Shave & Stuff – A Novelty VR Barber Sim That Runs Out of Hair Fast

Shave & Stuff is one of those VR curiosities that feels like it wandered out of a prototype lab and somehow ended up on a major platform. It’s a barbershop simulator in the loosest, most chaotic sense of the word, inviting you to shave, trim, and occasionally mutilate the faces of a rotating cast of cartoonish customers. On PSVR2, the premise has the potential to be tactile and oddly satisfying, the kind of “toybox” VR experience that thrives on physical comedy and haptic feedback. And for a brief window, it is exactly that. The first few shaves are genuinely amusing, especially when the adaptive triggers kick in and the razor buzzes with a convincing hum. There’s a simple pleasure in dragging a virtual blade across a lumpy chin and watching hair fall away in clumps. But the novelty fades quickly, and the game never finds a way to grow beyond its initial gag.

The interactions are straightforward to the point of repetition. You pick up a razor, you shave a face, you try to avoid carving accidental lightning bolts into someone’s jawline. The PSVR2 hardware does the heavy lifting, giving the illusion of texture and resistance, but the game itself doesn’t build on that foundation. Customers occasionally throw you odd requests or show up with bizarre facial hair patterns, but these moments feel more like random jokes than meaningful escalation. There’s no real progression system, no sense of mastering a craft, no deeper mechanics waiting beneath the surface. It’s a VR vignette stretched into a full product, and you can feel the seams.

Visually, Shave & Stuff adopts a soft, rubbery cartoon aesthetic that’s pleasant enough but hardly memorable. Characters wobble and emote in exaggerated ways, which suits the tone, but the barbershop environment is barebones and static. Audio design is similarly minimal, relying on razor buzz, a few goofy vocalisations, and not much else. It’s clear the game isn’t trying to immerse you in a world so much as give you a sandbox for slapstick grooming. That’s fine in theory, but the lack of variety means the charm wears thin long before the game runs out of customers to throw at you.

Performance-wise, the game is smooth, comfortable, and accessible. It’s a seated experience with no locomotion, making it ideal for VR newcomers or anyone prone to motion sickness. But that simplicity also reinforces the sense that this is a mobile VR concept dressed up for PSVR2 without taking advantage of the platform’s strengths. The haptics are the highlight, yet even they can’t compensate for the shallow design.

Pros

• Convincing haptic feedback and adaptive trigger use

• Simple, accessible, motion‑sickness‑free gameplay

• Some genuinely funny moments and oddball customer designs

• Works well as a quick VR “party trick” for newcomers

Cons

• Extremely shallow mechanics with no progression

• Repetitive interactions that grow stale quickly

• Visuals and audio are functional but forgettable

• Feels like a mobile VR concept rather than a PSVR2‑native experience

• Little long‑term appeal or replay value

Ultimately, Shave & Stuff is the kind of VR title you boot up to make a friend laugh for five minutes before moving on to something with actual depth. It’s harmless, occasionally funny, and mechanically competent, but it never evolves into anything more than a novelty. In a library where VR games are increasingly expected to justify their space with creativity or replayability, this one feels like a throwback to the early days of the medium, charming in its own way, but undeniably thin.

XPN Rating: 3 out of 5 (SILVER)

Shave & Stuff is Available Now!