GLUM Early Access Review: A Hilariously Chaotic "First-Person Booter" Trapped in a Technical Bug Fest

When a game enters Early Access, players are usually prepared to forgive a laundry list of shortcomings. We expect the missing features, the optimization hiccups, and the loose ends. After all, the entire purpose of an Early Access release is to offer a raw glimpse into a game's potential before the developers apply the final polish.

Every now and then, however, an indie title comes along that strikes you with such immediate, unhinged mechanical energy that you find yourself falling in love with its concepts despite the technical chaos. That is precisely the case with GLUM, developed and published by CinderCat Games. Released into Early Access on May 22, 2025, for PC, this self-proclaimed "First-Person Booter" throws serious swords, intricate firearms, and traditional spellcasting out the window. Instead, it arms you with a single, highly destructive tool: a magical, ass-kicking boot. It is crude, fast, and entirely unique—even if its current build is desperately crying out for structural stability.

The Premise: An Ugly Underling on a Mission

The narrative foundation of GLUM completely avoids traditional fantasy tropes. You do not play as a chiseled, chosen hero destined to fulfill an ancient prophecy. Instead, you are Glum—a crude, unappealing, and thoroughly stinky little goblin minion. Glum has spent his sorry excuse for a life serving a mean Overlord named Semperius. However, following a sudden political coup, Semperius is kidnapped by rival factions, leaving Glum without an employer, a purpose, or a stable income.

Armed with an ancient, magical boot, Glum sets out on a quest for vengeance across a world that looks and feels like it was lifted straight out of a dark, twisted Shrek film. The story isn't trying to deliver deep emotional resonance; it operates strictly on dark, crass humor and slapstick comedy. While the overarching plot is simple, the sheer absurdity of your goblin anti-hero makes the journey incredibly charming from the very first level.

Gameplay: Pure, Adrenaline-Fueled Ragdoll Chaos

If you have ever played cult-classic physics titles like Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, Bulletstorm, or 2024's indie hit Anger Foot, the mechanical rhythm of GLUM will feel immediately familiar. This is a high-octane, fast-paced action game where your feet do 100% of the talking.

The Power of the Boot

Kicking isn't just a basic melee attack in this game; it is the core axis around which the entire design revolves. Your boot can be utilized for a variety of tasks:

• Physics-Based Combat: A standard kick sends armored knights, archers, and rival fantasy creatures sailing across the arena. The physics-based ragdoll interactions ensure that every impact feels incredibly impactful and hilarious.
• Environmental Hazards: The massive, semi-open playgrounds are intentionally littered with hazards. You can launch enemies directly into spiked coffins, roaring fires, or pitchfork-rigged haystacks for stylish, instant kills.
• The Rocket Boot: You can literally fire your magical boot off your foot like a ranged rocket launcher to flatten distant targets, after which it magically flies back to your leg.
• Traversal and Puzzles: Kicking objects can activate remote switches, smash doors open, or launch Glum into the air to execute complex parkour and platforming sequences.

The pace of the encounters heavily mirrors the modern DOOM reboots. The action never slows down, forcing you to constantly dash, jump, and punch your way through swarms of guards while scoping out the environment for structural traps to exploit. Successful, creative kills reward you with health-restoring items, encouraging a reckless, aggressive playstyle that is incredibly satisfying when the mechanics line up perfectly.

The Purgatory of Save-Game Bugs

Unfortunately, it is impossible to discuss the brilliance of GLUM's gameplay without addressing the elephant in the room: the technical execution is currently a complete minefield. While glitches and minor physics bugs are to be expected in a sandbox of this scale, the game suffers from some devastating progression errors.

During our review process, we spent roughly two hours clearing out a massive chunk of the main map, hunting down hidden gnomes, and completing bizarre side objectives. After closing the session, a fresh developer patch dropped, completely wiping the save data and reverting all progress back to zero. Worryingly, this wasn't an isolated incident; a subsequent session met the exact same fate without a patch update even occurring. While the latest updates from CinderCat Games claim to have stabilized the save architecture, the game’s current state requires a massive amount of patience from the player.

Visuals and Audio: A Stylized, Fragmented Presentation

Visually, GLUM utilizes a semi-cartoonish, highly vibrant aesthetic that feels like a spiritual sibling to the Dishonored series, albeit wrapped in a comedic tone. The character designs are deliberately ridiculous, full of visual exaggeration that perfectly fits the game's unserious atmosphere. It isn't a title designed to push your modern hardware to its limits, but the art style carries a strong, cohesive identity.

The audio presentation, however, feels heavily undercooked and incomplete. Glum himself is largely mute, only grunting or offering a rare, strange voice line during pivotal moments, while the vast majority of the game's dialogue is handled entirely through silent text speech bubbles. The combat sound effects—screams, shattering barrels, and weapon impacts—lack a layer of audio mixing, leaving some encounters feeling strangely quiet amidst the visual mayhem. The dynamic soundtrack keeps the energy high, but it fades into generic background noise the moment you step out of combat.

Technical Performance

On our test platform (Ryzen 9 5900x, RTX 3080 Ti, 32 GB RAM), the game ran at exceptionally high framerates at 4K resolution. However, the game engine experiences massive optimization drops when transitioning between the tightly contained tutorial area and the wide-open main level. It’s a well-known issue within the community, and players running on portable hardware like the Steam Deck or ROG Ally will likely experience significant stability issues until further optimization passes are implemented.

The Final Verdict: A Brilliant Sandbox Worth Watching

GLUM is poised to become an absolute indie cult classic once the final, ironed-out version officially launches. The core concept of a first-person physics booter is incredibly refreshing, and the sheer volume of emergent environmental kills makes every combat encounter a joyous exercise in creative destruction.

However, potential buyers must treat this build as a true, volatile sandbox. The broken progression loops, missing audio profiles, and optimization drops mean that you are signing up for a bumpy ride. If you love wacky physics-based combat and want to help shape a unique, dark-humored project, it is well worth keeping on your radar. But if you demand a polished, seamless experience, you may want to wait until this goblin's boot gets a few more layers of polish.

Pros:

• Phenomenal, physics-based kicking combat loop.
• Hilarious ragdoll mechanics and inventive environmental hazards.
• Highly engaging, fast-paced traversal and level mobility.
• Charming, dark-humored cartoon aesthetic.

• Severe, game-breaking save progression bugs.
• Undercooked and incomplete sound effects and voice production.
• Significant performance drops in open environments.