Smashing your mouse like a maniac: free to play Cookie Clicker Review

The original cookie clicker was published in 2013 by the french developer Orteil. The game introduced the basic principles of a clicker type game. You click on a big cookie to earn cookies which can be used to buy upgrades and buildings.

Game appearence

The game in a cartoonish but very detailed pixel art style. While playing the game you can enjoy some relaxing music in the background. Clicking on the cookie also produces a sound effect but this gets quite annoying after some time. The different building minigames also have some nice sound effects.

Gameplay

At the beginning you can make cookies by clicking on the big cookie on the left of your screen. After you earned a certain amount you can purchase a Cursor that clicks the cookie for you, earning 1 cookie each 10 seconds. Keep on clicking and you can purchase a Grandma that produces 1 cookie each second. You get the idea: Get more money, buy better buildings, get more automated cookies per second (CPS) and use that money to buy more buildings, earning you more and more cookies.

In addition to the building purchases you can also buy upgrades in the store to improve the efficiency of buildings or the amount of cookies you get for each manual click and much more. Upgrades rise in prize the more you progress and sometimes even profit multiple buildings.

Some buildings unlock a minigame if you upgrade them with sugar lumps, an item that automatically gets harvested after a certain amount (1 irl day in my case). Minigames add another level of complexity to the game as you can get big benefits from the mechanics but also debuffs like getting your cookie production halved for 15 minutes. My favourite minigame at the moment is the Grimoire, a selection of spells that can help boost your production efficiency enormously.

Sometimes you find pulsating golden cookies on your screen. These give you random buffs, helping your cookie production but you need to click them fast as they disappear after around 15 seconds if you don’t click on them.

Grind

At the moment there are 637 steam achievements to earn in the game. Unlocking some specials ones grants you the ability to purchase the next kitten upgrade, an upgrade which boosts your cps. The amount of achievements you have also influences the color of the milk.

To unlock permanent upgrades you can start from the beginning using the Legacy button in the top right corner. Doing so will give you access to a skill tree and lots of upgrades to purchase. The more cookies you earn before “resetting”, the more heavenly chips and prestige levels you’ll get. These can be used to purchase said permanent upgrades.

There are also some seasonal events like the Christmas season that unlock new upgrades and achievements. If you progress in the game you’ll be able to unlock the Grandmapocalypse, an event that effects the game appearance but also causes the spawn of evil creatures. As I don’t want to spoil too much of the game’s story, you’ll have to find out about it yourself which should be more fun.

Conclusion

Get Cookie Clicker here