House Flipper was originally released on Steam two years ago. Riddled with bugs and poor graphics, it was far from being a technically polished game. Somehow, it still managed to become a best-seller in a storefront that’s rarely kind with lesser-known independent titles. Somehow, in the middle of a haystack of blandness, lay an unexpectedly relaxing gameplay loop that appealed to a much wider audience than anyone could have ever predicted. Porting a relaxing game like this on the Switch should have been a no-brainer in theory, but considering the previously mentioned technical issues, I was worried about the end result.

For those who are unaware, House Flipper is a house restoration simulator of sorts. You will start off with a bit of money and a few clients asking for you to paint their living rooms, install a radiator in their bathroom, or clean their garages that look more like post-apocalyptic wastelands than an actual place for you to park a car inside.

After saving up a bit of money, you will be able to start buying borderline derelict houses in order to restore and sell them for a profit. You will need to clean walls, remove pieces of trash, remove stains from windows, replace broken appliances with brand new ones, fix holes on the walls with plaster, buy some decorations, and so on. Basically, instead of playing The Sims, you are playing a video game version of those Extreme Makeover TV shows that were all the rage fifteen years ago. You’re refurbishing a house only for the sake of making a profit, although you can eventually buy one of the available houses and make it your headquarters.

I will be honest, for as uninteresting as the premise sounds, I have to admit that it is sort of fun. Buying a house in a worse state than a crack den, fixing all of its issues, and managing to sell it for a fat profit is way more rewarding than it should have ever been. Bear in mind, you’ll spend most of the time scrubbing the floor and painting walls with very slow controls, yet it still feels great when you look at a completely revamped room that used to look like a scene of a murder.

With all that being said, I didn’t mean that the Switch version of House Flipper per se is fun. Because it definitely isn’t.

House Flipper is already buggy as all hell on the gaming PC equivalent to NASA’s supercomputers, so you can already imagine the technical disaster that this game is on the Switch. I was expecting for underwhelming graphics and an inconsistent framerate. Honestly, if those were the only major negatives in this game, I’d still recommend it to everyone without thinking twice. It may be ugly and the framerate might be a mess, but considering this is a game about cleaning houses, that wouldn’t have been too much of an issue. Sadly, there are much bigger problems in here.

Everything went down the rabbit hole right after I started the game and walked a few steps forward, only to see my character walk to his left up until the end of the map. Yep, House Flipper features a godawful glitch in which you’ll occasionally keep on moving to your left after moving the analog stick to any other given direction. I will admit that this issue is less annoying when you’re inside a small room, as you won’t be able to move a lot, but it’s still absolutely game breaking. This glitch always ruins your momentum, especially when you’re painstakingly painting a set of walls.

This isn’t the only gripe I have with the controls, though. There is a sizeable amount of input lag in everything you do, from painting a wall to even browsing a tablet in order to look for a piece of furniture to buy for your house. This is only augmented by the previously mentioned framerate issues.

If all I had to worry about in the Switch version of House Flipper was its bad visuals and inconsistent framerate, I would easily recommend to everyone out there. It’s a silly game that features a surprisingly fun gameplay loop. However, the abysmal controls completely ruined my overall enjoyment of the game. Not only was the input lag annoying by itself, but the analog movement glitches were downright unforgivable. I have no idea how a blatant issue like that one managed to be ignored by the developer’s quality assurance testers. If it’s any consolation for the House Flipper devs, the Switch version of this game made me want to take a look at the PC version instead. It’s still buggy and unpolished, but I can actually play it without getting mad at the glitchy controls.

 

Graphics: 4.0 An average assortment of generic household appliance and furniture assets. The problem lies in the terrible framerate, though.	Gameplay: 3.5 This is a game that absolutely requires a mouse in order to work properly. The joycons just can’t offer the same degree of precision. To make matters worse, the game is absolutely riddled with input delays and other glitches.
Sound: 7.0 A decent, albeit unmemorable, collection of tunes that reminded me a bit of the soundtrack from the original The Sims game. It gets the job done and fits the overall mood of the game.	Fun Factor: 4.5 I can see the potential in House Flipper. It could have been a fun and relaxing experience on the Switch if it wasn’t for its bland presentation and abysmal controls.
Final Verdict: 4.5

House Flipper is available now on PS4, Xbox One, PC and Switch.

Reviewed on Switch.

A copy of House Flipper was provided by the publisher.