Review: Merek’s Market a Fast-Paced, Chaotic, and Comical Indie Game that will test your skills
Merek’s Market takes you on a journey of owning your own medieval shop in this fun and non-stop chaotic environment. You play as Merek a shopkeeper and craftsperson who is learning the rope on how to run his own shop by providing the necessary items for the whole town through crafting and haggling.
As you start this game, you can either play the campaign story mode in solo mode or if you want to have some fun you can play in through local co-op up to 4 players in multiplayer mode.
From the moment you start playing this game, you will have the feeling that the game has a similar playstyle of other games such as Overcook or Tool’s Up. Except this one you are pretty much running your own shop in a fast-paced environment where the clock is not your best friend while at the same time you are trying to make as much profit as you can within the day.
As you progress through the campaign you will meet some strange customers who wants specific items that is either on your shelf or something they want you to craft in the back of your shop. There will also be a few characters that you meet who will help you either by giving you some helpful advice or unlock new recipes for you to craft. On top of that to make the game a bit more competitive there is a leaderboard for each day, where you be competing against other players or even your friends to see who makes the most money or finish in the fastest time.
The controls for this game can be quite difficult for sure, especially if you planning to use a mouse and keyboard playstyle. One thing that make this game much easier is the ability to play this game with a controller, that is a big game changer. On top of that, there is an option for button mapping which is a huge bonus because not all gamers have similar playstyle method.
The narration of the game is well written with a bit of humorous moment, along with the voice over was fun listening to as there isn’t much read it on your own moments. I did like the visual of the development of each character and the environment, it had that graphic novel comic style to it in a medieval setting.
A few unique features that I really enjoy in this game is the ability to haggle some customers whenever they want to buy a specific item on your shelf, with that you can either make a small extra profit or make nothing at all. Also, another feature that really makes this game neat is whenever you sell an item or something, most games you just get the money automatically or you just collect it from the customer.
In this game you will have to approach the customer after you give them the item, but then you will have to interact with them and enter the prompt that appear on top of your head in order to receive the money, as a bonus every time you entered the prompt correctly for each customer you get a small bonus of the profit. (Keyboard – Words, Controller – Arrows and buttons sequences)
Merek’s Market is a great indie simulator game, it can be a bit challenging playing solo. But when you are playing with your friends or family through Local play it can be fun. Beware there will be chaos, but also there might be some laughable moment I can guarantee. There are still so many more surprises and without spoiling the game, this is a game that test your skills for sure alone or with other players.
Overall: 8.0
Visuals: 8.0
Audio: 7.5
Gameplay: 8.5
Merek’s Market
Platforms: PC, PlayStation, Xbox, Google Stadia
Developer: Big Village Games LTD
Publisher: Big Village Games LTD
Release Date: 15th September 2021