Master Key
The Summer of Demos : Day Eight
Tiny fox, whopping great key.
After falling into a torch lit cave, you stumble around pushing blocks until you find a giant key. That’s your main weapon in the game, functionally a sword and no help against any locked doors you may find (although I expect it to be Chekov’s Key near the end of the full game). From there, an exit opens up and you’re free to wander the world as you please. There’s a town full of other creatures where you can listen to the soundtrack, buy key and healing items and fall asleep if you leave your fox idling for long enough, but the rest of the world is a far less welcoming place.
With a few exceptions, the majority of enemies in Master Key’s demo are other animals. Axolotls take the place of the Zora, spitting spheres at you from afar; Crocodiles and Rabbits run at you; and Birds swoop down at you. Outside of the animal kingdom are Slimes that jump up and stomp on you with a rather large damage radius, as well as Kabu-like (from Kirby) heads in the demo’s dungeon that you can only kill by pushing off the edge. Worst of all are the frogs, who jump in the water and swim away if you get too close. I just wanted to chat, guys!
I died a lot in my two hours wandering Master Key’s world and the first dungeon, not helped by the fact that opening up the map doesn’t pause the game. There are a couple of save points marked by arches in the world, but they’re quite spread out so I found myself waking back up in the town quite a few times. Not sure if the game has a shield, but it does have an Easy Mode where you take less and deal more damage. Think I’ll pass on the Hard Mode.
If the default Black & White is burning a hole in your retinas, you can swap at any time to a different two-tone colour palette in the options menu, with some being conjured up by the game’s Kickstarter backers. Considering the freedom you have to tweak your palette, I find it strange that the easy mode appears to be locked to one. Also in the menu is the jukebox and a robust nonogram minigame. There are 50 nonograms available to play at any point in the demo from the main menu.
A Zelda-like where you play as a fox that’s light on the written word, Tunic is going to come up. Where that game was a full-colour isometric adventure with a lot of love for instruction booklets, Master Key is a lot simpler, with a top-down perspective, “1-bit” graphics and not even a conlang to be found on old signs, although interesting in its own right. You talk to people by approaching them and reading the text bubble filled with pictograms and emoji that pops up. Indeed, the only text outside of the title is the end of demo message.
Also different is developer Achromi’s emphasis on progression in the vein of Metroidvanias. Before you come across enemies for the first time, you’ll pass by two types of blockade you can’t destroy yet : a cracked rock that you will break by the end of the demo, and a wooden stump blocking a path, as well as piles of sticks that you can’t touch. Clearly, you’ll be able to come back later in the game to destroy that wood. Earning the gold to be able to crack rocks was a tough task early on, so be sure not to spend all your money on pears when you go shopping. If you’re interested in playing a game in the vein of classic Zelda, look no further than Master Key.
In a word : key.
Master Key is a top-down adventure game developed and published by Achromi for the Nintendo Switch and PC via Steam. At the time of writing it is on sale for 20% off. There is also a developer-sanctioned fan demake in development for the Playdate.
This article is part of the Summer of Demos series, where I’ll be releasing a Demo Diving preview article each day in July. If you liked this article, be sure to share it with a friend or enemy. If you back me on Patreon, you get access to articles one day before they release anywhere else. If we reach £25/month before the end of July, I’ll extend the Summer of Demos into August.