[REVIEW] Powerwash Simulator

 You'd really think that a game about just washing a bunch of dirty things for hours of end wouldn't be that much fun. It's easy to think that it would get boring really quickly, and that there wouldn't be much in there to hold your attention.

You'd definitely wouldn't think it would have a story arch that's absolutely bonkers and the equal of half the RPGs I've played over the years!

Welcome, friends, to Powerwash Simulator.

Powerwash Simulator released in mid-July 2022 on PC and XBox, though not until January 2023 did it make its way to Playstation and Switch. I was excited to finally get to play it then, as I'd seen a few YouTubers play through bits of it, and it looked like the exact sort of game I would enjoy, turning my brain off as I appreciated the simple pleasure of cleaning up something absolutely covered in mud, grime, and graffiti. Sometimes it's great to have something to do with my hands and eyes while I catch up on podcasts or listen to audiobooks, and Powerwash Simulator was absolutely great for that.

Especially because there's no soundtrack for the game.

Yeah, every level is quiet except for the wsssh of your powerwasher, and maybe some ambient background sounds every now and again. I don't know why it doesn't have a soundtrack, but it worked out well for me, since I didn't feel like I was missing anything if I listened to something else while playing.

WASH WASH WASH WAS POWERWASH!

 

In a nutshell, you play as someone who's just starting out in their powerwashing business, aided by a friend who keeps telling the townspeople of Muckingham about you in order to drum up customers. Though said friend keeps giving them different business names, so I don't know how good a friend they really are. And that really is the premise. You go around to different levels with your equipment and unending supply of water, and you clean the horrific mud-covered places you find. Whether you're cleaning someone's house and yard, or a playground, or a monster truck with a giant cat face on the front of it, the entire game is spent with you just... cleaning.

And it's so relaxing!

I know it sounds a little ridiculous, but it's true. Going through a level methodically, washing dirt away and waiting for that little ding and flash of light that signals you've finished cleaning that particular object... It results in some fantastic little dopamine boosts. Breaking things down by item makes each level feel far less intimidating, because you know you can start with one thing, finish cleaning it, and then move on to the next. You always feel like you're making progress toward a larger goal, and the game gives you a teeny tiny little reward for that slow-but-steady progress.

Honestly, I think we all need more games like this in our lives, especially when we feel like we're just stuck where we are with no hope of getting somewhere better. I know it sounds silly, but when a game gives me encouragement like this, showing me that small steps can lead to big rewards in the end, it makes me feel motivated to keep pushing on with whatever life is throwing at me these days.

There are moments where you're pretty damn sure you cleaned everything but the game is saying, "Nope, you missed a thing on that wall over there," but you can't see where. For that, the game has a really handy "show dirt" button that highlights the part that you missed. Sometimes it's really subtle, like thin streaks of dirt you probably thought were just part of the wood grain. Other times, it seems so obvious that you wonder how you missed it in the first place. Either way, that "show dirt" button is fantastic, and helps you focus on the exact problem rather than just spraying water all over the place and hoping you hit the right spot next time.

Again, fantastic metaphor for life...

THIS GAME'S STORY GOES HARD

 Never thought I'd have to warn for spoilers in a game about cleaning things, but yes, there's a story here, and yes, I'm about to talk about it.

It should be noted that a lot of the story gets conveyed to the player through a combination of text messages when you reach certain percentages of the cleaned level you're working on, and environmental storytelling. There are no people who'll come up to you on the street and tell you things. You have to piece it together by paying attention and not skipping past all the aspects that are trying to convey plot to you.The game absolutely can be played while ignoring that stuff, but I don't recommend it. It's so much more interesting when you take the time to look around, read messages, and figure out the story as you go.

While you may start out as an innocent businessperson just trying to make some cash, you very quickly stumble onto some signs that things might not be as innocent as they seem. The townspeople seem to hate the mayor, for instance, and there's evident that he's involved in some shady illegal stuff. The volcano in the background of many levels keeps spewing more and more smoke as the game goes on. The mayor's cat Ulysses disappears, but then it's revealed that Ulysses has basically gathered all the cats and is leading them out of town, away through the desert.

The desert in which you're tasked to clean a gigantic fish-man statue, who's staring at the volcano.

Also there are aliens. Like, honest-to-goodness UFOs. You have to clean their spaceship.

But they're not actually aliens. They're time-traveling scientists from the future, who came back to figure out a way to stop the volcano from erupting, because it sets of a volcanic chain reaction that massively screws up the world later on.

