I have no idea what the daily grind of being a medieval graveyard keeper actually entailed, but I somehow doubt it involved digging up bodies to appease an angry ghost and helping an Inquisitor hunt down witches. Thankfully, Lazy Bear Games wasn’t striving for accuracy when they developed Graveyard Keeper, or “the most inaccurate medieval cemetery management sim of the year.”
I’m not sure “inaccurate” goes far enough to describe the events of Graveyard Keeper, but after spending a few hours with the game, it’s weirdly absurd world is starting to grow on me.
Platforms: PC, Xbox One (Version Played)
Publisher: Devolver Digital
Developer: Lazy Bear Games
Genre: Medieval Cemetery Management Sim
Release Date: August 15, 2018
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+
How weird is Graveyard Keeper? One of your first tasks is to introduce yourself to a talking donkey. The donkey is surprised you can understand him, and he gifts you a freshly-deceased corpse. You take that corpse to the morgue and slice off a chunk of the body. You then trade “the meat” to the village bartender for a beer (which you need to loosen the tongue of a magical skull) and a promise to deliver a letter to the cranky blacksmith who lives next door. Naturally, the blacksmith has a job for you as well…
But I think the thing that surprised me most about Graveyard Keeper is that you’re not actually a medieval graveyard keeper. Instead, the game opens with a series of storyboards depicting the mundane modern life of a husband and father in the big city.
However, our protagonist is struck by a car crossing the street, and he wakes up in his medieval digs. Are “The Village,” “The Town,” and “Witch Hill” some type of purgatory? I don’t doubt it, but that’s probably a surprise for later in the game.
In between visits from the local Bishop and chatting with a restaurateur who seems a little too eager to get his hands on a few excess body parts, players will spend most of their time in Graveyard Keeper sprucing up the cemetery and crafting materials to expand the grounds. If you’re familiar with other life sims, this cycle of gathering, crafting, and building will probably feel very similar (though I doubt many other games in the genre ask players to slice up a dead body and sell the parts to desperate villagers).
A good cemetery manager also needs to know how to use a sword, and you’re given one very early in the game. But aside from battling a few Slimes behind the blacksmith’s house, there wasn’t much call for swordplay during Graveyard Keeper’s early hours. Though I did find it interesting that swinging a sword depletes your Stamina very quickly. Managing that meter during fights seems like it could get pretty tricky.
Keeping track of the many, many tasks you’re asked to perform after just a few hours as the graveyard keeper is a lot of work, and it feels very appropriate to the era (I guess Lazy Bear’s claims of inaccuracy weren’t entirely accurate). There’s a reason we throw around words like “The Dark Ages” and “The Black Death” to describe the centuries before the Renaissance, and putting the player to work (with an added dash of grinding pessimism) helps give Graveyard Keeper a very unique outlook.
Like most other life sims, Graveyard Keeper uses a pixelated palette to bring its world to life. The zoomed-out screen does a good job of showing off these sparkling sprites, and I’m a big fan of Lazy Bear’s artwork. I’m less thrilled with the tiny text employed by the game, but that seems to be a necessity for the dense menus you need to navigate to manage your inventory and a constantly-evolving tech tree.
I’m definitely going to continue toiling away at Graveyard Keeper. I don’t normally dabble in the life sim genre, but Graveyard Keeper’s unique setting and bizarre storyline have got me itching to know more.
Review Disclosure: A review copy of Graveyard Keeper was provided by Devolver Digital for the purposes of this review.
“A Few Hours With…” is a mini-review that offers a look at our preliminary thoughts about a game. An updated full review of Graveyard Keeper may be posted at a later date.
