Mars Attracts Review - The Martian Management Game That Turns Humans Into Park Attractions

Imagine entering an amusement park and discovering that the main attractions are us, humans. This is the promise of Mars Attracts, a management game that takes the grotesque and satirical imagery of Mars Attacks!, Tim Burton's iconic 1996 film, and transforms it into a disorienting and ironic management experience. At the time, the film divided critics and audiences: for some, it was an excess of kitsch and nonsense; for others, an act of love for pulp science fiction and the Topps trading cards from which it all began. Here, that same DNA is rewritten in an interactive key, with a tone that alternates dark comedy and social satire.

Instead of building roller coasters and Ferris wheels for smiling families, in Mars Attracts we are called to design enclosures – actual spaces of captivity in which to place men and women abducted across eras, from ancient Rome to the Wild West – and to keep them “presentable” or to experiment on their bodies to accumulate research points. The term enclosures evokes a zoo cage or a nature reserve, but here it becomes the grotesque prison that reduces us to sideshow freaks.

The park belongs to the Martians, but we are the ones under observation, prisoners of an experiment that ridicules the very idea of a zoo and overturns the anthropocentric perspective typical of the genre. If in Jurassic World Evolution 2 we are the keepers of dinosaurs that threaten to escape control, here we are the guinea pigs of a system that reverses roles and makes us objects of curiosity. It's no longer just about planning paths, services, and visitor flows: the goal is to stage cruelty as entertainment, balancing irony, sadism, and management engineering to satisfy alien guests hungry for fun.

The Plot of Mars Attracts: Martians Running a Theme Park

The “narrative” of Mars Attracts doesn't rely on a script with protagonists and plot twists, but emerges from the management challenges we face. As in other simulators, the game offers a sequence of progressive objectives: build a certain number of buildings, accumulate a money threshold, unlock a new type of research, or maintain visitor satisfaction above a certain percentage. It is this mission structure that shapes a growth path, replacing a linear plot with a progression marked by levels and milestones.

The setting, however, makes this scheme more poignant. The accurate habitats are not just functional enclosures: they become thematic spaces, enriched with decorations consistent with the era of the captured humans. If we host Roman legionaries, we can adorn the enclosure with classical columns and architecture; if we trap cowboys, we'll have fences and frontier settings. This aesthetic attention doesn't just “set the scene,” but influences the behavior of Martian guests: some appreciate the cultural reference, while others prefer to see the prisoners mistreated. The result is a dual track that adds variety to management.

As for longevity, the issue is delicate. The concept of novelty – the originality that immediately strikes you – is very strong in the first few hours: the role reversal, the cruel irony, the very idea of being laboratory guinea pigs are fresh and unusual stimuli. But an idea, however brilliant, risks wearing out if not supported by deep systems. This is where the title will have to prove its solidity: expand the research tree, enrich the economic challenges, introduce dynamic events or management complications capable of surprising even after many hours. Without these additions, the novelty effect could quickly fade, transforming the experience into a grotesque skin over a too-familiar scheme.

Humans as Lab Guinea Pigs, Topps Cards Come to Life! 

The beating heart of Mars Attracts are the human enclosures: actual stages where mechanics, aesthetics, and morality intertwine. This is where the park's reputation is built, because the quality and theme of the enclosures determine not only the satisfaction of Martian visitors, but also the influx of public and overall revenue. The more curated the enclosure – with consistent historical decorations and functional services – the greater the profit, while its deterioration or neglect can lead to escapes and drops in ratings.

The game's structure follows a well-defined spiral: you capture humans from different historical eras, place them in enclosures, and decide whether to keep them in acceptable conditions or subject them to scientific experiments. Each test yields research points in three areas – biology, physics, and chemistry – which allow you to unlock new attractions and technologies. The role reversal is complete: what in a traditional management game would be a laboratory or a research center becomes here a torture chamber disguised as science, applauded by an audience that has nothing human about it.

The attractions follow a progressive path: starting with recognizable rides, “Martianized” in style, to grotesque creations like the Toe Wheel (dominated by a huge yellow toenail), the Dreadmill (a cruel variant of the Viking ship transformed into a punitive treadmill), or the Vomit Ladder, which even integrates the water system. A clever choice is to link attractions to research: they are not given to us immediately, but earned through experimentation, so their appearance doesn't stifle the rest of the park and accompanies management growth.

Beyond experiments, the logistics come into play: separate warehouses for Martian products and human goods, staff who replenish feeders and showers, generators and water pipes that power services but also open up escape risks. The security system, with guards and patrol stations, is essential to prevent “guests” from escaping. At the same time, park cleanliness – bins, cleaning staff, maintenance stations – directly affects visitor ratings. In other words, it's not just cruelty that generates value, but the ability to combine brutality with managerial order.

One point that deserves attention is the graphical interface: while functional, the layout of menus and the readability of commands are not always intuitive. There is room for improvement, especially visually, to make navigation between buildings, enclosures, and research options more immediate. This is a crucial aspect, because a management game also thrives on the fluidity with which the player interacts with their creations.

Ultimately, the gameplay of Mars Attracts centers enclosures as the narrative and managerial core, building an ecosystem around them that links research, attractions, and logistics. The real challenge isn't how many rides to build, but what identity to give the park: focus on a “cultural” image with accurate habitats, or unscrupulously embrace the sadistic spectacle that the Martians seem to desire.

Ack ack ack ack! (there's a lot on the table, but everything is still improvable)

From a visual standpoint, Mars Attracts presents itself with a simple and immediate style, the result of a small creative team that chose functional clarity over hyperrealistic detail. The environments, the models of Martians and abducted humans, as well as the buildings and attractions, have a deliberately basic, almost caricatural appearance, recalling the pulp and satirical tone of the original work. This choice serves two clear objectives: to keep the game accessible even on less powerful machines and to leave room for grotesque fantasy rather than graphic realism that might have risked making everything too dark or disturbing.

It should not be forgotten that the project started as an indie gamble, built around the idea of overturning the perspective of the classic management game. The priority, from the beginning, was to define a Martian aesthetic language consistent with the retro illustrations of Mars Attacks and the kitsch imagery of the sixties. Some “corporeal” rides clearly show this intent: more than for their polygonal quality, they impress with their bizarre and surreal concept, capable of leaving a lasting impression.

However, it is undeniable that the graphical rendering is very basic: the models have few details, the animations are essential, and the visual variety is not yet able to support prolonged sessions without a sense of repetitiveness. Even the user interface, while having made progress compared to preliminary versions, remains improvable visually: menus do not always guide intuitively, and the readability of icons can be confusing, especially during the first few hours.

Furthermore, there is no Italian localization, and for a title that relies heavily on irony, this is a drawback: certain nuances of the dialogues risk being lost. And it's a shame, because the love for the franchise is clearly noticeable, especially in the Martian dialogues: on one hand, the unmistakable “Ack ack ack ack!”, on the other, their textual translation shown to us to understand what they are saying. It's a subtle but apt detail, capable of giving the player the feeling of truly being in front of Burton's aliens.

In short, the game is still in its early stages and graphically remains improvable, but the passion for the Mars Attacks universe shines through and gives hope that future updates can enrich and refine a framework that already has its precise identity.