Sludge Life

Exploring Sludge Life's perfectly-sized world simply doesn't get old and the game runs well enough to make you forget about its occasionally-finicky first-person platforming sections. There's plenty to see and do, find and utilise, and multiple endings to seek out. It won't outstay its welcome and we've got no doubt you'll want to return to Sludge Life just to vibe inside its fascinating little world again - when it's done, you won't feel like you've seen enough quite yet. It's certainly not perfect but it's a life, alright, and an enjoyable one.

Honestly, there isn't a whole lot to be said about Sludge Life without giving away its more memorably bizarre bits, of which there are many. It's a twisted, hellish, yet surprisingly charming playground that you'll want to spend a good (if small) chunk of time in, soaking in the off-kilter surrounds, humor and visuals. For a game that basically revolves around a filthy hellhole, there's still a lot of care that was put into making it a unique and fun hellhole and it shows.

It's understandable that this game's drug use and lack of direction can turn some players off, but I found it wild and truly unique. There's really nothing like it. Sludge Life is a vibe, for sure.

I really enjoy playing Sludge Life, and I plan to keep picking it up now and then to enjoy the atmosphere of the world that Terri Vellmann and doseone have created. It’s exciting, not disappointing, that there’s so much left undiscovered for me, and I can’t wait to pick up GHOST’s world again, only for some dour fast-food employee to tell me to get lost. Gladly, I’ll say, in this hypothetical scenario I have created inside a video game for myself.

Sludge Life is paradoxical. As a video game it's short, shallow, and often rudderless. As an artistic experiment, however, it's powerful, expressive, and bold.

Sludge Life is a strange but kind of hypnotic experience, between graffitis and social strikes, using its free exploration to deliver an in-between subtext. If the low-poly visual approach do not repulse you, this like-no-other ride sure offers a few hours of raw discoveries and disturbing encounters.

Brief and more of an experience than anything else, Sludge Life is a chill way to spend a couple of hours.

Devolver often delivers weird games that take familiar ideas or mechanics and deliver cool twists on them. Loop Hero is a very good example of how this approach can succeed. Sludge Life has good tunes and a new presentation style but it needed more in the way of either gameplay or narrative to deliver a truly cool experience.

People familiar with my tastes from my many reviews are likely well aware of my love for more unusual fare, so with that in mind I found Sludge Life to be a bit of quirky fun...

Sludge Life is a short game that breaks out of the ordinary, offering an exploration environment with lots of unpretentious but still fun elements. Although it doesn't always seem like a game, because it demands very little from the player, the proposal is interesting in itself. Returning to the initial theme, I see Sludge Life much more as an aesthetic experience than a game I want to entertain. And yes, this is very good.