Indie Game of the Week 444: PowerWash Simulator 2

In what has to be one of the fastest release-to-IGotW coverage periods in recorded IGotW history (which I hope someone out there is doing because I keep forgetting to back anything up) we have PowerWash Simulator 2: the long-awaited sequel to the superlative scrub 'em up PowerWash Simulator, in which you take on a series of splashjobs across the somehow simultaneously American and British berg of Muckingham that might cover relatively short tasks like thoroughly cleaning a truck to much larger ones, like an entire skatepark or subway station. The first game adhered to that mostly all-business aesthetic and structure of the "Simulator" subgenre in offering some simple mechanics that more or less recreated a real-life profession in a more video game-y context of dopamine-dumping completion "dings" and a progression built around purchasing ever more powerful sprayguns, but it also found a jovial levity of sorts in its more absurd projects—such as mystical ancient temples or that giant shoe Old Mother Hubbard lived in—as well as running text commentaries from your clients, who'd regale you with silly anecdotes about the location or vehicle you were washing or further exposition about the strange happenings around town. It's the type of game that leaves garden gnomes lying around with no explanation nor the need for one. It's that daffy personality, in combination with the almost atavistic satisfaction that comes from the central gameplay loop (after all, most dudes play "power washer" pretty much every time nature calls), which has endeared that first game to so many.

The sequel is for all intents and purposes the same business as before, just with a whole lot of extra places and things to clean. In truth, most of its new features either seem half-formed or entirely superfluous, but that hasn't detracted much from that compelling core of washing a whole bunch of grime from increasingly odd and memorable mission targets. The progression is mostly untouched: there's two models apiece for each tier of power washer, going from "light" to "professional", including my beloved three-pronged cannon that became my mainstay in the first game and has again here. (It's the Komaki Tiger Drop of the PowerWash universe. IYKYK.) It's also ramped up its QoL suite of features, including one that auto-tracks the last handful of wash targets so you're not having to pull up the master list with the tab key every few seconds and scrolling until you find the last grubby holdouts, and a few more tools in the form of a disc-based surface washer and an adjustable scissor-lift which I'd last encountered in the thematically (and comedically) similar Viscera Cleanup Detail. What is odd is that the object names on the list of things to clean seem to have become more vague than ever—"sign letter" instead of which specific letter it is, for example, or a whole bunch of "wall" instead of "north wall", "east wall", etc. to help narrow down which specific featureless wall the tracker is talking about—which might suggest the game not wanting to give you too easy of a time figuring out where to spray next were it not for all the other overly accommodating QoL additions proving otherwise. Not sure what the idea behind that change was, unless they simply ran out of dev time to give everything more precise names. At least you still get some fun esoteric architecture words like a pilaster (a type of column) or a corbel (a bracket on a wall to hold up a piece of roof) or a buttfor.

Last of the new features, and perhaps most significant, is the inclusion of a home base you can return to between missions. You can buy furniture in this mode with which to decorate the ground floor office area—after washing them, of course, since you're apparently buying them used from some filthy second-hand place—but this mode feels a bit undercooked in some ways. For one, furniture items don't automatically click in place to line up with walls and the like, which I feel like is a huge lapse in catering to the type of OCD nutcase most likely to love a game like this, but then as a mild sufferer of that condition I'm perhaps overstating the issue (or greatly understating it). Both these furniture items and the various multicolored palette-swapped cosmetic alternatives to your suit, van, and tools use a separate currency from the one you spend to buy new washer upgrades, just so it doesn't feel like the frivolous purchases are siphoning from the more important progression ones, which was a smart choice. Finally, the home office has a shelf in the back that slowly fills with miniature dioramas of the missions you've so far completed, which not only produces a visual treat of assorted colorful knick-knacks to appreciate but serves as a speedy shorthand for the mission replaying "free play" feature.

PowerWash Simulator is a game series that relies on its appealing formula to the extent that changing too much would've been ill-advised, given how they nailed most of what this game needed to be the first time around, and I'd bet most of its audience are happy just receiving more of what worked last time with perhaps a few more imaginative ideas for the missions. I got a sense that they were trying for something a bit wilder with one of the earliest jobs, where you're washing a floor panel that looked like one of those electronic billboard ad things that would pop up out of the ground when it sensed someone walking past: it turned out to be something like that, but a public toilet instead, which made me wish this game leaned into its sci-fi aspirations a little harder. Some of the larger projects, like an '80s roller disco blaring retro synthwave or an interactive museum exhibit of the Solar System, had some cute interactive elements that enlivened otherwise very long tasks that largely involved washing walls and ceilings—fortunately, these bigger levels tend to show up later on once you can afford the way more efficient tools to deal with them faster.

PowerWash Simulator 2 is, for better or worse, more of the same but for a few tweaks and some tossed-together interior decoration mechanics for flavor. It's hard to argue that this isn't the way a sequel should've gone, nor that it really needed to do much else besides find new avenues to travel to and clean with your trusty shoots 'n' ladders, plus a small gaggle of cats that seemingly follow you wherever you go. (And, no, you're not allowed to spray them with the high-powered spray rifles. Not that I tried. Why, that would be psychotic behavior.) Despite myself, and with everything else going on this month including a very enjoyable time with this year's GOTY front runner Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, I can't seem to help booting this thing up and scrubbing the crap off of yet other rundown jalopy or abandoned structure within which someone had some very bad diarrhea times. How this game always manages to get its hooks into me I'll never know; it's not like I don't have my own stuff to clean around here.

Rating: 5 out of 5. (I guess.)