Minotaur China Shop

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Minotaur China Shop puts the players in the hooves of a Minotaur whose lifelong dream is to own and run a china shop. His stubby bull legs, as well as his legendary bull temper, have always held him back. Blurst takes this literal “bull in a china shop” concept and manages to make a great game out of it.

You control the Minotaur inside your china shop. As customers stream in on the right, they ask for pieces of china somewhere in your vast inventory. You're tasked with fetching the china before the customer gets frustrated and leaves. Your stubby legs keep your walk wobbly and unpredictable, while customers constantly stream in demanding china that's stacked high on unstable shelves in your inventory. It's enough to drive a shop owner crazy; luckily you just happen to be a Minotaur with a bull-like temper.

Eventually if you break enough china, you will snap and go into a rage. But, being the prudent shop owner that you are, you took out insurance in the case of bull-rage-induced rampage. When rage insurance is activated, you make a profit for breaking china instead of losing money. At this point it's best to go on a rampage and begin destroying your china with reckless abandon. You can even do special moves designed to wreak as much havoc as possible before your rage insurance wears off. Of course if you overdo it, you become completely mad with bloodlust and burst into flames. Your insurance company foresaw this eventuality and they have hired security to help calm you down – with flaming arrows.

In between rounds, you can use your money to upgrade your abilities, inventory or rage insurance. In the end however, you're scored based purely on profit, so save those sawbucks.

The game is probably one of the few successful hybrids of building simulation and action genres I've ever seen. It also takes your frustration at your Minotaur's unresponsive control and funnels it into a hilariously fun game mechanic. This game manages to be more interesting than either of its component genres; serving customers and making a profit go well with the occasional violent rampage sprinkled in.

Why You Should Check This Out: A funny gimmick that turns out to be a really great game, Minotaur China Shop involves alternately serving fine china to customers then getting shot in the face with flaming arrows. Throwing a tantrum inside a china shop is a lot of fun, even when you're the owner.

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Comments

Its a good game. RPS watched its launch pretty closely and had some nice pieces.

I remember watching the trailer for this about a year ago. Cool, simplistic concept that looks well executed.

The background story of the minotaur was great, but I really liked how the mechanics actively built up frustration in me as a player, and then tapped into that frustration for the final act. It's a great demonstration of hoe mechanics can tap into pathos while making the player part of the story.

wordsmythe wrote:

demonstration of hoe mechanics

See here.

Oh man, thank you for reminding me about this game! I'd heard about it listening to a podcast in traffic and totally forgot about it. Nice post!

Amusing as hell. It's a great, original idea.

I'm a bit confused though as to what the benefit of the "calm down" ability is. Is it just to stave off an accidental early rage? It seems to me that the best strategy is to serve customers until just before closing, leaving you enough time to smash everything left in the store before time runs out (and you get ARROW'D!).

Quintin_Stone wrote:

Amusing as hell. It's a great, original idea.

I'm a bit confused though as to what the benefit of the "calm down" ability is. Is it just to stave off an accidental early rage? It seems to me that the best strategy is to serve customers until just before closing, leaving you enough time to smash everything left in the store before time runs out (and you get ARROW'D!).

I didn't buy it before day 5, but I think you can actually avoid security? I'm going to try it next time. Like, once you get to the flaming part, you can calm yourself down enough to where security will leave. Maybe it gives you a bonus.

Minarchist wrote:
Quintin_Stone wrote:

Amusing as hell. It's a great, original idea.

I'm a bit confused though as to what the benefit of the "calm down" ability is. Is it just to stave off an accidental early rage? It seems to me that the best strategy is to serve customers until just before closing, leaving you enough time to smash everything left in the store before time runs out (and you get ARROW'D!).

I didn't buy it before day 5, but I think you can actually avoid security? I'm going to try it next time. Like, once you get to the flaming part, you can calm yourself down enough to where security will leave. Maybe it gives you a bonus.

That's exactly what I used it for. If you get a little premature with your rage, you can calm down and still serve customers.

Just played again, and was actually able to get security to leave after I cleared the entire shop at the end of the day. It took several rounds of clearing arrows and meditating, clearing arrows and meditating, and I had to have a really high strength stat, but it worked. It was fun to flicker in and out of flames as the meditation calmed me down just enough, but the arrows would put me back over the edge.

PyromanFO wrote:
Minarchist wrote:
Quintin_Stone wrote:

Amusing as hell. It's a great, original idea.

I'm a bit confused though as to what the benefit of the "calm down" ability is. Is it just to stave off an accidental early rage? It seems to me that the best strategy is to serve customers until just before closing, leaving you enough time to smash everything left in the store before time runs out (and you get ARROW'D!).

I didn't buy it before day 5, but I think you can actually avoid security? I'm going to try it next time. Like, once you get to the flaming part, you can calm yourself down enough to where security will leave. Maybe it gives you a bonus.

That's exactly what I used it for. If you get a little premature with your rage, you can calm down and still serve customers.

My mind is in the gutter, but the view from here is hilarious.

wordsmythe wrote:
PyromanFO wrote:
Minarchist wrote:
Quintin_Stone wrote:

Amusing as hell. It's a great, original idea.

I'm a bit confused though as to what the benefit of the "calm down" ability is. Is it just to stave off an accidental early rage? It seems to me that the best strategy is to serve customers until just before closing, leaving you enough time to smash everything left in the store before time runs out (and you get ARROW'D!).

I didn't buy it before day 5, but I think you can actually avoid security? I'm going to try it next time. Like, once you get to the flaming part, you can calm yourself down enough to where security will leave. Maybe it gives you a bonus.

That's exactly what I used it for. If you get a little premature with your rage, you can calm down and still serve customers.

My mind is in the gutter, but the view from here is hilarious.

What's so funny? It's just that if you get too excited a bunch of guys rush in and unload on you.

Lot's of fun with this one, thanks!

Can't believe I never played this before. Thanks!

Strangest game I've played in a long time. Hilarious.