In a colorful world full of children’s toys, Plank Builders has you building the floor itself, so that you can get around! Playing as a little plush monkey, you are able to find marbles and bring other plus monkeys to life, so that they too can help you build out your world.
In Plank Builders, the floor is lava and hitting it will result in you resetting. It’s not a big punishment, but it is enough to keep you avoiding the floor at all cost. There are sort of two modes in Plank Builders — the first allowing you to walk around and explore, and the second allowing you to build.
When you are in the building mode of the game, you can place out planks to get to new areas. Over time, however, you can unlock blueprints and spend points in your skill tree to have different things to build. This gives you the possibility to create towers, stairs, and even benches so your monkey friends can have a little rest. You might even find yourself creating a fun world to play in, instead of just creating paths to whatever you want to unlock next. The monkeys that you end up helping actually will collect planks from the communal pile that you have, building up what you have planned for you, but you can also help them.
Plank Builders is open in the way that you build, allowing you to go to a variety of places, even if you might have something to build further down the line that would make it easier to get too. This open worldness, paired with these cute monkey’s and magical feeling as you explore, creates a really wholesome and relaxing game to play.
I got the chance to play the demo of Plank Builders at Gamescom. There isn’t currently a release date, but you can play this demo on Steam and wishlist the game now.
