- "You are new to this realm, pariah."
Perish is an open-arena First-Person Shooter developed by indie studio ITEM42, where you take on the Greek underworld with machine-guns.
Four deceased mercenaries turned amyetri (spirits condemned by the Gods to live a shadow life) converges in Purgatory, infested by all sorts of monsters, to be judged over their sins committed while in the realm of living. Tasked by the Gods to initiate the Rites of Orpheus, they will collect the corpses of hell's denizens in exchange for a passage to Elysium, murder their way through the bowels of the underworld and take on various bosses in an exchange for an entrance to heaven.
Given the premise, the game allows up to four players at once, but only one may be granted access to Elysium. If they survive, that is.
The game was released for the PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S.
This unsettling realm is far from where we need to be, pariah.
- Advertised Extra: Kathorao, the horned eyeless monstrosity that dominates most of the promotional materials, including the game's poster and cover art (seen above) is the first boss who is fought rather early on and appears briefly, degraded into a one-shot enemy at the ending.
- Bait-and-Switch: After the Deimos boss fight, the game tells you to "Bask in Glory" over your victory... only to throw his brother, Phobos, immediately after. There's another boss battle before the stage is cleared, it's not over yet!
- Battle in the Rain: Ruins of the Nekromanteion, a stage in an outdoor arena which is inexplicably raining, and plenty of enemies you need to fight in the downpour.
- BFS: Deimos, the "Herald of Dread" and Phobos the "Harbinger of Fear", a massive giants who wields a swords and axes larger than you. Whose Sword Lines shaves a big chunk of your health if you're hit.
- Big Red Devil: The first boss, Kathorao, a horned demon-creature who visibly turns red when you damage it enough. It appears to be a combination of this trope with Xenomorph Xerox, oddly enough, visible through it's long limbs and Eyeless Face.
- Checkpoint: Lodestones, magical crumbled runestones that reassembles themselves when approached. They serve as conduit between the player and the gods of Elysium guiding them across.
- Dash Attack: The Dash Pushback upgrade can knock over and damage mooks caught in your way.
- Dead to Begin With: You're an amyetri who died in the backstory (through unspecified reasons), and ended up in Purgatory.
- Excuse Plot: You're in hell, and must kill your way to heaven in a number of ridiculously straightforward levels. Also something somthing about some cosmic revelation, but who cares.
- Fictional Currency: Gold and silver danake can be collected for purchasing upgrades. Based on actual currencies used by Greece and Persia in ancient times
. - Fire and Brimstone Hell: From lava pools to raging fire everywhere, this is how Purgatory is depicted. The ending sees you atoning for your sins in a platform surrounded by a lava world around you.
- Flechette Storm: The Devil's Daggers power-up allows you to spam a wave of 100 throwing daggers at enemies.
- Flunky Boss: All the bosses will surround themselves with lower-level enemies as backup. Right off the bat, the first boss Kathorao will drag open a gigantic skeletal mouth of some unknown reptilian monster, and summon lesser mooks emerging from the mouth to attack.
- Giant Crab: Karkinos, the giant crustacean monster from Greek Myths, shows up as a boss in Charybdis, emerging from and fought beside an underground pool.
- Heroic Mime: You don't have dialogue in-game, just grunts when swinging weapons.
- Justified Tutorial: The opening, unskippable tutorial stage, where your Patron Godess revives you in the Pantheon of Purgatory and have you explore a large mausoleum with very few enemies. You also learn the game's mechanics, like walking, swinging your weapon, shooting and kicking enemies into pits.
- Living Structure Monster: Aiakos the Wandering Belfry appears to be a church wall. As soon as you enter the boss arena, said wall grows arms and legs and detaches itself, with the belfry acting as it's "head".
- Mecha-Mooks: Hephaestus' temples contains robotic enemies of the Steampunk variety, resembling armored Greek warriors that the game calls "Automata".
- Multi-Armed and Dangerous: Phorcid is a water-demon with four arms, each holding a weapon that she can use for launching projectile attacks. She can skewer you with all of her blades if you're too close.
- Named Weapon: The game's various weapons are granted mythological-sounding Greek names, like Ponos (the default sword), Labrys (an ax), Zophos (the revolver), Eos (a stiletto dagger), and so on.
- One-Hit Polykill: The aptly-named "Penetration" ability allows your projectile attacks to pierce more than one enemy with a single shot.
- Poisoned Weapons: You can obtain a "Serpent Blessing" upgrade that deals a poisoned status on enemies hit by melee attacks. It drains their health gradually after every strike.
- Post-Final Level: After defeating Aiakos, supposedly the Final Boss, you're suddenly thrown into another level, "Atone your Sins", filled with lower-level enemies that you must kill while standing atop a platform surrounded by lava. Ending with you meeting Kathorao, again (though degraded into a one-shot enemy instead of a boss). Kill Kathorao and the game ends for real.
- Winged Humanoid: Maelstrom of Charybdis contains humanoid enemies with wings, and can hover above you while showering projectile attacks.
- Wrecked Weapon: Your first weapon is a snapped sword whose blade is merely a few inches of metal.
