Goat Simulator Remastered Review (Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 & PC)

Tis’ the season to be anarchic, fledgling farmhands. The rampaging goat with violent tendencies is back for another round, and with all of the DLC and quirky trimmings, to boot. Suffice it to say, Goat Simulator 2 isn’t happening (thanks for that tongue-in-cheek joke, Coffee Stain Studios…), but Goat Simulator Remastered is, and that’s all the more reason for us to return to the trotting world of witty shenanigans and enigmatic crime sprees. The vibrant locale is once again teeming with obstacles to obliterate, weddings to crash, and, true to the series’ hallmark objectives, groins to pulverize. What more could you want, eh?

For those of you who’ve yet to fracture the pelvis of an elderly bystander, here’s an excerpt from the game’s description: ‘Goat Simulator is a game about causing as much destruction as you possibly can, as a goat.’ And that’s really all you need to know here: Coffee Stain Studios’ raw take on animal simulation is, for lack of a better description, mindless entertainment with a hefty pinch of crass humor and oddball gameplay. There isn’t a storyline to follow, but rather, an open-ended setting that essentially allows you to skewer your way through a series of random tasks and, well, cause total mayhem in exchange for points and relatively pointless pick-me-ups. In other words, you shouldn’t expect any award-winning material here. Love vengeful farm animals? Welcome aboard, you sadistic so-and-so. Let’s get busy with it.

The GOAT of Goat Simulators

Goat Simulator isn’t all that different than the other mayhem-centric sandbox games of its caliber; it’s relentless in its simplicity, and it makes it clear right from the get-go that seriousness isn’t exactly its forte. The premise of the game is all rather simple: take a goat—a horned troublemaker with a knack for wreaking havoc on the otherwise serine and quaint streets of a stereotypical city—and have it complete an array of what can be only described as, you know, extremely pointless exercises. From bashing heads with a nature enthusiast to jousting with a giraffe, the plot itself bears no real meaning; it’s more or less the case of presenting a casket of objects, and then giving you free reign to compete, destroy, and ultimately ruin the lives of those you come into contact with. That’s Goat Simulator: an excuse to commemorate futile efforts to annoy people.

Goat Simulator is presented in a somewhat digestible (yet thematically cluttered) format. To put it simply, there are no formal guidelines to adhere to, nor any overarching goals to complete, for that matter. There’s an open-world environment to scoot around in, sure — but it’s essentially up to you to decide which avenues to explore, and which pedestrians to wind up. In other words, there is quite literally no structure to the game. Case in point, there are numerous goals to tackle, but scarcely any that bear any real significance to the game’s development. And it’s because of that barebones simplicity that, in all honesty, you don’t need to be a genius to make short work of a lot of its challenges. Can’t really complain there.

A Good-Looking Goat

So, what’s new in this second coming of the beloved goat? Well, first and foremost, there’s the visuals; Goat Simulator Remastered pretty much dabbles along an almost identical wavelength as its successor, Goat Simulator 3. And by that, I mean that it presents itself as a cleaner, shinier version of what it initially brought to the table back in 2014. Don’t get me wrong, it still looks a little janky — but that’s just the aesthetic that Goat Simulator chooses to capitalize upon, to be fair. Again, I can’t say that the souped-up graphics that it does aim to generate are worthy of being celebrated, but, respectfully speaking, they’re a hell of a lot better than the vast majority of alternate sandbox games out there.

Of course, the beef of the game is more or less within the DLC—a casket of separate chapters that span the entire series’ ten-year lifespan. Alongside the bread-and-butter port of the original game, the Remastered edition also includes Goat City Bay, Goat MMO, Goat Z, PAYDAY, Waste Of Space, and Buck to School. And again, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what each of these meaty add-ons actually are: reskins of the same product, only with a few more set pieces, tasks, and areas to explore. But that’s fine, because, funnily enough, even the developer states that the DLC is a “mere cash-grab,” and that, even with the structurally sound backing of a newer visual palette, the 2.0 version itself is still “a completely stupid game.” Their words, not mine.

No Harm Done

The folks over at Coffee Stain Studios set themselves up to succeed with Goat Simulator Remastered, mainly due to their basic infatuation with not mincing words, but rather, their combined ability to tell it exactly how it is. To this end, the devs don’t really “big” themselves up and tell us a whole bunch of lies; on the contrary, Coffee Stain essentially informs us that, minor graphical tweaks aside, Goat Simulator Remastered is still littered with technical errors and other issues. And that’s a normal thing here, believe it or not. Frankly, the overhauled version could still do with an additional layer of complexity to make it a little more, I don’t know, playable. Nevertheless, it’s Goat Simulator — so take it with a pinch of salt, basically. Things will break, but you’ll probably be too busy jackknifing around the map to give a damn.

Thankfully, there are still plenty of reasons to return to the shoddy shores of Goat Simulator for another rampaging adventure. Yes, it’s a niche game, and it’s a little patchy in terms of its general mechanics and physics-based gameplay, but that isn’t to say that it’s without its myriad of quality components. I’m not saying that it’s capable of producing anything special, or even anything of value or merit — but it is, on the other hand, absolutely loaded to the brim with some great scenarios and humorous moments. Add the fact that you’ve also got a fistful of DLC packs that each bring their own respective characters, settings, and trials, and you’ve got yourself quite the banquet of ingredients. Oh, and did I mention that there is also a feature that allows you to switch between goats via a nifty Mutator system? Not a bad addition, that.

Verdict

If you’re looking for the definitive way to play Goat Simulator and the treasure trove of add-ons that have launched since its 2014 inception, then you honestly needn’t carve any deeper than here, in the polished quarters of the Remastered version that Coffee Stain has intentionally created to celebrate its monstrous creation, warts and all. Granted, there isn’t anything particularly fresh in the rehashed model, minus, perhaps, the inclusion of some refined visuals and a few quality-of-life improvements. With that said, for the measly price of $30, and not to mention the amount of content that you can gain access to right off the bat, I’m sort of inclined to say that the price is reasonable for what you receive.

If you can dive into Goat Simulator with relatively low expectations, then I can guarantee that you’ll end up getting your money’s worth — at least for a handful of hours before the next “quirky” animal simulation sandbox comes strolling through to pique your interest, anyway. If, however, you’ve already stumbled upon the original version of the game and, by some chance, struggled to find an incentive to continue playing it, then you’re probably going to kick yourself for considering what could otherwise be described as a simple rehash of a half-baked game.

I’ll just come out and say it: Goat Simulator is still just as fun to play in 2024 as it was back in 2014. Oh, yes, it is laughably bad, but when all’s said and done, that’s sort of the point, isn’t it? It’s a bad game, and yet, it’s also something that I wouldn’t trade for any other goat-centric simulation game of its kind, truth be told. Call it Stockholm Syndrome. I don’t know, man.