Deformers on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 does a terrible job at telling newbies how to play its game. The game about squishy animals, food and unmentionables slamming into each other was a smash hit when it released on PC in 2016 and now has finally made its way to console. It combines the soccer ball gameplay of Rocket League with blobs, weapons and weird power ups. It creates new ways to play, all while smashing sentient hamburgers and spaghetti together.
When you load into Deformers on Xbox One, you are greeted by the title screen that gives you no direction. After clicking “accept” on a long and scary looking user licence agreement, you end up at the menu. There’s no tutorial or explanation as to what the “workshop” or any of the game modes on the menu are, you just have to figure it out. There’s Deathmatch, which can be played in teams or solo, and Formball, which is soccer with blobs.
I just decided to jump blob-first into a Deathmatch and see if I could figure it out on my own. Matchmaking took a bit longer to find a game than what I’m used to in Overwatch , but it’s hard to knock a game on release day that’s experiencing server problems. When I did load into the game, I saw these five blue blobs in a circle and was told to choose one. The game doesn’t tell you this, but you can customize your blobs in the “workshop” and turn them into the weird, but oddly cute, balls the game is famous for.
There are also five different classes to choose from and nowhere in Deformers does it tell you how they work. There’s a tiny blurb in the selection screen for each class, alongside a difficulty rating and stats, but it doesn’t really clue you in as to what they do. After enough trial and error, I’ve figured out that Guardians are harder to knock off stages and Strikers knock enemies farther, I’m equally terrible as both.
The controls in Deformers aren’t particularly intuitive and the game would benefit from a tutorial. In my first game, I just pressed buttons at random and hoped they would lead me to victory. All I really did was zoom right off the stage by pressing the right trigger too hard over and over. The win condition isn’t even made clear, I thought it was to bounce your enemies off the cliff, but it turns out you’re actually supposed to collect food and items to earn points. Needless to say I ended up in last place.
Deformers never explains how you are supposed to use its controls, which is infuriating to say the least. I have no problem when a game decides not to hold your hand and show you the way to victory, but it has to at least tell me how it’s supposed to be played. I don’t think the blobby soccer, smash-up, arena brawler game is bad, It’s really fun once you get the hang of it.
There’s a full guide online that explains a lot of the stuff I’m whining about, but reading through a 12-page manual while I’m trying to play a new game is kind of stressful. This isn’t Legend Of Zelda on the NES, where you needed a full booklet of information just to get through the first dungeon.
TL;DR: I might just be a moron who can’t understand the simple mechanics of Deformers , a game about cow-shaped balls and good physics.