The Coin Game (2019) Review

^{*Reviewed in January 2021}

Part town simulator part arcade simulator, The Coin Game is a quirky experience of virtual gambling featuring a wide variety of coin-based arcade machines and other hotspots of entertainment such as carnival rides, laser tag, crazy golf, and go-karting.

The premise of the game has you earn pocket money by doing various jobs such as lawnmowing, babysitting, or by pawning off various items and using that money in the various arcades throughout the map to earn tickets which can then be further exchanged for more prizes, rinse and repeat.

The Coin Game features two game modes, Survival and Sandbox. Survival provides a more realistic experience with the player having to manage their health and energy by consuming snacks and energy drinks from the many vending machines throughout the arcades and shops. In survival the player will also have to manage getting back home before curfew so that they don’t get grounded. Sandbox mode removes these constraints so that you can focus purely on interacting with the arcade games without having to worry too much about earning cash.

The town of Islandville is inhabited by robots and littered with various attractions and themed locations with their own flavour of arcade games, prizes, and aesthetic. At the time of review there are currently four major arcade and game locations:

Larry’s Arcade – A small venue containing a handful of games such as claw grabbers, skee-ball, coin slots, and other rhythm-based skill machines. It also features a Chuck E. Cheese-style band that periodically plays.

The Carnival – Featuring rides like bumper cars, pirate ship, a ferris wheel, and various other spinning rides. There’s also a variety of carnival games to play and prizes to collect.

UFO Point – A space-themed venue with laser tag, go karts, and more coin games.

Treasure Cove – A pirate-themed venue with crazy golf, a BB gun shooting range, a pirate ship minigame, and even more treasure-themed coin games.

You can traverse the island on bicycle or save up your money for a golf cart and there are also various shops and supermarkets that you can buy snacks and supplies at with your hard-earned cash.

The Coin Game is a fun time-waster that you can easily kill a few hours with and will appeal to anyone who loved going to the arcade or carnival when they were a kid. The game is developed by a solo developer, Devotid, and they have been steadily releasing new content and features since its early-access release in 2019. Of course there are numerous issues with bugs and graphical quality but so far I haven’t encountered anything game-breaking. It will be interesting to see how far the developer takes this project and I can easily recommend you try it out.

Check it out on Steam