And then you reach the game's final level, where you're airlifted to an island where a mysterious temple as just been discovered, and of course, it's up to you to powerwash the hell out of it. Inside, you uncover ancient murals of you doing all the jobs you've done through the course of the game, complete with ancient cypher text that can actually be decoded to tell your story.

 So yeah, that illegal stuff I mentioned that the mayor was into? Turns out his illegal mining scheme destabilized the nearby volcano that was part of a chain of underwater volcanoes, which erupt and cause huge devastation to the world. But thanks to the effort of those time-traveling scientists from the future, they went back in time to when ancient people with advanced technology lived in a now-sunken city in the Pacific Ocean. The scientists told them about what would happen, and that you as the powerwashing guy would get caught up in everything, so the Pacifists build a huge temple that would rise from the ocean when need was great, and would fire off a massive neutralizing beam of energy at that volcano, stopping it from erupting and saving the future.

But only when it was cleaned by a great powerwashing saviour.

...Told you this game's story went hard!

I really didn't expect this when I first started playing. I expected a fun chill game where I just cleaned things and felt happy about it. I didn't expect a game with deep lore that seems like it would fit into any number of RPGs. Aside from using the game to catch up on podcasts I'd been missing, I also kept going because I was compelled to find the next story beat, to see how this whole tale would fully enfold. It was an amazing experience!

AND THEN THERE'S DLC

 Ever wanted to clean Lara Croft's mansion, or Tifa's bar? There's DLC for that! Free DLC, no less, which I definitely like! Each DLC pack comes with 5 bonus themed levels for both Tomb Raider and Final Fantasy VII, and that's just awesome.

Well, mostly awesome. A lot of the FFVII levels have a ton of fiddly little corners and crevices that are hard to reach and hard to clean, so they can be a bit frustrating sometimes. But on the whole, I still enjoyed the chance to take a closer look at some iconic scenes from beloved franchises, and to also make them shine with cleanliness.

...Look, when you play Powerwash Simulator long enough, you start to appreciate just how nice a newly-cleaned thing can be.

There's an upcoming Spongebob Squarepants DLC pack too, slated for release on June 29, but I don't think I'll be getting that one. Partly because it's not free DLC and I don't have a lot of spare income right now, but mostly because I don't really have an interest in Spongebob stuff. But for fans of the show, this would also be a great opportunity for them to visit some classic locations and have another great round of cleaning things. Just because it's not for me doesn't mean it's not for someone!

 While the career-mode levels give you plenty of money to upgrade your equipment and buy some extra fun skins to customize your character, the extra money from the game's regular bonus levels and the DLC levels are a great way to ensure you can get everything you want for your world-saving powerwash character. Especially if you want to use soaps or other cleaning fluids. Personally, I didn't bother with that stuff, because it always runs out very quickly, and while using the correct cleaning fluid on the correct material definitely makes sure that things clean up more quickly, the added cost of having to buy more and more fluids just didn't feel worth it to me. I just took extra time and used plain ol' water, and switched to different nozzles depending on what I needed. Did I need a wider spray, or something more focused and powerful? Those options are there without buying soaps, and it absolutely can be done without those extras.

But if you prefer buying them to make some bits a little less frustrating to clean, be prepared so sink a lot of your money into them. The bonus levels, which can be replayed if you want -- technically all the levels can -- can be a boon to your bank account at that point.

For my part, I think Powerwash Simulator is absolutely worth the purchase price. Most people spend 30-40 hours just playing through the basic career mode, not including any bonus levels or DLC levels. If you're like me and appreciate games that give you more playtime for your dollar, then yes, absolutely Powerwash Simulator is worth buying. If you're the sort to need something end to do while you listen to audiobooks, then this is a perfect game, since the controls are so smooth and you can let your mind wander while your hands do the cleaning. There's a lot to appreciate about this game, not just in the fun gameplay loop but also in the sheer amount of detail and lore that the developer added to make the game more than the basic game it could have been.

It still would have been fun even without the off-the-walls plotline and fantastic environmental details. But it was so much richer for the inclusion of those things, and I loved it.

So yes, if you haven't picked up Powerwash Simulator yet, I highly recommend doing so if you're on the lookout for an affordable game with a lot of playtime, where you can zone out and just chill with your own thoughts, or watch/listen to other stuff as you go. It's fantastic, and I can't recommend it enough.