Surgeon Simulator: anniversary Edition Treat that sick sense of humour

Remember Operation? Steeling your steady young hand for the precise removal of the pencil shaped ‘Writer’s Cramp’? Well, let’s face it, 15 years of caffeine abuse means none of us can play that anymore, so here’s the next best thing in the shape of willing patient, Bob. Hi Bob. It’s a really good thing you’re unconscious.

Already well known for its impossibility to control on both PC and iPad, Surgeon Sim’s first ambulance trip to PS4 isn’t breaking the unwieldy buttons habit. Add in what can best be described as a ‘loose’ approach to physics and it’s a bit like teaching yourself to use (blood-covered) chopsticks with your left hand in zero gravity. Bossa Studios’ insistence on being obtuse means  L2 will raise and lower your ungloved mitt, R1  and R2  act as finger controls and, saving the best for last, Sixaxis makes a…

errr… ‘triumphant’ return for hand rotation. Thus, armed with the controls from hell, you’re left with the pleasantly reassuring bleeping of a heart monitor and a nice man with his chest open to the elements, all while being instructed to perform heart transplants and double kidney switcheroos like a boss. There’s even a generous PS4 bonus of eyeball and dental work. Hello, twisted Marathon Man fantasies.

Cut Corneas

It all manages to be gloriously, gorily enjoyable. Ideal for the claret-hungry depraved and certainly not for the squeamish, once you’ve mastered the controls oops, I dropped my watch in his spleen, does That matter? surgery is a disgustingly joyous affair.

Ribs in the way? Have a saw. Skull causing problems? Shatter it like a boiled egg with some hammer taps before snipping the brainstem. Yes, it can be unclear how to progress and some levels are fiendishly difficult, but if surgery was meant to be easy we’d all do it so I can forgive Bossa. 

Should you manage to pick up the floppy discs in the main menu and shove them into the computer the right way up a feat in itself there are handy instructions detailing what tools to use where. But, like most things in life, there’s more fun to be had in messing with hallucinogenic hypodermics.

The moment that defines the game for me is a disastrous situation with Bob’s eye. I jab a scalpel in and try to wrench it from its socket, but his rolling eyeballs mean I can’t grab the peeper again. As Bob’s B Positive slowly drains away,

I can’t decide whether to laugh or vomit. And that’s before I get hacking through the optic nerve with scissors. Hungry?