Death Howl PS5 review – Into The Breach with druids

After becoming a cult classic on PC, strategy game Death Howl mixes elements of Soulslikes with turn-based battles, in this demanding but rewarding new console release.

Polish developer and publisher 11 bit studios make fascinating choices in the games they design and publish. From Frostpunk and its sequel’s austere politics, where there are no right answers and plenty of unintended consequences that spring from trying to find them to The Alters, an offbeat sci-fi base builder in which your operation is staffed by increasing numbers of subtly divergent clones; their output is thoughtful, often tactically demanding, and always hard to predict.

Their latest is Death Howl, which is described as a Soulslike deck builder. Inevitably there’s quite a lot more to it than that, most notably that along with deploying cards from your slowly expanding deck, turn-based battles take place on a square grid, your positioning and movement on it having a powerful effect on the outcomes of attacks and defences. You’ll need to line-up shots and plan for areas of effect, while stabbing foes in the back proves more effective than frontal assaults.

The son of protagonist Ro dies in the opening scene, forcing her to confront the spirits of the underworld in an attempt to win him back. To do that you’ll need to work your way through the distinctive pixel art biomes – each of which comes with its own enemies, cards, and beasts to fight – in search of a way to free him. You’re assisted by your spirit animal, whose guidance is just as elliptical and mysterious as the environments you wander.

Like the Souls games, Death Howl refuses to spell anything out for you, and that includes how to play. First impressions are that it’s literally impossible, Ro dying quickly in only her second encounter with the magical creatures of the forest. What it doesn’t explain, but you soon learn, is that you can return to sacred groves, all of which are marked on your map, to heal after battle.

They behave like FromSoftware’s bonfires, returning hit points and letting you acquire new skills. They also resurrect every nearby enemy you’ve killed. That’s actually extremely useful because when they die, enemies drop crafting materials that you use to create new cards to add to your deck, making Ro incrementally more powerful in battle.

It’s a peculiar game to play, and we certainly spent the first few hours thinking we must be missing something significant. There are few games that force you to grind before you’ve even really figured out their systems, but Death Howl does just that. In the opening hours, the only way we found to make ourselves viable in battle, was to repeat the first few encounters multiple times, returning to a sacred grove to recuperate before heading back out to fight, gather loot and craft cards.

Combat has something in common with Into The Breach. Although that had a sci-fi setting, and a far smaller selection of units, both sides’ attacks had specific patterns to their firepower as it spread across its grid, along with after effects like knockback, or setting things on fire. Death Howl’s cards are similarly complex, with some working at range and others requiring you to make sacrifices. In your starter deck, that includes surrendering some of your shield capability for an instant boost to defence or disposing of a card from your current turn’s selection in return for a ranged hit.

It means every time you craft a new card, its synergies and demands need to be tested and understood before it becomes useful. Cards also interact with totems, which give Ro extra perks, up to four of which can be equipped simultaneously once you’ve unlocked all their slots. It’s a system that offers an expansive depth and range of potential approaches in any given encounter.

Enemies respawn in exactly the same places and configurations after each trip to a sacred grove, which lets you refine your strategies against them, as you gain new cards and learn how best to use them. Since battles are turn-based, there’s no need to hurry any part of the process, yet despite that lack of pressure there are many moments where you kick yourself for hastily making a play, realising just afterwards that there was a better option.

As well as providing inspiringly different looking backdrops to your exploration, the biomes that make up Death Howl’s world bring their own modifiers, providing cover or slowing down enemies in marshes. You’ll also find the game’s plot unfolding as you search. Unlike Hades and its sequel, which kept story beats safely fenced off from their roguelite gameplay, conversations and discoveries abound as you travel and fight.

It’s a dark place, both literally and metaphorically, the map boiling out of the blackness as the screen follows your motion. Its, also Soulslike in the way its lore is revealed to you in tiny pieces, each of which makes little sense on its own, but that gradually start to reveal a pointillist picture of what’s happening, and Ro’s situation within it.

Death Howl is no place for dabblers. Its complexity and refusal to reveal anything without extracting a high price for it, along with multiple interacting systems that jointly affect the outcomes of its turn-based battles, demand concentration and experience. Nothing comes easily, which makes victories all the sweeter in this strange and wonderfully idiosyncratic game.

Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X/S, and PC
Price: £17.99
Publisher: 11 bit studios
Developer: The Outer Zone
Release Date: 19th February 2026
Age Rating: 12

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