Here in the UK, our government has run our health service (NHS) into the ground. Bad management, misuse of funding, massive wait times and more. What was once one of the greatest health services on the planet, has now become one of the worst. But, enough of my political commentary, developer Critical Rabbit and publisher Assemble Entertainment have a new hospital-based game out, Fall of Porcupine.

“Step into the town of Porcupine and take to the well-loved scrubs of Finley, the newest fledgling doctor to join the ranks of St. Ursula’s hospital. As the seasons in the small-town change and life starts to stir, you’ll soon realize that things aren’t always what they seem: Not everyone is honest with themselves and others, the healthcare industry is not as illustrious as it seemed in medical school, and the work/life balance Finley strives toward might be impossible to achieve.”

Set in the idyllic town of Porcupine, you play as Finley, a new junior doctor. Featuring very straightforward gameplay, you talk to the town’s residents, see to your patients and try to forge a social life and fit in as Porcupine’s newest resident. It’s all very twee and serene, a relaxing and calming game as you meet and chat with the town’s many residents.

The basic gameplay loop of Fall of Porcupine is pretty simple to grasp. Do your shift at the hospital and tend to your patients via various mini-games. These are usually some kind of QTE, rhythm-based, puzzle or similar. Keep the patients and the bosses happy, the better you do, the better your ranking. Finish your shift, you can then hang out with Porcupine’s residents and learn more about them. Go to the local bar to unwind, play some basketball, (depending on the weather and season) have a snowball fight and more. The more time that you spend with the people of the town, the more you learn about them.

However, things may not be as twee and serene as they first seem. Night shifts at the hospital can reveal some dark secrets, maybe some of the town’s residents are not as nice as they first seem and just maybe, there could just be more to the hospital than first meets the eye. There is a story here, quite an in-depth one too and one that I’m not about to spoil here. Overall, Fall of Porcupine is a very fun game. It is slow, it’s more of a relaxing/chilled game. There’s a lot of walking here and there, a lot of dialogue to read and take in and everything is just paced quite slowly. This does make Fall of Porcupine a rather ‘sleepy’ game to play and I really liked that too.

There is a (scripted) day/night cycle and even the seasons change, which brings a multitude of events to Porcupine. This gives the world a sense of constant living and character. Fall of Porcupine is a wonderfully nice and chilled game to play. However, there are issues. I played the Xbox version for this review and you can tell that this was programmed for PC play, as the optimisation for the Xbox leaves a lot to be desired.

On the main menu, when you pause or during sub-menus, there is a mouse pointer in the middle of the screen. You can’t move it, it does nothing and it is clearly a remnant of this being ported from the PC. There are a lot of spelling and grammar issues, a lot. I have had instances where text has been displayed on top of other text, making it impossible to read. There have been times when the text ran outside of the character’s speech bubbles, cutting off what they are saying. One of the QTE games tells you to use the arrow keys, there are no arrow keys on an Xbox pad, another slice of proof that this was a rush port from the PC. This is especially true as you are supposed to use the face (X, Y, A, B) buttons and not the D-pad, which could’ve been mistaken for ‘arrow keys’.

Another QTE told me to press the RT button, you don’t, you have to press the RB button. I have had my character walking above the designated path as if he was walking on air. I had the game freeze on me and when I reset, my daily goals had disappeared and I could not get any further in the game, I was stuck in limbo and had to restart the game from the beginning. This did only happen once, but it was still a setback.

Priced at £16 and available for PC and all of the consoles right now. I really would highly recommend this if you are looking for something a little bit different. It’s a good game at a great price. However, the bugs and glitches need addressing, at least on the Xbox version. Fall of Porcupine is flawed genius and if the devs can get this running properly on the Xbox, it could be one of the best games of the year. Endearing characters, a great story and some genuinely fun mini-games (some not so much). Fall of Porcupine is a nice little title, just get those annoying bugs fixed. And intentional or not, there is a brilliant allegory in relation to our NHS too.