my feelings on this game are complicated but overall positive. the game is a pseudo sequel remake/reimagining maybe even reboot of total overdose: a gunslinger's tale in mexico. aka one of my favorite games of all time... only this game is for the PSP and is almost hiding its relation to the first game, so already its weird, but even MORE baffling is the tone, as the whole games story is presented as a joke. the game literally opens up with ramiro celebrating his dads birthday with kittens when suddenly the bad guy crashes into the building with a combine harvester and turns them into hay barrels. this happens in under 30 seconds and it sets the tone for the entire game, as all the other cutscenes have that same feeling to them, but honestly i was just more baffled than entertained while watching them. the first game had its humor, a good amount, but this just feels like a parody of the first game, and maybe it is. i just dont know if it worked.
but on to the gameplay. now then, since this is a sequel on a handheld device, corners were naturally cut. so no more open world, instead its a series of linear levels occasionally interrupted by challenges. 19 levels and 12 challenges, and also some other single player missions titled "el macho" but thats literally running around in a circle shooting people until you either die without a rewind or lose your combo, but since enemies spawn in a fixed location, if you can make one loop, you can easily do it infinitely, especially if you unlock infinite ammo weapons (more on that later) but frankly i dont think there's any reward for el macho, it just seems mindless. only real interesting thing about it is that you can use unlocked characters in it, which you can't do in the campaign, but thats about it.
back to the campaign, it seems like it mostly recreates locations from the first game, in remixed ways. i havent played total overdose in a couple years, so i didn't notice how different or similar they were, but i will say they didnt seem familiar beyond the general aesthetic of the areas.
gameplaywise, there needed to be more sacrifices than just gutting the open world. since the game is on a handheld with only one nub instead of 2 sticks, and also just less buttons in general, changes had to be made. as a result, the game now has a much heavier auto aim and tank controls. the latter may be a deal breaker to some, but tbh you get used to it. i don't believe there is a sprint. jumping is a lot more jank, as you can only bullet dodge (will get back to that). now then there is also a hop ram can do while standing still, but thats useless, its really never used. to get over obstacles, you walk into something chest high until ram vaults over it. the loco moves got nerfed, instead of carrying various and switching between them, you can only have one at a time. its not so bad given that this game is more level to level with weapons and and loco abilities being reset with each level. beyond that, they pretty much managed to transition total overdose's max payne styled bullet time gameplay pretty well. you can still bullet dodge with the x button, shoot with square, triangle is your el loco move, and holding circle is your free aim (its clunky, only used for boss fights really). L button locks on to objects, R button locks on to heads (camera locks on to enemies by default) left and right on the d pad switch weapons, but up and down do seemingly nothing? start pauses, but select also seems to do nothing. i cant help but feel like those unused buttons could go to work, like maybe the up button will instantly throw a grenade or molotov, the down button could be used to quick turn. its a bit of a problem not being able to do that in the game at times, as the closes you can do is start a reverse dodge by double tapping x while holding back. and select could be a quick rewind button, because unlike with total overdose, in chili con carnage, you can only rewind in death. rewinding restores health if you're low and keeps your combo going, so being able to do it at will would be a great help. there are also a couple of moments in the game where you're in a claustrophobic environment and forced to platform. these moments suck as you can only dive and vault, and most of the time you end up undershooting your dive, and they usually give you combo extenders here, but miss that jump and thats a combo killer right there. now combos can be important, because you get up to 4 rewards at the end of each mission
bronze reward, which is usually an upgrade to your health or combo time or something similar
silver which usually unlocks concept art or something
gold reward which... idk i never got a gold
and a special chili reward which will usually grant infinite ammo. the first 3 rewards can be earned by getting enough style points, thankfully a bronze is pretty much always guaranteed no matter your skill level, so there's no risk of losing out on its, admittedly tacked on, rpg element. its more or less "you beat the level, you get the upgrade"
the chili is the unique one because once you start a combo, you have to beat the level before the combo meter dies. i like that you can actually complete a level without losing your combo, especially with how bite sized the levels are. that actually might be one of the games downsides however. its only about 5 hours. but hey its a psp game and it encourages you to replay the levels so i'll allow it. honestly for how much they had to cut back from total overdose, and all the weird changes, it still does make legitimate improvements on the original, even if some were likely out of limitation. if you're looking for a max payne like game on the go....well okay your options there are pretty much just between this and max payne gba, but this still scratches the itch.

