HOLD MY HAND?, NEVER IN A MILLION YEARS
TRASH GAME ALERT! CODE: MYRON
TRASH GAME ALERT! CODE: MYRON
The Sigma of Trash Gaming, Myron Kevan Tynes Jr. is back once again, this time is under the Project: Summer Ice banner. Let's see what the hell we're gonna face this time.
Title screen already tells who's to blame.
My First Date RPG is a 2020 game released on PC which believe it or not, it was for sale on Steam. Yeah, Steam is even more prone to trash gaming than the XBOX and PlayStation stores combined. Apparently it was only a matter of time until this game get a console release. I guess Breakthrough Gaming pulled the brake on their Arcade line up and brought this.
Unfortunately, this is the beginning of another "ongoing" Breakthrough Gaming nightmare, as this game clearly says "Story One" (of God knows how many stories).
First casualty of Trash Gaming: Your mental sanity.
Looks like Alexis is suffering because she knows what's coming up.
Sunday's meant to be fun, not for enduring videogame torture, and looks like Myron likes, no, Myron LOVES to play the fun executioner, and a very sick one 'cos he likes to torture gaming under a disguise of a messenger of God. ¿Where's the Lord to punish him for releasing all these atrocities upon the world? We don't deserve this.
Tough luck, girl. That's what happens.
As far as I know, there's two stories. One featuring Oriana as the protagonist and the other as Elliot, her potential love interest. The PC version bundled both stories as one game, but the PS port will surely split them as individual games (My condolences to all the trophy hunters like IBadDriverI, Dino_Roar Gaming, YOYO-33 Live and of course, to myself).
Trash Installation is Complete. Tough Luck.
Looks like this game tries to put some RPG aspects like deciding which shoes, jacket and purse Oriana will wear. Most RPG's involve equipment that boosts the character's capabilities. But in this game is not even reflected since there's no status to increase or show a minimal visual change like Alucard's capes in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, reducing this to the level of a regular Mass Effect choice of answer minus the Paragon-Renegade effect.
Can I go watch NASCAR with my friends, mom?
After leaving the room, now you have to do three more things: Talk to dad, talk to mom and sit down and eat your breakfast, which is navigate through a dialogue cutscene about Oriana will be getting a car so she doesn't have to borrow pops car anymore to do so (What I'd really like, dad, is to borrow the car keys. See you later, can I have them PLEEEEEAAAAASE?).
Say the "YESSS!" line in David Kaye's Beast Wars Megatron voice.
If in the house the game lacks of RPG features, the outside is the same thing: No enemies to fight or items to get, there's buildings, but you can't enter on them. This kills the concept of exploration and makes the game more linear despite having a considerable sized "world". Just walk to the park, then head to the bus stop, and "To Be Continued. Download Story Two", sigh. ¿Do I need to say "Even the tech demo of CrossCode was better" again like in my review of Our Church and Halloween?. God damn it.
In today's story, Orko failed to stop the Bydo Empire by pretending to be a super pilot.
Defeating the Bydo is a task that involves intelligence and patience rather than stupidity.
See you next time, folks.
In the style of the morals from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, BraveStarr and Double Dragon, the game throws us an attempt to a moral about dating, and this is where the religious element appears, as we're told that we have the Power of the Holy Spirit to help us on a date.
Well, we've got to admit it, if you've played the PC version you'll realize that the graphics look very well made as they look like a SNES/Gameboy Advance game, as if the game tries to nod Pokemon and a bit of Megaman Battle Network, and for Breakthrough Gaming/Project: Summer Ice standards is definitely an accomplishment, especially the houses and interiors, not to mention the waving water effect on the lake. A proof that Myron can make retro-looking graphics that are capable to compete with the major commercial games in both character and scenery. It's not CrossCode, but it's vastly superior than Our Church and Halloween and Lent The Easter Bunny.
Unfortunately, that was on the PC version, 'cos the PS4 port suffer the Anti-Enhancement, a transmutation of taking a visually good game and make it look bad. The PS4 sprites are terrible since rather than keeping the 16-bit styled characters, they've made them look like bad 8-bit sprites and they contrast a lot with the scenery just like the CG vehicles on today's animes and cartoons. The well made dialogue mugshots were replaced with the CG-ish portraits like in Bowling, along with the "overpixelation" effect that makes them look like shit. The decision/dialogue boxes were downgraded to the level of Our Church and Halloween and the opening cutscene was also changed too. Looks like Myron slammed himself on the hands with a heavy hammer on this one.
The music is recycled from Bowling and Lent The Easter Bunny, so there's nothing else to talk about this aspect of the game here.
Looks like this is not the right moment to say that, Nina.
What we've got in the PS4 port is the perfect example of how NOT to improve a game. I mean, if the PC version had nicer graphics and artwork, ¿Why the fuck Myron had to change them?, feels like I'm playing a bad hack of the early days of ZSNES and that's one step back in the overall product.
"If it ain't broke, don't fix it" is the lesson here. Hope Breakthrough Gaming releases the remaining parts of Bowling and Our Church and Halloween so we can finish those catastrophes once and for all.
GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY SIGHT!!