Have a Nice Death

Every run in Have a Nice Death begins with the same premise: Death himself has let his corporate empire, Death Incorporated, spiral out of control, and the department heads—his own employees—have grown powerful enough to need a personal correction. That comic-bureaucratic framing is not decoration; it shapes every mechanical layer of the game.

Magic Design Studios built the game around fast, scythe-forward hack-and-slash combat across procedurally generated departments, each functioning as a distinct themed zone with its own enemy roster, mini-boss, and department head. Over seventy weapons and spells are available to find and combine within a single run, and upgrading them mid-run into synergistic loadouts is the central skill expression. Between and within runs, a performance-review system unlocks items and upgrades that carry forward, ensuring that even failed attempts contribute to future capability.

The most distinctive tension sits in the Curse system. Taking on curse upgrades grants Death more power but provokes a Labor Inspector response: enemy subordinates receive buffs, and shop economies shift against the player. This creates a genuine risk-reward calculation on every curse pickup rather than a simple stat trade-off.

• Procedurally generated departments with distinct enemy sets and bosses
• Over 70 weapons and spells combinable into run-specific builds
• Curse upgrades that strengthen the player while buffing the opposition
• Post-run performance review that progressively unlocks new items
• A named supporting cast—including the pumpkin-headed assistant Pump Quinn—delivering ongoing office-gossip narrative

The game entered Steam Early Access and launched in full on March 22, 2023, with that release delivering the eighth and final department, the Inevitable Time Department, along with its new boss, mini-boss, enemy types, and the conclusion of the storyline. The 1.0 release also included what the studio described as quality-of-death improvements accumulated over the Early Access period. Post-launch activity has been limited to minor hotfix patches in spring 2023, with no major content updates visible after the 1.0 feature set. The publisher banner changed to Arc Games in April 2024.

The game rewards players who enjoy reading combat encounters quickly and iterating on build decisions under pressure—anyone drawn to action roguelikes that use workplace absurdism as a straight-faced mechanical metaphor will find the tone and systems unusually well matched.