Surgeon Simulator 2013 review

Prepare to kill edition. For those unaware of Surgeon Simulator 2013′s glorious rise to power: it was a game, that consisted of a single surgery level, developed for the Global Game Jam by a very smart group of fellows from Bossa Studios. After it released to the general public, along with its teeth-grinding controls and hilarious concept, it was showered with love and kittens from all over the Internet. Now, after a long, hard wait of a few months, it's time to welcome the full game of Surgeon Simulator 2013 to Steam! All thanks to the magic of Steam Greenlight.

There is even more good news, everyone: it's still just as difficult, hilarious, and funny as it was back in demo form – only now there's even more of it! There are now three surgeries which you can perform, as far as I can decipher as I cannot complete the brain surgery but it appears to be the final one in the list, including: an updated version of the heart surgery available in the free demo, a double kidney transplant, and the illusive brain surgery. I kept failing the double kidney transplant initially because I could not wrap my brain around how to do the intestines properly (a sentence that school never prepared me to write). Rest assured though that all three surgeries available are equal parts difficult, awesome, and bloody difficult. The brain surgery one especially as it bested me despite hours of attempting.

The concept of the game is pretty much in the title: you play as Nigel Burke, a man thrust into the occupation of surgeon with no prior knowledge or experience. A pretty entertaining concept already, however the true addictiveness of the game lies with the controls. It sounds dumb, but it's true. You place your left hand on the A, W, E, R, and SPACE keys to simulate the hand's fingers, and use the mouse to move, lower, and change the angle of the hand itself. You only control one hand throughout the game, and it sounds easy – but it isn't. You will kill the patient enough times to convince them they're stuck in a coma-dream eternally playing Dark Souls.

Gripping, lifting, and using the tools with true precision takes time. Luckily, the game is self-aware enough to accept this. It will take practice to complete a level, a lot of practice, but once you've honed your skills enough so you're ready to replace the vital organ at the end of the level you can just dump it in without a care in the world. When dropping the new heart into the patient's open, bleeding chest cavity at the end of the heart surgery, the game proudly announces: "Yeah. It looks like he'll live. COMPLETE!"

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