GAME REVIEW: West of Loathing (2017)
Keepin’ it weird
Sometimes you come across a game that seems so silly that you just have to try it out. This summer, my partner picked up a game called West of Loathing, which was initially released in 2017 by Asymmetric Publications. It’s the simple story of a stick figure leaving their small, boring hometown to seek adventure in the wild west, painted in an absurd sense of humor. While my partner did pick the game up for himself, I happened to have a gap in my gaming queue, so I decided to play it.
Premise
As mentioned, West of Loathing is about a stick figure who is leaving their hometown of Boring Springs to make their way out west. The west contains things like goblins, bandits, traders, necromancers, demon cows, hippies, bureaucrats, clowns, and even strange space shrapnel that may lead to information about technologically advanced races. It’s pretty batshit nonsense, but quite entertaining.
There is a story to the game, which really just involves the main character reaching a big city out west and there being a few roadblocks (or train-track blocks, to be more literal) along the way that need to be sorted out before the player progresses. So really, the story is mostly there to separate the three different regions on the map so that the character is at an appropriate level before moving on. Most of the humor and stories are in the various quests the player can do on the world map. A personal favorite was retrieving some missing mail from an extremely suspicious AirBnB.
There’s also a DLC where you can solve the haunting of an old manor, which was perfectly fun if you enjoyed what the game offered.
Gameplay
West of Loathing follows basic RPG rules, with turn-based combat and a level-up system. The main character can choose a few different ‘pardners’ (a second party member), who each have their own move-set that you won’t learn before they join your party (which is kind of annoying). It is possible to pick up other characters via various quests too, like a buffalo man. The combat is a quite dialed-down turn-based roleplay system. The level-up system was great , wherein you get to choose which skills to put points into, but the move-sets and usefulness of the ‘pardners’ could have been more well-thought-out.
Otherwise, the character travels the world map, getting location hints from others or encountering things at random. There are also battle encounters in the wild, as well as treasures. I did like that battles could be avoided once in a while, which isn’t common in RPGs.
There was also a nice selection of inventory items with various uses (or complete lacks of use). The player could eat, drink (usually alcohol), and take supplements/tinctures/etc. a few times per day and days lasted more or less as long as you wanted them to, assuming a story event didn’t push time forward. You’re also limited in how much you can consume before your blood toxicity gets overrun. The equipment also adds various buffs and debuffs, so you’ll find yourself swapping outfits regularly.
Summary
This game is pretty uncomplicated on the whole, amusing for its silly humor, and easy to get through. It also offers some more complicated puzzles for the hardcore games, making for a surprisingly balanced game for something so short and goofy. If you like RPGs and comedic games, this is probably worth a few bucks for your amusement. I’ve actually got my eye on Shadows Over Loathing, the medieval sequel. If I find it on sale at some point, I’ll surely check it out.
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