As the year comes to a close, we’re reeling off the games that we’ve loved the most over the course of 2022. Next up: Teardown.
I’ve played a lot of games over the past year. Some have been under the radar indie affairs that deserved better, others have been bona fide blockbusters that made more money than the entire GDP of the Isle of Man. For as complicated as those games can get in terms of narrative, winding paths, and mechanics, few have managed to match the simple joy of Teardown: smashing stuff.
Teardown isn’t the year’s most complicated game (on paper), with the main objectives in the campaign revolving around causing some destruction and doing some thieving. After a job goes awry, you soon become embroiled in increasingly daft subterfuge where you’re basically helping out the parties you’ve just stolen from over and over again. Say you steal some cars from one guy, then that guy will unknowingly hire you, the guilty party, to blow up a tower owned by the person who first hired you, and on and on. It’s very, very silly, almost Monty Python-esque. If you’re wanting something deep from Teardown, the deepest thing about is how deep a hole you can blow up with a pipebomb.
The story is really just here as an excuse for the main attraction: blowing things up in beautiful voxel fashion. Whether you’re knocking things about with the satisfying thump of your sledgehammer or making new doors with your shotgun, Teardown is an absolute joy to play, especially when your best laid plans come to fruition.
As mentioned, Teardown doesn’t appear like the world’s most complex game at first, but it’s actually devilishly complex once you burrow into it a bit. At its heart, Teardown is a heist game in which you must make your getaway after triggering an alarm. However, multiple things to snag means that you have to meticulously plan out your route to get everything and also get out in time. On a particular level, I created a bridge to one piece of art by using blanks and part of a dump truck. Then, I blew a hole in the ground underneath the art before dropping down and speeding away in the car that I’d placed earlier. Getting all your chips to line up perfectly makes you feel like a blocky Danny Ocean.
While Teardown’s voxel graphics might not be the best fit for those who crave absolute fidelity and seeing every sweat pore on their hero’s face, it’s still an absolutely beautiful game. The path tracing makes every sunset and reflection look gorgeous, while the detail in the destruction is so impressive that you could almost break a wall down cube by cube if you wanted to. Say it quietly, but Teardown actually looks a lot better than most of the AAA games that came out this year.
Beyond the campaign, Teardown’s modding potential has only really just started being tapped thanks to the launch of its own featured mods. Just being able to play among voxel dinosaurs, take a somehow even more destructive trip to Night City, or use the Metal Gear Rising katana are all big selling points on their own. Maybe it won’t quite be as complete as something like Dreams, but Teardown creators are just going to keep adding value to what is an already very fair asking price.
Teardown is, quite simply, some of the best fun you will have with any game. What’s blocking you from giving it a go?
A PC key was provided by PR for this coverage.
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