Full disclosure, I played so much of iNiS's Elite Beat Agents/Ouendan trilogy as a teenager that my parents sent me to a psychiatrist when I was like 15, and the dude was like, "Yeah, she's prolly on the autism spectrum".† So it kinda goes without saying that Gitaroo Man has been a game I've been looking forward to playing for the past 15 years or so, I just never really found the opportunity or time to get around to it. Nowadays I have a pretty good PC that can run pretty much any PS2 game perfectly, so I decided to finally take some time to sit down and play this while I was on a rhythm game kick. And man, if I had actually been able to track down this game as a teenager (I spent a lot of 2007/2008 hunting down copies of this game, Pikmin 2, and Path of Radiance, but only ever managed to find a slightly overpriced Pikmin 2), it would have absolutely ruined my life.

Gitaroo Man is raw as fuck, and I don't mean that in the broadly positive colloquial sense -- I mean it's an experience that's clearly indicative of nascent talent with all the good and bad that entails. It makes PaRappa look like a baby game by comparison; if Gitaroo Man were an arcade cabinet iNiS would have been fucking rolling in money -- this game's normal mode knocked me down, kicked me into a ditch, and spat on me. But I almost feel like it's not fully intentional, some levels are a bit of a pushover, and others are so overtuned I question if the game had any QA at all.

Most of the pain points in Gitaroo Man lie with the controls and rhythm-based visuals, and while some of that is probably due to imperfect frame pacing in the emulation, modern controllers, or just skill issue on my part, it's the one thing that's really held the game's mechanical greatness back for me. The guard sections would have really benefitted from being presented in a less confusing manner (the cross formation just makes the button prompts completely unparsable for me when there's a large amount of them from all four directions coming at once), and using the analog stick during the attack/charge sections is so unwieldy that I almost wonder if they had at some point wanted the game to have its own specific peripheral. Of course, we wouldn't all be here talking about the game these days if it required a peripheral, but I feel a lot of issues would be smoothed out with a standardized controller with more finely tuned controls.

Despite all that, it's difficult to not love Gitaroo Man's full experience, and when the controls work god fucking damn it's so fucking cool. I haven't felt this sort of rhythm game high doing the hardest levels in Ouendan on the secret invisible rhythm circle mode that was only available from like, gas stations in Japan but I used a cheat engine to unlock it in my game somehow. It's an experience that you cannot get from any other game that I've personally encountered (please give me suggestions if you're actually reading this) when it's at its strongest, and it legitimately boggles my mind that reviewers from the early 00s derided it as a standard rhythm game.

And even if you could argue there's nothing special about the gameplay, the aesthetic, music, and sound design set it apart so starkly that you almost forget it's largely borrowing a lot of elements from PaRappa and Beatmania (and everything else of that era really, it's kind of the Star Wars of rhythm games if Star Wars got left in the dust as a cult classic). I want to put this game in a blender and just fucking chug it; everything down to the box art of the NA version just WORKS for me -- I very badly wanted to love this game. But I think I ended up merely liking it, even if I DO love the soundtrack, character design, and artstyle in general.

On some level Gitaroo Man is my dream rhythm game: adventure structure, anime battles, ultimate rhythm game power fantasy, and amazing music, but it's been rough getting my grips with the game as a whole. But it's really clear how much they were able to learn and refine in their Ouendan/Elite Beat Agents series, and I at least deeply appreciate it as this raw, unfiltered creative vision for a rhythm game that helped provide the seeds for my personal favorite rhythm game series. Gitaroo Man didn't quite land for me as the immaculate work I see people heralding it as, but I would say that it certainly lives up to its Legendary status, and when it rips it REALLY fucking rips. I hope someday I'll be able to play this on actual hardware with a PS2 controller to see if that turns this game from lost potential into one of my favorites of all time. Either way, it's a game infused with empathy for the world and love for life, and the older I get the more I value that the most in my media.

Could personally do without stages 4 and 5 though.
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† Okay okay, it was more complicated than that, and frankly my parents were way outta line, but it's kinda funny that iNiS's rhythm games indirectly lead to an important psychiatric diagnosis for my young self.

FUCK YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

BEST GAME.

GAME MAKES ME VERY SWEATY WHEN EVE4R I PLAY IT BUT THAT'S OK

I want to write more but i can't really think of anything.

This game is super sick! I think what stands out the most to me here is the music. It covers so many different genres and nails it. From funk to dnb to rock and acoustic guitar, there's a lot of really great tracks. The difficulty pretty much consistently ramps up, and there's definitely a learning curve to it, but nothing feels out of reach in the base game. It just takes a bit of practice to make it through. And the music being so good is just an added bonus.

In terms of gameplay, there's kind of two different rhythm games melding together here. One is pretty standard where you're pressing specific buttons to the timing of the song and on screen (defense), but the other has you using the analog stick to line up with different notes and play them on time (attack and charge). I had a lot easier of a time picking up the defense side of things, and the attacking is where it gets a little more tricky on a technical level. It's a really cool way to add in all of the guitar effects, and although it took a while to figure out, I really enjoy the balance between the two.

I think the art direction is also super cool, and while it's definitely pretty dated in that early 2000s 3D modeling style, it's got a great use of color and really charming character design. I also love all of the visual effects going on in each song. It can definitely be a little distracting at times, but I love seeing like the little frogs sing along or seeing the people cheering.

This game has a lot of heart, and it's got a really nice challenge to it. It's been on my radar for a while, and I'm so glad I took the time to play it!

"This is the sound, that glorious sound...we'd forgotten this sound for so long..."

I listened to the Legendary Theme, and from then I knew I had to play this game for myself, and despite the damage I probably did to my thumb, It was SO worth the trip. From the opening movie alone, I don't think anyone could resist being hooked. It's fun, it's got so much charm and style, and the ENTIRE soundtrack is great; toss that all up together and you get what's one of the best games of its genre

This game isn't afraid to immediately dump you into the den of bloodthirsty rhythm demons out of nowhere, and you'd better believe getting the best ratings will give your hands permanent blisters. With that in mind, this is a must-play for anyone who loves rhythm games and niche PS2 titles.