494 Words about: Goat Simulator
I bought Goat Simulator for my Playstation 5 when it went on sale because the video trailers for it were, well…I don’t know.
That’s honestly the intellectual impression of Goat Simulator by the way. I don’t know what this game exactly is apart from a physics simulator.
The player controls a goat and…after that, there isn’t any explanation, or, maybe more accurately there isn’t an explanation for what the “narrative” of the game is about. For starters the goat can enter a nearby town which is an urban district, but the zoning for it places agricultural spaces alongside commercial properties, and then there’s an entertainment district alongside residential spaces. These civic curiosities aside the player is encouraged to move the goat into the town and begin doing…things.
The goat can jump onto objects like cars, benches, roller coasters, bounce houses, trampolines, and doing all of these will result in some physical response. Literally. The goat is programmed to bounce or be propelled after interacting with objects. Depending on how well the player navigates the space however it’s highly likely these interactions will result in the Goat going limp as a ragdoll and flying through the air before crumpling into a heap. And then it will stand back up.
There’s also people, I guess, and the Goat can lick them.
“Licking” them is the wrong verb though.
The goat’s tongue acts as a suction cup and part of the appeal of Goat Simulator is capturing these human non-playable characters(npcs) and dragging them into cars that then explode sending them, and the goat, flying through the air and collapsing onto the ground before both parties get up apparently unharmed.
I did this for ten minutes. And then I stopped.
After playing an accumulated hour of Goat Simulator I believe I’m confident in the statement that I’m unlikely to continue playing the game, or any of its sequels. But not because it’s bad.
Goat Simulator is chaos. Having the goat blow up gas stations, or drag behind 18-wheelers by its tongue is less an opportunity to make a fun animal game in the vein of the Untitled Goose Game. Rather, it’s a chance to create a simulated environment where anything can be grabbed or thrown or bounced upon.
This is likely a rhetorical gesture on the creators part to remind people that goats, in real life, are animals that regularly create chaos. But Goat Simulator pushes the implication into the purest realms of the abstract. At some point the game is not even a life simulator, or an animal simulator. It’s just a physics simulator that gives the player a nexus point to observe radical responses to input commands.
So, what did I learn?
The videogame Goat Simulator has opened my eyes to the philosophical, physical, meta-physical, psychological, spiritual, and existential realities that goats have apparently been navigating over the millennia of their existence. Also, I have learned their tongues possess an inordinate amount of strength.
Joshua “Jammer” Smith
6.28.2024
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***UPDATE***
I’ve uploaded a video on YouTube of myself reading this essay. You can listen to me read it by following the link below: