Gerrrms Switch Review
In a period of our lives where we are making sure to wash our hands and use sanitiser frequently it is an amusing thing to see a video game titled Gerrrms. Even more so because Gerrrms is a title aimed for family fun with the kids, yet we are currently telling our kids to keep the terrible germs away. The developers, Bugbomb Games, will hope Gerrrms will not be avoided like the plague. Its cutesy appeal and simple gameplay should help find an audience with families and their kids to have something to enjoy together to past the time.
The Nintendo Switch is a system that has a design for party games and so the hybrid console has found its fair share to pick from. Gerrrms is another party game that wants to take a stab at this genre, which is helped by having a low price point. The title is currently a digital only budget release, priced at £8.99 on the Nintendo eShop. The concept pits up to four germs within a 2D boxed arena to fight against each other in a battle for domination to be the last germ standing.
Gerrrms is unlike a typical versus party game, as players do not have direct control over their germ. Players activate a sort of grappling hook with a button that will hook onto grapple points within the battle area to swing around until launched in the desired direction. This adds some chaos into the mix, as once launched, the direction cannot be altered, only the face of which the germ is looking at. Barriers around the arena can be bounced off for altered trajectory, unless they are covered in spikes, which will result in instant death and removing a block of health (lives). Whoever manages to avoid losing all their health or having the most left after the game times out becomes the champion.
Each of the eleven germs has a distinct colour and design, but this is just for show, since every germs’ behaviour is the same. This means no character statistics are involved within the gameplay; it’s pure germ-on-germ-on-germ-on-germ that gives no one the upper hand when it comes to balancing a game due to character traits. This is good for casual play, as it removes a element of learning an additional layer on top, but for people who want more depth this game will not be for you. Everything in Gerrrms is aimed at making it simple for youngsters to pickup and play.
Winning in Gerrrms depends on which game mode is played. There are seven on offer that cover familiar modes, while also setting what abilities a germ can use in the battle – homing missiles, power fist, dash, hand grab to name a few. These abilities have a cooldown for a few seconds, which is shown with a timer that fills up once ready to use again. There is a nice variety of modes to play in Gerrrms, but due to the short round time (a few minutes), these modes can feel a bit short in supply when playing Tournament mode, a collection of six randomly selected modes played in succession with the person who wins the most crowned king. These modes can sometimes be repeated, more so in the start where not all modes are available and must be unlocked through missions, which is the game’s way of giving a multiplayer title some single player progression. Accomplishing the missions unlocks more germ characters and modes. Missions are straightforward – score a goal within five seconds, hit so many people with missiles, win with without taking damage, etc. – and can be accomplished from selecting the mission in the mission section or doing the required mission in something like quick play or tournament mode.
Deathmatch is the standard affair, where germs have missiles with slight homing capabilities to shoot at rival germs. Flag is about holding the flag as long as possible before the timer ends. Bomb is the opposite of Flag; try keep the person with the bomb away from yourself so not to get tagged with it before it explodes. Gobble is a collectathon, requiring the germs to eat as much food as possible. Synapse Snatch focuses on grabbing a ball and taking it back to your designated coloured corner. Antibody involves avoiding a police germ that tries to attack the players. Lastly, Take Over, a mode that involves building your own coloured spikes on the walls around the arena by collecting spots to activate them, so that rival germs can be pushed into the spikes to take a life away.
Disappointingly there is no online mode in the game, which means multiplayer is limited to local play. If no one is around to play, then CPU opponents are the only option for you. The CPU does a decent job at being opposition, more so if you pump up the CPU to hard, but the joy one gets when smashing a friend into a wall spike is lost when playing against soulless CPUs that cannot initiate the banter than comes when playing locally.
As mentioned in the beginning, Gerrrms is a budget released party game that fits its price tag making it ideal for a title that can be picked up, played a while and then probably only ever brought out at family occasions. The lack of content and online play does hurt its overall longevity, since seeing everything Gerrrms has to offer is done within the first hour and its simplicity means there is nothing to learn. Still, it is fitting of its price, as Gerrrms is an enjoyable and simple game for when the family is around and they require entertainment for half an hour before moving onto the next thing. Sometimes video games can just be a stop gap to entertain for a short while and then be forgotten down the line without needing to be the deepest, complex experience.
