Death, Jr. Preview

PSP Marked For Death

See DJ and his scythe in action in the second official Death, Jr. trailer.

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Death, Jr. was one of the first titles announced for the Sony PSP, but it didn't manage to show up for the PSP launch in March. It's almost done now though, and it's scheduled for release by Konami in August. We recently got our hands on a copy of Death, Jr. and spent some time exploring this oddball, Burton-esque adventure from Backbone Entertainment.

Death Jr., known to his friends as DJ, is the mischievous son of the Grim Reaper. DJ goes on a field trip to the museum one day and wanders off with a group of friends, including Pandora, a troublesome and impulsive girl; Seep, a rude boy who lives in a vat of some sort of liquid; Stigmartha, a brainy girl with stigmata that appear when she gets nervous; Smith and Weston, a set of brainy conjoined twins that like to work with gadgets; and Dead Guppy, who is… a dead guppy. In a cutscene that looks like something from The Nightmare Before Christmas, Pandora finds an ancient box that she wants to open. When she can't get it open, DJ helps out with his trusty scythe by slicing the lock off the box, which of course unleashes unspeakable evil upon the world. Specifically, the evil power is Moloch, a necromancer who creates warp portals throughout the museum. Hordes of demons travel through these portals and begin invading various locales throughout the world. Not only that, but Moloch also shatters the souls of all of DJ's friends and scatters the pieces in various locations, such as a school, suburbia, and a place called Meat World. It's up to DJ to defeat the demons and return his friends to normal before Death, Sr. finds out what his son has done this time.

Death Jr. has to find the pieces of his friends' souls and get rid of all the demons before his dad finds out.

Before heading off to collect the pieces of his friends' souls, DJ can practice some moves in beginner and advanced training areas in the museum. Here, you can get used to the controls and learn how to use DJ's scythe to climb walls, slide on cables, swing from rafters, activate switches, and hack enemies to bits with powerful combos. In addition to the scythe, DJ also comes equipped with a pair of pistols. DJ moves using the analog stick, jumps with the X button, uses his scythe with the square button, fires his ranged weapon with the circle button, and performs a quick dodge with the triangle button. You can strafe by holding down the R button, and the L button resets the camera behind DJ's back. The directional pad is used to change guns. Although the game requires you to use every button on the PSP, the controls still feel intuitive and easy to master. However, we did notice that it isn't very easy to switch guns on the fly, since you have to take your thumb off the analog stick to use the D pad, which means you can't move as you change guns. This can be frustrating, since you'll often run out of ammo or need to switch to more-powerful guns while fighting a big group of enemies, which is a bad time to stand still and fumble with the D pad.

DJ has to run, jump, slice, and shoot his way through several wacky stages.

As you run around, the camera usually stays close behind DJ, but if you suddenly change direction, the camera won't follow. You can tap the L button to snap the camera back behind DJ's back, which works pretty well for the most part, but in confined areas it's sometimes difficult to see what's going on around you. Luckily, you can lock on to enemies by holding the R button, which also lets you strafe around them. However, once you are locked on one target, you can't quickly switch to another target, which can make it difficult, as sometimes you'll auto-lock on an inanimate object while a huge beast chucks fireballs at you.

Speaking of beasts, there are plenty of them in Death, Jr. You'll often be fighting five or six enemies at a time. Some will rush you and attack head-on, while others will shoot at you from afar. Every time you kill an enemy you automatically collect its soul, which you have to use to open up doors that Moloch has placed throughout each level to impede your progress. Since the enemies spawn often, souls are never in short supply--as long as you're able kill the enemies to reap those souls.