Review: Gunbrella

destructoid.com:

Way back in 2019, I did my first game review for Destructoid. It was for Doinksoft’s Gato Roboto. I wasn’t a huge fan. I thought that it played well but was derivative and insubstantial, largely paling in comparison to the games it took inspiration from. To be fair, however, that was one of Doinksoft’s first attempts as a studio, and imitating those that inspired you is a totally fair way to start out.

With that out of the way, however, we have Gunbrella. Now, this is something I can get behind. Or get under. While there is still some obvious inspiration showing through in many places, Gunbrella makes it obvious that it’s a game that started with a simple concept and grew from there. It’s the best, most organic way to make a game.

Gunbrella (PC [Reviewed], Switch)
Developer: Doinksoft
Publisher: Devolver Digital
Released: September 13, 2023
MSRP: $14.99

Gunbrella casts you as a simple woodsman who returns home to find his wife murdered and his daughter abducted. The only clue he has to go off of is the murder weapon, a gun that is also an umbrella. I’m not sure why the eponymous gunbrella was left behind at the murder scene. That’s pretty careless. It’s just striking me now as a plot hole. Fridge logic, as it’s often called, or an icebox scene, as Alfred Hitchcock termed it.

Anyway, the Woodsman then sets out into the world to find the one who broke up his family and get revenge, and the world sucks.

While Gunbrella depicts the whole planet as a small, interconnected sidescroller, it’s generally implied that it’s been going downhill for a long time. The super-privileged have secluded themselves in a place called Avalon, where they use technology to keep themselves in perpetual comfort at the expense of everyone else in