Burrito Bison Revenge | a Review
originally published on 14/12/2024;
Hello everyone, I am Burrito Bison’s long lost cousin, Döner Bison, also known as G.E.M.Simov, a murderer of candy everywhere, and I’ve come to tell you about the flash game “Burrito Bison Revenge” (henceforth Revenge).
Simple review details - I rank games on an out of 10 basis, granting up to 3 points in 3 categories, as well as a last, single point from my own self, depending on my experience with it.
Gameplay
This game is, essentially, Burrito Bison 2. Much like Burrito Bison, it features the exact same mechanics, but with some additions. As a result of that, I will skip out on describing most things, with the exception of stuff that is new.
New stuff includes - missions, 120 of them, which give the Player tasks that they need to complete, usually stuff that gets done on its own so long as the Player keeps playing the game. These award extra money, thus making getting stuff easier - but not really, because upgrade costs are roughly two times higher than what they were in Burrito Bison, while the rate at which money is obtained, from squashing gummies, at least, is the same.
So there is incentive for the Player to, get this… Pay. Yup, there’s a big button in the shop that says: “Get more money!” and it directs the Player to like the developers’ page on Facebook, Follow their Twitter and… Add them on Google Plus? Additionally, the Player can just buy money with real dollars, though not directly. The amount of money the Player can buy is ludicrous, more than enough to buy all upgrades and skip a huge part of the game, as a result of which removing any sense and reason to engage with it in the first place.
That’s a colossal misstep. It is entirely understandable to want to make money out of what you have created, but doing this… Do not intertwine paying with the gameplay of your game at all. Otherwise, the game’s integrity is gone and the thing that was made by you (the game developer) loses its value, because people get to ignore it, get to skip it. This is a nasty can of worms that screams BAD gameplay design. So I’ll just dock points and be on with it.
Other interesting, new things that the game does is introduce new wrestlers. Whereas in Burrito Bison there was only the Jawbreaker, in this one there are three possible goons, each featuring different indicators for when the best moment to click is, thus introducing a bit of variability. On top of that, they also drop different amounts of money when stricken, but… Well, they need to be purchased prior to being used, which is unfortunate. The addition is neat, but nothing too spectacular.
On that particular subject, there are a lot more things to upgrade. Oddities include the separation of cop resistance and door resistance, which just aims to bloat playtime and further incentivize buying money with real currencies. There are also neat little upgrades that can be unlocked and provide the Player with little boosts, such as instant slam refills or boosts of speed when their speed gets too low.
The way speed diminishes and increases in this sequel is very odd - it seems as if, unlike Burrito Bison, in this one each door takes away more of the PC’s momentum than the previous one. That, in turn, necessitates getting resistance, whereas in Burrito Bison that was not totally needed. Again, this is a minor change that prolongs the amount of time the Player spends playing the game, and incentivizes buying money so as to get through this debacle faster.
On the topic of special gummies, there are a lot of new contenders - in fact, all of the unlockable gummies are new, and everything from Burrito Bison is nowhere to be found. That is odd, in the sense that there seems to be nothing really stopping the special gummies from the previous game to make a return in the sequel, especially keeping in mind the fact that it is all based on chance, so it could feasibly be balanced, but… They just are not there.
The new gummies are similar in concept to the previous ones, featuring slightly different mechanics, but are, ultimately, decent replacements.
One of the more interesting things that Revenge does is the addition of a Survival mode, which is the same as the ordinary mode, with the exception of it having no end. It is unlocked after reaching the end of normal mode and is where the Player gets to complete roughly half of the missions left over after completing normal mode. Unfortunately, there are no new things in it, aside from the way it looks.
With all that said, Revenge suffers from being way too long and way too slow. Whereas Burrito Bison could be completed, wholly, in less than two hours, the same can not be said about Revenge, which stalls on for double that. The enjoyment derived from the game is thus strongly diminished, and, with the addition of payment to skip that lengthy time to win… Well, the game makes far too many concessions and fails at improving what its predecessor did. In fact, Burrito Bison was better, as a result of which I am going to be very harsh. 1/3
Presentation
It looks the same as Burrito Bison, though the vibe is different. The once ‘pristine’ Candy Land lies in ruin after the fabled luchador’s rampage, and there’s a lot more screen shake, but, aside from that, things are the same. The tutorials work the exact same way - as in, pop-ups whenever some new mechanic is introduced - and this time there is even a User Interface element that shows off the distance covered by the Player.
The big change shows itself in the addition of more music, which replaces what was previously present, but is also… Well, more. There is more than one track that plays during a propulsion, and the tracks are quite neat as well.
Certain animations are different, though literally everything else about the game is… Quite similar, if not the exact same, to what it was in Burrito Bison. Thus? Still excellent.
Also, one of the tracks is sampling the yawn meme sound effect. You know the one… 3/3
Story
After escaping from Candy Land, Burrito Bison goes back to his grocery shopping, BUT! He notices that his wallet is missing. So he goes back to Candy Land to get his wallet back from the enslaving, abducting and thieving gummies!
The great hero commits violent genocide upon the gummies until he reaches a humongous safe and procures his wallet… But while the game tries to do more of the same, in regards to the story, the vibe is totally different. Whereas the violence and the context in Burrito Bison was that of a person being abducted and forced to participate in cage-fights, which could be far more reasonably interpreted as a life-or-death situation, this time, Revenge has the Main Character just… Murder countless gummies because they took his wallet. There’s something unsettling about the fact that he just gets up and walks back to the ring, ready to propel himself again, or the fact that cops now get beaten up horribly, mangled and totally disabled.
The roles seem to have been switched, and what was a somewhat sympathetic hero in Burrito Bison is now more villainous a Character. Of course, there is actually no depth to the story, but this single switch-up, with the Character going back for more carnage, makes me very queasy, and renders that, which was present in the first installment, moot. 0/3
Legendary Point
Does this game get the Legendary point, so craved and wanted by all and none at the same time? NO, for reasons outlined in the Story section of the Review as well as the Gameplay section. Even if the story was God’s gift to man, something that’s so clearly designed to force the Player into paying is… Not it, chief. 0/1
Conclusion
4/10. Burrito Bison Revenge is a middling sequel to a very good flash game. It does the same things its predecessor does, but worse, as a result of which it is not recommended.
In the bag of mediocrity, narrowly avoiding the wall of shame. Let it gather dust and cease to be.