Crypt Custodian combines Metroidvania exploration, broom-based combat and progression through new abilities in an interconnected afterlife filled with ghosts, secrets and dungeons.
Synopsis
Crypt Custodian follows Pluto, a mischievous cat who has just died and finds himself sentenced to become the afterlife’s janitor for eternity.
In this new world, he meets other banished ghosts, explores a vast territory and confronts the creatures inhabiting it.
His new existence as a custodian therefore leads him to clean up the afterlife while traveling through its regions, battling monsters and gradually uncovering the secrets of this strange environment.
Trailer
Overview
Developed by Kyle Thompson and published by Kyle Thompson, Top Hat Studios and H2 Interactive Co., Ltd., Crypt Custodian is a video game released on August 27, 2024. The platforms listed in this entry are PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch and PC. The associated genres are action, adventure, RPG, platforming and indie. The specified game mode is Single player and the engine listed is GameMaker Studio 2.
Crypt Custodian takes the form of a top-down Metroidvania action-adventure game. Pluto explores the vast lands surrounding the afterlife palace, organized as an interconnected world containing side paths, dungeons, hidden areas and passages that become accessible through new abilities.
The world can be explored relatively freely. Exploration allows players to choose different routes, search for secrets and return to previously visited regions when new skills open up additional possibilities.
Pluto mainly fights with his broom, used as a melee weapon. Combat combines direct attacks, quick movement and dodging against creatures, some of which also use projectiles.
The combat system remains closely tied to mobility. Many encounters require moving around enemies, avoiding their attacks and then taking advantage of openings to respond with the broom or abilities obtained during the adventure.
Some skills directly change movement and interaction possibilities. Pluto can notably obtain a broom projectile capable of reaching distant targets or switches.
Later upgrades expand this same ability. It eventually becomes possible to teleport to the location reached by the projectile, changing combat, movement and exploration at the same time.
Other powers allow different interactions with the environment, including the use of a ghostly double in certain puzzles or digging passages underground.
Progression also includes numerous equippable upgrades. The player can combine several effects to adapt Pluto’s abilities, with some directly increasing health or damage while others more significantly alter combat behavior.
The number of upgrades that can be used simultaneously depends on the available points. Exploring more of the world therefore gradually expands the possibilities for customization.
Special attacks complement these upgrades. They operate with a cooldown and can produce different offensive or defensive effects, such as temporarily protecting Pluto or attacking enemies from a distance.
The dungeons and different regions combine combat with environmental puzzles. Solving them allows players to obtain new abilities or upgrades that then help open additional sections of the map.
Battles against bosses also make use of the movement and attack abilities acquired up to that point. They mainly require understanding enemy movements, avoiding attacks and identifying opportunities to move back into close range.
The other ghosts encountered during exploration also play a role in the game’s structure. Pluto can talk with them, learn about the circumstances of their deaths and meet them again at the Sinner’s Inn, which notably serves as a gathering place and allows equipment to be upgraded.
This structure directly links exploration and progression: discovering new areas makes it possible to meet characters, collect upgrades, defeat bosses and obtain abilities that in turn make other parts of the world accessible.
Crypt Custodian therefore builds its Metroidvania structure around a largely interconnected space where Pluto’s powers simultaneously affect combat, puzzles and navigation. The broom forms the basis of combat, while abilities and upgrades gradually expand the available possibilities.
Crypt Custodian structures its progression around a vast interconnected afterlife in which new abilities gradually provide access to more paths, secrets and areas.
Combat mainly relies on Pluto’s broom and mobility, while the powers obtained throughout the adventure add further possibilities both during encounters and exploration.
The upgrade system also makes it possible to combine different effects and adapt the character’s abilities, while puzzles, bosses and dungeons provide some of the new skills required to continue exploring.
The game therefore combines action, exploration and Metroidvania-style progression within a structure where acquired abilities directly change the way the world is traversed and interpreted.