Dr. Fetus’ Mean Meat Machine

Genre: Match-4 Falling Block Puzzle

Players: 1

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Review:

Dr. Fetus’ Mean Meat Machine, released in 2023 on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch (and from here on simply referred to as Dr. Fetus), is a spin-off of the Super Meat Boy franchise in the form of a Match-4 Falling Block Puzzle game, with the game and its title both clearly a nod to the 1993 Sega Genesis game Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine, which was similarly a Puzzle game spin-off of a Platformer franchise.

In fact, much like Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine, Dr. Fetus is a take on the classic Puyo Puyo formula of Match-4 Falling Block Puzzle games, with individual pieces falling when not supported underneath, and blocks clearing not only when in a straight row, but in any sort of contiguous chain of four or more of the same color. However, Dr. Fetus doesn’t just take the classic game, add a new skin on top, and call it a day.

Rather, this game takes a standard Falling Block Puzzle game field or well, and turns it into an obstacle course, with each level featuring hazards to avoid. Touching one of these while trying to place a block (consisting of mutant Meat Boy clones) will cause you to lose and force a restart, which seems a bit arbitrary as your goal is also to destroy them, but only by matching them. Meanwhile, the game is indifferent about whether a hazard destroys a block after it is placed – it only cares if you touch the hazard before placing (bad), or destroy it by matching it (good).

The game features some clever level designs to take advantage of this. As mentioned above, some levels act as an obstacle course, forcing you to dodge through buzz saws and other hazards to get to the bottom where you can make matches. Others have hazards that clear placed blocks so quickly that you’re forced to make matches as fast as you can to outpace it. It is this sort of creative use of the game’s central concept where the game shines the brightest.

The thing is, playing this game almost doesn’t feel like a Puzzle game, the way that the game forces you to restart when you touch a hazard makes it so that the “obstacle course” part really feels like the main gameplay focus here, making every level feel like a nail-biting rush. However, this focus also puts a highlight on the game’s main flaws.

Namely, both the way blocks and hazards move and the space they take up exist within an uncomfortable mix between digital and analog. You can’t very well carefully edge toward a hazard when each shift jumps your block 100% its own length to the side, rotating a block now becomes a life or death question of just how the block will rotate when you press the button, and judging what movements are safe and what are lethal ends up being a lot of guesswork, something you absolutely don’t want in a game where the wrong guess means starting everything all over again.

This focus on surviving obstacle courses also has another negative side-effect – this game doesn’t have any sort of multiplayer mode, and it really feels like it could use it. There at least having an opponent contending with the same frustrating gameplay mechanics could have acted as an equalizer. This game also could have used an endless mode, perhaps challenging players to survive as long as possible through shifting level hazards. Unfortunately, without either of these, the game feels incomplete.

When it comes to the presentation, this game makes use of a similar art style as Super Meat Boy, which means colorful cartoony visuals depicting at time grotesque creatures, with lots of blood and violence. This is backed by a soundtrack that seems a bit too placid for the intensity of the gameplay here, and definitely feels like a far cry from the great tunes that the original release of Super Meat Boy had.

In the end, I applaud Dr. Fetus for trying something a bit different to shake up the Puzzle genre, but I can’t help but feel like, in doing so, the game loses sight on the precision needed for the sort of obstacle course-focused gameplay that’s the center of this game, and also lacks some of the important game modes players have come to expect from Puzzle games. The result is still enjoyable, but frustrating and limited at the same time.

tl;dr – Dr. Fetus’ Mean Meat Machine is a spin-off of the Super Meat Boy franchise in the form of a Match-4 Falling Block Puzzle game combining classic Puyo Puyo-style gameplay with obstacle course-style level design. This focus on the game’s obstacle course design makes things frustrating given how unclear it is when a move will collide with a hazard, and the lack of game modes and multiplayer makes this game feel far too limited. It’s still enjoyable, but also frustrating and limited at the same time.

Grade: C+

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