REVIEW | Get Packed: Couch Chaos

LifeisXbox’s Get Packed: Couch Chaos review | There’s a long list of local co-op party games to play with your friends or family on a rainy day. Some of the first ones that come to mind are probably Overcooked, Bake ‘N Switch, Guacamelee, and so on. Maybe you’ve even heard of Moving Out? Well, today we’re taking a look at a game very similar to that last one! Get Packed: Couch Chaos is the latest Switch release by developer Coatsink and publisher Moonshine. Initially released as Get Packed: Fully Loaded on Steam last year, the game got a Nintendo Switch release recently, with some extra content. As you can tell by the title of both ‘Moving Out’ and ‘Get Packed’, it’s all about packing everything and getting the hell out. If you’re just as curious as I was about this party game, be sure to check out the rest of this review!

ℹ️ Reviewed on Nintendo Switch | Review code provided by PR/publisher, this review is the personal opinion of the writer.

What we Liked!

• A good amount of game content | Get Packed: Couch Chaos offers quite a lot of content. First of all, we have the campaign mode in which you can choose between the regular story mode or the versus mode. The difference here is that you either work together or try to beat your co-players. This campaign mode has a total of six stages (five actual stages and an epilogue). Each of the stages has three missions for you to complete and some cutscenes to help you follow the overall story. In every mission (or level), you have to pack a truck with as many valuable items as possible. To win you have to reach at least one star worth of goods. Every now and then, you can gain extra money by loading a specific item in a truck. Of course, there are all kinds of obstacles to throw you off (literally).
  So you have 18 levels to beat, which can be done in roughly 2 hours. That’s not a lot of game time, I know. Luckily, once you’ve successfully beaten a level, two more game modes per level are unlocked: destruction and time-attack mode. As you can probably tell by the names, one challenges you to destroy as much as you can in a given time while the other has you survive for as long as possible. Lastly, the game also offers party games. These are basically mini-games that are often sports-related like a soccer game. There is one ghost-hunting game where you’re in a mansion and have to suck as many ghosts as possible in your vacuum cleaner. These minigames aren’t all that great, in my opinion, but they do add some extra fun for kids.

• Completionist-tailored | If you’ve gone through the entire campaign in the story, versus, destruction, and time-attack mode, you can still try to go for a complete game! Every level has three stars that you can gain (the more value you move, the more stars) but there is also a high score attached to every level. But there is more, of course! Every mission also has a bonus objective, e.g. break into the vault, but also a couple of challenges you can choose to go after. These challenges include all kinds of random things like packing all the turkeys or getting 3 stars without being hit by a car. Besides this, you can also unlock different characters and stickers and consult interesting stats including the total amount of items you’ve packed and the total damage you’ve caused.

• Fun in both single- and multiplayer | Get Packed: Couch Chaos is definitely a co-op game in heart and soul, as it can be enjoyed by one to four players. I played both by myself and with my boyfriend, and, as expected, it was more fun with multiple players. I did, however, enjoy Get Packed playing by myself as well. It still manages to create some kind of chaos and fun, even if you’ve got no one to play with. Of course, I still only recommend really buying this game if you’re going to play it in the co-op mode, simply because of the content that’s clearly tailored to multiple players enjoying the game at once. And who doesn’t want to yell at their friends when playing a chaotic game? I’m getting major flashbacks to my fellow LIX writer Alexis and me playing Bunny Factory and being at each other’s throat so let’s quickly continue to the next section!

Mixed Feelings

• Can be frustrating | When I tell you that this game is chaotic, I mean it’s ridiculously chaotic. You’re limited in time, there are a ton of objects to choose from, and there are mechanics working against you. Still, up until this point, it’s a fun kind of chaotic. You can probably see where I’m going with this already… there was a different kind of chaos going on in Get Packed: Couch Chaos as well. You see, this game works with ragdoll mechanics and this often led to some very, very, very frustrating moments. Trying to grab items and bringing them to the moving van often resulted in damaging other items, which in turn resulted in a loss of the money that you so desperately need to beat the level.

• Mediocre graphics and forgettable soundtrack | Unfortunately, we know that games that are ported to the Nintendo Switch often lose a bit of magic when it comes to the art style. And that is exactly what happened with Get Packed: Couch Chaos as well. What was a good-looking game on Steam, turned into a mediocre-looking game on the Switch. Pixelated graphics and loss of detail ruined what could’ve been a cool art style. The environments you are presented with are quite fun really (including prison and an alien facility) but I could never enjoy them to the fullest. An expected but nevertheless unfortunate downside of this game. When it comes to the sound in this game, I can only say that it’s quite forgettable. I don’t mean to say that it’s bad, but because you’re so focused and sucked into the (sometimes frustrating) gameplay, you’re not paying attention to it at all.

What we Disliked

• Buggy sometimes | I mentioned that Get Packed: Couch Chaos can be quite … well chaotic. In a negative way. And I’m afraid there are some more frustrating things about this game. The thing that annoyed me the most was that grabbing items sometimes didn’t work for some reason. At times, I tried to grab a specific item from multiple angles but could not, for the life of me, grab it. Quite tiresome when you’ve got your eye on something. Besides this, you also have to deal with slow loading times when you fire up the game.

How long to beat the story | About 2 hours
How long to achieve 1000G | No achievements on the Nintendo Switch.

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