RATUZ

Review

You have been imprisoned in a secret facility against your will. You do not know who you are or what your name is, but what you do know is that you are lined up with another 5 people, tied up on chairs and you are wearing a prison uniform with the number 5 on it! It is an experiment! Numbers 1 and 2 are dead after receiving their injections. Number 3 turned into a gigantic rat. Numbers 4 and 6 and yourself managed to leave the room while the monster rat killed his maker (scientist). There are no two ways about it, you must escape before you and the other numbers become the monster rat’s lunch! Can you run away from RATUZ?

RATUZ is a horror puzzle platformer game developed and self-published by Bad Coffee Games on the 23^rd of April 2022 on the Steam platform.

RATUZ is a short game that consists of 3 chapters with 8 different endings. The gameplay is very similar to Prince of Persia where you must find the exit on each level in order to move forward, but without fighting. Yes, you do have a few interesting puzzles, but they are average in terms of difficulty. What you will find while playing RATUZ is many ways of dying, which for me was one of the entertaining bits of the game.  Being cut in half by a dropping door, impaled by a huge spike ball or traps on the floor or spikes coming out of walls, pulverized by lasers or acid, falls, and of course, being eaten by the monster rat!

Most of the endings will depend on which course you choose to take regarding the characters you decide to save during your playthroughs. So make sure to read the information given by NPC’s you interact with. If you are like me and decide to leave everyone behind, the ending number 8 will be the one you wind up within your first playthrough. Even though the game is short, because of its multiple endings, RATUZ provides good replayability.

Your character, number 5, will only be able to run, crawl and jump for the entire game. There are no weapons to use in RATUZ and the only way to succeed is to either be quick or hide from the enemies, most of whom are Aliens who look like red spiders with an eye on the top and crawl either on the floor, the ceilings or on contaminated humans, able to jump on your head at any time. And the monster rat, of course.

In terms of the level designs, well, they’re average and short. However, you will have some interesting encounters with the monster rat, and it may take you several tries before you figure out what to do.

The graphics are decent, the soundtrack is well suited, and the story is fun. You can play the game with your keyboard, but I really recommend playing with a gamepad. What really annoyed me was that the button A on my gamepad, as well as pushing my analogue stick forward, made my character jump and I consequently died many more times than expected.

Review written by THE CPT FROGGY for Zeepond.com

RATUZ Steam Store Page