Tinybuild’s Guts and Glory is a hard game to describe. We tend to look at it as a racing game that leans more on the gruesome, comedic side of things. Like, for instance, do you laugh your ass off when you accidentally drive head-first into a hanging spike? Well, then, this game is for you.
Videos by ComicBook.com
Guts originally appeared on Steam last year and became an immediate cult favorite, despite some people being uneasy about kids being thrown into the fray. (That’s since been remedied with the console editions, which features all adults — and, yes, watching an old man drag around an old woman in a wagon is pretty weird.) The goal here is to basically race around different levels, meeting objectives and completing the race in the fastest time possible.
Ah, but there’s a catch. Or rather, death traps. Like a bunch of them. Saw blades spin along the ground and chop up your lower half; cannons fire deadly projectiles that can knock you down the block; and even Oooober drives (yep, that’s how it’s spelled) can ruin your day just because they’re coming for you.
Unbalanced Difficulty Stalls This Ride
Part of the fun is watching as your rider of choice (from the usual nine available) perishes in a bloody manner. For instance, driving straight into a saw will cut you and whoever’s riding alongside with you in half. And driving over a landmine could send you careening into explosion-town, with the body parts to match.
It’s fun at first. But Guts and Glory doesn’t know when to quit. The fact of the matter is the levels get ridiculously tough right away. For instance, one stage asks you to invade a stronghold Robin Hood style, and then try to get away afterwards. What they don’t tell you is that there are cannons on each side and you’ll need split-second timing just to survive the first two blasts. Then you get shredded from another side and have to start all the way back at your last orange checkpoint.
This can become aggravating in a hurry. As a result, the comedic, bloody fun of Guts and Glory is lost in favor of continuing to try — and fail — getting through these levels. Tinybuild would’ve been wise to try and balance these out so they weren’t completely ruthless. After all, one cannon or Oooober driver at first is a handful as it is. But piling on three at a time? C’mon, dude.
I would say “well, at least the community levels make up for it,” but there is no community.
This Ride’s Over Before It Gets Good
Unlike the robust Steam version, Guts and Glory on Switch is missing both community-designed levels and the map editor in general. I don’t know if Tinybuild is looking to add these later or perhaps overlooked them entirely for console release, but the game is much emptier without them. After all, creativity is the spice of life. Not to mention we’d have something new to play outside of the heinously tough levels we can’t get through.
Guts and Glory‘s design is crude, but that’s what the original intention was. The level designs are wacky and the trap effects are fun to watch at times. However, things get a little monotonous over time, and the game also suffers tremendously between slowdown (especially on larger levels) and long load times. We’re not sure if this applies to all the console versions or not, but a patch for the Switch version is definitely needed.
One thing that does work in the game’s favor is its soundtrack. At times, it sounds like you’re just taking a quaint run through the neighborhood. But the next, the rock music kicks in and all hell breaks loose. At least this portion of the Steam game retains its wily charm.
In essence, Guts and Glory is built on a fun concept. It is. We could have all sorts of fun with its imminent destruction and bloodshed (in-game, mind you — we’re not savages). However, it’s got too much working against it, namely its heavy difficulty settings, its lack of community and map editing features and its loading and slowdown issues. For some, it may be enough of a fun ride to last; but for the rest of us, it feels a bit barebones. And that’s ironic considering enough stuff happens that we can actually see the bare bones.
Hopefully Tinybuild fixes the game with some additions down the road. Otherwise, this humorous ride is gonna run out of gas real quick. There’s only so far the comedy can get you.
WWG’s Score: 2.5 out of 5
Disclaimer: A review code was provided by the publisher.
