Ampu-Tea (PC) Review

The goal in Ampu-Tea is to make a cup of tea. Simple, isn't it? It could have been, but the character has a newly amputated arm and has yet to learn how to control it. Besides learning how to make a cup of tea then, the lead character must also learn how its new arm works.

The gameplay is relatively easy to get into and pretty self explanatory, but the execution is really hard. The controls are precise and demand some practice to get used to. Even something as easy as grabbing and placing a tea cup will be difficult at first, but that's the point of Ampu-Tea: to show how hard it is to live with an amputated arm.

Ampu-Tea captures the feel of being unable to control the new arm very well. Sadly, though, it fails to be entertaining to play. It is only frustrating to play until the controls are learned, and after that point the game is extremely easy as there is really only one thing to do: to make a cup of tea. Ampu-Tea is a clear example of a title that is much more fun to watch someone else play than to play themselves. It is, in other words, a perfect Let's Play title.

Ampu-Tea does succeed with the Let's Play aspect very well and might become a cult classic in the YouTube and Twitch community. Sadly, that is all there is to say about it. A short title and once the player knows the controls there is very little reason to return to it, other than telling friends to try it out.