“…you no longer have to just dream about being a goat, but you will probably start to once you play this!”
Simulator games have seen a massive spike in popularity in recent times. Goats have not shown a massive spike in popularity in recent times. That does not mean however that goats are not about to, and once this game spreads they almost certainly will do! Goat Simulator is a legitimate game. It began life as a joke, but some developers out there decided to take it to the next level and take the time to put out something that absolutely nobody wanted. And you know what, it became a huge viral phenomenon and people are now going crazy for it! So the guys over at Coffee House Studios didn’t just corner a gap in the market, they created their own market, and before the game even reached release day this seemed to have worked out for them.
So what exactly is this Goat Simulator game all about? Well it’s pretty much what it says on the tin in a loose sense; you spend some time fooling about as a goat. It doesn’t sound like much, right? But my goodness is this mess of a game fun! If you are looking for more details before you buy the game, you will find yourself in hysterics even at that point in your journey. Some of the selling points on the Steam marketplace include “You can be a goat”, “In-game physics that spazz out all the time”, “Seriously, look at that goat’s neck”, and naturally of course “You can be a goat”. This does make the game a bit of a reviewer’s nightmare, given that it uses dodgy physics and numerous bugs as selling points, but hell, let’s go ahead and give it a damn good go anyway!
The game plays like an old-school Tony Hawk’s experience, with goals being set out for you to try and complete, while you spend the rest of your time doing off the wall albeit physically impossible tricks, only with a goat. You may find yourself jumping off a crane the height of a ten storey building onto a trampoline in a swimming pool. You may find yourself doing a double back flip head butt into an oil tanker which consequently launches you across the map into an anti-gravity facility, meriting you the roflcopter-inducing achievement “F**k the Police!”. You may even find yourself walking into the developers’ own studio, armed with a tennis ball launcher on your back, destroying anything and everything they might have used to create the nonsensical piece of god knows what that you have found yourself mindlessly spending your hard earned pocket money on and consequently spending your hard earned me time playing. Basically, you can do whatever the hell you want. Nobody is going to stop you and nobody really cares. The developers single aim it seems was to make you laugh, and they overshoot that goal by miles!
It is very important to remember while you play the game and more important again to consider before you buy it the simple fact that this game is broken. In fact it is more than broken, but the word I would like to use would require an age rating and warning on this review, and that would be a shame. Let’s just say it is about as broken as the minds of the developers of a game about being a goat must be. Physics basically do not exist. Frame rate issues are not uncommon. Clipping issues are very present. Your character model is barely a character model at all, and its movements don’t even bare talking about. There are a million and one problems with this game if you look at it realistically. However, if you continue to follow this path of looking at things realistically, you will quickly realise how few of those words I couldn’t use before you give about any of this, because the game isn’t meant to be one you take seriously, and it will likely make you cry with laughter over pain when you see all this rubbish forming the masterpiece which it somehow does.
What other features can you look forward to in this game then? Well, with a player-controlled ragdoll button, a slow-motion button and a lick stuff and then drag it round with your sticky and wildly stretchy tongue button amongst the rest of your nonsense buttons, you can create endless hilarity for yourself and your friends. There is even a baaa button at your disposal, in case you just want to hear your goat moan; the developers wont judge, but those friends you are playing with might at this point… There are also numerous secrets to be found around the game, from trophies which are hidden around the world to a secret castle where you can become lord of all the goats and gain the ability to summon goat minions at will. You can also unlock different types of goat to play with, for example tall goat, and expand your experience in this way. There is no development process, no waiting around to do things; you are simply thrown into a world as a goat and told to go and have fun as if your parents had gotten sick of you goatifying their television and told you to go and play outside.
Goat simulator is all just about having fun and having a laugh, and if you are able to do this and not take the horrifically broken game too seriously, you will find yourself dressed as a goat crying and rocking in a corner and attempting to summon goat minions to take you on a real life goaty adventure in no time. As the developers say, you no longer have to just dream about being a goat, but you will probably start to once you play this! If you are one of the few gamers left in the world you is still looking for some fun over the pleasure of 360° no-scope sniping across the map, then this game is for you!
The Good – Goats. Doing goaty things. A really long tongue. A funny neck. Goats n’ stuff. Goats.
The Bad – Some people will undoubtedly not see the funny side of this horrendously broken game and try to ruin it for the rest of us goat-lovers…
Disclaimer:All scores given within our reviews are based on the artist’s personal opinion; this should in no way impede your decision to purchase the game.
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