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So instead of trying to beat 52 games in 52 weeks (or 41, as the case ended up being last year), I figured this year I'd just... try things. Things I'd never played, games in my backlog or even shit I'm emulating on a whim. I don't want to just gun for a bunch of short Popcorn Clears just to fill a list, so if I beat a game, great! If not, that's fine.
Sometimes I'll ragequit on the actual last stage of the game. That's fine too. Either way, once a week, play something I've never played before. Chronicle my experience. Gonna try to make it hit on Wednesday but it may not always hit on Wednesday. I have a sqrlmog and a woodrat to smack me into keeping a schedule if need be, because I need some sort of schedule in my life that isn't abject despair.
Too bad that my first choice was "MANOS". Yes, I am always going to write the game's name like that; it's the only way to really encapsulate it.
Now, I'll admit something up-front: Despite being a fan of MST3K, I have never watched the "MANOS" episode. I know it solely through pop-cultural osmosis. The master may not approve but I don't give a shit. Give me Space Mutiny any day of the week. That said, don't think I didn't spot the derelict Tom Servo gumball machine or the fact you have to fight the Ro-Man or...
Guys. Guys, MST3K didn't even do The Giant Claw. Why the fuck is that there. You fucked up your funy and I feel like that was intentional.
See, the thing about "MANOS" the game is that... it does a lot of things competently only to very, very intentionally throw them on the ground, Lonely Island style. It overloads on the MST3K jokes (being "MANOS", having The Screaming Skull and Trolls as enemies, inexplicably having the Ro-Man as a stage boss for no other reason than Because), but then it just starts throwing shit in from whenever. (You fight The Giant Claw not once, but TWICE, and it is the worst boss fight in the game. I think a later boss is Morticia and Fester Addams? Were they in "MANOS"? I don't even know.)
It starts as a responsive, if NES-styled, platformer and then it commits literally every platformer sin in one single stage. After all, what screams "quality" better than an autoscroller with crumbling platforms and limited visibility and enemies that hop around like goddamn Castlevania fleamen? Why, doing it again but in monochrome! And then a third time but vertical!
That third time is what finally made me say "fuck this". It's a vertical autoscroller but it's not a smooth one; it's that chunky "one tile at a time shift downward" that I've seen in some games but it's super demanding and the checkpoints are in places that seem systematically DESIGNED to get you killed and the stage has that same bullshit limited visibility and AGHHGHG.
Then I looked at a longplay and discovered I tapped out on the last stage of the game. That the titular fight against The Master was basically a reskinned Castlevania Dracula. Yeah, you know what? I'll pass.
"MANOS" is a game that does everything in halves. It tries to be kusoge, but it also tries to be a responsive, playable platformer. It tries to be referential, but doesn't really give half a fuck what it's referencing. It tries to be well-made, but then 90% of the game is one five second bleepy-bloopy loop.
In turn, it does nothing in a satisfactory manner. It's viscerally and emotionally empty. It's the equivalent of an unseasoned, plain rice cake. It's nothing, but something about your lizard brain becomes so violently disgusted at just how nothing it is and you hate it despite it being... literally nothing.
Don't buy your friends this as a joke. It's not a bad game. It's not a good one. It's just... "MANOS".
Sometimes I'll ragequit on the actual last stage of the game. That's fine too. Either way, once a week, play something I've never played before. Chronicle my experience. Gonna try to make it hit on Wednesday but it may not always hit on Wednesday. I have a sqrlmog and a woodrat to smack me into keeping a schedule if need be, because I need some sort of schedule in my life that isn't abject despair.
Too bad that my first choice was "MANOS". Yes, I am always going to write the game's name like that; it's the only way to really encapsulate it.
Now, I'll admit something up-front: Despite being a fan of MST3K, I have never watched the "MANOS" episode. I know it solely through pop-cultural osmosis. The master may not approve but I don't give a shit. Give me Space Mutiny any day of the week. That said, don't think I didn't spot the derelict Tom Servo gumball machine or the fact you have to fight the Ro-Man or...
Guys. Guys, MST3K didn't even do The Giant Claw. Why the fuck is that there. You fucked up your funy and I feel like that was intentional.
See, the thing about "MANOS" the game is that... it does a lot of things competently only to very, very intentionally throw them on the ground, Lonely Island style. It overloads on the MST3K jokes (being "MANOS", having The Screaming Skull and Trolls as enemies, inexplicably having the Ro-Man as a stage boss for no other reason than Because), but then it just starts throwing shit in from whenever. (You fight The Giant Claw not once, but TWICE, and it is the worst boss fight in the game. I think a later boss is Morticia and Fester Addams? Were they in "MANOS"? I don't even know.)
It starts as a responsive, if NES-styled, platformer and then it commits literally every platformer sin in one single stage. After all, what screams "quality" better than an autoscroller with crumbling platforms and limited visibility and enemies that hop around like goddamn Castlevania fleamen? Why, doing it again but in monochrome! And then a third time but vertical!
That third time is what finally made me say "fuck this". It's a vertical autoscroller but it's not a smooth one; it's that chunky "one tile at a time shift downward" that I've seen in some games but it's super demanding and the checkpoints are in places that seem systematically DESIGNED to get you killed and the stage has that same bullshit limited visibility and AGHHGHG.
Then I looked at a longplay and discovered I tapped out on the last stage of the game. That the titular fight against The Master was basically a reskinned Castlevania Dracula. Yeah, you know what? I'll pass.
"MANOS" is a game that does everything in halves. It tries to be kusoge, but it also tries to be a responsive, playable platformer. It tries to be referential, but doesn't really give half a fuck what it's referencing. It tries to be well-made, but then 90% of the game is one five second bleepy-bloopy loop.
In turn, it does nothing in a satisfactory manner. It's viscerally and emotionally empty. It's the equivalent of an unseasoned, plain rice cake. It's nothing, but something about your lizard brain becomes so violently disgusted at just how nothing it is and you hate it despite it being... literally nothing.
Don't buy your friends this as a joke. It's not a bad game. It's not a good one. It's just... "MANOS".