Developer: Lazy Bear Games
Platforms: PC (Reviewed), PS4, PS5, Switch 2, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
Genre: Adventure, RPG, Simulation
Publisher: tinyBuild
Coming to PC, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch 2, Graveyard Keeper 2 immediately caught my attention when it was announced. I briefly played the original Graveyard Keeper on Xbox a while ago, but honestly, I don’t remember enough of it to make any real comparisons. So, for me, Graveyard Keeper 2 was pretty much a clean slate. And looking at everything the game had to offer, I was immediately interested. From the pixel- and sprite-based graphics to the slice-of-life elements, resource gathering, crafting and intriguing narrative, it had so many of the things I usually look for in a game.
The game starts with the Keeper shackled inside a dungeon before a mysterious fairy appears and helps awaken him. After breaking free, the Keeper meets his new talking skull friend, Larry, and the two set off into a town that is absolutely brimming with zombies. From there, the Keeper finds an abandoned Inquisitor base which he begins repairing and turning into his new home, all while collecting resources and figuring out what exactly is going on. Eventually, his purpose becomes clear: save the town from the zombie outbreak and face his evil doppelganger.
One of my favourite things about Graveyard Keeper 2 is that the game is fully voice-acted. The voice acting has a quirky charm to it, which fits the goofiness and humour the game has. I genuinely enjoyed listening to the characters because they have so much personality. Larry, the talking skull, is hilarious and throws out plenty of brain-dead jokes, while the nun’s absolutely screeching voice had me laughing every time she appeared. The cast has such distinct personalities and accents, and I think they fit the designs of each character really well. It made the major cutscenes especially entertaining and gave the world a lot more character than I was expecting.
Even coming into Graveyard Keeper 2 without remembering much about the first game, I had no trouble getting into the sequel. If anything, playing this one has actually made me want to go back and properly play the original once I’m finished. There are so many different systems and mechanics packed into the game that I constantly found myself discovering something new.
For example, the game has a stamina system that is used for pretty much everything you do. Building materials, cooking, chopping down trees, smashing rocks and mining ore will all consume stamina. Interestingly, these actions also reward you with three different types of gemstones: green, blue and red (technology). These can then be used to unlock recipes and new abilities through the game’s tech tree.
The tech tree is a whole other part of the game that you slowly work through as you progress. At first, I felt like the gemstones were taking quite a while to collect, but eventually I was doing so many different activities that I had more than enough resources to unlock what I needed. I also liked how certain items and recipes are locked behind NPC levels, as this gives you another reason to keep completing quests and interacting with characters while also naturally pacing the story.
​The pacing of the quests was another thing I really enjoyed. I’ve only had the game for a couple of days and already have around 20 hours played, but I never felt pressured to rush through it. I could focus on the main story, take on side quests or just spend an entire in-game day gathering resources and working on my base.
The game definitely requires some grinding early on, but once you start understanding resurrection and getting zombies to take over some of the work, things become much more manageable. There were even moments where I found myself juggling between different workstations, trying to remember what I needed to craft next. There is a lot going on, but thankfully, Graveyard Keeper 2 never makes you feel like you need to rush. You can take your time and play at your own pace, which I think works perfectly for this type of game.
As the title suggests, you are quite literally a graveyard keeper. You manage a morgue where you perform autopsies, remove organs, prepare and bury bodies, and generally make sure the dead are put to rest. At the same time, you’re trying to turn your graveyard into something respectable and even prestigious.
But graveyard keeping is only one small part of what you can actually do. You can make potions, brew alcohol, farm, gather resources, craft items, and build up your various workstations. There is a ridiculous amount for the player to invest their time into, and I thoroughly enjoyed experimenting with all of it.
​The further I progressed, the more of the map I unlocked, along with new characters, locations and points of interest. The weekly system also adds another layer to the game, with different days bringing different events and activities.
Sermon days quickly became one of my favourites because they are such a useful way to gain faith, which can then be used for pillars, recipes and other upgrades. Other days allow you to accept town orders, while another involves ringing the bells to help fight off zombies.
Speaking of which, the zombie fighting mechanic was actually a really fun surprise. It almost feels like a little capture-the-flag minigame, and I loved that it wasn’t just thrown into the game for the sake of having combat. Nearly every mechanic has some connection to the world or the story, which made the whole experience feel much more cohesive.
As you carry out your various duties, you’ll also earn perks that can improve your inspiration and overall mastery. This works almost like another skill tree, allowing you to unlock permanent upgrades that benefit different areas of your work.
