Some people don’t like cockroaches. I’ve always found them to be reliable mounts for the tiny gnome army via which I’ll one day conquer the world. Anyway, forget I wrote that. Grounded 2’s come out this week, and as such folks have fired up their modding machines and got to work tweaking the garden survival extravaganza to their liking.
Let’s see here, we’ve got some of the usual useful changes, texture swaps, and…ah. A mod designed to help folks who’re afraid of cockroaches. It’ll do just that, provided you’re not also terrified of clowns, or bugs vaguely dressed like them.
I’m starting off with this roach mod, put together by gallant Arthurian knight/modder Sir_galahad172. They’ve had a good idea. Save the folks with phobias by arranging the cockroach equivalent of the arachnophobia mode the game has to change eight-legged enemies into something less spidery.
Here’s the thing, though. At first, I just saw the party hats and painted eyes they’ve given the roaches and thought oh, ok, they must be going for a Saturday night under the floorboards sort of vibe. Then I clocked the goofy shoes on each spindly limb and the red nose. Putting two and two together, this has to be a roach clown. Is it clowny enough to go off the deep end in the other direction and give nightmares to folks who can’t sit through IT? I’m not sure, but you get a mixed review of your valiant attempt at making people un-scared, Sir Galahad.
To cut them some slack, I can throughly appreciate the fact they’ve swapped the SCAB scanner for Fallout 4’s Pip-Boy, in some Xbox brand synergy so synergistic Phil Spencer’s probably just had to reach for the tissues. Ditto their spooky, scary skeletonising of the player character.
As you’d expect, they’re not the only one at it. There are bunch of tweaks to the likes of stack size (all the way up to 999 if you want), difficulty and player stats from modder Caites. You can also chuck in a hasty port of an item spawner for the first game and some Mod Organiser 2 support.
Overall, aside from the roach clown, it’s close to what you’d expect for most big-ish games that’ve recently debuted on PC. We’ll have to see if Grounded 2 has the insect legs to outdo the fairly titchy total of 144 mods planted in its predecessor’s backyard.
