Meet Your Maker Review: Mario Maker Meets Doom

Look, I love video games as much as the next person; they’ve pretty much been an obsession of mine for the past 30 years. I’d be lying, though, if I said that as a medium, it constantly throws up new concepts that excite me. Over the last few years especially, it feels like gaming has become more about iterating on genres and gameplay loops that have come before, and I get it. The longer an industry persists, the more and more difficult it becomes to come up with an idea that feels genuinely new and fresh.

That’s why Meet Your Maker seemed massively exciting to me when it was first revealed. The latest effort from Dead By Daylight developer Behaviour Interactive Inc, the game looked like an incredible mish-mash of ideas, pulling from the post-apocalyptic wastelands of Mad Max, sprinkling on a little bit of intense FPS action that resembled Doom, all while placing a huge focus on user-generated content and levels similar to Nintendo’s beloved Mario Maker series. It was a product that looked like it was going to bring something truly fresh to the FPS space, and I’m happy to say that, for the most part, Behaviour Interactive Inc. has nailed its whacky vision.

Narratively Bankrupt

Right off the bat, I was intrigued by Meet Your Maker’s narrative setup. Within moments of booting it up, I was greeted by a monstrosity contained in a test tube named the Chimaera, who explained that humanity had been almost entirely eradicated by a disease, and in order to turn the tides on the horrible fate humanity had suffered, I, a Custodian, was being tasked with raiding the wastelands for a substance referred to as Genmat. By offering Genmat to the Chimaera and an anonymous band of misfits who inhabit the base on which she has been contained, I’m told she will grow stronger. The catch? To get my hands on this precious resource, I was going to have to venture into bases infested with murderous bandits and all other sorts of deformed creations.

I was genuinely eager to discover more about this world, the Chimaera, the people assisting her, and the disease which was responsible for the downfall of humanity. However, this is probably one of the few major areas where Meet Your Maker entirely drops the ball. See, once you make your way past the introductory cut-scenes and gain this initial background, that’s pretty much it in terms of narrative. No further detail or plot beats follow in any capacity whatsoever. As I returned Genmat to the Chimaera by the bucketload, I was incredibly disappointed to repeatedly discover that none of my return trips would result in further plot revelations, or even an acknowledgment of the impact my efforts in delivering Genmat were having. I should add that I’ve spent a ton of time with Meet Your Maker, so it also isn’t a case of not having put enough hours in. There’s just simply no story to speak of, and it’s hugely disappointing that the intriguing world that gets established in those opening moments isn’t explored any further.

A Hell Of A Gameplay Hook

While the narrative may be lacking, Meet Your Maker’s gameplay is anything but. An eclectic mix of FPS raiding mixed with base building, I’ve spent a heap of hours exploring Meet Your Maker’s addictive systems, and fully intend on dedicating plenty more to them.

Looking at the raiding side of the equation first, Meet Your Maker tasks players with raiding trap-laden and enemy-infested outposts in search of that precious Genmat. Trap variety is plenty varied, with spike traps, crushing pistons, flesh-melting laser grids, and deadly cubes that spit out charged beams of death being just some of the dastardly contraptions you’ll find yourself navigating around. There are enemies to contend with as well, and while they themselves aren’t the most threatening of foes to grace the FPS genre, each encounter carries a huge risk due to the singular hit it takes to die. I’m not exaggerating; get hit once by either a trap or an enemy, and that’s it. Back to the beginning of the outpost you go.

At first, I thought this was maybe overly punishing, but having spent considerable time raiding the wastelands, I’m now of the view that Meet Your Maker would be a considerably worse experience if you could soak up any amount of damage. Each run is fraught with tension, the knowledge that one wrong step could spell doom as you weigh up whether to sprint for the Genmat and hope that your pace will see you through, or, instead, methodically crawl through an outpost, slowly taking out each trap and enemy. Adding further to the drama is the weapon system, with each gun that it’s possible to equip coming with limited ammo that needs to be collected directly from the enemies or traps you’ve just eliminated if you want to reload your weapon for the remainder of the run. As you unlock more weapons, the amount of ammo you have access to at the start can increase, but it’ll always be a finite resource. It’s another inspired design choice, and it can be downright terrifying to realize that you’ve just spent the last of your ammo taking out enemies, knowing that pressing on without recovering it could spell death if you encounter more hidden surprises, but also knowing that recovering it could also spell death because, well, you may encounter more hidden surprises.

