No Vacation for an Executioner

About

No Vacation for an Executioner is a single player survival role playing game with horror, fantasy, mystery, thriller and others themes. It was developed by Jay O and was released on March 23, 2026. It received mostly positive reviews from players.

About It's a story about a frustrated executioner in late 17th century. He felt sick at his job and ran away from the gallows. It aroused a riot of monsters, he had to clean up this cruel mess, and find out the truth about the "Gloomy Oil" of this crazy world. It's a Retro PS2 style Survival Horror Action-RPG, you will use various skill to survive, beat your enemy and explore forward. Inspi…

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76%

Audience ScoreBased on 21 reviews

graphics4 positive mentions

story2 negative mentions

Unique and astonishing art style blending baroque, gothic, and nightmarish influences with an incredible atmosphere and music.
Strong nostalgic vibe reminiscent of early PlayStation games, with influences from Bloodborne, RE4, and King's Field, creating a compelling and tense experience.
The game shows clear passion and originality from the developer, with interesting world and enemy design, and rewarding exploration and challenge for fans of cryptic and archaic games.

Combat and parry mechanics are clunky, unreliable, and need significant polishing to improve gameplay experience.
Numerous bugs and missing features including poor translations, lack of sound effects, crude UI navigation, and missing options like exiting the game from menus.
Poor tutorial and lack of polish in gameplay systems (crafting, crouching mechanics, NPC interactions) make the beginning confusing and frustrating for many players.

graphics
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
40%
30%
30%
The game features a unique and striking art style that blends baroque, gothic, and surreal influences, creating a captivating atmosphere reminiscent of Bloodborne and Resident Evil 4. While the visuals and design receive high praise for their creativity and smooth performance, the overall graphics feel somewhat unpolished, needing refinement particularly in combat animations and gameplay integration. Despite its current rough edges, the game's aesthetic passion and potential are widely appreciated.
- “The atmosphere, music, and visuals evoke a bizarre pastiche of baroque, gothic, and nightmarish influences, merging together into an incredible and surreal experience.”
- “The art style and NPC/enemy design simply cannot receive enough praise.”
- “It’s got a super unique art style and vibe, and plays kind of like Bloodborne meets Resident Evil 4, better than any new Resident Evil game without a doubt.”
- “First because it's pretty cheap currently, and second because the game if it worked perfectly, it would be great, truly a magnificent work in the feeling of a PS2 game, the art style and everything, it reminds me of MadWorld colours combined with Bloodborne.”
- “This game in a few months, if the creator hears the issues of his game, can be great. If he fixes these issues and makes the combat better, it can be great. When we talk about the atmosphere, the graphics, the designs, it shows the passion for this game. If you want your 'Resident Evil 4 + Bloodborne' experience, buy it, but if you don't tolerate games that are not ready to be launched, no matter if it is indie or not, don't.”
- “Honestly, there's a lot to like here even in its unpolished state. If this was a bigger game, I'd have to give it a thumbs down for how unpolished it feels, but I'm giving it a thumbs up because it kind of nails the atmosphere and the visuals.”
gameplay
8 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
38%
24%
38%
The gameplay features a unique, rough style that adds to the game's uncanny atmosphere, but it suffers from unpolished mechanics, especially the unreliable parry system which often fails despite correct timing. Additionally, some controls and interactions, like crouch-related actions, feel awkward and hinder fluid combat, resulting in a slow-paced gameplay loop that could benefit from refinement.
- “Additionally, I personally enjoyed the rough game mechanics and bizarre rhythm of the game. This unusual style contributes enormously to the game's uncanny appeal.”
- “The gameplay loop isn't bad, though it's very slow-paced.”
- “Excellent bones, and incredible art style, however needs some polishing as far as gameplay goes.”
- “The parry is registered very poorly, approximately only 50-60% of the time, and to top it up, parrying also depends on the distance from the enemy, making the whole mechanic very broken and unworkable.”
- “The parry mechanic seems to be unreliable and fails even when timing it correctly.”
- “You can't grab objects or kill enemies while crouched, which defeats the purpose of the crouch mechanic designed to surprise enemies, forcing you to stand up before killing.”
atmosphere
6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
67%
33%
The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its unique blend of baroque, gothic, and nightmarish elements, creating a tense and surreal experience reminiscent of Bloodborne and Resident Evil 4. Despite some unpolished aspects and short music tracks, the visuals, design, and mood demonstrate clear passion and effectively immerse players. Fans of atmospheric horror will likely appreciate the game's distinct and captivating ambiance.
- “The atmosphere, music, and visuals evoke a bizarre pastiche of baroque, gothic, and nightmarish influences, merging together into an incredible and surreal experience.”
- “The atmosphere is really incredible too; things felt genuinely tense quite a few times despite being pretty sure I could outrun whatever horrible monster I found.”
- “Honestly, there's a lot to like here even in its unpolished state; I'm going to give it a thumbs up because it kind of nails the atmosphere and the visuals.”
music
6 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50%
50%
The music effectively blends baroque, gothic, and nightmarish influences to create a surreal and oppressive atmosphere that complements the game's apocalyptic theme. It evokes nostalgia for early 2000s survival horror and games like Bloodborne and King's Field, though some players note the background tracks are too short and occasionally miss certain sound effects.
- “The atmosphere, music, and visuals evoke a bizarre pastiche of baroque, gothic, and nightmarish influences, merging together into an incredible and surreal experience.”
- “The creator of this game is highly passionate and original about their proposal and artistic vision, and it shows. The music, textures, world design, and enemy designs blend together smoothly and efficiently in conveying the game's oppressive and apocalyptic nature.”
- “The music in the convent area in particular really conjured up the same feeling I get when playing early 2000s survival horror games.”
- “- Missing sound effects/music”
- “The music in the convent area in particular really conjured up the same feeling I feel when playing early 2000s survival horror games.”
- “The creator of this game is highly passionate and original about their proposal and artistic vision, and it shows (the music, textures, world design, and enemy designs blend together smoothly and efficiently in conveying the game's oppressive and apocalyptic nature).”
story
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The story features NPC quests that rely heavily on trial and error, similar to older RPGs and FromSoftware titles. Users feel that better integration of mechanics and narrative could enhance immersion and align the story with the game's overall tone.
- “The NPC quests in particular feel very trial and error, similar to many other FromSoft and older RPG-inspired games.”
- “If the game tied its mechanics and story together to introduce you to the game's setting, it would fit the overall tone so well.”
optimization
1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game's optimization is somewhat lacking, with users noting performance could be improved alongside enhancements like adding fog effects.

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What if Bloodborne was on PS2? Dark horror No Vacation for an Executioner is so old school even the dev insists to try the free Steam Next Fest demo before buying "to make sure you like this control style"

February 23 on gamesradar.com

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Frequently Asked Questions

No Vacation for an Executioner is a survival role playing game with horror, fantasy, mystery, thriller and others themes.

No Vacation for an Executioner is available on PC and Windows.

No Vacation for an Executioner was released on March 23, 2026.

No Vacation for an Executioner was developed by Jay O.

No Vacation for an Executioner has received mostly positive reviews from players. Most players liked No Vacation for an Executioner for its graphics but disliked it for its gameplay.

No Vacation for an Executioner is a single player game.

Similar games include Bleak Faith: Forsaken, Wicked Seed, Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon, Of Ash and Steel, Hyper Light Breaker and others.

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