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1016
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Recent reviews by Gorgoe

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Showing 1-10 of 19 entries
7 people found this review helpful
1 person found this review funny
14.8 hrs on record
Yuppie Psycho is a game I really like in terms of its concept and vibe. It's not unusual for office culture to be lampooned, criticised, or taken to bizarre directions but this is the only example I can think of where that environment is turned into a survival horror game. The way this manifests is pretty neat in terms of how it influences the game's structure wherein it's based around various levels of social hierarchy within the company system that the game allows you freely travel between. It also has cute novelties like having your inventory being justified by typical stuff you'd see office workers eat or use for work.

The gameplay for Yuppie Psycho is very lacking, however. Waiting around in observation of enemy movements is not unusual for stealth games and it has a presence in the horror genre too. But the difference is that, in those games, you generally have an active role in how enemy ai works and you're given a lot more gameplay options than waiting under a desk until the threat moves away. Since the game provides virtually no options of interaction beyond that, it's entirely reliant in how these threats manifest itself. To the game's credit, this comes in a variety of forms. This can be a full screen beam of lights to actual monsters roaming about. But the thing is that none of these threats save for one boss do anything about you hiding which just makes these encounters a dull game of patience until the threat in any room leaves an opening for you to move and none of them are capable of catching up to you anyway (aside from the aforementioned boss) so it's usually easy to avoid them regardless.

The other element to the gameplay is the resource management. Reading the reviews on here is funny because of how many people got filtered by the concept of resource management which is very common in this genre; yet, I seem to be the odd one out in thinking the game is very generous in how many resources it gives you. In contrast to something like Resident Evil or Signallis, your resources are never for direct combat and you never have to think about using such resources to eliminate threats within a given area. There's no "fight or flight" dilemma in this game. There are limited saves but the game is so generous in its handouts on witch papers that saving is trivial and they always slap down a save spot with a piece of witch paper before any major boss/setpiece so it's rarely tedious if you end up dying. The game's structure is also fairly linear despite how it's laid out so it's also not really a case of considering pathing when utilising your saving resources. There's also pencils, and while a bit more scarce if you're being liberal in using them, once you realise there's only a few instances where you actually need to use them and that avoiding mines is easy it also becomes trivial as a resource. Health only becomes an issue depending on how good you are at avoiding damage and admittedly there are certain setpieces and bosses which can drain you pretty hard, especially if you played carelessly the way I did. But again, the resources are so generous here that I could actually get away with playing carelessly and justify it by abusing the health items. Since the entire resource game comes down to these 3 resources and you have unlimited space in your inventory, maintaining them feels like an afterthought due to how generous the game is about giving them to you. I'm genuinely baffled by the people who find this aspect frustrating. I'd love to see them play something like Pathologic or Fear & Hunger if they think this game is rough about it.

The third core aspect of the gameplay is psuedo-adventure game puzzle solving. This is amusingly the game's strongest point and frankly what's going to be taking up most players time. While the actual solutions are usually pretty straightforward and obvious, on occasion it does provoke you to investigate areas more to get clues about how solve certain puzzles. This is bare minimum when it comes to the design of these games but I do think a bit more thought was put into this aspect of the game because it does encourage you to jump between floors and snooping around to grasp any sort of solution. They could have pushed this a lot harder to the point you're making interactions with NPCs that change the layout of levels or playing around with item interactions more, but I'll still take this over waiting any day.

The narrative provides solid hooks due to how bizarre the general atmosphere is and how NPCs seem to have no real reaction to it but I don't think this is dealt with in a satisfactory way. Named characters all fit into office comedy stereotypes but nothing is done with them in the narrative beyond their one note joke. Despite the setting, it doesn't seem to have anything it wants to explore regarding office culture or any specific drama that comes with that. There is light commentary about the cutthroat mentality of classism but aside from two characters this is largely ignored. In both of these cases the whole concept is treated as a joke despite the legitimately horrifying ramifications of it that the story implies. Nobody seems horribly concerned about what their place in the hierarchy means for their social status nor is there any questions asked about the actual ethics of Sintracorp even having this hierarchy to begin with. The side characters just tacitly accept everything and even in the ending when you end the curse none of these characters seem particularly phased or particularly care about it, which gives off the impression they never had much stakes in anything that happens in the plot. There are some potentially interesting plot beats such as Inay's relationship to the robot or Chapman's relationship with his father that could have played into larger aspects of the narrative's theming but they end up getting tossed aside and made mostly irrelevant.

Another issue I have with the plot is just how generally detached Brian is from it. He's portrayed as the straight man who's the only one aware of how crazy the setting actually is, but beyond the obvious love interest in Kate; which is obscenely trite and boring, he has no stakes in anything. The core of the story is moreso about the family dynamics of the companies founders and while I do think there's some spice in that it comes off as limp because Brian has nothing to do with any of it. We see this dynamic play out from Brian's perspective but he never feels obliged to invest himself in that drama or has anything to say about it. He's a white bread protagonist who acts on heroic impulses and that's about it. The most his investment matters is simply as a goal to end the curse and his relationship to the Sintra ai to a lesser degree, but the latter doesn't play off of the family dynamic in any way whatsoever despite later plot twists. There is solid hooks about the curse's origin, but the story is way too vague about the family's general goals or ethics to make any of that interesting within the grander scheme of the setting. We have no idea what sort of business Sintracorp even is or how its founder operated or what motivated the owner to adopt Domori specifically. The most we get are vague clues about their household dynamic which only gets explored in the alternate route, but even in that case it's too underbaked to be satisfactory.

