7 Billion Humans

Genre: Puzzle

Players: 1

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Review:

7 Billion Humans is a game that has you giving commands to a group of employees who are interacting with various objects in a room. However, players do not control these characters directly. Rather, they create a list of commands for all of the employee to follow, and only by correctly instructing them can they complete the task. This game was released on multiple platforms, including the Nintendo Switch, in 2018, and unlike the prior games from Tomorrow Corporation, this game is essentially a direct sequel to their prior work, Human Resource Machine.

As with Human Resource Marchine, people in this game are depicted as crude drawings and there’s not much here that’s visually interesting. However, this game finds a nice balance in the satire this time, not being too bland like I’d argue Human Resource Machine was, but not overdoing it like Little Inferno did, with this game’s plot focusing on people being given menial jobs after every other job on the planet becomes automated. And while earlier games from Tomorrow Corporation may have made me smile on occasion, I will say that this is the first game of theirs that had me outright laughing at points. Also, the music this time around is pretty good too, with some catchy songs on some of the game’s levels.

When it comes to the gameplay, much as with Human Resource Machine, 7 Billion Humans tasks players with creating a script for employees to follow, in what amounts to a simple version of a programming language, and like Human Resource Machine, this game will likely act as a great introduction to programming languages by making players get acquainted with commands like GOTO (called “Jump” here) and If THEN ELSE, all presented here in a very user-friendly manner that even those who know nothing about programming should understand.

However, while Human Resource Machine had players creating programming scripts to solve math equations, 7 Billion Humans has them creating scripts to deal with spatial problems – sort every box in each row by number, move every box the number of spaces printed on it, that sort of thing. It may sound complex, but I didn’t find it especially more difficult than the problems in Human Resource Machine, and quite the contrary, it was a great deal more rewarding seeing all my employees carrying out my commands after I wrote a working script.

I would still warn against those who have difficulty with logic puzzles getting this game, as they may find it a bit too tough, but this time around the game is a bit less math-focused, so those who didn’t care for that subject in school may find this the better way to go than Human Resource Machine. That said, I do have to criticize this game a bit for being so similar to its predecessor – it definitely seems like less work went into this game than every other game from Tomorrow Corporation.

I should mention that this game controls wonderfully on the Nintendo Switch, supporting Joy-Con motion controls very well, as well as allowing the use of the touchscreen in handheld mode. This is about the best-case scenario that could be hoped for in a Nintendo Switch port of this game.

All in all, I found 7 Billion Humans to be an improvement over Human Resource Machine in multiple ways, with a more amusing story and better music, and gameplay that keeps the “simple programming language as a puzzle” concept but re-imagines it as far more satisfying spatial organization puzzles. It still has some areas that could be improved on – namely, the visuals. Also, it may still be a bit too difficult for some players to wrap their heads around. However, if the premise of this game doesn’t scare you away, I highly recommend you give it a try, as this is one of Tomorrow Corporation’s best Puzzle games yet.

tl;dr – 7 Billion Humans is a Puzzle game about creating a set of instructions for a group of employees to follow to complete various spatial organization tasks. This is a direct follow-up to Human Resource Machine, and it improves on that game in multiple ways, although the presentation is still a bit lacking and the game may still be daunting to more casual players. Still, if you’re looking for a good Puzzle game that’s also a nice introduction to the world of programming, this is an excellent choice.

Grade: B+

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