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There’s no shortage of simulator games that gravitate in some form or another around one of real life’s more tedious tasks – cleaning. They are oddly successful, illustrative of the fact that we’d rather perform menial chores in a virtual world, pixely satisfaction and fun a far more enticing proverbial dangling carrot than a tidy home. The latest to enter the fray is Monster Mop Up, and rather than positioning itself as more of the same, it aims to inject some life into the genre.
Published by Yogscast Games and developed over the course of two years by Terahard, a 20-person studio mainly based in the UK with team members dotted around the globe, the core concept for Monster Mop Up first emerged during an internal game jam, the brainchild of game director Gary Dave. As the studio explains, the prototype was too good to pass up, with its unique blend of cleaning simulation and cute, fluffy creatures. The rest is history.
These creatures, dubbed Ragamuffins, are the sim’s real unique selling point, not just bathing the game in an adorable sheen but also giving players a diegetic purpose to clean up all that muck. They are a messy bunch, defecating messy paint as they hop and bounce about. Terahard describes them as the soul of the game. They’re a point of pride for Terahard. “They’re just so cute, and we had a thousand ideas of what to do with them (all safe, fun stuff, of course), but just having them there really lifts the mood of the game. ”
Image credit Terahard and Yogscast Games
Image credit Terahard and Yogscast Games
That mood found inspiration in the likes of Monsters Inc., with the team aiming to bring a Pixar touch to recreate the feel and style of the studio’s much-loved movies. It shows with a visual style that sits somewhere between the vibrant colours of Journey to the Savage Planet and a kid’s summer blockbuster. Of course, Terahard also looked to cleaning sim royalty as well, citing Viscera Cleanup Detail, Powerwash Simulator and House Flipper as creative fuel for the nitty-gritty of the central task of cleaning a succession of very messy levels, but a more “cutesy wholesome version”.
Development wasn’t without its hurdles, though, namely the lighting system. Terahard explains, “We had originally intended to bake all the lighting, but this proved problematic in certain situations and looked too fake considering we wanted players to move everything around. A mix of real-time and baked was considered, but then a third-party plugin (not naming names) came and crashed the party on that. In the end, we went with a really well-optimised baked global illumination, which, in simple terms, allowed us to use real-time lights and still get most of the benefits that baked lighting gives us. This actually worked out great and fit the style we were going for much better than fully baked. ”
The result is what Terahard describes as “satisfying fun with no pressure, but a sense of achievement, both in the moment-to-moment cleaning and also having a long-term goal. Decorations, furniture, lamps, etc. make the player’s home a way to express themselves and create a unique environment where they would want to host their fluffy little roommates.” Having sunk more hours than I’d care to admit into Monster Mo Up, it’s hard to disagree with that assessment; the game is more-ish, and you’ll invariably always find time to have a crack at cleaning up just one more level.
With Monster Mop Up having launched on August 14, Terhard are hoping for a ton of rescued Ragamuffins, safe and playing in each player’s home, keeping them company. If that doesn’t tickle your fancy, then the studio recommends Plate Up, a mad, co-op management cooking sim, also published by Yogscast Games. As for what’s next, Terhard is hard at work on their next game, Dunebound Tactics, a turn-based tactical roguelite based around a perilous trek across hostile sands with a demo out now on Steam.
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