Idon’t like it when point and click adventure games tell me how to play the game, a.k.a. tutorials. Call it elitism, but the genre is incredibly intuitive, so jumping through the hoops in GrandMa Badass was mildly irritating. The kind of irritating that makes you raise an eyebrow for 10-20 seconds. Such an inconvenience.
GrandMa Badass is a teeny bit of a try-hard. That’s evident with the humour, as being a cynical geriatric goes with the territory, but teasing with the odd toilet humour was on par with someone making a fart sound with their armpits. Though I’m terribly sophisticated, a good ol’ joke about poo will put a smile on my face. The good news is this: Adipson Studio doesn’t go overboard with silliness, though don’t expect a narrative on rails.
Pointing and clicking in one of these damn adventures on the Steam Deck isn’t always the best, but the game performs well. You play the grandma of the titles. She’s a little like Mrs Brady from Viz, but without the swearing. After the teeny prologue, the task at hand is to feed your cat – a bit like Pants Quest, but guess what? Feeding the cat isn’t as simple as it sounds, and before long, you’re running drugs, heading to Russia, and then experimenting with Tiki puzzles.
GrandMa Badass Review
There are some frustrating elements with navigation. Initially, you need to get rid of your cat as it’ll constantly hover around your feet. Trying to be accurate with the Steam Deck’s stick wasn’t easy, but it’s only for a short part of the game. That said, there will be times when you can’t move GrandMa Badass where you want her to go, and she takes an age to get there. There aren’t any double-clicks when navigating off screen, and if you click in error, you have to wait until she finishes what she’s doing. There is an initial map, but there aren’t any fast travel points (that I noticed), so expect some backtracking.
As one might expect with a point and-click, the story does get a little absurd, but it’s ok. Yes, there is backtracking, but the puzzles in the game are so easy in places that it feels like your first playthrough is your second or third, as there is minimal challenge. Puzzles such as pin numbers are easy as there are hints all over the scenery that you can’t miss. In its defence, it’s good to play an adventure game where the problem-solving isn’t too out there.
Though GrandMa Badass is straightforward, it’s not a super quick experience, so once you get into it, it should keep you engaged for one or two sittings if you have the time. Something about it feels raw, meant that in a good way. It’s like one of those games I would have played on the Amiga years ago that nobody heard of, like Nippon Safes. What didn’t sit well with me were the incredibly annoying sound effects and voices.
Mrs Badass’ Pussy
It’s mostly a non-verbal game; conversations are represented by speech bubbles that are typically A + B = C. It works, and even if you get confused, GrandMa keeps a journal of objectives. But the sounds like, “Oh, no, no, no” each time you do something wrong were irritating, and the music didn’t match what was happening in the scene, so I turned that off. The dialogue was comparable to The Minions, too, as there will be snippets of English, French and miscellaneous, and some of the items in the game will be a mixture of English and French. It’s no big deal, just a little inconsistent.
Anyway, GrandMa Badass is out now on Steam and works fine on the Steam Deck. I’m still not entirely sure why she’s a badass. It had its moments, but the comedy and the animation were slightly off. Perhaps that’s just a subjective thing on my part? It wasn’t for me, despite being a point and click adventure, but give it a look-see and see what you think. Right after you’ve fed the cat.
