Rain on Your Parade

Developer: Unbound Creations | Publisher: Unbound Creations | Release Date: 2021 | Genre: Action / Casual / Indie | Website: Official Website | Purchase: Steam

Video game developers, particularly indie developers, have proven time and again that pretty much anything can be turned into a game. The results might not always be fun or entertaining, but sometimes the stars align and you get gold from something as simple as a large waterbird terrorizing a small town. While it is somewhat in the same vein as titles like Untitled Goose Game and Donut County, Rain on Your Parade by Unbound Creations is also very much its own game. Players are given control of a cardboard cut-out cloud, named Cloudy, and let loose on the unsuspecting “hoomans” that populate the various levels.

Rain on Your Parade has a storyline too, in the form of a granddad telling his grandson a clearly made-up story about a cloud on its way to the mythical land of Seattle. In truth, though, it’s all just an excuse for fifty-odd levels of mayhem as you make your cloud do things that no cloud has ever done before. It all starts very simple, of course, with your cloud ruining a wedding by raining on all the guests. However, it’s not long before people are running around with their hair on fire, cars are crashing, and dinosaurs are being exterminated!

Each level in Rain on Your Parade opens with a small checklist of objectives for your cloud. Usually, only one or two are essential for completing the level while the rest or optional. If you do manage to check everything off the list you are rewarded with some type of cosmetic item, which can be used to customize your cloud. Due to the sheer amount of levels in the game not all of them are a hit, but Unbound Creations managed to put together way more hits than misses. From turning people into zombies and leading them on a rampage to sneaking into a secret base without getting spotted, there is rarely a dull moment. The game is also packed with pop culture references with some like The Office and Counter-Strike being very blatant while others are a little more subtle. Every now and then you’ll also encounter a level where the objective is as simple as painting whatever you want on a canvas with your cloud or petting a dog. Then there are the levels where the goal is to play some type of mini-game, complete with leaderboards for competition. Believe it or not, there’s even a couple of boss levels as Cloudy has its own nemesis named Dr. Dryspell!

As fun as raining on people is the game would not have been as entertaining if this was the only ability that Cloudy had. Sure, you can soak up different fluids like tar or paint for extra mayhem, but the real fun begins when Cloud unlocks additional abilities.

These range from lightning that can destroy things and start fires to snow that can make surfaces slippery and turn people into snowmen. Our favorite, though, is the tornado power that can be used to suck up everything in your path and then fling them around. Your powers are gradually unlocked as you progress through the levels, but completing the game opens up a “New Game+” mode where all your powers are accessible right from the start. While playing this mode there’s also new objectives on each level to make use of these powers, which adds some nice replay value to the game. Rain on Your Parade is not a particularly difficult game, so anyone should be able to complete the primary objectives on each level. The optional objectives are a little trickier, but still easy enough. Fortunately, the New Game+ mode also unlocks the “Sun” mode, which increases the challenge a bit. With this mode activated you are followed around by a cardboard sun that will steal some of your water if it catches you. Your water level is represented by a liquid meter and can typically be refilled if there are water sources on the level, but sometimes the challenge is to make do with what you have.

Run On Your Parade is not going to win any awards for visuals, but the bright colorful levels fit the goofy tone of the game perfectly. By keeping the graphics relatively simple the developers were able to inject a ton of variety in the levels. From the inside of a fancy restaurant to the moon, whether indoors or outdoors, nowhere is safe from the ill-natured intentions of Cloudy. In fact, the developers even casually threw in a first-person shooter level where Cloud roams around Doom-style shooting water at cardboard suns while searching for color-coded keycards. However, some of the most visually impressive levels in the game are the Katamari parodies where you use the tornado power to scoop up everything in sight. Thanks to the handy photo mode you can even capture dramatic screenshots of your havoc to share with the world. We have to admit that we also spent far too much time on the customization options. Not only can you outfit Cloudy with the unlockable hats and accessories, but you can also draw a custom face for it. The character customization is done from Cloudy’s home, which also gradually fills up with “souvenirs” from the levels that you have completed.

As with the visuals, the audio in Rain on Your Parade is simple yet effective. Along with some catchy tunes to accompany your escapades the game also features a nice selection of sound effects that mostly consist of people screaming and things exploding. It’s a pity that the game doesn’t feature any voice acting as Cloudy befriends everything from a wise old cloud to a funky granny and even a frog. We agree that the game works best when played with a controller as the developers suggest, but the keyboard controls are perfectly adequate too. Players simply move Cloudy around the levels and use its shadow as a targeting spot for unleashing one of its four abilities. Levels that attempt to deviate from the usual formula, such as the Break-out style stage and the tower-defense mission, are a little trickier to control, but overall nobody should have any trouble.

These types of casual games are not everyone’s cup of tea, but we thoroughly enjoyed our time with Rain on Your Parade. The developers have taken a relatively simple idea and fleshed it out enough that it remains humorous for its 50+ levels. The objectives are varied and the inclusion of all the jokes, parodies, and references add to the charm of the game. It’s not a very lengthy title, but the inclusion of a New Game+ mode, tricky achievements, and unlockable cosmetic items add a ton of replay value. If you enjoy games such as Untitled Goose game or just enough messing around in games in general you will love Rain on Your Parade.