at first, i didn't care for this game compared to other ys games
the combat was just more of ys seven/memories, the characters were boring, the areas seemed much more held back than previous entries, and the story started out in typical ys fashion and then started jogging in place.
but as the game went on, the gameplay got more fun and dynamic, the characters were fleshed out to the point where they might be the best in the series so far, the story was engaging the more you learn about dana, the lacrimosa and the island, and the levels, while still a tad restricted (likely due to the vita lmao) began to impress me
it's a slow burn, but it burns bright

in a lot of ways, this is a legitimate step up, maybe even a leap over the first game, but i do have a few major gripes with it that hold it back from being absolutely perfect

first is the story. now largely the story is pretty great, but, without spoiling, there's so much contrived shit to the story, everything just HAS to be connected, and everytime there was some twist that was like "this thing from the first game actually happened because you see the psychonauts blah blah blah" i just rolled my eyes. the burger king kids club side characters are also pretty lame. they start out as unlikable assholes and then once you spend more time with them, they just kind of fade into nothing as you realize there is nothing to the characters. except sam, she's good.
then there's the combat. it's one of the things thats largely a step up on the original, however the flaw is the emphasis on it. the combat gets grating fast, it is not what makes this game great, but it feels like the devs don't really realize that, so just about every step you take, you'll need to swap, change your loadout (i'll come back to that) and start doing piss damage to waves of enemies (unless you turn on story combat or whatever, but that just ruins some bosses), and there are more types too, which should sound better, variety is the spice of life right? well, i kinda prefer the lack of enemy variety in the first game, because the first game knew it wasn't a combat focused game, the enemies were largely obstacles and the actual combat sequences were far and few, and could be defeated by just about any way. but in this game, each enemy needs their weakness to be exploited to do any real harm to them. flying enemies need your laser, fast enemies need your slow down, gooey enemies need to be burned, hammer enemies need telekinesis, theres even an enemy that can only be defeated with clarevoyance for SOME reason and it means lots
and lots
and lots
of weapon switching
which is where my main gripe of the game comes in. see, this game gives you 8 powers to use. about half are used for traversal or just general use in the field and the rest is more combat focused. technically all can be used for combat, but they're more or less useless against any enemies not weak to them, dont go through the game thinking you can deal with what you currently have without swapping powers constantly, you NEED to swap and swap and swap, and it is just easily one of my biggest gripes with the game. granted this problem was also prevalent in the first game and i don't know why they didn't fix it for this one. it's not a hard fix either. the up button on the dpad currently brings up the weapon wheel, right? well, why not just have 2 power loadouts, to swap between with the up button? and hold up if you really want to bring up the wheel to rebind powers. hit square to swap between the loadouts, boom there i saved the game, well mostly, because while that would make the combat bearable, and fix the stop-go pacing the game has, it still has one more major issue, and that's the pacing of the levels, as they go on for far, far too long, easily 3 times as long as i feel they should, especially if you're hunting for collectables (and it is a collectathon so lets face it, you will) and you'll really feel it. there are levels that feel like they should be bite sized, but then they just go on for longer than any level from psychonauts 1. the worst offender of this is easily the game show level. that stage has one gimmick and it just repeats it 3 times until you get to the boss. and then the boss is just the worst in the series, not for being hard, but by just being a waiting game until you get the chance to interact with the thing that hurts them. the hub worlds end up being the most fun areas of the game, and i can't help but feel that the actual levels, or at least some, should have had that more sandbox approach to them.
it's still a great game, and i can't even say i was disappointed by it even after god knows how long of wanting a psychonauts sequel, it does legitimately live up to the hype as i do prefer it to the original largely. but i do wish these issues weren't a problem at all. here's hoping we get psychonauts 3 someday to fix some of these problems
or even just a patch to make the power switching less tedious by implementing loadouts

