If you go down to the woods today, chances are you’ll stumble across a LumbearJack armed with an oversized chainsaw looking to take down the man. Fortunately, that experience is exclusively FinalBoss Games, and Armor Games Studios (ITTA and Jet Lancer) recently released game, not real life. Then again…
While on the subject of ‘stumble across’, this cute lil’ adventure game was first seen during the Steam Next Fest and was a favourite in this household. Tired of The Man polluting everything he touches, our bear hero takes matters into their own hands and takes apart everything man-made, with a cheeky bitch slap to any passersby.
Axe in hand, LumbearJack smashes through toxic waste, cranes and make-do constructions to return it to nature. Best played with a controller, there’s only one button for attack, which also shares a bed interacting with NPCs and upgrading the axe. It’s all simple stuff without any faffing about.
Each stage will present an animal dilemma you solve by destroying everything in sight. The main objective is to ensure said animal gets home safely. Still, every location has an optional challenge of turning everything man-made to nature, slapping all the grey humans, so they get off their backsides and enjoy life, plus locating and destroying a bear trap on each stage.
LumbearJack is one of the easiest games I’ve played, and I loved it. My own motivation for snapping this up was for the chill factor, gorgeous visuals and cute gameplay. Perhaps that was outweighed by its accessibility as my youngest played this with me and thought it was ace. There are no deaths, no real tricky elements to contend with (other than locating all the objects that can be destroyed), plus there are customisation options.
Besides upgrading your axe to a behemoth chainsaw, the bear can don some costumes – cosmetic, of course, but a nice touch. Additionally, there are a bunch of achievements, but considering it took a couple of hours to complete with the bulk of those achievements, don’t expect to be playing this for long.
Despite that longevity element, LumbearJack undoubtedly gets a thumbs up from me. That family-friendly aspect is a definite winner, and I dare you not to get caught up in the cuteness of it all – irrespective of your testosterone levels and headshot counts. Even when my little one was at school, I picked this up, played by myself, and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you don’t mind finishing this in one sitting and are happy with the price, I’d say go for it.
