Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop

If you’re in the market for a game that combines spaceship repair with existential crises and absurd humour, Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is well worth checking out

Roguelites usually frustrate me, but I’ve never once wanted to rage quit Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop. Whether it’s the fact that I’m armed with new knowledge, I’ve got new perks to push me further, or it’s just that Droose has gently encouraged me to keep going, I can’t stop playing Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop. I want to find all its secrets and once, just once, manage a perfect run. I’ll probably have to finally figure out what to do about exploding nuclear reactors first, though.

Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop is a very good video game that manages to fit the simulation soul and the roguelite one. Making mistakes makes poor Wilbur's life a real hell like the real one, and what he manages to achieve is not always optimal. What is really great, however, is this pearl of a game here that manages to do all the right things and implement simulation mechanics that are really well integrated within it. To be had seriously, both if you love space and if you need to stock up on a similar video game.

Exactly what it wants to be.

Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop’s logic puzzles and space dystopia won’t be for everyone. If you dread having to assemble drop-shipped furniture or aren’t charmed by sardonic storytelling, the game might be downright laborious. But for DIY tinkerers, Rocket Shop’s space garage sim shouldn’t be overlooked.

Maybe it’s a slow burn and I need more time with it, but Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is so unrelenting in its first act, it left me hanging my head in defeat. It’s a title with a lot of potential, but ultimately, the punishing, repetitive foundation it sits on isn’t enough for me to support continued playthroughs.