The next sequel to Orcs Must Die! offers brisk, fun gameplay and plenty of room for experimentation and strategy. Unfortunately, it requires a lot of patience.
After years of the series feeling running in place, the roguelite and hero-based approach to Orcs Must Die’s decade-old tower-defense formula feels perfect. Deathtrap is a return to form with much-appreciated new twists like 4-player co-op, upgradable traps, hero abilities, and much bigger maps. Although the barricade limit is a solid deal-breaker, Deathtrap feels and plays like a solid Orcs Must Die! game and finally feels like a proper step forward for a series that felt like it was doomed to be forever chasing past successes.
A fantastic addition to the franchise that takes what 1-3 built upon and makes a replayable masterpiece with interesting characters and amazing enemy scaling that will keep you coming back and trying different spots and different traps.
Orcs Must Die Deathtrap is a fun roguelike take on the OMD formula. Unlike a traditional OMD where you go through a campaign and then repeat with some difficulty tweaks, in this format you do runs that involve playing on a different map each mission, picking from different negative modifiers, and getting buffs each wave. I've put in just under 200 hour as of the time of writing this review. Mostly with two teammates but probably 50 hours or so solo. It's all viable especially since the enemies stagger a bit more solo and you get more barricades. The game can feel pretty slow to start on the lowest difficulty which I think can turn people off of the game. They made it so you can up the difficulty right away so I'd recommend doing an initial run on 0 and then upping it to like difficulty 2 pretty quickly. The weakest part of this game is the start. The tutorial videos aren't the best and then you launch into a large map where enemies slowly get to you. Thankfully there has been a lot of feedback given already on that and some new small maps are coming soon to help with the flow of first getting started. I think the new way they handle barricades is actually good and many of the reviews are dramatically overreacting. It's different so people freak out. You start out with a bunch of free barricades now and then can get more via threads, via skipping threads, and by using the rift barricade trap. I've seen people who get over 100 of the free to use ones in a run. It's a good format that helps keeps runs varied instead of just zig zagging enemies forever on maps. All of the characters are pretty interesting. Some absolutely need buffs to be viable higher difficulty options but they are all pretty fun. My favorite is Kalos. Being able to launch yourself across the map in order to take out priority targets is really fun and rewarding. There is also plenty of content coming. All future maps will be free. There is a new character coming this month that will also be free. A more traditional endless is coming too. There is a lot in the works and the devs do listen to feedback and are clearly working hard to continue to improve the game. I've had a blast and would easily recommend this game
Orcs Must Die! Deathtrap brings a breath of fresh air that has been absent from the series in recent years. With better optimization and more content in the form of new Warmages, traps, maps and modes it could easily become one of the best entries in the series.
Death Trap proves that the series' basic formula is still a hell of a lot of fun. The moments of triumph, when your traps work in perfect sync, or when you throw an orc into a lava pit and watch it bounce off the saw blades, are still just as satisfying as they were a decade ago.
Orcs Must Die! Deathtrap's roguelite spin on the action-tower defense series works pretty well. Even if most of its traps and endless parade of highly killable enemies are carried over from past games, the new Warmages' abilities and the combined impact of its randomized modifiers can really shake things up nicely for quite a few runs.
The introduction of a roguelike element in Orcs Must Die! Deathtrap results in a somewhat contradictory fusion. Setting up a defence with traps and tearing apart entire columns of Orcs remains highly entertaining, especially with friends, with constant pressure forcing you to adjust your strategy, wave by wave, map by map. However, progression through the levels is inconsistent and outside of combat it's simply uninteresting. Even so, Orcs Must Die! Deathtrap offers many good moments of gameplay, if its slow progression doesn't bore you.
I don’t know who Orcs Must Die! is for, and I’m not sure Robot Entertainment does either. Anyone new to the series is at a massive disadvantage, and existing fans are going to be scratching their heads. This series might’ve put Robot Entertainment on the map, but what they’re doing here isn’t their future. I used to love these titles — I still love the first two — but even if this mess is the result of an unfortunate series of mistakes made with the best intentions, that still doesn’t mean it’s a good experience.
Amazing game, best Orcs Must Die game since Orcs Must Die 2!! If you played 4-5 hours you will start to see how great it is. If you only play 1 or 2 rounds you won't see how good it is. Nice improvement from Orcs 3.
Pretty rough, overall. I wouldn't say any of the design or mechanics feel good to engage with. Feels like it would be a big grind to proceed through the levels and upgrades. Its possible some fun sessions could be had with friends.
So did they just say "screw our fans"? This is a far cry from number 1 and 2. This is slop. The story is horrendous. The traps are uninspired. The characters? Well let's just say you can tell they were made in the trashy DEI generation. I'll stick with the original 2 games if I want to play, not this slop.
SummaryOrcs Must Die! Deathtrap combines chaotic third-person combat with devious trap-laying strategy. Enjoy endless replayability as your War Mage grows stronger with every battle. Repel relentless orc hordes solo or with up to 4 players.