Demon Quest ’85 (Playdate)

Demon Quest ’85 is not an RPG, despite is deceptive efforts to position it as one. The game banner depicts a battle between a knight and demon that wouldn’t look out of place in a role-playing game yet this doesn’t represent anything that actually occurs in Demon Quest ’85, the game’s official Playdate page lists it as an RPG to further the deception, and its creator even went on the official Playdate podcast to try and spin it as one. It does not feature character progression, abilities, equipment, or most any of the elements that would make an RPG player interested in a game claiming to be part of the genre. Instead, Demon Quest ’85 would be better described as a visual novel or adventure game with minor puzzle elements. Why it chose to be dishonest about its nature gets even stranger when you consider that it’s included in the Season 1 bundle of games that come free with the Playdate which contains other adventure games and visual novels, although perhaps it didn’t want to be directly compared to games that handled their ideas better.

Demon Quest ’85 has you playing as a teenager who found the Ars Goetia under their brother’s bed. This demonology tome tells the reader how they can summon demons safely in order to request their aid, but because you’re just a kid in the 1980s, your priorities are far different from ancient sorcerers. With part of your motivation being that summoning demons just sounds cool, you get to work seeing which rulers of Hell you can successfully bind, not so that they can make sweeping changes to your life, but so you can assist friends with mundane problems that seem much larger because you’re still in high school. While the demons are busy killing and torturing people for power in their realm, you call them to Earth because one of your friends had their secret crush revealed, their pack of cigarettes confiscated, or they’re just doing really bad in Geography class.

This deliberate contrast is pretty much Demon Quest ’85’s main appeal. The petty problems of a modern teenager contrasted with the ongoing centuries-old wars of demons is its main source of humor, the demons you summon making bold proclamations and using fanciful prose while the teens who are present at the ritual don’t seem to take it seriously at all and are more concerned with the lost cat they hope the demon can find. In some ways, juxtaposing these two can also make the squabbles of the demon realm seem equally juvenile, all the posturing and promises of torment feeling a little insignificant when the conflict has been raging for ages and whatever ground is seemingly gained has done little to alter the hierarchy of Hell. Demon Quest ’85 isn’t very long though, a run through the story taking an hour or so, the game not always giving itself room to evolve these demonic interactions beyond the basic recycled idea of having one very serious character be undermined or pushed around by the teens who are manifesting it in the mortal plane.

To summon a demon though, it ends up important to consult the Ars Goetia and find what it likes. Most of the rituals have three vital components to get right: music, an offering, and the people present. While each demon has a page explaining what it is and its position in Hell, it also hints at how to arrange the ritual components properly, although calling them hints might be a little generous. Certain segments of the text are written in bold letters, drawing your attention to it and often practically spelling out the proper way to invoke the demon. If it says the demon likes the singing of a chorus of angels, you go and look at your limited music options and really only find one that fits that bill. If it says in bold the demon likes salted meat, well, your cabinet full of food only has beef jerky to fit that bill. At least the three teenage friends you bring with you to the ritual can be a bit more work to figure out. Your yearbook contains a short profile about who they are and what their main concern is, and while the Ars Goetia can still sometimes be too direct in saying a demon helps people find lost things and thus anyone with a lost item is a good fit for that ritual, some conditions are a bit less directly stated to at least make you ponder which three people you bring with you. At least the menus for selecting these offerings take on the appearance of an ominous house exterior on a stormy night, again leaning into how little the gravitas of a night of summoning Hell’s rulers weighs on the minds of the young characters.

Once you’ve easily discovered the required music and offerings and figured out the three people you wish to accompany you, you start making some of the choices that can actually change the course of the narrative. One of your friends must be the conduit for the demon, meaning even if they had an issue the demon could solve, they won’t be able to petition it because they are serving as its voice on Earth. Even after that choice, you’ll only be able to solve one of the issues of the group. Sometimes two characters may have an argument that technically means you can ask the demon to mediate, although it will again lead to a choice you make that will help one but displease the other. Mostly, these limits just mean you’ll have to start a new file if you want to see how the other issues would be resolved, and while the others will react even if you’re not helping them directly, the personalities aren’t often too strong so the motivations to replay the game and try different combinations are light.

What can be a bit more impactful are choices made in regards to aiding the very demons you’re summoning. Their conflict in Hell can be nudged in different directions by giving them advice or using your control over a demon to give it a command. In fact, because sometimes one demon will give you a vital piece of information for summoning a different one, the game does lock you a bit into following a nearly set order for the rituals, meaning even the ones that didn’t seem like they gave away the whole puzzle are actually just withholding information. You won’t ever see Hell or its demons beyond the illustrations in your demonic tome, but ultimately the game’s ending will change a bit based on how you tried to influence the power struggles and respond when it comes to a head. Across the multiple endings though, Demon Quest ’85 seems to promise a gameplay idea that sounds a lot more interesting than casual demon summons with fairly easy puzzles, which unfortunately also indicates the game is over and there’s nothing left to do but potentially replay it and see if the other valid sets of teenage summoners might get a new chuckle or two out of you.

THE VERDICT: Demon Quest ’85 has the occasionally effective joke of having the simple adolescent problems of crushes and school contrasted with the wars between demons in Hell, the joke sometimes running a little thin but the commitment to it at least can lead to some little bits of fun absurdity. However, it’s not quite strong enough to make up for how basic many interactions can still feel, especially since most of the game’s puzzle-solving angle is undermined by the bold text in the demonic tome essentially telling you exactly what to do. Replaying it to see slightly different routes isn’t very satisfying because of how shallow the changes are on top of the rituals already being too basic. Its humor tries to carry it, but it can’t get it very far even in this hour long visual novel.

And so, I give Demon Quest ’85 for Playdate…

A BAD rating. Demon Quest ’85 gives away too much of the game when it decided to have the important parts of the Ars Goetia written in bold. There are so many offerings in the kitchen, but most just exist for you to ignore as you try and find the one that exactly matches what that bold text said. The music feels even less like a puzzle since it has fewer options, but even when looking through the yearbook for the three teenagers to accompany you, it still feels like it can’t present its information with too much subtlety. If a character doesn’t sound like they’re a good fit for a demon ritual, they aren’t, and there are a few others where it will be more clearly spelled out so they can match some of the key words over in the tome. As a result, Demon Quest ’85 almost feels like it’s only appeal will be the writing during its visual novel elements. It can tickle the reader to see a great demon who speaks so highly of their power be reduced to solving inconsequential problem that some adolescents treat like they are truly the most important issues in the world, but when the issues are shallow and the characters intentionally shallow, it also makes most of the jokes arise from the same lack of reverence for the demons or the demons scoffing at the humans and their squabbles. Even influencing the path of the demonic wars feels like it mostly builds up to that promise of a more exciting adventure that Demon Quest ’85 elects to use as a cliffhanger rather than a second stage of this adventure, but the number in the title is supposedly meant to indicate already there could be plans for a sequel rather than it just priming you to treat the story as one set in the 80s.

There simply isn’t enough substance in this initial outing for it properly hook a player though, and while some people may be kinder to it because it was included alongside around 20 other games with the system, it really feels like it would have floundered on its own and definitely would have failed to find such an accommodating audience with its RPG trickery. Nailing down genres can be difficult at times admittedly, but with Demon Quest ’85 seemingly only able to claim that you assemble a party of characters to put it in that genre, it feels disingenuous to accept that label, especially since that “party” is really just a way of solving a puzzle. While someone with broad tastes such as myself won’t be too bothered if the game’s genre isn’t what it claims, Demon Quest ’85 still misses the mark no matter what type of mark it was actually trying to hit.