Deer God is a game where you find yourself as a deer, punished by the almighty deer god to go on a journey to really understand what it means to be a deer.

It's a simple game, pixel grapics, nice music, easy premise, but at times can be frustrating due to questionable spawn locations, often putting you in the exact same spot you died (in an enemy, or hazard) sometimes causing constant death.

There is a main story, and a number of things you can do outside the main story, such as collecting various powers.

The basic controls are relatively straight forward

You can use the arrow keys to move, or opt for the wasd controls if you rather try playing with one hand ;D

The left and right keys (or a and d) move you front and back
Up (or w) will make you jump
Down (or s) lets you eat food on the ground or talk to others if you can
space bar is your dash, your attack

at the top left hand corner you have three bars, the red one is your health, green is hunger, and blue is stamina (or dash, dashing depletes it so you can't do it eternally)

Items

Items can be accessed from your inventory (Tab, or I) and can be equiped to your bar. you can have up to 6 things equipped at once, either items or powers, and each can be used by selecting the item (by pressing the 1-6 key, whatever the item is linked to) and press the Shift key to use.

Powers aren't required for the main story, but they are nice to have and fun to use, or if you find yourself stuck and unable to jump to a height without items to help, there's one power that can be used. The powers are shown at teh tip of the antlers on the main menu, one power per tip.

Hunger

Another mechanic of the game, is that you need to eat to survive, or you'll starve to death.
There are a number of items you can eat in various biomes, mostly berry bushes or apples. The apples you can find in the trees you can jump to get. There are also grasses and pineapples (in the jungles).

Karma Bar

Throughout the game, you'll likely end up killing a decent amount of animals. This will earn you karma. There are two ways this Karma impacts you, You can go to the light side(blue), by killing things that try to kill you, or you can go to the dark side (red) by killing friendly animals, This'll be explained in a further area what gives what.

Journal

In the Inventory, there is a tab called 'journal' just under the skill list. It pretty much tells you what things you did or are on story wise. Unless you take a long break, you likely wont need to have a looksee unless you're curious.

Skills
Skills are located on the left side of the inventory screen. These are gotten throughout the main story, and are pretty much upgrades to things like your dash attack. No need to press anything special to unleash some ultimate spell, it's things like double jump, or more powerful blah blah.

There are a number of biomes in the game, all of which offers different enemies, foods to eat, atmosphere and houses. You can tell which biome you're in by both the ground and the background

*These are as I see them, some might call them by other names ^w^

Grassland: The first biome you'll see, and the one with the easiest enemies. Including foxes and porcupines, most enemies take a couple of hits to kill and deal the least damage.

Farm: A mini biome in resting usually near or within the grassland biome. You can tell you're in the farm, as there is a farmhouse in the background. This is the only place you can find cows, if you're looking for the 'cow tipper' achievement.

Jungle: one of the harder biomes to run through, as the enemies in this one can be rather tough. It's home to the tough panther, enjoys its spike traps, and if you're lucky, you'll be able to find the temple, which happens to be booby trapped.

Snow: Another biome that contains some tough and fast enemies. It's pretty aesthetically, but pay attention or you'll be on the wrong end of a polar bear or wolf pack. This is also a spawn location for one of the optional bosses if you choose to fight it.

Desert/canyon: I like to call this the wild west, since some of the buildings that can spawn here look like something you see in the movies. lots of jumps, sand, and cougars ready to bite into your hide. IF you're lucky and don't get caught up in a pack of them, it's one of the lesser dangerous areas as most of the enemies are slower than you, or don't jump.

Cliffs: As the name suggests, there's a lot of jumping here, most jumping failures will result in death via spikes. It's one of the more dangerous areas if you're not a jumper. It contains cougars as well, who can and will keep up with you, jumping over the gaps after you. It;s characterized by grey stones, leaps and bounds.

Swamp/Graveyard: The spooky, dark area is home to ghosts, snakes, skunks and alligators. I lumped both swamp and graveyard together since for me, they've appeared together intermingled. I'd say it's one of the easier areas to run though as it doesn't have many spike traps and tricky jumps, as long as you are fast enough to avoid the gators in the water.

Cave: The caves are common biomes that usually acts as a go between some of the different biomes. It's home to one of the story bosses, and your typical spiders and bats one might expect. It can be difficult, as there are the occasional spikes, breakable blocks that crumble after a little bit standing on them, and the spiders root you in place with their web.. that together is a match made in heaven..

