"Rest In Paperwork."
Long before Death had an extensive payroll of posthumous office workers to help in his labors, he did things the old-fashioned way, pruning the dead one soul at a time.
And there were a lot of souls.
Over time, Death grew weary of his job, and his “scythe elbow” got worse. His solution? To create Death Inc. and have the Sorrows - powerful death spirits responsible for causing and overseeing different kinds of deaths - go and do all of the busywork for him. The plan worked perfectly: they collected the souls, and all he had to do was sit back and stamp the documents brought to his desk…
Only to get slowly burnt out as he became subsumed by a tidal wave of postmortem paperwork.
You see, once Death got too busy to oversee them directly, the Sorrows let the power go to their heads. They grew arrogant in their positions and began completely ignoring company protocols to brag about how many souls they could reap. This led to them intentionally flowing more souls than necessary and going well beyond the quotas needed, causing havoc in the living world - and Death Inc. to strain under the workload.
With the world and company in chaos (and his plans for a vacation in Bora Bora rapidly disappearing), it's up to the Reaper to grab his scythe and take his company back from the Sorrows, one swing at a time.
Have A Nice Death is a side-scrolling 2D Platforming Roguelite by French creators Magic Design Studios, the creators of Unruly Heroes; in the vein of Hollow Knight and Dead Cells, Death must hack and slash through a hauntingly whimsical world, using his trusty scythe and an arsenal of dark magic. The game entered Early Access on March 8th, 2022, and the full version released on March 22, 2023; it can be found on Steam
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Not to be confused with the trope of the same name.
Have A Nice Death includes examples of the following tropes:
- 20 Minutes into the Future: If the lore entries are to be believed (specifically Harriet's entry), then the game takes place somewhere in the 22nd Century.
- Addiction-Powered: Maxxx, the Sorrow in charge of the Addictions Department, fights you and teleports by pumping a syringe that's lodged in his chest
- Allegorical Character: Each Sorrow embodies a particular aspect of their department.
- Gordon Grimes, Sorrow of Industrial Pollution, is a giant mass of tar/oil with a sleazy personality.
- Hector Krank, Sorrow of Physical Illness, is a Mad Scientist crab - an odd choice, until you remember what the crab represents in horoscopes...and see his Red Right Hand and eye covered/swollen with tumor-like corruption.
- Lesser known is a bacteria called CRAB, also known as Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii, found in mud and water. This can cause infections in blood, urinary tract, lungs, wounds, and other body parts.
- Maxxx, Sorrow of Addictions, is a crazed, masked humanoid, powered by his substance abuse.
- Major Warren Pliskhan, Sorrow of Modern Warfare, is a crazed army general obsessed with weaponry and mass destruction.
- Waldo, Sorrow of Toxic Food-Processing, is the mascot of a fast food company who cares more about the unchecked growth of the franchise over the well being of its customers, preferring that they keep buying their unhealthy food until they drop dead from heart failure or other related complications of obesity.
- Ms. Catherine Imamura, Sorrow of Natural Disasters, is a water elemental with power over the weather.
- All Love Is Unrequited: Pump Quinn has an extremely obvious crush on Death, but he shows no interest in her.
- Animate Inanimate Object: Vengeful documents, pharmaceuticals and hangman's nooses are among the workforce of Death Incorporated.
- Badass Adorable: You wouldn't think the trope would apply to the Grim Reaper himself, but years of office work have shrunk him down to chibi proportions. They did not take away his skills with his scythe, and he's perfectly capable of showing his subordinates why he's the boss.
- Blob Monster: A good chunk of the work force of the Department of Industrial Pollution is comprised of sentient masses of tar, including the Sorrow, Gordon Grimes.
- Burger Fool: Waldo Burger is pretty heavily implied to be one of the worst examples to work for. The Handbook's second entry on the Sorrow implies that many call employees there "Waldo" just because they work there with few bothering to try and remember actual names.
- Crapsack World: While we don't see it, it can be pretty easy to assume Earth isn't doing too hot with the rampant pollution, wars and disease being spread by the Sorrows.
- Celestial Bureaucracy: Death, Inc. It used to be much better run, but after a change in management, the place has been thrown into general chaos.
- Clever Crows: Subverted. The Employee Handbook entry on the Crows mentions how clever living crows are, before going on to clarify that the ones roaming Death Inc are "alarmingly stupid".
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: The Sorrows are far more interested with competing with each other to see how many souls they can reap to care about the fact that they are reaping too many of them, overwhelming the rest of the workforce, including Death himself.
- Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Naturally, all employees of Death Inc. are revived should they be struck fatally. It's partially why the enemies and Sorrows continue to be bosses on subsequent runs. Even if they are blown up, melted, or consumed by their own pestilence, they'll be back in time for Death's next visit. This is also why the game is a Roguelite - killing Death isn't exactly going to do you a whole lot of good to begin with, let alone when he's your boss.
- Death Takes a Holiday: He really wants to, but the Sorrows throw a rather large monkey wrench into those plans.
- Defeat Equals Explosion: Defeated enemies explode.
- Early-Installment Weirdness: Candice the Cupcake was initially part of the addictions department (since sugar can be addictive) in pre release builds. Once the food processing dept. was added in the update/full release, she was moved since she fit there better. She's largely unchanged save for a slight Nerf to her speed and attack frequency most wouldn't notice.
- Everyone Has Standards: Death is generally unsympathetic, treats his employees poorly, and appears to take an active role in reaping souls, rather than merely coming for them when their lifespan has ended. The Employee Handbook shows how little the company cares about the human souls it's responsible for; one Sorrow wiped out an entire archipelago simply to audition for employment at Death Inc. All medical professionals are immediately recycled into Nursurions upon death. Even so, the lengths some of the Sorrows have gone to disgust even Death.
- He takes issue with Brad beating up other employees and the "dudebro" culture he's developing with Will Hung, not just the fact that Brad is totally ignoring his responsibilities.
- He is disgusted by what Grimes is doing to the planet in order to meet his quotas. This is especially noteworthy, since the Handbook notes Death was "not impressed" when a prospective candidate caused a tidal wave that annihilated an entire archipelago somewhere on Earth.
- He views the pandemic Hector has recently caused on Earth as a massive problem, and cites stopping it as one of the reasons he's there to beat the tar out of the crab. That being said, he redirects his anger to Hector's misuse of company equipment after noticing him smack his computer in frustration.
- Fictional Currency: Soulary, Prismium and Gold Ingots are the currencies of the game.
- Soulary is a common currency gained through standard gameplay, and is used in Various shops and also for upgrading weapons and spells.
- Prismium is a rare currency only found in certain floors, through specific contracts, or from an insanely rare drop and is used in buying more shop slots or transforming your scythe, Open one of the amulet lockers in mark’s shop as well as having the ability to buy anything regardless of Soulary cost.
- Gold ingots are slightly less rare, being found in Vault floors, dropped by big enemies, and gained upon death via the after action report. Gold ingots are used to purchase meta game upgrades such as new weapons and food items to find on your run, or more advanced contracts from Jocelyn.
- Genki Girl: Pump Quinn, Death's pumpkin-headed secretary; she's very cheerful, enjoys her job, and almost always has a smile on her face.
- Candice the Cupcake, a mid-boss in the Toxic Food Processing Department, weaponizes this; she darts around on a perpetual sugar high, moving at super speed with a constantly fish-eyed, happy expression on her face.
- Giant Enemy Crab: Hector, the Sorrow of Physical Illness. He's a gigantic, mutated crustacean, and he's got a mean streak every bit as ugly as he is.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: A common fixture on enemies, especially the bosses, combined with Red Eyes, Take Warning.
- Gone Horribly Right: Death unleashes the Sorrows because he's tired of reaping every single soul personally. They proceed to do their job so well that they make him almost completely obsolete; the only responsibility Death still has is personally rubber-stamping paperwork, and eventually he's tired of that, too, when the Sorrows start burying him with it.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Time and Life were the ones who convinced the Sorrows to overwhelm Death with paperwork in an attempt to force him out and leave Life the sole owner.
- The Grim Reaper: Our hero, everyone!
- This Is Gonna Suck: Most of the sorrows Death beats down have absolutely priceless looks on their faces while they’re begging for mercy. Special mention goes to both Major Warren Pliskhan right before his weapons misfire and nuke him to kingdom come, and Death as he realizes the elevator to his vacation is about to explode…With him right in front of it.
- Have a Nice Death: “Welcome to the afterliiife!”
- Harder Than Hard: Breakdown difficulty modifiers can be added to a run after beating the game on “Imminent Breakdown” for the first time. These are separated into 15 Breakdown Levels (Going from I to XV) with each level stacking upon one another. Breakdown XV is an absolute nightmare, and attempting it is tantamount to suicide, if the in game descriptor has anything to say:Your final hour is upon us. Have A Nice Death.
- He's Back!: After reaching his Rage Breaking Point, Death obliterates the paperwork swamping his office with Eye Beams before conjuring his iconic scythe and black robe, covering up the business suit he was previously wearing.
- Hidden Depths: Major Warren Pliskhin is caught playing with a ball when Death arrives, and is shown to be quite skilled with it, up to spinning it on the tip of his foot. He quickly collects himself once he notices his boss has arrived.
