Bugsnax in the test: Culinary adventure with depth

as Bugsnax When it was first shown in the PlayStation 5 reveal stream, I was immediately drawn into its crazy concept. Creatures with the aura of food roam the fields and turn everyone who eats them into strawberries, fries and the like. But I had no idea at the time that the brightly colored adventure concealed surprisingly profound characters and clever mechanics.

Already at the unveiling of Bugsnax in June 2020, the extraordinary concept brought a lot of attention to the title. The developer “Young Horses” is already well known, having already started a few years ago with the chaotic Octodad celebrated successes. With Bugsnax seemed on the surface to be back on a crazy adventure that doesn’t take itself too seriously. But who once into the world of Bugsnax dives in, quickly realizes that this has turned out to be much more profound and emotional than one would initially like to assume.

You are what you eat

In Bugsnax we slip into the role of a journalist who is invited to the mysterious island of Schleckum by a certain Lizbert Megafein. Upon arrival, however, we fall off our airship and encounter a confused Wampus named Filbo. From him we learn the basics about the local Bugsnax and are taken to the abandoned village of Naschingen. After its leader Lizbert went missing a while ago, its inhabitants have gradually left their homes and have disappeared into the different regions of the island. Our mission: track down the natives, persuade them to return to the village and of course solve the mystery of Lizbert’s disappearance. We travel through the varied areas of the island one after the other, getting to know its inhabitants better.

As the name suggests, Bugsnax are crawling creatures modeled on food. This includes, for example, an upside-down strawberry with big eyes that walks on its leaves and repeats its own name throughout, in the style of the Pokémon. As we adventure, the residents regularly provide us with new Bugsnax-hunting gadgets. In addition to the simple trap, these include a grab, a sauce slingshot to attract the Snax and a particularly useful tripwire. In order to find out more about the creatures, we can photograph them with our camera and we also get small tips on the appropriate capture strategy on the display.

The natives will regularly request Bugsnax from us and let us feed them. As a small side effect, one of their body parts turns into the food they eat – but this usually has no effect on their behavior. We can’t even eat Bugsnax ourselves, the game explains this with a food allergy. It would certainly have been exciting to explore the effects of the Bugsnax on the player – there is potential for a possible successor here. The transformations also have no effect on the behavior or the abilities of the characters, but are mostly purely optical in nature. At least when it comes to the question of which body part is transformed, we have freedom of choice and can thus freely design the appearance of our companions.

Gotta catch ’em all

The main focus of the gameplay is in Bugsnax on exploration. We comb through the island, which is divided into several areas, in search of the former villagers and also come across various clues about Lizbert’s disappearance, smaller secrets and, of course, the Bugsnax. These can be caught with the tools mentioned and then either fed to the natives or donated to Grumble’s barn. Gramble is a real animal lover and so we can visit our donated Bugsnax in their outdoor enclosure, observe them and, if desired, pet them.

While smaller creatures like the strawberries called “Erddie” walk straight into our trap, we often have to think outside the box to catch the tasty creatures. It starts early with the “Bunger”. This mobile fast food snack on fries legs must first be stunned before it can be caught. We can do that by luring him to his fellow dog with a few dabs of ketchup. When they try to defend their territory, the two then get into such a fight that they are left knocked out on their backs. Now we can easily catch them with the net.

Further Snax also require that we first cool them down, lure them out of their lair, or even set them on fire. The latter procedure is necessary for the small corn grains, which then turn into popcorn and only then can we catch them. In this way, catching is very varied and, unlike the example “Pokémon”, is not monotonous. Occasionally there are also big boss fights in which we compete against oversized Bugsnax. We usually use a certain tool in a clever way to reduce the size of the giant snack piece by piece and then capture it.

As with the pocket monsters, the Bugsnax are given humorous names. For example, we come across a crustacean and pickle jar hybrid called Canning Shrimp, some succulent spare ribs called Ribfoot, or the spidery fries called Frittine. In German, however, not all puns are successful and often fail due to a lack of a suitable translation – for example “Traubrücke” or “Atacotäterin”. Since the game only offers English voice output, the German names are not included in dialogues or in the exclamations of the Snax – that can be a bit confusing. If you want, you can also switch to the English texts via the main menu.

Surprising depth

The gameplay mechanics are fun, the graphics are colorful and the characters are kid-friendly. At first glance, “Bugsnax” seems to be an entertaining trip that offers pleasantly light fare with its wacky concept. But the story about the disappearance of Lizbert and the mysteries of the island allows far more depth than the outside suggests. On our journey we get to know a variety of different characters, each with their own character traits.

Filbo tries in vain to be the best possible substitute mayor with his good nature, while Wiggle, a wacky pop star, has found her way to Schleckum to get inspiration again. Conflicts regularly arise between the rabid Wambus and the animal lover Gramble, Beffica is a typical gossip girl and Cromdo is in no way inferior to his big role models when it comes to business acumen. It actually sounds like a colorful bunch of carefree creatures, but there is far more going on than meets the eye.

Once we’ve persuaded them to return to Naschingen, we’re free to do more side quests for the villagers. However, these not only offer additional hours of play, but also allow us to look deeper into the soul of our opponent. Because as happy and confident as they may appear on the surface, on the inside most of them are wracked with self-doubt and have serious concerns about their future, the other residents, or their identities.

We experience a first moment of this kind early in the game. Attention: little spoiler! Beffica teases us to find out what the aging farmer does at night. In the last hour we have experienced him as a rough character who thinks little of the other residents and seems to be quite hardened. But when we watch him at night, we find that he sorely misses his wife. It probably ran away some time ago and hasn’t appeared since. At night, Wambus talks to his wife’s cactus sculpture before falling asleep again alone in his double bed. A classic case of “hard shell, soft core”.

Without revealing too much, side quests also allow other characters to look deeper into their innermost being. The relationship between the muscular Chandlo and his childhood friend Snorpy was particularly interesting. The latter is a convinced conspiracy theorist and broods in his house (safe from the vapor trails of the “Grumpinati”) on various machines. As surprising as their friendship may seem at the beginning, the side quests make it particularly clear how important they are to each other. Of course, I would like to have as few spoilers as possible in this context, but the stories of the characters always surprise with depth and lead to a furious finale, which comes to a great conclusion. For the end credits and the previous completion of all side tasks, you should plan a playing time of around 10 to 14 hours.

My verdict on Bugsnax

With its fun exploration gameplay, varied catching mechanics and creative creepy-crawlies Bugsnax one of the biggest surprises of the year for me. It not only offers a crazy concept, but also has an unexpected narrative depth. The characters are interesting and diverse, their emotional stories about self-doubt, their own identity and of course the disappearance of their leaders captivate to the end.

The graphics are a bit too simple in places. Smaller convenience features such as fast travel would have been nice and the German translation isn’t particularly successful either, overall it stays the same Bugsnax but an interesting experience that I can recommend to every player. If you don’t let the colorful cover fool you, you’ll quickly discover a well-written story and very special characters with dark facets.

The game is also fairly priced at 20 euros for a playing time of just over 10 hours – until January 2021 Bugsnax Incidentally, thanks to PS Plus, it is even available for free for the PS5. Even without the new console, the game can be added to the library via the store as a precaution. Alternatively, you can play on PS4 or PC – other platforms are not (yet) planned.

Update: Since April 28, 2022 Bugsnax is also available for Xbox and Switch.
A free expansion, The Isle of Bigsnax, has also been released.

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