Bunker Tidy Up is the latest organization simulator by Tovarishch Games (Liquor Store Simulator). With publishing by sim-centric PlayWay S.A., this game has you busy organizing the various supplies that have been simply dumped into a bunker. You can check it out on Steam now for PC.
Enter Your Unknown OCD Organization Skills
I don’t play a lot of simulator games. Not that they don’t interest me, they just usually take more time and attention than I want to spend on them. I took a look at Bunker Tidy Up mostly because it seemed simple and easy to play through. I missed the part about how many individual items there were to pick up and sort… Nevertheless, I persevered and my review can be found below!
Gameplay
Bunker Tidy Up is a simulator about picking up, sorting and stocking supplies in a bunker. That’s it. No crazy or outlandish objectives. No way to fail apart from misplacing items on shelves, as they have their own different sections of the bunker. An upstairs for some survival items and books and the downstairs for food and drink. There are also a set of collectable items to find, which isn’t very challenging either since they’re just buried under all the things you have to pick up anyhow.
Completing shelves gives you points to put toward upgrades. Upgrades include efficiency items such as the ability to stack the same items in your inventory, draw a stack of items to you automatically, and automatically placing your picked up items wherever they go in the bunker. There’s no right or wrong order to obtain the upgrades either so you’re free to get what you want, when you want. Some upgrades also seem more helpful than others depending on the timing of when you get them too. Helpful hint: larger items generally have fewer to gather, so grab those first to get points quickly.
Progress can easily be found by checking the item and shelf count in the upper left of your screen. Bunker Tidy Up also has fourteen achievements if you want to measure yourself there too. When it comes down to it though, it’s a pretty simple game with a very simple objective. A little bit of a time sink but not nearly as bad as others out there.
Graphics & Audio
I was playing Bunker Tidy Up basically exclusively on my Steam Deck. Mostly because there was a point while reviewing it that game saves didn’t travel between systems. (Don’t worry they do now!) The graphics, from both a texture and model perspective, are fairly basic so it wasn’t burdensome at all and plays smoothly. My only complaint would probably be that when you’re grabbing items from the pile, items above sit there and defy gravity until you move them yourself. Throwing items off the top level down at least works.
I wasn’t sure what to expect from the audio in the game. The techno music tracks seem to help with focusing on the task at hand. Can’t ask for much more than that. Perhaps a news blurb or two here and there thrown in though would add more depth to the game to hint at why you are where you are.
Longevity
I was able to 100% the game in just under 12 hours. Had I been playing at peak efficiency it likely would have been under 10. The achievements came naturally just by playing. I honestly don’t see any longevity beyond that for the game unless you’re simply looking for something to zone out for a while. Though the drive to keep playing was there while tidying up was needed, I don’t expect I’ll return to it at all. Given the low price of the game, I don’t know that the developer expects you to either.
Final Thoughts
Bunker Tidy Up is as simple and straightforward as you would expect. It scratches that organization itch without involving niche hurdles or objectives to overcome. Unfortunately that also leads to a fairly short-lived game that doesn’t bring much, if anything, to the table for replayability. However, it doesn’t come off as a “janky” game despite using some well-worn mechanics and simple assets. So I am still awarding the Thumb Culture Gold Award.
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
If you enjoy this review, be sure to check out my other reviews here.
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