

They observe and admire from afar – ensure you have a roof!

So yeah, the controls are simple to pick up and learn and the only issue you’ll have is you may blow when you meant to suck – it happens to all of us… The D-pad is also mapped to things like your map and slimepedia, but they can also be accessed with the Options button, so I never used them. Face-buttons are just as simple – Cross jumps, Square interacts, Circle pushes slimes away (when unlocked) and Triangle is your flashlight. The Left and Right stick are your usual look and move controls ( Slime Rancher also has the y-axis invert option!). L2 is used to suck in your victims (slimes, poop, food and chickens), R2 shoots them back out with R1 and L1 swapping between your four slots, similar to Minecraft. At its core, Slime Rancher plays like a First Person Shooter, but with a giant ‘vacpack’ as your chosen weapon. In terms of the controls, Monomi Park has created the perfect control scheme as everything is so easy to operate and remember. Slime Rancher is pretty much all of those aspects, you’re mindlessly collecting slimes and resources, creating pens to hold your prisoners, growing your own crops to feed them, and then selling off their poop to make money so you can expand and do it again to their friends. As such, I can usually watch a TV show, listen to a podcast, or even talk to someone whilst I play it and not worry about getting confused with my multitasking. However, I find games I don’t have to think about too much helps me to relax and pass the time by knowing I’m progressing but not having to ‘be all there’ as I play in order to know what’s going on. I’m a massive fan of resource management, simulations, farming and mindless monotonous games – I know, it’s a strange combination. What’s that? There’s a broken bridge which she can’t cross – nevermind, she’ll construct a jetpack so she can overcome the obstacle and search out more money-makers! The depth comes into the game when you have to go and explore in order to find the various varieties of slime, create Frankenstein creations so you can obtain more of the expensive poop, and unlock new areas to expand your small ranch. Nothing will hold young Beatrix back, if she sees a locked door she doesn’t go home and cries about it, she’ll overfeed a fat slime in order to make it burst and turn into a key.

However, she won’t be looking after pigs, cows and sheep, ‘Far Far Range’ specialises in slimes and their poop. You play the role of Beatrix LeBeau, a young energetic rancher who has decided to try something new and travel a thousand light-years from Earth in order to run her own ranch. In a way, it technically is pretty much a sandbox as you’re free to progress at your own pace, but there is an underlining story in the background.

I thought it was just going to be an open sandbox where everything was a free-for-all. An aspect of Slime Rancher that I wasn’t really expecting is the fact that there is a story in play.