- Hide-and-Seek Horror: In life, Pump Quinn suffocated to death in a garbage bag while playing hide-and-seek.
- Hope Spot: Upon beating Major Warren Pliskhin for the first time, Death prepares to take the elevator that finally leads to his vacation. Then Time goes flying around the screen while cackling madly, disabling the elevator…which then explodes…with Death right in front of it. Rest In Paperwork. Afterwards, Death is incredibly unamused.
- Jacob Marley Apparel: Death Inc is made up primarily of undead mortals, and most of them have injuries reflecting how they died. Patrick has a knife through his head, probably launched from the lunch he tried to heat up in the nuclear reactor he worked at. Harriet has no skin, having died during a hang-gliding javelin-throwing accident. Mark has literally been decapitated, and lost a good bit of his body besides. Presumably he died in some kind of terrible car accident related to the food truck he drove when he was alive..
- Justified Tutorial: Death has been sitting behind a desk stamping papers for untold years. Harriet, Death Inc's fitness manager, stops him in his tracks in order to give him a physical at the start of the game.
- Lazy Bum: Brad, to Death's eternal chagrin. He's supposed to control the flow of souls entering the Hall of Eternity so that no one is overwhelmed by them, but he's more interested in posting selfies and playing paddle ball than actually doing his job. After defeating him a few times, he starts taking his job much more seriously as “Barnaby Proudfoot”…unless you defeat him in which case he switches back to slacking off.
- Lightning Bruiser: Candice. She fights by moving around the arena so fast it borders on teleportation, and her attacks come out just as fast.
- Macrogame: The game has a leveling system where, upon doing stuff like defeating enemies or sorrows, it does stuff like unlocking new items, giving you more Anima at the start of each run and letting you skip to certain bosses.
- Mean Boss: Downplayed. While What we see of Death's interactions with his employees is not particularly flattering to his managerial style. He does get a few Pet the Dog moments, showing genuine concern for his employees, and telling off the sorrows for not meeting “Morality Quotas”
- The Sorrows are no better than he is. In fact, they're probably worse, and unlike Death, they don't get any softening moments.
- Life is implied in the lore to be even worse as, while her management skills are stated to be far better than Death's, she thinks anyone taking a break or a vacation is being unprofessional. Nevermind the fact that her pushing production so hard is part of why Death has been so overworked and wanting a vacation.
- Meaningful Name: Multiple, with the on-the-noseness and subtlety varying greatly.
- Will Hung is Brad's Thanager; at first glance, he seems to be an office worker hanging from a noose, but Hung is actually the rope. Once you beat him up, he collapses, and the corpse gets up and walks away.
- Hector Krank, a crab with a particularly curmudgeonly and abrasive personality.
- The Thanager of the Department of Physical Illness, D. "King" Dengue, is a giant mosquito, and is named for Dengue Fever, a mosquito-borne illness.
- Mirror Boss: Major Warren Pliskhin to a degree, as a small nimble aspect of death who can fling projectiles obsessed with his duty, but also shows a desire to relax and goof off. More accurately reflected with Life’s battle, as her design and attacks mirror death’s, even using a few of his weapons.
- Must Have Caffeine: This appears to be in effect for most of Death, Inc's employees, but Death himself takes the java. The title screen and level transitions both show him holding a mug of Koffee, his scythe is rumored to be able to dispense it on demand, and most of the healing items are variations on different preparations of Koffee.
- Nominal Hero: Death is the protagonist and opposes the Sorrows, but only because they're burying him in paperwork and trying to take over his company. The way he treats his employees makes you wonder if the Sorrows have a valid reason for rebelling against him, and what we see of his reaping techniques imply he wasn't much nicer to the souls he collected.
- Noodle Incident: How Harriet, Joe and Mark died. Harriet's death concerned a "dramatic hang-gliding javelin-throwing contest," and left her skinless; Joe appears to have a hole in the back of his head that is completely unexplained; Mark made a living driving a food truck for a children's show, but met an end that left him decapitated and missing all but a small chunk of his torso.
- Ocular Gushers: Gordon Grimes doesn't just fall to his knees and melt, he falls flat on his belly, hands clasped and crying profusely, and melts in defeat.
- Pet the Dog: While Death is generally grumpy and treats his employees less than ideally, he does make a point of telling Patrick that nobody thinks he's a sap in the break room. He gets more of these moments throughout the game.
- In general, whenever Death confronts one of the Sorrows, he makes it a point to tell them that mortality quotas have not been met. He also seems to take issue with how the Sorrows are Mean Bosses, causing more death when they were made only to split his workload; even Death is appalled at the lengths they're willing to go to achieve this.
- Power Floats: Death floats around, dishing out an arsenal of powerful dark magic.
