Powerwash Simulator 2 review: Deep cleaning sequel is as serious as Silksong

It’s a thought I kept coming back to as I spent hours cleaning mold out of public restrooms and blasting rust off cars. When the originalPowerWash Simulator (a game whose title tells you everything you need to know about it) hit early access in 2021, I approached it like a gag gift at a holiday party. I found its cleaning gameplay legitimately satisfying, but I thought of it less as a proper game and more as an ironic stunt executed to perfection. With its content-loaded sequel, I no longer see the calming cleaning game as an elaborate bit. What makes killing monsters more legitimate as a game premise than washing your house, anyway?