Throughout playing the game, with all the tricky jumps and masses of enemies, the chances are good you'll die at least once.

WAs you play adn survive, you grown from a fawn to an adult. When you die, You'll respawn back as a fawn.

A few ways to combat this, is by mating and raising a baby. You'll respawn as the baby, though if it grows to be older, that's what you'll be. It can be relatively hard to raise a jid with the enemies, spike trap and general lack of being able to follow you when you jump (or overjumping into a pit of spikes)


The best way, though, is by acculumating extra lives. These look like shining deer head symbold on the map. When you die with an extra guy, you revive where you died (so caution if you die in a hard spot to get out like fire or spikes) but you revive at the stage of life you died in, so die as an adult, get revivied as an adult. There's an achievement for having 10 1 ups at once.

(the picture shows a life at the bottom left hand corner. I find most of my lives in areas like this, in the cliff biome, though I drop to the other side of the pillar since it's not always there)


If, on the other hand, you die while you have the dark side of the karma bar higher, you'll resurrect as a different animal. It could be a mouse, or a porcupine.. you don't know. (there's an achievement for reincarnating three times.) If you die as that animal you go back to being a fawn. These animals have different perks, but lack your skills, like double jumping, or sometimes jumping at all.

There are a number of items you can get to help you on your journey, which are randomly obtained through breaking items (barrels, bushes and such), treasure boxes or beating bosses.
These are just the ones I have in my inventory, if you happen to have or know of anthing else, please let me know and I can add it to the list.

Turtle egg- Spawns a turtle, invulnerable to spikes

Falcon egg- Spawns a falcon to fight for you

Cobra Venom- Greatly increases attack for a short time

Witch Hazel- Invulnerable to enemy for a short time

Lotus- Defy gravity for a short time

Coffee Bean- Increases speed for a short time

Clover- Gives some luck in finding items for a short time

Skunk Cabbage- Enemies avoid area when dropped

Feather- Lightly glide down after a jump for a short time

Large Turnip- Fully replenishes hunger

Toadstool- Places a large mushroom you can jump on.

Honeycomb- Regenerates health quickly for a short time

Pinecone- 50% chance to block an attack for a short time

Beehive- Releases bees that kill other enemies

Moon Flower- Become a stealthy apparition

The Image below shows all my items in the order listed.

Enemy name: Hunters
Location: various
Threat level: high
Karma gained: Blue
Notes: Located in various biomes, usualy with guns, though snow ones have spears, they do a lot of damage if they can get a shot off, but they are easy to outrun if you go right past them without stopping, best to jump when they shoot to dodge the bullet.

Enemy name: Fox (arctic fox)
Location: Grasslands, Farm, (Snow)
Threat level: Low
Karma gained: Blue
Notes: Weak, among your first enemies, don't get swarmed by them

Enemy name: Porcupine
Location:Grasslands, Farm, Cliffs
Threat level: Low
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Slow but spiked, don't run nilly willy into it

Enemy name: Cougars
Location: Cliffs, Desert
Threat level: High
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Fast, strong, aggressive, can jump across the gaps to get to you. Unless you have bad luck in having no way to deak it out, try to jump back and forth over it as you revive dash power to kill it.

Enemy name: Bears (black/brown, polar)
Location: Cliffs, Snow
Threat level: Severe
Karma gained: Blue
Notes: These guys are powerhouses! tough, dangerous at close range, probably best to book it away from them.

Enemy name: Jaguars/Panthers
Location:Jungle
Threat level:Moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: I havent had a problem outrunning them as anything but a fawn. If you can, run, I find them in packs sometimes and they are mederately strong.

Enemy name:Wolf
Location:Snow
Threat level:High
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Not a high jumper, but strong and fast, it'll almost always catch up to you if you're running a straight line.

Enemy name: Birds
Location: Various
Threat level: Low
Karma gained: Blue
Notes: These guys come in a number of species depending on the biome. Hawks, crows, owls, they'll be perching on trees and will try to divebomb you if you get close. not a high damage animal, though can be tricky to kill.

Enemy name:Warthog
Location:Desert, Cliffs
Threat level:moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Dangerous in groups, they can outrun a young deer and pack a nasty punch. they can't jump though, so use that to your advantage.

