Baby Steps Review (PlayStation 5 & PC)

Death Stranding took a toll on me. Scratch that, it drove me to the brink of tears. It wasn’t because it was a difficult game, or even that it was a depressingly boring game; it was because it was painfully long, and not to mention ridiculously tedious thanks to the perilous job of having to balance and juggle cargo whilst simultaneously chugging on cans of Monster Energy to preserve stamina. Now, if you can imagine that pain and suffering that I went through, and then substitute the lofty shoulder baggage for two portly legs and a sack of incompetent meat, then you ought to have a rough idea of how Baby Steps follows its footsteps — literally.

Slugging through Baby Steps is a bit like being drunk; it involves struggling to put one foot in front of the other, and tumbling into every single inanimate object that miraculously appears before you. In Baby Steps, though, you aren’t under the influence; you’re just plain lazy. In fact, you are not just lazy; you are incapable of doing most human things. And it’s because of that annoying lack of competence that you have here that things, in general, are an absolute pain in the backside to conquer. Oh, walking is just the brunt of the problem; it’s learning how to navigate an entire world that’s clearly out to fracture your spine and whittle your self-confidence down to a pulp, that’s the problem.

If you’re vaguely familiar with games like Octodad: The Dadliest Catch, then you ought to have an idea of how Baby Steps works. And if not, then just know this: life is, sadly, is a heck of a lot tougher when you don’t have full control over your body. It just so happens that Baby Steps is a little more unforgiving.

Stepping Up to the Plate

Baby Steps puts you in the shoes of an unemployed failson who, in light of their miraculous evolution and bewildering circumstances, finds themself in control of their legs for the very first time. As the annoyingly incapable man-child in this rather bizarre situation, you have the monumental task of pushing the unlikely hero through a series of environmental challenges and oddball obstacles, all whilst learning how to put one foot in front of the other — literally.

It goes without saying at this point, but seeing as the game centers its entire premise around walking, the actual act of doing so is painfully awkward. It’s so awkward, in fact, that the game actively requires you to manually escort each ligament to a certain position, and then use your legs to either walk, climb, or, in some instances, lunge. Heavy stuff. But that’s not all. Oh no, Baby Steps isn’t just about putting one foot in front of the other; it’s also about finding a new sense of purpose in a barren world that has clearly moved on without you.

The locals here are eccentric, as are the minor details that flesh out the world around you. But for you, it’s all so new, sort of like a newborn child seeing the light for the first time after disembarking from the womb. The only difference here, of course, is that you are a fully grown man and not, well, an infant. Thus, we have our premise, and we have the foundation from which Baby Steps builds its story. The rest, as you can imagine, is a cakewalk, and again, probably needs no formal explanation.

One Small Step for Mankind

At the heart of Baby Steps is a rage bait experience that knows all too well how to pull on your emotions and test your patience. Similar to how the likes of I Am Bread, or heck, just about any physics-based IP, for that matter, deals its cards, Baby Steps thrives on your failures. But there’s a difference here: failing is a small part of the journey, and frequently struggling to tackle even the smallest problems is a strange delight. The fact that Baby Steps knows how to keep you in the loop even during these times, too, makes it all the more spectacular. Well, I say spectacular, when really I mean marginally more palpable.

The mechanics are a pain in the backside, true. That said, for every shortcoming and nonsensical curveball that Baby Steps brings to the table, another slightly more positive aspect thankfully steps up to balance the scales, so to speak. With a treasure trove of weird but weirdly engaging environmental puzzles to tackle, oddball characters to discover and interact with, and an entire mountain to conquer at a snail-like pace, Baby Steps comes into its own as a surprisingly jam-packed walking simulator that unapologetically bathes in stupidity and pointless shenanigans.

There isn’t a purpose to this experience, but there are, however, hats to collect, obstacles to navigate and, if you’re feeling ballsy, waterfalls to topple down in a onesie. It’s finding the nerve to tackle the feat for the fifteenth time, that’s the toughest part.

Verdict

Baby Steps provides comic relief to those who are struggling to grasp a remedial breather and respite with a walking experience that’s both hilarious and stupidly entertaining for all the right reasons. It’s a bittersweet affair, if anything, in that it offers frequent moments of joy and satisfaction to counter its back-breaking mechanics. And that’s exactly what I love about this: the fact that it divides its time between two completely different experiences. It’s tricky, but it also makes it so that even the most challenging aspects are often met with bottomless belly laughs and ridiculous moments of contextless camaraderie.

Baby Steps feels like an easy one to jump into, so to speak. It’s an easy one to recommend, too, given that it falls directly from the same creators who brought us both Getting Over It and Ape Out—two additional rage games that also went on to find universal acclaim. With that, if you happened to enjoy either of the studio’s previous releases, and you still have the mental capacity to withstand another major uphill battle, then I’d like to think that you’ll enjoy donning the onesie and stepping up to the plate in this homage to adolescent concepts.