If you swap out all the parts of a ship (or broom) over time, is it still the same object after decades of maintenance? Say you had a broom which is just two parts (the handle and head) and you replaced the handle 14 times and get 17 new heads, is it the same broom after 20 years? Is it the same broom if you have a picture of the original and show it to everyone who says that it isn’t the same broom to prove them wrong? That’s enough about the divine hero of Greek mythology Trigger and his ship, let’s talk about Claudiu Kiss’ latest game after PC Building Simulator, The Repair House.

It seems the marketing strategy for The Repair House has been “Look, it is the guy behind that thing you liked.” That happens to be an odd choice, but it could have paid off well if done correctly. The past tense speaks volumes, as many seemed to have found disagreement with the elementary model re-builder for whatever reasons. With a number of bugs and quality-of-life features missing at launch, pointing at the high-quality thing that many love then releasing in that state might have been a misstep in dismantling goodwill that now has to be repaired.

Thematically that’s the point, so I am sure those that love meta details to the point they rub the inside of their pockets will be happy on some level. Though, I hadn’t run into too many egregious mishandlings of the gameplay. As you would expect from the developer behind PC Building Simulator, you are similarly taking on odd jobs of varying degrees of fiddliness as you align screws up for ease of dismantling. From off-brand 80s/90s consoles, toy trains, household items, tools, and more, including guitars to my annoyance.

In theory, the pieces are fitting together to create the same experience as before. It is less technical though, as you don’t need thermal paste to put together a GB Boy Colou. Buying odd bits from a catalog, you unscrew and remove the broken pieces, and put the new ones in. In those early stages, there is quite a laissez-faire attitude as you just get into a rhythm of repairing until you are gouged for rent money and you start putting some more effort into things. Parts then have to be of a particular condition, painted in certain colors and to specified amounts of quality, washed, sandblasted, and all on time frames.

For the most part, that’s a tried and tested gameplay loop, as you work to spruce up the hovel you rent. Can we also speak about the fact you are paying $500 a month in rent, yet the second rooms are blocked off and the staircase to the second floor is broken? No wonder 20-something vegans want to hang landlords by their feet and let the blood drip like pigs in a butcher’s shop. Though if you put the work in and play smart, the difficulty drops off like a stone skimming a pond. One of the supposed problems early reviews seemed to take umbrage with was the fact tools cost an arm, a leg, and a kidney on the black market.

Being a game designed with experience in this very genre of relaxing job simulation, you would think there would be at least some understanding not only of difficulty but also accessibility and overall quality-of-life features. Performance-wise, The Repair House hasn’t been too taxing at all to my PC or to the frame rate, hitting 60 with V-sync enabled and hitting 200+ without. The options menus are rather slim when it comes to a PC title, especially one you would assume might understand after the marketing talks about one of the developer’s previous titles. It is not only graphical options that are slim, but all options.

Any game with a first-person perspective is something I expect to have a FOV modifier. I don’t care if it means clipping through a texture or two, my ability to play a game exceeds that technical point. The early update thus far also mentions the walking speed being upped so it wasn’t as glacial as it might have been before (but still is), and the catalog was fixed to have things in order too. Could I bother someone by asking for some UI scaling so item selection doesn’t make the catalog that of Fisher Price? Every item is huge and there is some wasted space.

I don’t dislike The Repair House for lacking these things. I enjoy the game despite their lack of appearance which would make it to be more malleable (thus greatly more enjoyable) and more accessible. Somehow I seemingly stumbled into two bugs, one of which is said to be fixed. Though the one that really inhibited gameplay was a point where I was ordering lots of parts for a number of jobs and I noticed I could also buy the washing station and sandblaster to complete my tool set. Paid the extra 50 bucks for next-day delivery, and it seems Jeffrey’s next-day guarantee failed as I got the parts a few days later.

The other bug we might consider twofold, as while taking apart the Titania Guitar, the camera would reset position focusing on something I wasn’t taking apart. “That was patched in the first update,” I hear you possibly say if you’ve taken a look at the Steam updates. While that’s true, I encountered the bug more than two days after that update. What was I trying to dismantle on the guitar? The tuning pegs on the headstock so I could get the neck plate off, which of course connects the body and the neck.

I can hear the creak of guitarists sitting up in their chairs ready to say “Idiot, you don’t have to take the pegs off!” Just as an American teen can field strip a rifle in seconds, I can take a guitar to pieces, clean it inside and out, re-string it, tune it, and have it fully playable within 10-15 minutes. So yes, I know. I might not know the intricacies of a tobacco slicer, RC buggy, model train, or the inside of the faux NES/SNES, but I know guitars as well as anyone can. Either it is a bug or the programming demands you do needless faff.

Gameplay gets quite repetitive very early on, I’m not complaining, that is just intended as a statement of fact. Though you progress fairly quickly through the levels, opening up more items and places to go to obtain parts or items to sell. It is obvious within short order that you’ll mostly be fixing meat slicers covered in too much rust and other household items. It is difficult to say there is much rhyme or reason to what orders you’ll get day-to-day, but the balance seems to be focused on giving you as much money as possible to get by.

It seems like most orders are geared towards paying enough for the parts and express delivery (with the occasional big order coming in) both in the sense of profit to be made and parts to fix/replace. It is the side projects that I’ve found to be the biggest money sink. At some point, you’ll be able to go outside your little workshop to flea markets or garage sales and you can pick up half-broken consoles or radios (for example) which you’ll find rusted and lacking major parts. Spending money washing, sandblasting, painting, and replacing parts that are broken or missing, all accrue incremental costs.

The big profits are supposed to be made from your showroom filled with that akin to what Tat Finder General Ashens shows off. The trouble, I think between all of this, is how quickly you lose a sense of knowing what you are doing. I found myself finally using the new Steam feature of notes to keep track of parts required/ordered for all projects. Even then, when everything is delivered and you see all the parts in your inventory, it is all scattered throughout your Fisher-Price booklet showing your inventory. You can search for each part, but I’d argue it could make more sense to be grouped together for each item.

At this point, it might sound like a whole lot of complaining because that’s what the majority of this review has been, nitpicking and observations of features that could make sense. The truth of the matter is, despite all of this, I do enjoy The Repair House for what it is. What is it? Personally, I could see the point that The Repair House seems to be a game in the late stages of Early Access, just needing that little bit of polish to iron out the bugs and solve the balance/quality-of-life problems.

Ultimately, The Repair House has some problems that made the marketing an interesting choice, but there is a solid game underneath all of its roughness and problems. Playing the paradox of Theseus, repairing and building the odd objects here and there is fun enough, but the oftentimes repetitive nature of several jobs is tiring. Currently feeling like a very late Early Access title, the overall experience is enjoyable enough in that absentminded dad/work-sim way of the slower pace and repeated objectives, but with the variety seemingly dictated on a whim interest can drop quickly.

A PC review copy of The Repair House was provided by Fireshine Games for this review.

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The Repair House

$19.99

7

Score

7.0/10

Pros

• Solid, simple, and tried and tested gameplay loop.
• Some interesting repairs over time.

Cons

• Undoubtedly you'll stumble into bugs at this point.
• Some quality-of-life features or options are missing or completely lacking.