very very good so far, will be following this one i think :3
CardCaptorKiley
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A member registered Jul 11, 2019
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I think a hard mode would be wonderful if you felt like devoting the dev time. I'm not sure how much it would really take, but I think current endgame is maaaaybe fine? It's hard to say, I'm not sure how apparent the really broken stuff would be to someone that isn't trying to approach the game from that angle, but adjusting the endgame might not be a bad idea. The starting the game on your first playthrough is already fairly challenging, and cranking it up for the very end might just be in line with the intended narrative experience! I do think it's fine as is tho and hard mode is the preferable option here. Getting to trivialize end game stuff is the reward for meta-gaming, increasing difficulty too much could offput a more casual player. A hard mode however, presents a challenge for those who want it! You can get brutal outside of the fights too if u wanna script an event or two - like the landlord coming out at random overworld chance for a down payment on your rent, and taking all your money.
rip working for the knife
As we said like a dozen times in the playthrough, I don't think it's much of an issue that like, players can acquire so much power. From the old days of TES: Arena's magic crafting system, to modern roguelikes, players have enjoyed earning significant power, especially within a system that gatekeeps it from them. Like, lets analyze what Working for the Knife does, gameplay wise -
you need a significant amount of money for it to start to eclipse the other 3 characters, damage wise, to the tune of a few thousand dollars. In addition, it soft locks you out of using Ramona's other skills, or at least, you can't use them AND get the boosted damage from the weapon effect. Not only this, it significantly handicaps your spending; this means while you have Ramona cracked out, your ability to do things like purchase gachas is limited. This creates an interesting inverse of the usual build, where Ramona is the main lead on DPS, and the rest of the team is playing support, and creates new issues with stuff like confusion that are mechanically interesting. But as high as the ceiling for working for the knife gets, its no easier, faster, or more busted than simply dropping the money on artifact gachas and using Ramona 'normally.' Adding a cap like this only removes a possible avenue for power and a playstyle.
been enjoying this, though sleeping at night seems to have broken, forcing me to debug to home every morning thus missing assumed morning scenes with Miss Grey and Hannah. Also, even getting to what seems to be the breast size cap has no effect on how its portrayed in the bathroom, and the black thong is treated as non-matching by Miss Grey, training with ashley gives no xp AND breaks, and Jennifer seems to longer hit me up cash after a point.
Anyways, I do think there could be a bit more spread of the midgame (?) content to match the early game, and given the advertisment of foot/nylon/shoe fetishism, it's very lacking all those things as far as I can tell, however, this is at a pretty good spot for an in-dev game of this type and shows promise
So, I found this game browsing through Itchio as I like to highlight to indie game and devs on my stream, being an indie streamer myself. Finding this game, I felt like I had uncovered a hidden gem - not only does the premise of GBC metroidvania sound promising, being a longtime shantae and metroid fan, but the art looks wonderful! Booting it up and hearing the soundtrack only made me more excited to play it. The first hour or so of wandering about only furthered my expectations, but after, I'm afraid to say things took a bad turn.
I found reptitive boss fights, in every sense of the word, where I was pitted against an enemy with seemingly tons of health yet only one attack I had to worry about. I found myself constantly lost, with the promise of a map somewhere (late game was certainly a choice. I understand not wanting to give every secret away but still). I found a timed escape with little wiggle room for error (PLEASE ACTUALLY PLAY A METROID GAME. THE ESCAPE TIMERS ARE FAIRLY GENEROUS. Also no health restore after the boss fight? Jesus, sis). I found an absolute SLOG of a three boss finale, with little to write home about. Constant lack of any checkpoints or niceties even games on this system would give.
This game wants to be a GBC game. It ties itself to the aesthetic and programming limitations. It gives little to no consideration however, to how it would actually play on the gameboy color. The two bosses before the final one can chip you so easily, yet the final boss gets no checkpoint, or heal, or even tell for what patter you're getting next, and some of them punish you instantly if you are poised to dodge most the rest. This would be par for the course in perhaps an arcade machine, looking to squeeze every last quarter out of my allowance, but a published game? In the late 90s/early 00s? It feels like you were so eager to make the game feel retro, you forgot not only what era you were making a game for, but also that we left a lot of these design choices in the past for a reason.
Art/Music/World: 10/10. Absolutely peak, this game just OOZES charm. Its what kept us going through the many rough patches. the enviroments were all wonderful and unique, and I adored them bit.
Writing 6.5/10: Feels kinda weird this is about Rosemarie and her sisters, and we get to see one early, but only once? Theres only one real character for the bulk of the game, but she does have interesting dialogue. Theres plenty of enviromental stuff to flesh out the world's feel, which is more important.
Actual Gameplay experience: 2/10. For the reasons noted above, It felt like the game was actively trying to sap out any enjoyment we had. Actively hostile to the player and the concept of fun. Might be good for the particularily masochistic, or those who don't mind abusing save states, but I feel for those trying to play on an actual cart. Just play Shantae, or Metroid 2. Or any other indie Metroidvania. I like Blasphemous a lot.
All said, I think I am glad I played this. It was an experience I don't think I forget for a long, long time. Might come back to post the maps here, to save the next person some madness.
Finally got around to playing 1.3 and very much like the new content. Do wish there was something special for peeing your diaper/yourself with like, 5 minutes left (or maybe exactly 1). Feels weird to pull over on the freeway when you should be driving up to the gates. Looking forward to more, as always~
Long overdue Review Time.