There are different sections for things such as building, farming and other activities, so you can gradually improve the areas you spend the most time working on. I liked having this extra layer of progression because even the smaller tasks felt like they were contributing towards something.
If there was one part of Graveyard Keeper 2 that I struggled with the most, it was the zombie automation system.
The idea itself is really cool. You can resurrect zombies and essentially turn them into workers who take care of different tasks for you. You can build the required stations, give them the right tools and assign them to their jobs, which should eventually allow you to automate parts of your workload.
The problem was that I couldn’t always figure out how to get them to actually do their jobs automatically. For example, I had a farmer station set up with a zombie equipped with a shovel, but sometimes it would only actually go and farm the wheat after I interacted with it. I felt like I could have progressed much faster if I had properly understood the automation system, and even after spending a lot of time with the game, I was still scratching my head over certain parts of it.
The game does a good job of explaining new mechanics as you progress, but there were definitely a few systems where I felt like I needed a little more guidance rather than being thrown into them. The zombie limit system and automation were two of the biggest examples. I was also genuinely shocked when I unlocked the factory, only to discover that there was an entire other layer of mechanics for me to learn. Update: I revisited the game after a patch made by the developers and found that they made the zombie workstation much clearer and also added little icons to inform you what may be missing. For instance, the issue I was facing with the zombie farmer was all because I was missing a chest. I’m glad to see that the developers are taking these things into account and also fixing the bugs as they go.
I don’t necessarily see this as a bad thing, though. Graveyard Keeper 2 is clearly designed to be a game you spend a lot of time with. You are not going to understand every system within your first few hours, and there is no real pressure to do so. Once you start figuring things out, the amount of automation available can make your life considerably easier.
The grinding can still get frustrating at times, especially when you know there is a way to automate something but don’t yet have everything required to unlock it. There were definitely moments where I thought, “Surely there has to be an easier way to do this,” only to realise I had another few hours of progression before reaching it.
The pixel and sprite-based art style was one of the first things that caught my attention when I saw Graveyard Keeper 2. The visuals give the game a really distinct identity and work surprisingly well alongside the darker medieval setting. Even the sound design of the game is splendid, from the little blood-blot noises when removing guts from the corpses, to sawing wood or even mining iron. Everything in the game is filled with lots of life even though it may all be dead.
I also really enjoyed how the characters were designed. Each character has their own personality, appearance and voice, which makes the world feel much more alive. The voice acting especially surprised me, with Larry’s ridiculous jokes and the nun’s screeching and Albert’s constant coughing becoming some of the most memorable parts of my playthrough.
Overall, I had a really enjoyable time with Graveyard Keeper 2. I honestly wasn’t expecting to become as invested in it as I did, especially considering I barely remembered playing the original. Within just a couple of days, I had already put around 25 hours into the game and was still finding new things to work towards.
I didn’t come across any major problems during my playthrough, although I did encounter a small bug where some of the gemstones would occasionally get stuck in the black abyss around the edges of certain locations, particularly around the house and church. I also wish there was a better way to move buildings around rather than having to destroy them and rebuild them. This becomes especially annoying once you’ve established a proper layout and have lots of different stations in specific areas. I think just some quality-of-life additions would make things feel a lot smoother to interact with; for instance, being able to hold items in a chest to get a specific amount or having a check-marking system to know which materials are needed next.
My biggest frustration was definitely figuring out the more complicated mechanics, particularly the zombie automation or the conveyor system. But even then, I never felt like I wanted to stop playing. If anything, it made me want to figure the system out even more.
Graveyard Keeper 2 is an unusual medieval graveyard management game that only becomes more complicated the longer you play. You’re going to spend several hours in this world before you feel like you’ve genuinely made a dent in everything, but that’s also part of the appeal. There is always another recipe to unlock, another character to meet, another part of the map to explore or another system to figure out.
The game does require some patience, and the grinding can definitely become a little frustrating, but I really enjoyed the freedom it gives you. There is no constant pressure pushing you forward, so you can simply pick what you want to work on and take things at your own pace.
Graveyard Keeper 2 is one of the most enjoyable management and life-sim games I’ve played in a while. Between the quirky characters, hilarious voice acting, satisfying progression, a huge amount of things to do and the freedom to play completely at your own pace, I constantly found myself wanting to jump back in and see what I could unlock next. If you’re looking for a game that’s just as relaxing as it is surprisingly addictive, with plenty to explore and manage along the way, then Graveyard Keeper 2 is absolutely worth checking out!
Overall: 9/10
This is S & S. We are world game explorers. We play games. We have played over 10,000+ games! We travel, we write reviews AND we play more games!!!!