- Pumpkin Person: Pump Quinn, as the name indicates, has a pumpkin for a head.
- Punny Name: Tony O'Shah, Death Inc's health and safety inspector. His last name is a play on OSHA, a common acronym for America's Occupational Safety and Health Administration. One has to wonder about the exact details of his job, since all of his responsibilities involve people who are long-since deceased.
- Relieving the Reaper:
- Discussed. The Sorrows are actually very good at their jobs - too good; they wind up rendering their progenitor obsolete.
- In the true ending, Pump Quinn fills in for her boss when he finally gets his vacation.
- Ripped from the Headlines: Hector Krank, the Sorrow of Physical Illness, is responsible for a pandemic on Earth so bad that Death specifically cites stopping it as a reason why he's finally left his office. Remind you of anything?
- Sinister Scythe: It's a game about the Grim Reaper, and his obligatory scythe is right there next to his cowl and skull. It can cut through time, space, the elements, give off noxious fumes, summon lightning, and make a mean cup of coffee.
- Sleep-Mode Size: Partially at least. Death used to be the tall, dark, and Faceless figure we've all come to expect. Unfortunately, an untold amount of time atrophying behind his desk with nothing to do but stamp paperwork made him smaller and smaller physically. From a gameplay perspective, this is more accommodating to the evasive combat and movement style the game's core loop is built around.
- Spell Book: Death's Pitbook. It follows him around by flying, catalogues Death's kills, and is used in casting all of Death's magic based attacks. Fire arrows, poison bombs, meteor showers, it can do it all, provided you find the spells during a run.
- Status Infliction Attack: Certain weapons and curses:
- Poison does Damage Over Time to enemies inflicted with it, with the amount corresponding to the number of poison counters on it.
- Burn does less damage than poison, but it can spread to nearby enemies.
- Bleed does extra damage to any enemy that has a bleed counter on it when it's hit, with the base amount equal to the number of counters.
- Slow... slows.
- Arcane is applied in stacks, but they do nothing for the first four, but applying the fifth stack does quite a bit of damage and removes all arcane stacks applied on that enemy.
- Stuck freezes an enemy in time, temporarily preventing them from doing anything.
- Status Quo Is God: Just beating the Sorrows once doesn't seem to make the lesson stick, in order for the Rogue Like aspect to work, and because in-universe Death's business has a Death Is a Slap on the Wrist system going on.
- Brad is especially noticeable, as he will always bust out of his dudebro persona when defeated as a professional-looking Badass in a Nice Suit and fly off. He's the first major boss, and always reverts to his casual wear when you return. Death suspects it's because he'd rather not admit defeat on these repeat visits. Beat him enough times however, and he starts taking his job far more seriously, reinforcing the boss arena with metal detectors, and gaining far more lethal attacks, all while keeping his Nice suit on…until you beat him and he switches back to his dudebro outfit for a few runs.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: In general, when a large corporation with multiple divisions and quotas, there is typically going to be in-house competition and rivalries that will develop and try to go above and beyond the quotas. Thus, when Death divvies up the Sorrows to handle different kinds of ways to die, they start going above the call of duty and start taking way too many souls, which makes other divisions do the same so they don't look bad.
- Tom the Dark Lord: The Sorrows, powerful creatures created by Death to reap the souls of the living, have such intimidating names as Hector, Gordon, Maxxx and Brad.
- Ultimate Job Security: It doesn't seem to matter how much he disapproves of their leadership or how much they insult him; Death never thinks to just fire any of the Sorrows, despite presumably being able to do so.
- Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist: Death is shown to be quite a dick when it comes to doing his job in the intro, treating it as a grind he has to fill out, rather than taking peoples lives. In some cases, he seems to just go after healthy living people just to do that and is annoyed over making the choice to do it. It makes his struggle with getting a vacation, and thus - the Roguelite element, work. Cause he’s just as big a Mean Boss as the enemies, and the whole situation becoming worse is his own fault in the end.
- Voice Grunting: Characters have noises they make when speaking, Death in particular having a distinct sort of "nyeh" sound. Pump Quinn can be heard vaguely saying something like "sir, may I see you?" in the opening cinematic, though.
- Wake-Up Call Boss: Brad is the final obstacle before leaving the Hall of Eternity, and battles with hard hitting attacks and constant movement that can quickly bring an end to a run. That said...
- Warm-Up Boss: Brad's ultimately this, as his attacks have nowhere near as much screen coverage as the Sorrows after him. Until he brings out the big guns as “Barnabus Proudfoot” after beating him enough times.
- Was Once a Man: The workforce of Death Incorporated is comprised largely of deceased mortals recruited by the company- willingly or otherwise.
