I’ve never been into buying records, but if it made me look half as cool as the characters in Wax Heads I’d buy a whole record store (plus some ripped jeans and hair dye). Wax Heads is a self-described “cosy-punk slice-of-life” puzzle game about working in a record shop and helping customers with their musically inclined requests. I’ve played the demo (it's free to download over on Steam) and very much enjoyed chatting with the shop’s eccentric customers, puzzling over what records they would like, and getting the inside scoop on the dramas of the music world.
The demo begins with some juicy drama. The hottest pop band of 1988 Becoming Violet has broken up due to some inner band squabbling (one band member wants to go full Beyoncé to the dismay of the others). Flash forward and ex-lead singer Morgan Macintyre has opened a record shop and the game begins as you clock in for your first store shift.
Your job is to listen to each customer’s request, search the store for the right record, and then ring up their order on the till. Select the right record and you’ll have a happy music fan skipping out the front door, get it wrong and feel the wrath of a slightly disgruntled customer. Correctly giving the right record to each person can be solved in several different ways. They can tell you exactly what they want - like superstar pop idol Mimi’s new album *screams in fan girl* - but more often than not you’ll have to deduce what they want by picking up on clues.
For example, the customer could be wearing a band t-shirt or holding a crumpled concert flyer, meaning that all you need to do is find the matching record. More difficult requests might have you searching through a band’s discography for exactly the right release, or riddling through a band’s history told to you by the customer. In one encounter, I had to deduce what record a customer wanted from his tattoos.
It’s lightweight detective work without feeling like actual work and made more fun because you actually have to search for the right record too. You can poke around the cluttered store to see what records are on display and can even pick them up and read the description of the music and band on the back cover for more information. When you’re confident in your choice you can head to the cash desk and ring up the order, hitting the big ‘CHECKOUT’ button when you’re done (but not before you’ve added a bunch of emojis to the receipt).
One thing I especially love is the game’s level of detail. Visually, characters and environments are packed with hand-drawn personality, but beyond that, I had a lot of fun with the amount of ‘lore’ written into the game. I love learning about the drama of all these bands, like why Gareth Gringleby really left Brick Dog to become a folk singer. And speaking of Brick Dog, I am obsessed with their song names, some personal favourites being Uncut Sandwich, and I couldn't leave out Ballad of the Trolley Left in the Dalcraig River, and of course, Another Night of Crisps, Cola, and Morphy Kart - incredible stuff.
If you’re after some light-deduction puzzle-solving game with a cool comic-book visual style, you should absolutely give Wax Heads a spin.
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