that’s sharp and dumb in equally amusing measure, is some damn good comedy - and maybe more than a little damned.
I did, indubitably, lol.
9/10