great story, characters and music
serviceable combat
gets a bit repetitive, drags by the end
but overall its a fun time
(plus it got that dan abnett-andy lanning star-lord, 10/10)

decent enough zelda-like with a cool... at first... gimmick, but everything about the game just really overstays its welcome
the form gimmick is good at first, but as you progress them more, you can basically have 3/4 of your abilities be from other forms, and the game knows it, because it starts expecting you to do these grindy little challenges like use this forms ability to cause fire damage while your minion kills it, and those challenges where you have to use other abilities for the forms, just kills the game imo, and it also makes the forms feel so interchangable when their only unique thing is their default move, which most the time is either a basic slash or a projectile. sure their stats are also different and some can swim or go into crevices, but once you get the dragon youre pretty much set.
65% of the way through you just want it to end, and the dialogue can be grating. it isn't so bad for most the game, but then endgame they just give you what feels like a 10 min cutscene, by that point i was just mashing A and looking at discord
not a bad game, but one that trips itself over with its own gimmick partway through

a traditional point and click game in vr is an interesting concept to be sure, but in execution, well it makes the entire experience an extreme pain. despite being such a short game, it took me more days to beat than the first game did, because i just had to stop playing it after 20 minutes or so. i don't normally get vr headaches, but this game does absolutely everything to make sure you will, but constantly having these bright animated filters right up in your eyes, and fading to white everytime you go into someones mind (which is how you move around, so it happens a LOT), and when you first get to the final level, i swear the colors are a fucking virtual boy reference, and it hurts. but the headaches are far from the only problem in this game, see despite being so short, it has this annoying formula
it puts you in a moderately sized area filled with "people" for you to mind hop to, in that area you basically have to solve puzzles and pixel hunt. and while it wouldnt be too bad if this were just your average first person point and click game, it gets painful with every aforementioned thing the game does to give you a headache or eyestrain, and since your face is basically your mouse, having to constantly adjust yourself on top of all that makes it even worse. it makes solving puzzles a nightmare, and while most the time the puzzles arent too bad, just go inside the person, and do something simple, sometimes you'll need to actively pixel hunt for a clue, like a code or something. and given that most vr headsets dont have the best resolution... yeah...
but after you get done with one area, the way the game gets you to another area is by fish. doesn't sound too bad, right? hop into a fish and have it swim to the next level for you, right? wrong, you hop into a fish, wait for another fish to swim on screen, wait for it to stop, hop into it, repeat for 5 minutes until youre in the next level. that is the only way you go from level to level. the only time you don't do that is for the final level when raz snaps back into his own mind.
it's a miserable experience from start to finish, the only thing saving it is maybe the writing, or at least the area after you beat the only boss in the game (which was just repetitive btw).

watch a playthrough of it, never play it for yourself. its not worth it.
alternatively you can just skip this and get right into psychonauts 2

great game, meat circus isn't as bad as i remember, some of the collectathon elements can be a bit annoying, as is going back to camp anytime you want to spend your stuff, and constantly having to reassign your 3 ability buttons. but at it's core its still an amazingly well written game with fun platforming (and a couple less than stellar levels)


and i would not recommend the dogshit pc port to my worst enemy, that shit is held together with sticks and glue, and even when i did manage to get it working, things were still messing up throughout the playthrough and anytime i tried to fix something, 2 more things would mess up or the game would crash or controls just wouldnt work and cutscenes stopped having audio halfway through
please just play this on anything but pc