Hopefully, near the back of a very long line of job simulation games, Arena Renovation is the latest (but far from greatest) offering from Cooking Simulator developers, Nasalis Games. Serving up a dish that has fast become far too familiar in the gaming banquet, the South African studio’s hors d’oeurve will likely leave a sour taste in your mouth.
Released in March of last year (2023), this run-of-the-mill tradesman simulator offers up more of the same in terms of dated graphics, tedious tasks and the long-running “clean up and decorate” theme. After subjecting myself to a day of Arena Renovation, I share my thoughts.
Arena Renovation Lacks Innovation
With a handful of job simulation titles out there that stand out from the ever-growing crowds (here’s looking at you, Food Truck Simulator and Power Wash Simulator), there’s testament that games of this tired, old ilk can actually work. However, to do so there needs to be some form of innovation, a breaking of the mold and the will to step beyond the realms of the ordinary and into the extraordinary.
It’s only when these plucky developers step up to the mark that job simulation games work in a way that not only wins awards but – more importantly – hold the interest of its players. It’s sometimes frustrating when I see a game with a solid idea, only to fall into the mundane and murky depths of repetition. Arena Renovation is a fine example of this.
The moment that the game had loaded up and I saw rubble and rubbish strewn around, I knew what lay ahead and, sadly, I was right. Picking up rubble, tying it up in garbage sacks and throwing it away is something I have become well versed at while playing recent(ish) simulators, so at least my ample work experience helped out a lot. All of the signs pointed to Arena Renovation being yet another job simulation clone and I soon found out that they were right.
Arena Renovation – Gameplay
After spending a generous amount of time tidying the garbage and rubble in the first level (after the tutorial), my tidying up was still far from done. My next task was to take my might sledgehammer and destroy any furniture or blocks of stone that were too large to fit into my trusty bags. While this process was somewhat satisfactory, it’s still nothing that we haven’t seen before.
With the decks cleared I still had to bring out the power washer to remove graffiti that was adorning the walls and the dirt and grime from the floor. The moment I first saw I had to use a power washer, my mind drifted to fond memories of the 2021 hit as I anticipated a fun minigame to award me for my tedious work of tidying up. However, patient reader, I was so badly off the mark.
Frustration Guaranteed
Instead of the detailed system we saw in FuturLab’s game, I was given just one nozzle and a nightmarishly awkward power washing task. The graffiti on the walls was – for the most part – not too bad. However, the floors stepped up the tedium levels by a fair few notches. This was due to the many, many marks I had to clean up not being visible to the naked eye. The only way I could clean the floors was to keep aiming the nozzle backwards and forwards until completion bars were filled. With some of these taking ages and there being so many of them, this part of the game nearly had me asleep and dreaming of better games.
Usefully, there’s a scanning system you can use to see if you have missed anything. This highlights plastering, hammering, painting, and flooring jobs still to do but still doesn’t highlight the actual marks. It was, however, a nice addition to a game that – at this point – was way beyond redemption.
Arena Renovation Summary
Arena Renovation was enough to hold my interest for around an hour. It was when it came to cleaning up invisible stains that I finally lost all hope. With a few tweaks, the game would show promise but, as is so often the case, the game was released unfinished
REVIEW
OUR SCORE - 4
4
SCORE
Arena Renovation was enough to hold my interest for around an hour. It was when it came to cleaning up invisible stains that I finally lost all hope. With a few tweaks, the game would show promise but, as is so often the case, the game was released unfinished.