Intro

"Crabmania" is a short, comedic, adventure game developed by visitorsfromdreams using RPG Maker MV that is about a crab trying to make the ultimate Reuben sandwich. A task that is a lot easier said than done when you live underwater. After all, were going to have to make this sandwich with soggy bread. At any rate it should take most players around 20 to 40 minutes to complete this game by just muddling their way through. And while the developer does recommend having a notebook nearby to keep track of things. I really don't see it as necessary. In fact, I'd argue graphing paper would be more useful since you could use it to more readily create a rough map of the game's universe. After all, your biggest challenge in this game will be to keep track of where everyone is. Though, I should probably cover the story before I discuss the gameplay.

Story
Summary

We play as Crabby whose woken up and now has the munchies. So it's time to track down the six ingredients needed to create the ultimate Ruben sandwich. Those ingredients being rye bread, butter, Russian dressing, Swiss cheese, corned beef, and most importantly sauerkraut. Of course in order to get the necessary ingredients were going to need to help our various neighbors. After all, our cupboards are completely bare.

Greatest Strength/Weakness

Like a lot of comedy games this projects greatest strength and Achilles' heel is it's comedy. If you enjoy jokes about people inviting themselves over and fish being unable to close their doors in order to keep us out because of their lack of hands this game will probably appeal to you.



Conversely if those sorts of jokes sound terrible you'll probably want to stay away from this game since most of the jokes in this game are of that same vein. At least those are the jokes I remember the most.

Gameplay

You'll spend most of your time in this game simply wandering around and talking to people. You'll also find a few items hiding here and there as you journey to and fro which can be given or trade with other members of the community for other stuff. Do this enough times and you'll eventually manage to assemble all of the ingredients needed to make the ultimate Ruben sandwich. In a lot of ways this game reminds me of Kyle MacDonald, a Canadian blogger, that started with a red paper clip and managed to trade his way up to a house. In the same vein were ultimately trading items for ingredients. Though it does feel like were trading down in a lot of cases with us giving away a monocle for soggy rye bread.

Graphics

On the graphical side of things the game is quirky and cute. Which is pretty fitting considering this is a non-serious game about a crab trying to make a sandwich while underwater. Though the world itself feels like it could use a bit more color when it comes to the sand in my opinion, but I'm aware that white sand beaches are a thing. I've just never been to one so I tend to associate sand with yellow or brown.

Music

On the musical side the game was alright in my opinion. Which basically means I forgot what the game sounded like shortly after beating it since none of the songs really stood out to me, but none of them stood out in a bad way to me either. Though, I suppose being forgotten about is the purpose of background music to a certain extent.

Conclusion

"Crabmania" is a solid comedy game that has some adorable artwork going for it. On the whole the game is solid for what it is, but your ability to enjoy this game will come down to if you enjoy visitorsfromdreams's sense of humor. So if the gif in the story section of the review makes you cringe you'll probably want to skip this one. Other wise this is probably worth a quick play if you've got 30 to 40 minutes to spare. Albeit I managed to beat this game in under 23 minutes on my first playthrough.