A few bucks for some 16-bit Dragonducks.
A bit more than a decade ago, Breath of Death VII: The Beginning, in which there were not six other games, released on Xbox 360 for a low low price of just one dollar. It was a crudely pixelated short RPG adventure that often poked fun at the genre. It had simplified visuals, a combo-based combat system, and was able to be beaten in a single sitting. Now, all these years later, Breath of Death is back, and better than ever.
Releasing on Steam for $5, Breath of Death VII: The Beginning - Reanimated is a full ground-up remake of the fan-favorite Xbox 360 title. With completely remade visuals and numerous tweaks based on feedback of the original, Shadow Layer Games has certainly did the original a ton of justice as the 16-bit-inspired visuals are outstanding, with the same engaging combat and humor that made the original so treasured.
Breath of Death VII is a fast paced and heavily condensed adventure that is more about the conversations between its cast of characters than its overarching narrative, which is fine enough as it is, but feels built to simply support the journey’s conclusion. As you trek across the country to track down some magical crystals, their use and the truth behind them will change the land, and its cast, forever.
You'll start the roughly 3-hour adventure with Dem, a mute skeleton whose thoughts can be heard by Sara, a ghost historian who hires Dem as her bodyguard, whether he wants the job or not. It's not long then that you'll meet Lita, a vampire techie, and Erik, a zombie prince who forgoes the crown for the chance at love with a potential mademoiselle. While the cast is largely pretty well put together, Erik’s late join and one-note shtick of how he talks, doesn't get the care the other characters get. What I do like is that Sara, Lita, and Erik, all forcibly add themselves to the group, with Dem really having no say in the matter. Personally, how Lita joins is a complete riot and often fitting for the genre.
In Breath of Death VII, the world suffered an end-of-life catastrophic event that saw humanity wiped out, resulting in the undead to populate its cities and towns and rebuild. While that underlying scenario doesn't truly influence the story, Dem, Sara, Lita, and Erik, will battle countless creatures, robots, and zombie cars, in an effort to uncover a secret that has been hidden for countless decades. While the towns are filled with various NPCs, they mostly spout tutorials or hints at locations flooding the countryside around you.
The humor between the cast is the main driving force of the game. While there are nods to other games constantly referenced, there is also a narrator who occasionally provides the odd joke about mandatory sewer levels and more. That said, it is the unlikely relationship between the cast that really does a lot of the heavy lifting. Dem's thoughts can be read by Sara, who often speaks the reverse when it comes to her explaining what Dem has said to the group. “Dem loves this idea!” She says as Dem is vehemently against it. This back-and-forth is really good and gives the characters some good moments to stand out. While there is a chat feature in the menu, it always repeated the same lines of dialogue and rarely provided anything new until a new character or event had shown up.
The new visuals are a huge step up, allowing the world, combat, and menus to really provide a much better game. Environments look great, with far away vistas scrolling in the background as you climb up towering mountains. Placing both games side by side is a trip as you'll certainly see the vastly improved visuals in a fraction of a second. Character sprites are solid with great character art and significantly improved battles as the original simply has plain black backgrounds to the combat. Now, each battle has nicely produced backgrounds that reflect the different terrain the random battles took place on. From swamps, open fields, and junkyards, you'll scrap with mutated rats, zombie cars, and plant-like abominations.
Battles work off building up a combo and then unleashing attacks that benefit from the built up combo, making them more devastating. From fire attacks that single out a foe or blizzards that freeze the entire opposing force, there is a decent variety here to work with. Characters have standard and magical attacks as well as skills and unite attacks that pair characters together for powerful strikes. And, as you level up, you can choose what upgrades you get from increases to your core stats to improvements to certain skills. This allows you to work towards creating micro-builds that concentrate on specialty skills or beef up the HP of characters to take more of a beating.
With new additional modes, such as Dragonduck Mode, which is a quest for Dem, or the newly added Hard Mode+, which provides a much harder version of the game, there’s more to do here than simply wrapping credits a single time. While the main story will take you around 3 hours, these extra modes can double or triple that time, all for just a few bucks. If I had to wishlist a feature, an autosave when entering a new area would be great to see. Thankfully, you can save pretty much anywhere, so you’re never far away from keeping your progress.
With an entirely new soundtrack from HyperDuck Soundworks and fresh new visuals, and some quality-of-life features to make the game flow far smoother than the original, Reanimated is a wonderful remake that maintains the spirit of the original and provides a fun few hours. My only gripe is the simplicity of its story, especially how you retrieve these crystals. That said, Dem, Sara, Lita, and Erik, take part in a brief little adventure that despite being a small random journey, has big consequences you'll never see coming.
Developer - Shadow Layer Games.
Publisher - Shadow Layer Games. Released - December 12th, 2024. Available On - PC/Steam. Rated - (N/A) - No Descriptors. Platform Reviewed - Steam/Steam Deck. Review Access - A review code was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review.
Jeff is the original founder of Analog Stick Gaming. His favorite games include The Witcher III, the Mass Effect Trilogy, Hi-Fi Rush, Stellar Blade, Hellbade: Senua’s Sacrifice, and the Legend of Heroes series, especially Trails of Cold Steel III & IV.