Developer: Llamasoft
Year: 2020
Genre: Arcade
System: PC

Given that this site is called The Virtual Moose, I’m surprised I never wrote a post about Moose Life, the 2020 arcade game by Llamasoft. It’s a game where you play as a voxel moose, flying through 3D tunnel-like levels, shooting at weird little bits and making them explode into trippy visuals. The gameplay gimmick in this one being that as you glide through the levels, you can either shoot at objects on the floor or flip upside down and run along the ceiling to shoot. I don’t know if it’s my #1 Llamasoft game, that’s probably Polybius, but it sure is up there.

It’s got everything you would want in a Llamasoft game. Sheep, trippy 80s arcade game-inspired visuals, the same audio samples you’ve heard in a dozen or so other Llamasoft games. It’s not doing anything radically experimental but that’s fine with me. It’s just great playing an arcade game by someone that has been making them for decades and is at the top of their game. It’s a bit more challenging than their previous game Polybius, where I loved being able to basically enter a trance-like state while playing, but I suppose that’s what the Free Ride mode is for, where you can play without worrying about lives. Even though it’s an arcade game, the game saves the best state each time you enter a level, meaning you can pick up at the most recent level if you lose all your lives. You’re certainly welcome to start at the beginning if you want, but I appreciate that there’s a way for players to experience all the levels in the game.

Something I really love about Moose Life is how much it seems like it’s doing its own thing. Other Llamasoft games are often a riff on another arcade game but in Minter’s own style and innovations, but I don’t see the specific influences with Moose Life. I maybe see a tiny bit of Defender and other people bring up Juno First in their reviews, but I don’t know what the direct inspirations are and I think that’s really neat. I certainly don’t mind when Llamasoft remakes an existing game, I’m a huge fan of their Tempest games and their most recent game, I Robot, is a delight too, but it’s fun playing a Llamasoft game and not knowing where it came from too.

There’s really no unique insights or surprises in this post. I just love Llamasoft’s games and wanted to talk about one that I think gets less attention since it’s not a remake. If you’re looking for an arcade game, consider giving it a look. I also want to give a shout out to the Llamasoft documentary Heart of Neon, which I need to do a longer post about at some point, but I really enjoyed it and how it not only looks at Jeff Minter’s career but the indie devs in his circle as well.

Moose Life is available on Steam and PlayStation 4.