Earth Must Die, the new game by Dan Marshall’s Size Five Game, has just been given a 27th January release date and a Steam demo.
Earth Must Die is the comedian-packed, point-and-click-style space comedy in which you play as the villain – a Ming the Merciless-style tyrant called VValak Lizardtongue – and where you have to decide “how much of a dick you’re going to be”. Those are the words of Dan Marshall, by the way, who I talked to about the game when it was announced last year.
Like many of Size Five Games, it plays in the classic point-and-click, adventure game way, but also like Marshall’s previous games, there’s a twist. In this case, it’s a point-and-click game without an inventory and in which the main character doesn’t want to pick anything up, because he thinks it’s beneath him.
Arguably the most eye-catching feature of Earth Must Die, though, besides the bright cartoon artwork, is the list of actors voicing the game. Leading it are Joel Fry (Hizdahr in Game of Thrones, if you watched it), Ben Starr, Martha Howe-Douglas (co-creator of Ghosts), Alex Horne (Taskmaster), Mike Wozniak (Man Down, Taskmaster, Three Bean Salad podcast), Don Warrington (Rising Damp!), Matthew Holness (Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace), Tamsin Greig (Black Books, Green Wing!), and Stevie Martin, Julie Nolke, Sophie Duker, Emma Fryer, Alasdair Beckett-King, Rosie Holt, Jon Blyth, Sam O’Leary, Tom Lawrinson, Sally Beaumont, David Montieth and Inel Tomlinson. See what I mean?
If that wasn’t enough of a recommendation, consider Size Five Games’ previous work: Lair of the Clockwork God, a relentlessly hilarious point-and-click game merged with a platformer that I’m still sore I didn’t give five stars to instead of four. “Bottomless wit and some inspired design choices make this genre mash-up a joy to play,” I wrote at the time (2020).
Publisher No More Robots added during the release date announcement that Earth Must Die will be roughly an eight-hour game.
