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8Doors: Arum's Afterlife Adventure Review


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129942678_8Doorsboxart.jpg.25765a723bebe93a017a57fc434ed218.jpgWhat awaits us when we die? In 8Doors: Arum's Afterlife Adventure, it's a treacherous purgatory filled with deadly spirits, platforming challenges, and a bureaucracy of afterlife guardians who shepard souls through the system. With inspiration from Korean folklore, 8Doors takes players on an engaging though perhaps not very memorable tour of the afterlife via Metroidvania gameplay.
 
You play as Arum, a young girl whose father recently died under mysterious circumstances. Determined to get him back, she travels to the afterlife to find his soul, and stumbles into a conspiracy of missing souls. The Korean influence adds a fun and unique personality to the game, further fueled by the otherworldly afterlife designs of NPCs and creatures. Other than that though, the story feels a bit bareboned. The mystery isn't all that mysterious and more often than not you're just traveling from one objective to another. There are multiple endings though so exploring everything the game has to offer yields a more satisfying conclusion to Arum's quest.
 
The gameplay is pretty classic Metroidvania. As you progress you'll unlock new weapons and abilities to explore more of the map, and although 8Doors isn't quite as difficult as Hollow Knight it definitely feels like it's in the same vein. Save points are fairly spaced out and oftentimes you'll be struggling to just make it to the next checkpoint so that your progress wasn't in vain, and the bosses can definitely be challenging.
 
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Part of the issue is just how flat the combat is. Even once you have multiple weapons there are disappointingly few ways to approach any battle. You have a pretty basic combo attack and each weapon has a special attack, some of which are defensive rather than offensive—the umbrella, for example, will block damage from above—but overall the combat is extremely repetitive. Your basic attacks don't do much damage so you always want to try to finish off your multi-hit combo, but oftentimes you're dodging enemy attacks yourself so all you can do is slowly chip away at their health. Even when you do get off a full combo, the bosses have a ton of health which just makes the battles drag on, going through the same motions over and over. The combat system desperately needs something to break up the monotony.
 
Arum also has an upgrade tree that you can customize with skill points, granting special effects like being able to use health potions more frequently or reducing damage from terrain traps. It's nice to have a customization element but the upgrades are pretty lackluster. The majority of them are straightforward upgrades like increased attack or defense, and even then they don't feel like significant boosts to your skills. The skill tree needs something more impactful to make it actually feel rewarding.
 
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The platforming side of the game is pretty solid at least, though there's not much else to say about it. It goes through the typical Metroidvania upgrades—double jump, dash, break boulders, etc.—which are always fun to get, but there isn't much that distinguishes 8Doors from the myriad other Metroidvanias out there. There are some tricky platforming challenges, and the aforementioned "just trying to survive to the next checkpoint" feel of the game applies to the platforming just as much as the combat system, but there's not much to wow you here.
 
The game's striking hand-drawn animation and limited three-color palette are quick to jump out at you when you start playing. The afterlife of 8Doors isn't quite fire and brimstone, nor is it a flashy landscape—purgatory is appropriately bleak and foreboding, with rich splashes of red thrown in to highlight dangers and points of interest. The artwork feels maybe too simple at times, but there's definitely personality here. The soundtrack isn't quite as successful. The subdued music might suit a purgatory setting, but it makes for a pretty forgettable audio adventure.
 
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The game takes around eight hours to finish, though that can change depending on how much you struggle with the game's tougher challenges and bosses, and of course whether or not you complete everything needed for the alternate ending. The length feels about right and the game doesn't overstay its welcome. However, even with multiple weapons and a customizable skill tree, 8Doors feels lacking in replay value.
 
8Doors: Arum's Afterlife Adventure is a solid Metroidvania, though it struggles to stand out in a pretty jam-packed genre. The hand-drawn art and Korean folklore influence add some great personality to the game, but the core combat and platforming mechanics are fine at best and pretty monotonous at worst. Die hard fans of the genre might enjoy another take on the familiar gameplay elements, while anyone else probably won't be won over by the game's lack of depth.
 
Rating: 7 out of 10 Souls
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