Manual Samuel Review

Manual Samuel

I’m annoyed by the potential that’s been squandered here. The game starts out with Samuel getting smacked so hard in the head by his girlfriend that he has to start doing everything manually. What a great way to setup an otherwise gimmicky premise. But just a few minutes later, Samuel gets hit by a truck, dies, meets an obnoxious rendition of Death, and then has to agree to a day of “manual labor” to get his life back. Why did we need the Death angle, though? Not only is Death an incredibly annoying character, but his presence cheapens the opening sequence and makes the overall game feel… well… gamey.

That gamey feel couldn’t be more present than in the last two chapters, where Samuel “manually” takes over another souped-up body to do battle against robots first and then friggin’ demons. By then, it’s not really Manual Samuel anymore but a really bad hack ‘n slash with awful controls. The final boss battle—yes, there’s a final boss—is so wrought with quick time events that’s it’s like the ultimate “eff you.” There’s a lot of humor and cleverness in Manual Samuel, and I do like that it can be played co-op by divvying up Sam’s bodily functions, so it saddens me to see the game go the direction it did.

Reviewer

Clark
I love gaming so much, I wrote a book about it.

Published by

Clark

I love gaming so much, I wrote a book about it.