Enemy name:Snake
Location:Grasslands, Swamp/Graveyard, Caves
Threat level:Low
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Hard to see, and can really sneak up on you, especially in caves and the swamp area. Don't get stuck in a group of them.

Enemy name:Bat
Location:Caves
Threat level:low
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: the typical bat, swoop down from the ceiling, but low damage.

Enemy name:Spider
Location:Caves
Threat level:Low-moderate (depending on where you freeze)
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Weak enemies that dn't physically seek you out to harm you. Their sticky web will freeze you in place, which can spell instant death if you're caught on a crumbling stone over spikes.

Enemy name:Skunk
Location:Swamp/Graveyard (quest skunks outside a certain house)
Threat level:Moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: With a small aoe attack, they spray you when you get near. dangerous in groups, not hard to kill, and slow.

Enemy name:Beetle
Location:Jungle
Threat level:Monerate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Not hard to kill but can pack a punch. you can sometimes find pits of them in the jungle in groups of 3-4

Enemy name:Scorpion
Location:Desert, Jungle
Threat level:Moderate-High
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: They are slow, but pack a punch. While slow, they sprint when they get close to you, and screech. Keep your distance unless fighting.

Enemy name:Frog
Location:Jungles
Threat level:Low
Karma gained:None
Notes: These unkillable little guys are black, and jump in place. time your jumps to go over when they finish.

Enemy name:Dark Deer
Location: Snow, Cliff?
Threat level:High
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: These guys are fast and agile. Faster than you, aggressive, tough, they are nothing to laugh at, and a major pain in the rear.

Enemy name: Monkey
Location:Jungle
Threat level:Moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Doesn't move to physically attack you, but the projctiles they toss at you can deal quite a bit of damage.

Enemy name: Aligator
Location:Swamps
Threat level: moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes: Not hard to dodge if you're a jumper, as they are found in the swamp water. they snap at you if you're in front of them, giving a little push.

Enemy name: Ghost
Location:Swamps
Threat level:Moderate
Karma gained:Blue
Notes:Here are two types, white and pink. The white ones are simple, they'll float towards you. The pink ones will throw magic balls at you and can do a bit of damage.

Enemy name: skeleton/ghoul
Location:Swamps
Threat level:low
Karma gained:Blue
Notes:Hard to see against the foliage and background of the biome, they cause little damage and are slow moving.



Creatures that do not attack you, such as rabbits, cows, other deer (except dark ones) and lemmings,, will give you red karma, avoid killing them if you want to fill your light karma bar. A dark deer is in the picture below, to tell the difference between your friends and this foe. (To the right of the left most tree.)

This game has five bosses. Two are story related, and three are optional. Killing all five are needed for an achievement.

Snapping turtle: Just jump and pound its head. Simple strategy, but don't get stuck under it after you hit. Found in the caves after you gain access to a particulat skill.

Toad: Found through either a cave or entering a mysterious door in your journeys. Attack him when his mouth is open summoning his minions. I stand on the edge above him, use a honey comb and just pound him, retreat and repeat.

Snake: Found through a door in the swamp. This guy is invulnerable to physical damage when up and moving, jump and trigger a stalactite to drop and knock him out for a couple of seconds, and attack him when he's down. Run away before he gets back up though, as like most snakes he's fast to attack.

Badger/Wolverine: In the Snow biome, there'll be a breakable rock in the ground. Once you get a certain skill you can break it and drop down to fight this boss. I tend to use a lot of my items in this fight, since the thing cna hit hard and is slipery. If you want the achievement. do not let him kill himself on the spikes or it will not ding!

Eagle: The final boss of the game. Once you get the fifth relic, just run right, I like to try to kill birds to see if that helps, but I have no clue, He'll eventually fly in and grab you. Beat the chicks, then wail on his when he comes to atack you. I like to use my bees, just be sure not to let the relic it drops drop intot he spikes below... I wasted five lives trying to get it my second time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnnZzLM23i4

Here is a video I made just quickly showing off the boss fights, and my ways of beating them.. keep in mind I heavily use items, but I've included tips and tricks here and there as well

Turtle- 0:00
Toad- ~2:19
Snake- ~3:16
Wolverine/badger- ~3:52
Eagle- ~ 5:51

There are a number of powers you can get in the game, and are required for the achievement 'powers that be' and you'll know the puzzled by the giant deer statue resting around.