If the difficulty factor sounds offputting, you’ll perhaps take solace in knowing that you can bring a friend along for the ride, as both the building and raiding portions of the game can be enjoyed entirely in co-op. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the opportunity to experience the multiplayer madness that Meet Your Maker offers, but it’s clear that it almost acts as a difficulty slider in a way, as suddenly you’re blessed with double the firepower and the chance to be revived should you go down. I don’t expect that I’ll delve much into the co-op side of the game due to how much I enjoy the tension of exploring outposts alone, but it’s great to see the developers include it as an option for those that don’t want to go it solo.

What makes Meet Your Maker even more addictive is knowing that no two runs ever feel the same due to each outpost being entirely user generated. This is where the base building comes in, as every player has access to a set of expansive, yet accessible, building tools that lets them create all manner of nightmare-infested labyrinths, and it’s these death-filled mazes that you’ll be exploring while out raiding. Not only is building an outpost just outright fun, but it also allows you to passively generate Genmat while you yourself go about exploring the wastelands. I always got a kick out of returning from my runs and getting the notifications that other players had died in my outpost, knowing that another player had fallen to my own personal creation. In a nice touch, it’s| also possible to explore your own outposts following these player deaths, enabling you to not only see where they died but also allowing you to pick up any crafting materials they dropped. It’s a great little mechanic that encourages the likes of me, someone who usually stays away from base building and sandbox mechanics in games, to dive right in and toy around with something I’d probably have otherwise overlooked.

But Why Though

You might be reading this and find yourself asking, “But why, though?”. And, honestly, it’s a valid question, as failing to click with the core of raiding and building may leave the whole experience feeling rather pointless. There are progression systems to propel the player along and motivate them, with the various materials and Genmat that you’ll collect on your travels all feeding into vendors that will gradually unlock a greater arsenal of traps, enemies, armored suits, and weapons for you to play around and build with. But, even at that, progression can feel somewhat hollow as you’re really not progressing for any other reason than to be able to raid and build outposts more efficiently. There’s no endgame here, nothing to ultimately work towards, and, while I haven’t hit that point, if things keep headed in the direction they’re headed in, I’ll eventually just be collecting Genmat for the sake of it.

Taking all that into consideration, I think whether or not someone sticks with Meet Your Maker for the long haul is going to largely come down to how much of a kick you get out of simply coming back to see what crazy new content the community has come up with, or whether or not you can tackle the hardest outposts on offer, which, I should add, are easy to access due to the intuitive way Meet Your Maker categorizes outpost difficulty, basing it on how packed an outpost is with traps and enemies. I’m totally fine with this, after all, I still dip into Mario Maker 2 on a regular basis just to experience the wilder side of the community, but, as many are, if you’re someone who thrives off of progression and a sense of always having a meaningful goal to work towards, I question whether you’ll find much to stick around for here once the initial novelty has worn off.

Optimized To Death

It’d be doing a disservice to the developers if I didn’t touch on the stellar job they’ve done with optimizing Meet Your Maker. In a year where PC gaming has, at times, become a meme due to the consistently shoddy ports which seem to land on PC, Meet Your Maker has been nothing short of a treat. That performance extends to the Steam Deck, where, due to how damn well the game seems to scale, I carried out my entire review playthrough. Honestly, I was blown away by how well it runs on the Steam Deck, with silky smooth framerates of 60fps being entirely possible when switching to a mixture of high and medium settings. It also helps that the Steam Deck feels like the perfect place to play Meet Your Maker; the building controls are accessible and feel great, and the short time investment of each run means it’s a title that’s perfect for picking up in a portable form factor and dipping into here and there.

Conclusion

Despite the shallow narrative and somewhat redundant progression systems giving rise to doubts about the overall mass-market appeal, there’s no denying that Behaviour Interactive Inc. has absolutely stuck the landing here with Meet Your Maker. The tension fuelled raiding, accessible base building, and a steady stream of new content coming in via the user-generated levels result in a package that’s fiendishly addictive and incredibly difficult to put down. If you aren’t someone who needs a constantly dangling carrot on a stick to chase, and, like myself, still find gameplay to be king, then this is one trip to the wastelands you certainly won’t want to miss.

Final Verdict: 4/5

Available On: PC (reviewed), PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X: Publisher: Behaviour Interactive Inc.; Developer: Behaviour Interactive Inc.; Released: 4 April, 2023; Players: 1-2; ESRB: M for Mature 17+; MSRP: $24.99

Full Disclosure: A review code was provided by the publisher.