2018

As boring as visually atractive (the first hour at least)

Forced myself a few times to play it until I quit.

I wanted MUCH MORE from this city and these characters that I guess it is MY fault after all.

I like the story, it has loveable characters and some strong moments. The art style is really nice, with a raw feeling, as if drawn with some angry pencils and not much care, pretty loose. They do some cool stuff with it.

However, the main mechanic of erasing the past gets repetitive really quickly: it feels it would have been better to save it for some special moments rather than having you rub the screen constantly.

But, if you like the kind of game it is, and are able to connect with the story on a deep level, you will have a great journey.

Great to see more stories about trans people.

Whenever I feel bored of video games, whenever I feel sad, whenever I doubt about the potential of video games to explore sincere and intricate human emotions, I think on "The Beginner's Guide" and I smile.

I should probably re-play it soon. It is so precise, concise, to the point and short that it never fails to find a place on my busy schedule agenda of empty games that try too hard.

I love this game.

Perfect for a lazy evening.

It's a little game full of soul and uniqueness. You can really feel there is one person behind it, their tastes, their worries... it's far from perfect and there are some metaphors that feel too much in your face, but if you're able to overlook them and inmerse yourself on the atmoshpere and mood you might have a great time.

The soundtrack is pretty good too.

After finishing the game I went to the kitchen to prepare myself a juice. I didn't clean the juicer for two days straight. I took apart its pieces, washed them on the sink, and assembled them back together. For the first time in ages, after doing it in an automatic fashion, it felt satisfying.

2016

Frenetic and hugely enjoyable twin stick shooter... when it allows itself to be: the pace of the game is constantly interrupted by the narrative and by the funny/comedic remarks of the most annoying protagonist of video games.

If you are into daddy jokes add a star and a half to the score.

One of the few games that will stay with me during my whole life and that I love in a kind of irrational way.

It's flawed as fuck (as all of SUDA51 games) but, at the same time, has such a HUGE heart beating behind it, it is so FULL of ideas, of STYLE with substance and meaning, of interesting characters and scenes...

It will change your life.

It's in incredible how much tedious and poor (or lack of even) gameplay are we willing to ignore in order to enjoy such of cool characters and aesthetics out of SUDA's mind.

In this case it has gone too far and a fantastic soundtrack and characters can't hold such an awful game. Go throw rocks on a pond, or clip your nails while listening to the soundtrack on youtube and you will have a better experience.

Fuckin' hell SUDA, what the fuck and how do you even dare.

It does a LOT with so little: change of atmosphere, style and narrative vehicles and plot at every turn of a corner. Fortunately, it has just the right amount of corners to turn.

The gameplay it's pretty simple in the best way possible: a little adventure horror game in which you need to collect objects to solve little puzzles. They never get in your way and help the story to flow forward with momentum, using the puzzles (mos of them) to keep telling you something about this world and their characters.

An ugly dead Frankenstein that barely moves, a sad Mikami's Greatest Hits, a cocktail made out of what he thought were their best ideas, mixed in a terrible uninspired way.

No surprise that on the beautiful documentary that Archipielago made of him (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKYX3GstHlw) he openly acknowledges what a coward he was with this project, holding back, looking at the past, instead of moving forward.

Still, the atmosphere it's great and some parts kind of work... I even finished it and I still don`t know why. I guess it touched some kind of addict part of my brain.

Bad Mikami, BAD.

An amazing Journey. The moments of peace, quiet and solitude that this game has given me, those piano notes lingering in the air, the sound of my steps running through the grass... they can not be compared with any other game.

And for that, I am eternally thankful.

However, I feel the game it's too longo/big for my taste, and this sublime experience gets diluted half way. I didn't like the combat (I know you can go crazy creative but not for me), etc...

So yeah, there some things that can be polished, but it's hard not to understand the value of this game and to look at it with awe when I think it's a WiiU game from like 4 years ago.

Another thing: I didn't wanted it to end. I was getting bored in the end, feeling a bit forced, and still, I wanted it to be there, to never end... it's a weird feeling.

What now?

I just imagine myself playing this game with a gamecube controller in my hands and I get shivers all over my body.