Rough Time stamps for the video (Sorry It's laggy, I had a bit of a fight with my recording doftware when trying to record):

Light: 0:00

Growth: 0.52

Teleport: 1:30

Divine: 2:40

Tame: 4.24

Fireball: 6:19

Ice: 6:51

Hailstorm 7:55

Fire Shield: 8:49

Lightning Strike: 9:35


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DaRL0NmF_YU

Hungry Jack
Eat 100 plants in one playthrough.

Foodie
Eat 25 mushrooms. Mushrooms are found in caves in stand out colours.

All Grown Up
Reach adulthood. It can be tricky if you keep dying, but keep careful and you should be able to do it.

Family Man
Breed 5 fawns. It can live or die, all you have to do is mate 5 times.

Long John Silver
Run 50,000 meters in a single game. You can see progress in your inventory. Just keep running. Chances are you will have to continue to end game (choose deer) and just kep running.

1 Upper
Have 10 or more extra lives at once.

Jack of All Trades
Use three items at the same time. I use the items that give a timed perk, like honeycomb, venom and luck clover.

Blessed Soul and Serial Killer
Blessed soul = Fill up the light (blue) karma bar
Serial killer = Fill up the evil (red) karma bar

Reincarnationist
Reincarnate as 3 different animals.
*You have to have the red karma bar outweighing the light one, and when you die, you have a chance to reincarnate as another animal instead of a fawn


Psychopath
Kill 10 deer. Since deer are friends, should probably do it while working to the serial killer goal.

Train Rider
Ride the train. In the desert-canyone, if you're lucky, there will me a tunnel that spawns, along with tracks. standing ready, a train will come out, and all you have to do is jump on top of it. Took me three games and countless hours for me to get it to spawn.


Tortoise Master
Ride a turtle through spikes. I used a turtle egg on the edge so it would spawn and land in the spikes and jumped on the resulting turtles back, though I had to try a couple of times for it to ding. Alternatively, you could try to get one in, but hatching an egg is quicker if you have it.

Statuesque
Get all the relics. It'll happen during the story.

Eagle Eye
Defeat the eagle. It'll happen as part of the story.

Chose Elder or Human
At the end of the game, you get a choice, choose one, and the other in another playthrough

Fox Fire
kill 5 foxes using fire, one of the spells/powers you get

Put Em On Ice
Freeze 5 hunters. Ice power is gotten from solving one of the puzzles, same as the other spells.

Stinky Feet
Collect 10 skunk cabbages.
*Must have 10 in your inventory
*You can use the lucky clover thing to increase the drop chances for items before breaking objects, it's a lingering effect so break a few before it wears off.

Farmer Joe
Collect 10 turnips
*Must have 10 in your inventory
*You can use the lucky clover thing to increase the drop chances for items before breaking objects, it's a lingering effect so break a few before it wears off.

Egg Collector
Collect 25 eggs
*Must have 25 in your inventory, either tortoise or falcon, both count towards (so getting 10 of one and 15 of the other will ding it).
*You can use the lucky clover thing to increase the drop chances for items before breaking objects, it's a lingering effect so break a few before it wears off.

Cow Tipper
kill 10 cows, found in the farm biomes

Treasure Hunter
Open 10 treasure chests. The stand out fairly well, just dash into them

Falconer
Hatch 3 falcons. Just equip and use a falcon egg.

Goody Two Shoes
Don't kill anything for 15 days.
*Time consuming and boring, best just wait there, eat when you need to, and repeat. I like to do this in the beginning part when enemies are scarce, unless you're a runner, in which case run run run and keep that finger off the space bar.

Survivalist
Survive for 50 days.
*This will come naturally as you play. I had rotten luck and hadn't beat the game yet by this point, but if you have, continue as a deer after in the same game and just survive. It doesn't matter if you die or not.

Powers That Be
Unlock all powers.

Deer Boss
Defeat all 5 bosses.
*make sure the badger/wolverine doesn't suicide on the spikes or it doesn't count!

Completionist
Finish the game with all the achievements.
*You can reenter a save file where you chose elder deer and it should ding, it did for me after getting both endings