Oh...Sir!! The Insult Simulator is a dumb-fun experience for the cost of nearly nothing. Its wittiness and sizable options for insulting, as well as its online/offline modes, will keep you entertained for a while, but in short stints.
Oh…Sir!! The Insult Simulator is a simple and unique experience that brings the oddity of gaming to somewhat of a new level, but at a reasonable price. How could you possibly put a price on saying someone’s mother is vile and dances like a Nazi? You can’t. I mean, Vile Monarch did, but honestly I’m not sure you could put a value on it.
On that note, let’s dig right into the game.
If you couldn’t figure out by the name, then let me lay it out there for you — you’re going to be playing an insult simulator. The gameplay is structured in simplistic fashion, where the gamer chooses a set of words to form an insulting sentence that equals out to a certain amount of point damage to the opposing player (think Street Fighter, but with words and not cheap moves). The better the insult, the more it hurts the other player. That is the ground level construction of this game design and it works because it is a game anyone can pick up and play.
The limitation? Well, you have to be able to form complete sentences, otherwise you’re going to get zero points for your insult. If you aren’t good at insulting people, or you are easily offended, then maybe this game would be tough for you to get into. You would most definitely probably fail at it and more than likely leave the room in tears, much like you would if you watched Grave of the Fireflies. I’m not sure I know someone who fits that last category, but I’m sure there is someone out there that just plainly sucks at being mean.
Anyway, the game does its absolute best to help you out and doesn’t require that you become a master at insulting people to succeed, but it would certainly help the experience. I will say that along the way, even if you put insane sentences together that don’t make sense, there would be a moment or two that you would get a kick out of your creations, even if they’re bad. That is also the joy of the game, which is finding the ridiculousness in your train of thought. Laughing is always a good thing.
Now, the game is turn-based, meaning you take a piece of a sentence from a list in the middle of the screen, then your opponent takes a piece, which is proper for the gameplay design proposed at ground level. Each player slowly forms insulting sentences from the pieces acquired. The back and forth gameplay creates solid design for a couple of reasons. First, choosing what you want is imperative for success in the game, so knowing what you want to say before you say it helps in decision-making when snagging words or phrases from the list in the middle of the screen. For example, if you wanted to say “Your mother is vile”, you would need to choose “Your mother”, then wait for the opponent to choose something, then choose “is vile”. Knowing the insult will help with the choices. Be very, very choosy because once you pick a piece, it is removed from the list, which means you need to know what you want before diving in.
The second part of this design that makes the game interesting is that you have to keep up with your opponent’s sentence and try to strategically block them from getting the choice that they want, sometimes at the expense of your sentence. If you steal their word, then it ruins their insult, thus either decreasing their points or killing their scoring attack. It’s a perfect blend of offense/defense with word choices. That makes the game deeper than it appears on the surface.
In addition to this, there are a few ‘extras’ that you can use to garnish an advantage over your opponent. The first is that you can get combo insult points by reusing certain phrases or insulting specific attributes of your opponent. For example, if you insult your opponent’s father multiple times, then each time you keep going at their father there is a multiplied bonus to increase the score. Of course, you would get a better score if you could incorporate good insults that work with “your father”. It’s quite the complicated game, if you make it so.
The second extra is in the form of an ellipsis (…). There is an option during the game that allows you to choose an ellipsis at the end of the sentence. This option regenerates the list of choices, but also allows you to keep your sentence that you are forming. You can then potentially create giant insults that could potentially wipe out an opponent in one swipe. It’s a neat option and one you should take into account when playing against players online.
The last extra in the bunch is the use of tea. Yep, you read that right, tea. Each round will refill a tea cup in front of you, which is directly correlated with secret sentence insult phrases below your character onscreen. These choices are unique to you and you alone. You can choose from the two choices initially provided or you can sip your cup of tea (by pressing circle) in front of you to reset those choices. You have no control over what choices are given to you, so make sure you have a plan B in case those choices turn out to be unusable. The fact that they are there makes the game, again, a little deeper.
In addition to the gameplay design above, you also have a bevy of characters to choose from, including H.P. Lovecraft (creepy dude), locations to choose from to unleash your insults (kind of like Street Fighter location select) and a bevy of unlockables that will extend both categories. There is quite a bit of motivation to keep playing the game beyond just performing insults.
If that doesn’t tickle your fancy enough, the game also provides single—player, local and online gameplay. While you can probably figure out how the single and local modes go, the online mode is smooth as a button. The few weeks I’ve been playing this game I have enjoyed playing people online. It’s quick, easy and works remarkably well for such an inexpensive game.
Now, you might be wondering how long you’ll be playing this at any given time. Well, I still play it on and off, when I need humor (especially during E3 time), but the initial gameplay time lasts about 3-4 hours. You’ll probably revisit it here and there, but it’s usually a rest stop type of gaming experience in-between the Call of Duty and Battlefields of the world.
That said, don’t let that set of sentences be a turn off for you because you’re going to spend a whopping $2.99 on the PS4 for this experience. Yes, you read that right, a whopping $2.99 USD. For what you get and for how deep the gameplay can be that is incredibly cheap. That’s us robbing the developers. So, in short, you’re getting a very solid, fun, humorous game for much of nothing. It’s a steal, folks.
Overall, Oh…Sir!! The Insult Simulator is a dumb-fun experience for the cost of nearly nothing. Its wittiness and sizable options for insulting, as well as its online/offline modes, will keep you entertained for a while, but in short stints.
