Death and Taxes is a video game where you are a grim reaper tasked with choosing whether certain humans live or die. Your decisions have consequences though and you have Fate looking over your shoulder.
Fate is a being that is your boss and give you specific instructions that you must follow. Instructions can be as simple and only specify a certain number must die or be more complicated and reference the humans past, work, age, etc. You are given a set number of profiles for those that must be assigned life or death and the profiles have all the details you need to make your decisions.
Despite having instructions, there are still decisions to make and consequences for those decisions. It is possible to have other influences affect your decisions, be it the cat Lady Pawdington or mysterious voices in the mirror. Trends will also start to happen based on your choices. As I was playing, a financial crisis started to happen and one of my instructions was to make choices that could fix the crisis. You have a phone that gives you updates on the human world and how your decisions affected it, so your choices do matter to keep balance. And your choices are final so once you mark them, that is their fate.
The game plays out over 28 days with assessments happening periodically through out your time there. You will also be able to go and purchase items that can help you make decisions and see the impact they have on the world. These items are definitely key to being able to strategize as much as possible for whatever end you are striving for.
Overall, I found Death and Taxes really interesting and I definitely enjoyed playing it. I enjoy choices matter games and I like how the outcomes are not obvious in anyway, thus you don’t fully know what ending path you are on. You are also left to some moral decisions of whether you follow the instructions verbatim or if you take fate into your own hands. Plus the game is super easy to get in and start playing and the difficulty comes from strategy and decisions. If you enjoy the game Papers, Please you will enjoy Death and Taxes.
Do you enjoy choices matter games? Share your favorite with a comment below.
Funny you should mention Papers Please because that’s the kind of vibe I get from this game too.