The Roblox preview image for Regretevator

I definitely know that elevator games, as well as a lot of casual games in general, aren’t really my thing, but Regretevator does some things very right and some things very wrong that I’m sure I’d share my opinions here on even if I was more predisposed to the genre.

There’s another post I’m withholding for emotional reasons that I was considering posting to start my media thread. I thought I wouldn’t have one of those for a while, but realized there was something I needed to speak on about a game I’ve played a lot of casually, but never really understood the appeal of. As a game, I still struggle with that; however, as a creative universe, I think I understand it a lot better. It’s an interesting mishmash of unrelated concepts that explores the interactions between them in an interesting way, and given how well I can interact with its universe when I’m not interacting with the game itself, it’s something I’m very sad isn’t more accessible with some of its more interesting features.

I’ll start with the negatives, because that will make my experience with the community and with the characters a lot more clear of a contrast. The game itself is quite inaccessible; it’s random about what you can actually access, with a floor roster small enough that it’s very predictable what comes next, but very difficult to get where you actually want to go. Perhaps this is a consequence of me spending as much time as I have playing the game, where I have put enough time into the game in droves to be able to tell where I need to go and what I need to do, but many things about the game are predictable, yet despite that, it is very difficult to get a grasp on floors. While that feels like the point, it feels like everyone else has a better grasp of the game than I do all of the time, which makes it diffiult to follow.

For how little replayability this game has, however, it is incredibly slow to actually farm for things. It feels like you have to be doing one of a few very specific things to get any rewards, while there are a lot of expensive things that you have to go well out of your way in terms of grinding to purchase, namely emotes and floor tickets. It is a grind to get things going in this game, and for a game like this, I think that is incredibly bad; however, I imagine that this game’s economy is less balanced for someone like me with less patience as opposed to one of the players who are practically going daily at this game.

Speaking of the dailies: Why are they so difficult? I have never beaten one in all of my time playing since the feature was added. I’d imagine I’m doing better in this game than a lot of people, and yet I’m not able to get much more of a streak than 15, even though 19 is being called for. I feel like, unless you get lucky, a few of the dailies that are present in this game are genuinely so difficult for a lot of players that it makes it demotivating to attempt them more than once. It feels like an insurmountable challenge to get over as opposed to a reason to check in; while I do get that an easily daily check-in leads to a very unhealthy feedback loop, one that I’ve struggled with in games in the past, I’d much rather feel like I can get a reward out of a menu that takes up so much screen real estate.

This is entirely personal taste, but I’m definitely not a fan of how much horror the game has that is unavoidable unless you know what you’re doing; I’m not a fan of horror media in games, as I get very immersed in them and it makes it impossible to play if I have to put up with my emotions in that regard. It is a lot easier for me to watch a horror game playthrough than engage with the media directly, to the point where I am barely affected by jumpscares unless I’m the one playing the game. There are a number of horror-esque elements in the game, namely things like the Fafa screen effect, that terrify me for no good reason, and while you can turn off jumpscares, you can’t turn off everything.

It’s not to say this game is all bad, of course. There’s a lot to explore, and a lot of interesting feedback. For casual games, which tend to be difficult to get into for me because there’s nothing going on, the game provides a lot of feedback that lets the player make their own challenge; often, when I play with friends, I just try to build a high streak and enjoy the floors as they come with friends. I do get competitive, even sometimes in a game like this, but there’s no pressure here to perform, and that’s fun at times. I’ll also laud the movement and character control this game has; while it feels very foreign due to being a bit different from base Roblox in how it feels, it is quite smooth in comparison to base Roblox movement, despite not using many systems to do that. It is very interesting the changes the engine makes that are more conservative than other first person perspective games, but still make for a unique gamefeel.

Mechanically, I definitely have more issues with than I have draws to the game. Then, on the other side of the coin, there is the actual universe the game takes in itself and the many interesting things going on here.

Regretevator’s characters receiving so much love is something I think the game absolutely deserves. It’s a lot of unique artists and characters that are just set in an interesting place. Putting many different ideas and aesthetics in the same game, one with a very charming aesthetic that speaks to pretty much all of the current audience of Roblox that is at least somewhat interested in the old-school, means that people are bound to get attached to at least something about the universe; not only that, but you actually spend extended, “personal” periods of time with these characters in a way that is unique, and get to hear these characters elaborate briefly on their ideas and relationships. They feel real, comparatively, and unique in a way that is interesting; that, and I think that the character designs Roblox developers are capable of are very consistently quality, and to have so much room to experiment in a game like this means that so many of them are going to be excellent. My best experiences playing the game has just been experiencing it all and digging through it, which is something I don’t often enjoy going out of my way to do, but when I do get the chance, especially when playing with friends, it’s quite enjoyable.

I initially made the first part of this post well before I got to this point, but it was initially inspired by a Bluesky post of a Gnarpy fan-model that gave me a surprising amount of gender envy. On top of that, I already had some level of attachment to Prototype, though not on a kin level, and a friend of mine does kin Scag, which made for fun banter, and I had also played around with Split from a gender angle as well; because of these kinds of phenomena, through exposure to this game outside of actually playing it, I had a real chance to get attached to these characters and talk about them with friends. I think much of the positive experience I’ve gotten with the game has been what I’ve explored of the community, which is a similar angle to how I felt about Five Nights at Freddy’s and Undertale at their peaks, as well as with some consistency throughout their continued relevance; there are a lot of games where I love the chraacters, but think of the games as something that’s difficult for me to approach for their own reasons. Regretevator definitely has a lot to explore that isn’t often talked about outside of the game, which always makes it a fresh experience, but the coolest things are what I’m talking about outside of the game already.

Do I think the game is cool? Incredibly. I don’t recommend against playing it, but I can’t recommend it either unless you’re playing with friends; it’s an incredible game to experience, especially when updates come along and add bucket loads of content, but a slog to grind when you know most of what’s going on and don’t have any saying power on where the elevator ends up. It’s one of the best labors of love on Roblox as it stands, though, and will continue to grow in that way as the game gets more popular; due to the platform, it’s always easy to boot up as well. It’s just a good idea to know what your expectations should be when playing the game.