If there was a game that perfectly captured being on psychedelic drugs, it would be DEEEER Simulator: Your Average Everyday Deer Game. Having spent a couple of hours in what is probably the weirdest and hands down the most absurd sandbox game I’ve ever played, I am still struggling to figure out if this was made by a real person. Were copious amounts of drugs used during the entire development process, or was an AI fed every video game ever made and asked to produce its own?

From the moment I finished the trailer, I knew this was going to be an experience. I wasn’t sure what to expect outside of the obvious mental comparisons between this release and Goat Simulator, which is a pretty fair assessment. Surprisingly, there is a little more structure here than in the world’s first goat-centric game. You’re dropped in a small city as a deer, just an average everyday variety deer… one that can replace his antlers with guns, run on two legs at speeds that would make The Flash’s head spin, destroy buildings, swing from his neck in a weird Spider-Man-esque fashion, and make dimwitted NPCs sprout their own set of antlers and exhibit deer-like qualities. Oh, and then make them dance in a flash mob. That’s a thing too.

The open-world you’ll explore is very much like stepping into a dream of someone in the midst of their worst blackout. You literally cannot look or visit any location that looks as it should; whether it’s flying elephants, massive demonic fish, koalas with laser beam eyes, or sheep cops, everything is as weird as it could be, and then some. This only accelerates like a semi doing 80 MPH right into Bambi’s mom as you begin interacting with the world, as almost everything I’ve run into can be destroyed, controlled, or interacted with usually gut-bustlingly hilarious results. The trade-off for this entertainment is that much like the previously mentioned Goat Simulator, there is an extreme amount of jank to deal with.

This is definitely one of those games that is bad for the sake of being bad, all in an attempt to add some charm to something that is already bonkers to the point that if you told a casual gamer about the experience, they would probably assume you’re drunk or retelling a story a toddler told you. If a AAA developer tried to release something this broken, they would be bankrupt by the end of release day, unless it’s EA with Battlefield 2042. Luckily, they still have Madden money. The controls are floaty and mildly delayed, regardless of whether I was using the 8bitdo Bluetooth Adapter on the Nintendo Switch paired with my Xbox One controller, or just running the standard setup with my Series X. Our bright-eyed protagonist has the ability to drive any vehicle you can find, but they all control the same – kind of like an old RC car that had been thrown into a lake, set on fire, and then had some half-used mismatched Dollar General batteries put back in. When gunplay becomes prevalent, it’s almost as bad as trying to use a potato as a weapon, but at least a potato would damage something if you put it into some PVC pipe with hairspray and then added heat. Regardless of which gun I was using, I always felt like hopping up on my hind legs and kicking at my target did far more damage than anything that went pew pew. Finally, the audio drops in and out like a DJ who mixed his Ambien and Adderall meds, and there is so much clipping and random jaggies at almost every moment, it would send any Bethesda RPG into a seizure. Long story short, this game is technically broken, but I am pretty sure that was the intention.

Outside of quickly giving you a rundown of the controls, the game doesn’t go too far in-depth regarding direction. The gameplay loop is essentially to create as much chaos as possible, avoid or kill the cops until it opens a boss battle, take out the boss, rinse and repeat a few times. It reminds me of playing some of the older, early 3D Grand Theft Auto titles with all of the cheats turned on, which if you recall, generally broke the game. This is that without all the busy work of activating the cheats, since it’s just how the game runs by default. If you prefer, you can explore to find some nifty little Easter eggs that I won’t go into as not to spoil them, but it’s worth it in most cases, especially if you follow indie gaming.

DEEEER Simulator: Your Average Everyday Deer Game is a niche game that is hard to recommend across the board unless you’re someone who enjoys intentionally bad games. If that’s your thing, this will be right up your alley. The game is good for the achievement hunters, as I completed this game twice, once on the Switch, and then again once it hit the Xbox Game Pass on release, and saw both endings in under two hours. At a $20 retail price, this is a hard sell for most people, but if you’ve got the money to burn, enjoy the occasional so bad it’s good style game, this is a trip you might not regret.

8 out of 10

Pros

• A Janky So-Bad-It’s-Good Style Game
• It’s Hilarious
• Decent Easter Eggs
• Tons of Interactive Assets
• Horrible Dancing

Cons

• A Janky So-Bad-It’s-Good Style Game
• Lacking In Content
• Horrible Dancing

DEEEER Simulator: Your Average Everyday Deer Gamewas developed by Gibier Games and published by PLAYISM. The game is available for NS, PC, PS4, X1, and XSX. The game was provided to us for review on NS and played on a NS and XSX. If you’d like to see more of DEEEER Simulator: Your Average Everyday Deer Game, check out the publisher’s site.

 

Here at GBG we use a rating method that you are more than likely familiar with – a scale of 1 to 10. For clarification, we intend on using the entire scale: 1-4 is something you should probably avoid paying for; 5-7 is something that is worth playing, but probably not at full price; 8-10 is a great title that you can feel confident about buying. If you have any questions or comments about how we rate a game, please let us know.

 

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