Electrician Simulator Switch Review

In one of my previous careers, I built and programmed circuit boards and was one of the lucky few who had an international certification in PCB board repair. It was a fun job, especially diagnosing what was wrong with boards that failed inspection. I still use those skills in my life today and never thought I would see a video game about them. Enter: Electrician Simulator, a sim game from indie developer Take It Studio that promises to put you in the boots as an electrician. What’s it Like? Grab your screwdriver, and some spare wiring, but leave your master fuse on so we can review Electrician Simulator for the Nintendo Switch.

Electrician Simulator is just that, a loose representation of what it’s like being an Electrician/Appliance repair person. The gameplay revolves around a fairly addictive loop of doing electrician work on-site and repairing smaller appliances at home on the workbench. The jobs are varied, the gameplay is fun, and during the early stages of the game, it can be crushingly difficult. I bankrupted 3 businesses while learning the ropes of the game, sometimes my fault, sometimes due to bugs.

You can even live out your best Electrician life by using your cash to decorate your home, Knowing you’ve made it when you get your big-screen TV. It’s a nice touch that adds a little personalization to the game. During your time as a virtual Electrician, you will rewire sockets, wire fuse boxes, repair appliances, and manage your business by balancing jobs and supplies which are all accessed via your laptop. You can earn new certifications via a VR Headset, that allows you to take on more complex jobs, and you can use your trusty pickup truck to go to job sites for your call-outs. The gameplay is quite fun, although the controls leave a little to be desired. Sometimes, the game can be a bit fiddly and requires you to adjust your sensitivity, you can also use the touchscreen controls, but due to the sizing of components this has mixed results. Sometimes, there’s not a lot of direction on what to do, leaving you lost on a job site. There are achievements to unlock, challenges to complete, and thanks to the Endless mode, technically there’s an endless supply of work in this economy.

When it comes to Electrician Simulators performance on Switch, it’s actually really well optimized. It looks sharp enough, runs well from a framerate standpoint, and looks high quality. The environments look nice and do a good job of making you feel like each house you visit is a different one. Where Electrician Simulator becomes a little… shocking… is when it comes to the polish of the title. I had to restart my game 3 times due to bugs, which only seemed to affect me early on in the game. On one save, I couldn’t use my screwdriver on the workbench, so I quit to home screen and reloaded, only to have to purchase all my tools again, bankrupting me and forcing me to restart. There are also a few frustrations with direction on what you have to do, with one task asking me to rewire the fuse box. I spent about 15 minutes clicking away in handheld mode trying to find where to attach the wire, only to find I had to press the Y button to switch to wiring mode. Another save I forgot to pick up a screwdriver on my bench and got stuck in a job because I had to purchase a new one after reloading a quicksave, thus bankrupting my business again. In my most recent save, with about 6 hours of gameplay on it, I haven’t encountered a single bug.

All bugs aside, my biggest complaint is how the game handles finances, requiring you to purchase parts on smaller repairs, with some jobs breaking even, or ending up in you losing money altogether. This really only affects you in the early game, but despite being given the freedom to choose whichever job you want, there’s clearly a set way to do things at the offset, lest you bankrupt yourself over a $20 pair of tweezers.

If you can look past the frustrations at the start of the game, you will be rewarded with an addictive gameplay loop, fun scenarios, and a lot of hours of gameplay thanks to the game “Endless Mode” which generates houses and jobs for you to complete, meaning the game will last as long as your attention. I preferred working on the workbench rather than going on location, as pulling apart appliances and repairing PCB boards was something I enjoyed doing in real life. To its credit, on the appliance repair part anyway, the game is actually fairly realistic, while keeping it light and fun. The on-site electrician work is in-depth as well and gives you plenty to do. You’ll find yourself rewiring sockets like a pro in no time – just don’t try that stuff in real life.

At under $30 AUD, Electrician Simulator will provide you with plenty of hours of entertainment, provided you can look past the opening frustrations. Like real electrical work, it may require some patience to start with and careful planning, but once you navigate the treacherous first hour you will have a hard time putting your controller down. It’s challenging and frustrating, but overall a very fun and addictive game, and I’m sure with a couple of patches, will be one I continue to return to as my hobby job.

So What’s It Like?

Electrician Simulator is like a cross between repairing actual PCB boards, with some hard-hitting financial reality while being self-employed.

I award it 72/100