This review has been mostly negative but despite it being deeply flawed I do find it interesting enough conceptually that I don't flat out hate it. I love the monster designs and the general quirkiness is extremely charming to me. I've grown to find more value in novelty than polish/depth when it comes to games these days and Yuppie Psycho fits that bill. But I just can't help but feel so much of it is missed potential so I can't recommend it.
Posted 11 November, 2023.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
2.0 hrs on record
Legitimately hilarious but I wouldn't pay more than $1-3 for this game.
Posted 16 July, 2017.
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2 people found this review helpful
16.8 hrs on record (16.3 hrs at review time)
This is one of the most phenomenal games I've played in years. While the gameplay is extremely simplistic and the overall game isn't difficult, it manages to blend gameplay and narrative brilliantly. It's a game that captures multiple emotions perfectly without breaking the mood of its plot - very few games have made me laugh as much as this has, and even fewer have had me feel legitimately sad for its characters the way Lisa has. This is an accomplishment in any medium, and Lisa does this in stride.

The main flaw of the game is that its combat is perhaps overly simplistic and isn't very deep, but there are far more deeper games that have had less of an impact on me emotionally than Lisa has. Everything outside of Lisa's combat is expertly executed and you'd be doing yourself a disservice by missing out on this title.
Posted 10 February, 2017. Last edited 10 February, 2017.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
0.3 hrs on record
As an art piece, I find this to be eloquent and intriguing. The art is fantastic and mesmerizing, complimenting the forgettable but suiting score. The symoblism used to represent events in Mossaddegh's life were well utilized and brings forth an interesting perspective on his life.

On the other hand, the game isn't very good at telling you anything about Mosaddegh aside from the bare basics. It also doesn't help that the game is somewhat incoherent with how it presents its information as the order of info is done backwards, starting from the time of his death to the day he was elected.

Given that it's free, I'd recommend that you'd only blow ten minutes on this if you want a simple art piece to examine and have an interest in recent Iranian history.
Posted 10 June, 2016.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
4.0 hrs on record
It was okay. I find the premise interesting but the cast doesn't leave me with a fantastic impression. A gruff teacher with a questionable morality being paired up with an inexperienced, younger person who questions said morality? That's nothing new. Granted the VN was far too short to really expand on these characters beyond these archetypes, I question if they will in future episodes.

I feel like the premise leads itself to a lot of potential for good stories, but I feel like how effective this will be is dependant on how much your choices matter. I'm not asking to be bombarded with a bunch of trivial, pointless decisions such as "will you drink the beer or not?" But I'd like to have it so that my choices don't lead to the same result. The fact that the nuke destroyed the entire world was.... a real big copout. I think your choice to either launch the nuke or not should be reflected on what happens to the nation and your ability to discern what you think is right on the people based on the codex information{which is admittedly interesting to read} would add a lot to the story I feel.

To its credit, the art and music are pretty good. The use of facial expressions is well implemented and the images don't feel like they're static portraits. I don't think the music is particularly memorable, but it works well given its usage.

I personally felt unimpressed by this game's story. While I see it for its potential, I don't think the writer has the right idea on how to use it based on my 3 hours spent on this. They have to make some pretty big improvememnts to the overall storytelling and structure of decision making to really leave an impression on me.
Posted 13 December, 2014. Last edited 13 December, 2014.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
1 person found this review funny
48.7 hrs on record (19.7 hrs at review time)
Do you enjoy RNG? Do you enjoy rape? Then this game is for you!
Posted 16 October, 2014.
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1 person found this review helpful
1.2 hrs on record
It's alright for what it's worth. A lot of funny, cute puzzles that reminds me of those old adventure games they use to have on those old computers at school{and I wouldn't be too surprised if this game would be among them as well}. It's not much, but then again, you're not paying for much sooooo....
Posted 30 December, 2013.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
28.3 hrs on record
I'm pretty nostalgic over this game. It was one of my favorite WRPG's in my adolescent years. I decided to replay it recently to see if it lives up to my standards today and in my eyes it certainly did, however... the game isn't the glorious masterpiece I saw it as years ago.

First things first I feel the game had good dungeon design as the levels felt multi-layered and non-linear for the most part. However, the minus to this is that combat is VERY EASY{aside from the last boss} and hardly ever worth a challenge. At the same time though, the plot felt VERY MUCH like what the old movies felt like. Epic, fun, cheesy at times but also providing character dilemma's that reach satisfying conclusions. Even if you don't like the plot I feel that it at leasts keeps you interested.

A lot of people complain about being forced to be a jedi ruining your class choice, but in my opinion that's not true. All that does is give you force powers. You can pretty play the game as you please, with whatever weapon you desire.

The main plot has its quirks and downfalls. The Sith are laughably one-dimensional and for the most part and don't really do much to really get you to care about them. Malak, despite being a bit more interesting in the comics, is rather boring in this game. He just didn't exude the intimidation or power that someone like, say, Vader did and his only real defining moment was blowing up Taris.

On the plus side though, the planets you travel to tend to be interesting. Some are lackluster{like Kashykk} but others are great{like Manaan}. The side missions are hit and miss, but they don't feel unworthy of completing.

Overall I don't feel like I wasted my money on buying KOTOR and playing through. I dare say KOTOR II beats it HARD in all departments and it's not the most refined WRPG around but it's definitely not the worst either. Personally, I think this game is more of a big step towards the Star Wars franchise{adding in the KOTOR era} than it is to WRPGS.
Posted 10 December, 2013. Last edited 11 May, 2014.
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No one has rated this review as helpful yet
0.3 hrs on record
Best f2p KPOP game EVER!
Posted 10 December, 2013.
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4 people found this review helpful
0.5 hrs on record
I stopped playing after I realized this game wasn't f2p.
Posted 12 November, 2013. Last edited 2 December, 2013.
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Showing 1-10 of 19 entries