The quest structure doesn’t help, as the absurd premise (I need to eat that bug!) leads to increasingly inane tasks prescribed by the helpless island denizens. From swinging nets to launching springboards, it can be fun to put together a multi-step plan to lure the burning hot stew creature to the freezing popsicle insect that will cool it down enough to pick up, but more often than not, the process just feels tedious. Sometimes, I stumbled onto a solution through trial and error, or found the correct answer, but failed because of the finicky way the hunting tools worked. However, the challenge often comes through convoluted action and tool combinations that don’t always make a lot of sense. The puzzles start out extremely simple, and ramp up to be moderately challenging by the end. To reunite everyone, you have to hunt down and capture the adorable and tasty bugsnax, and several dozen varieties across the island each have different behaviors to decipher, which is initially a compelling hook. Whether it’s the guy who tries to understand if his longtime roommate is really his boyfriend or not, or the husband and wife who love each other despite being completely different, everyone is struggling to connect. All the flawed characters are lonely, and themes around the value of community and relationships make for a heartfelt message. When the storytelling works, it’s because everything is communicated through such an earnest and wholesome delivery. The lighthearted but deeply strange premise isn’t always enough to keep the story engaging, and there’s a lot of borderline-nonsensical spoken dialogue as you meet and problem-solve for the eccentric cast. Along the way, you get to know many offbeat island dwellers, and unravel a mystery about the missing founder of the settlement. You wander several relatively small open areas from a first-person perspective, scanning and bagging the little walking morsels by luring, trapping, or tricking them. While that makes for an unusual wrapper, Bugsnax is really a puzzle-solving adventure game. You must bring the scattered townsfolk back together, usually by capturing particular creatures and feeding them to individuals, even as absurd melodramas play out between the characters. This process is called “snakification,” and for some reason, it delights rather than terrifies everyone. The googly-eyed inhabitants inexplicably desire to eat these bugsnax, which transform their limbs into the objects they’ve devoured. You inhabit a world of Sesame Street-like monsters, and visit an island filled with bugs shaped like snacks – hot dogs, soda cans, and more.
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