Merek’s Market – Review

Our Score: 8/10

Merek’s Market, a game developed and published by Big Village Games is a game set in medieval times where you run a blacksmith’s shop. How do you run it? Think Overcooked and/or Moving Out and you have your answer.

There’s a lot more to it than just that though. You’ve got a fun storyline, upgrades and perks, and best of all, co-op. So let the chaos reign as you yell at your co-op partner to get things done properly while they cackle away at your misery. This may or may not be a true story.

What is Merek’s Market

Prepare yourself because things are about to heat up in Merek’s Market. You take control of a small shop in a small town where you need to master the art of haggling, bartering, and crafting. But don’t expect to craft the usual items because folks from this town are a weird bunch.

The game bears similarity to games like Overcooked and Moving Out like previously mentioned but it adds its own unique design to it. First off, you actually need to haggle for a price. Some of us are born hagglers, while the rest of us are not so much.

The game also features Boss missions! Every tenth mission is a boss mission in the campaign. These missions involve doing some rather massive builds while also requiring you to run your shop. And these builds feature small minigames for you to complete that help add variety to the game. So if you’re someone who likes to get the best rating in these games, you’re going to be spending a while practicing the perfect routine.

The game features around 50 levels and a single playthrough will come to around 12 hours. Now, this is considering you’re just playing through the levels and not caring about your rating.  Once you start going for the max rating or start playing it in co-op, you can easily get a lot more out of this game. And yes, the game does feature a proper co-op campaign.

Running Merek’s Market

Through the game, you’ll be crafting a lot.  This involves finding the item in your workshop and then combining it with the necessary item. The gameplay loop is fairly simple for this part but as the levels go on, it starts getting more and more difficult.

Thankfully to help you out, the game features upgrades that help Merek get better at his job. From getting the ability to sprint around to having the foresight of seeing what orders are about to come in, these upgrades change how you play the game.

Look and Feel

Merek’s Market has a very simple and clean look to it. The presentation is easy to understand which makes this game quite accessible. And since you spend your time inside the shop, the game has does a good job of lighting up the space around you with that orange glow of a flame.

The game also has some very fun interactions with the customers. First and foremost. the game actually features voice acting for the customers. Some of these interactions caught me off-guard, especially with some of the accents that accompany the dialogue.

Final Verdict

Merek’s Market by Big Village Games is an extremely fun and unique game that makes for a great solo or co-op experience. While it is the same genre as Overcooked, it does so many things different that if you’re a fan of those games, you will doing a disservice to yourself if you don’t pick this one up.

Merek’s Market is out now on PlayStation 4, Microsoft Windows, Xbox One, and Google Stadia.