Fall Guys Fever

August 13, 2020
1:08 pm

Why is everybody playing Fall Guys? And what the hell is it?

Fall Guys is a multiplayer battle royal online game that was just released for PlayStation 4 and Steam. It was developed by Mediatonic and distributed by Devolver Digital.

With an avatar that looks like a cute little bean with an outlet face, you always have a random mini-game available to battle with 59 other people.
You have to survive in several eye-candy scenarios, kind of like an inflatable fort jumping simulator on child’s day. Hence, all the beans are properly padded and all the structures so that they can collide safely.

The levels are picked at random, and they are obstacle races, capture the flag (or rather the tail), the last man standing, etc. Most games are free-for-all, except a few in which players are sorted into teams, like Egg Scramble; here, three teams have to pick up eggs in the middle of the map and bring them into the team’s nest. One thing is certain; this is not a dull game.

The goal is to receive the coveted crown for the first qualified in each game. Whoever is qualified moves on to the next game, with fewer and fewer players left. The remaining are left behind.
As you win matches and collect points, you unlock colors and gears. The first-week bonus is the wolf outfit, but there are all kinds of equipment, such as pineapple hats or pirate outfits, which you can also acquire through microtransactions.

It’s a fun and fast game, as each minigame lasts about 2 – 3 minutes. That chaos and those deliberately wonky controls make it hard to put the controller down.
It’s hardly surprising that Fall Guys quickly reached number one on Steam’s top seller and PlayStation, as it’s free on PlayStation Plus this month. It’s currently in second place as the most broadcast game on Twitch (only League of Legends is first) and had two million players in the first 5 days. As nobody expected this sudden success, there are still some connection issues, and sometimes it’s hard to start a game.

The last time I laughed this hard with a game was Rayman Raving Rabbids (Wii), and there is a certain similarity within the goofy and amusing environment. A negative point is the sound, which is too repetitive, and the music, although enjoyable, makes me want to mute the game after a few hours of playing.

If you want to look at the gameplay, I’ll be live on Twitch with a special guest, Nicole Concha, on Friday, August 14 at 1 pm CDT (7 pm WEST). Join us here