We're going to lead with the brief for the sake of others browsing this game - IHY,PS is one the best games we played in 2024, a year we finally got around to games such as Elden Ring, Hollow Knight, Both Portal games, and some other fantastic stuff we aren't gonna inflate this list with. The only reason it isn't hands down our favorite is that it's narrowly edged out by the Dev's previous work Slimes. (Mostly because Slimes linear nature allowed us to experience it with little time lost to trying to figure out what we were doing, but also it's extremely dark tone was simply delicious.)
If you are considering buying this game, you should. This game is nothing short of a masterpiece and it's honestly a steal even at full price.
Now that we've written enough to hopefully be under the read more, lets get into a more full review with some light spoilers. Read further at your own caution.
This game perfectly captures how it feels to be a mid 20s to 30's something without purpose. It's how it feels to be crushed under the weight of capitalist society, how it feels to lose the little security you have, how hard it is to scrap together the pieces in the wake of losing a once stable life, and how meaning is made, not found. All of these themes are iterated time and again throughout not just the main party members, but just about everyone you interact with. It goes into the various ways people cope with such loss, across a spectrum of unhealthiness.
And this is a game about getting better.
There is an undeniable and powerful emotional core here, and it's the kind of thing that will have you rethink your life, asking the same questions the characters do - Am I happy as I am? Can I build a life where I am? Can I grow past my hurt? Can I do it even though it's a struggle?
And what a struggle it is, one that comes across clear to the player. The hardest part of this journey is undoubtedly the beginning - getting the ball rolling in the first few feels a lot like trying to get out of debt in real life, but once you do, once you have people supporting you, it gets easier. And the more people you have supporting you the easier it all gets. It does help that even comes in the romantic flavor, but more on that in a second.
Speaking of, the characters themselves are all masterfully done and memorable. Even many of the side characters are immediately distinct and endearing, or obnoxious/off-putting, as per narrative need. All help further thematic core at the heart of IHY,PS - Building a life where you are happy is painful, hard work, but it is worth it. (also you don't have to do it alone)
We also want to highlight how much it means to us to see so much authentic queer representation in a game that's not really 'about' such a thing. Sure, Ramona, the main character, is a trans woman and often has to deal with transmisogyny and an emotionally abusive mother who doesn't accept her, but the focus always feels focused on building happiness in her life. Three of the four party members are even bisexual and poly - as a bi poly trans woman there were a lot of moments we got all giddy over. The ending we got, Vodka scene, and Imposter fight being absolute highlights. But again, the focus is always on making a life you want to live, realizations of identity are merely the shape it takes, not the pure function of the story.
It's honestly hard to think of any real criticism to lodge with the game. Sure the beginning is easily the hardest part of the game, and getting you first few hundred dollars is a struggle, but it all works perfectly in a ludonarrative sense. Personally, we would have liked it if there was another transwoman besides Ramona given there are three transmasc people, but that's not much of a complaint. A trans woman MC in a game that isn't explicitly about being a trans woman is rare enough. If we had to point out something, it's that occasionally quests would break, and that finding quest NPCs on the randomized floors even with the fast resetting of the smoke bombs quickly gets tiresome.
In all, this was an absolutely perfect game, and we're looking forward to replaying it to explore it's many paths.
This is the part where the review breaks down a little cuz we've been writing this on and off for four days now and have more stuff we wanna say but cant be fucked with, so apologies that this is a bit scattered:
Ramona hits almost too close to home in a lot of ways, and her knife fighting being a weeb thing is fucking hilarious. Kyrie is simply one our fave characters in anything ever and serial killer that masks as girlie pop is just delicious. Devon is a cutie, would love to show him my vinyl collections and talk music, we think he'd really dig our instrumental post metal collection. Jasper kinda grew on us with just wild they are with the whole casual admittance of having been in a cult and other such moments. Becoming broken in the mid to late game feels really good after the struggles of early game. Really liked the various other groups of adventurers and their different dynamics and how this made the world feel alive, especially the soft time limit on random side quests being them taking the quests in your stead. Maybe the first game to get us to do fanart of anything besides Vocaloid.
10/10, S tier game, made us rethink our life. Thank you for the food, and we can't wait to see what you do next~ <3
I was recommended this by a friend some time ago. Honestly not even sure who as it was so long ago, but we threw it in a doc of games, where it sat unassumingly for a few months. I'm a small time indie vtuber, and like to maintain a list of indie games to pull from. Yesterday was my 2 year streamerversary, and I thought doing a variety of indie horror games and some runescape to wind down would be perfect. The listing said this was 3-4, and we were intrigued, so we tossed it in for the first slot.
Eleven and a half hours later, we are sitting in silence as we recover from one of best games we've played in a long, long time.
This game is nothing short of a triumph. The themes of how religion is oft used as both yoke and whip by the abusive and oppressive being present down the very party mechanics had me literally giddy at how good it was. I felt awful in the most wonderful way. I choked up a few times. It was divine.
Trying to think of any actual criticism feels like grasping at straws. We did soft lock ourselves twice by accidentally blocking our way out of the room with the rock slime, but that felts more like a small oversight than anything like a flaw.
The combat was a joy, and the strategy was wonderful. I liked that the touch the characters never grow from their experiences, but they do learn. 5/5. Thank you for making this.
Of course! Oh another thing I would like to see is the MC getting more into the mindset themselves, starting to look for their mommy, feeling overwhelmed and emotional without her, comforted nearby her. There's some of this already in of course, but more is more gooder. Just the mindset becoming stickier and more natural.