This review contains spoilers
Disclaimer: I work on the Vidya Gaem Awards, whose voting source is 4chan, and awarded "Goodbye Volcano High" the Most Pretentious Game award for 2023. I also have limited connections to Cavemanon: they made Snoot Game, and submitted a trailer for I Wani Hug That Gator to our 2021 show.
The staff of Cavemanon do not work on our show, and none of the Vidya Gaem Awards staff work on their projects either. This review below is my own personal opinion on Goodbye Volcano High, and is not the opinion of anyone else.
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Goodbye Volcano High tackles love, identity, and the emotional turmoil of adolescence through a looming specter of doom. The game, through protagonist Fang and supporting cast of Worm Drama (Trish/Reed), offers a soundtrack to turbulent times.
Unlike the past winner of "Most Pretentious" (We Are OFK), Goodbye Volcano High earns its visual novel tag. While its rhythm games are similarly inconsequential to OFK, the rare opportunities to customize and the emotive dialogue choices lend a relatively greater autonomy for the player to express themselves.
The game fleshes out its world and characters through a variety of techniques, such as unvoiced comics in the pause menu, snapshot memories, and Dungeons and Dragons sessions. You get a feel for all the characters and what they're about. Their personalities, their passions, and their social proximity to Fang.
However, because Fang's moral support system is demonstrably rock solid, not much can go wrong. You can completely flunk all performances and no one will act much differently than if you aced them. However, it's not absolute apathy - although GVH ultimately ends one way, your playthrough experience will differ based on your dialog options.
The game throws in a clever nod to Cavemanon with the Swamp Babies band—a thinly veiled metaphor for Snoot Game. Each 'Swamp Baby' is color-coded to serve as a masculine-presenting punk-rock rival to Reed, Trish, and Fang. After all, LJ "found them" first, and they're "good, but not like 'good' good". The whole thing is cheeky as hell, but just as the Swamp Babies attend Worm Drama's final concert - crying with joy that they finally see their rivals perform, Snoot Game's devs showed up for the release of the game and gave it the respect of a full run.
For the purposes of contextualizing GVH's win for the Most Pretentious Indie award, I played through Goodbye Volcano High first, and then followed it up by playing Snoot Game. It was the most fun I had in years. While Snoot Game wouldn't have possible without Goodbye Volcano High existing, the fanwork clearly served inspiration as its own. It bouyed interest in the original work, and set a high bar for KO-OP to match.
Still, I feel a certain degree of sadness for the team that, in the pursuit of "taking the high road", waged a multi-faceted war on the parody and lost up to 60% of its audience as a result. Getting banned for sharing, honestly, that Snoot Game was how I found Goodbye Volcano High only serves to remind me that KO-OP views with contempt people who enjoy the "forbidden fruit", and furthers a cycle of victimization and resentment for the other side.
Turn the other cheek, and play the game anyways.
I hope my $30 serves as encouragement for the creation of future works that are impactful and inspiring, without the unnecessary drama that plagued this one.
The staff of Cavemanon do not work on our show, and none of the Vidya Gaem Awards staff work on their projects either. This review below is my own personal opinion on Goodbye Volcano High, and is not the opinion of anyone else.
___
Goodbye Volcano High tackles love, identity, and the emotional turmoil of adolescence through a looming specter of doom. The game, through protagonist Fang and supporting cast of Worm Drama (Trish/Reed), offers a soundtrack to turbulent times.
Unlike the past winner of "Most Pretentious" (We Are OFK), Goodbye Volcano High earns its visual novel tag. While its rhythm games are similarly inconsequential to OFK, the rare opportunities to customize and the emotive dialogue choices lend a relatively greater autonomy for the player to express themselves.
The game fleshes out its world and characters through a variety of techniques, such as unvoiced comics in the pause menu, snapshot memories, and Dungeons and Dragons sessions. You get a feel for all the characters and what they're about. Their personalities, their passions, and their social proximity to Fang.
However, because Fang's moral support system is demonstrably rock solid, not much can go wrong. You can completely flunk all performances and no one will act much differently than if you aced them. However, it's not absolute apathy - although GVH ultimately ends one way, your playthrough experience will differ based on your dialog options.
The game throws in a clever nod to Cavemanon with the Swamp Babies band—a thinly veiled metaphor for Snoot Game. Each 'Swamp Baby' is color-coded to serve as a masculine-presenting punk-rock rival to Reed, Trish, and Fang. After all, LJ "found them" first, and they're "good, but not like 'good' good". The whole thing is cheeky as hell, but just as the Swamp Babies attend Worm Drama's final concert - crying with joy that they finally see their rivals perform, Snoot Game's devs showed up for the release of the game and gave it the respect of a full run.
For the purposes of contextualizing GVH's win for the Most Pretentious Indie award, I played through Goodbye Volcano High first, and then followed it up by playing Snoot Game. It was the most fun I had in years. While Snoot Game wouldn't have possible without Goodbye Volcano High existing, the fanwork clearly served inspiration as its own. It bouyed interest in the original work, and set a high bar for KO-OP to match.
Still, I feel a certain degree of sadness for the team that, in the pursuit of "taking the high road", waged a multi-faceted war on the parody and lost up to 60% of its audience as a result. Getting banned for sharing, honestly, that Snoot Game was how I found Goodbye Volcano High only serves to remind me that KO-OP views with contempt people who enjoy the "forbidden fruit", and furthers a cycle of victimization and resentment for the other side.
Turn the other cheek, and play the game anyways.
I hope my $30 serves as encouragement for the creation of future works that are impactful and inspiring, without the unnecessary drama that plagued this one.