It was amusing watching Lets Plays of Mixtape because some people tried to push the boundries and were frustrated by how shallow and railroaded it is, while others barely touched the controller and it played itself most of the time. I saw someone get an achievement for avoiding all obstacles in the shopping cart sequence and they didnt touch the controller once during it. I dont actually have a problem with it essentially being a lightly-interactive movie, but the writing had better be fantastic if you're going to do that (and it wasn't).
I'll be honest, this game was extremely boring to me to the point where I didn't even finish it. Every little segment felt like a chore. I have no idea how it got so highly reviewed.
Reviewers were bribed with care packages, the people behind the game were influential so nobody wanted to burn that bridge, nostagia bait and just the desire to be a contrarian in the internet
I don't think its some huge conspiracy, more that the kind of person who dedicated their career to writing about video games will probably connect more with a story about a teen passionate enough about an artform that they'll dedicate their lives to it.
Similarly I think the 'nostalgia bait' rings hollow as many of the tracks were too niche for people to have warm memories of them. As someone who was a teen at the time, I can promise you that no-one was trying to be popular or impress people by pulling out obscure Australian tracks from the mid-70's, or giving a shit about Portishead's debut album.
(And this is from someone who genuinely loves 90's English Trip-hop)
Eh I spent years working in both TV and comics, and almost universally everyone there was at least partially because they loved their medium.
Is it that hard to believe that Video game writers/reviewers/YouTubers chose to do so because they loved video games, as opposed to purely chasing cash or metrics.
How stupid can you be? It’s not like it’s a lucrative career path. Why else would people do it besides loving it? It’s so baffling to me when people regurgitate this dumb as bricks sentiment.
You do know most people work for money, not passion, right? "How stupid can you be" is certainly an interesting question you REALLY ought to be asking yourself right now.
Generally you do not go into an industry that doesn’t pay well for the money. I hope you’re young, because otherwise if you’re so jaded you think people working in games media don’t like games that’s pathetic.
Generally you do not go into an industry that doesn’t pay well for the money.
Uhuh. Again, and genuinely, how stupid are you? Video game journalism isn't some high barrier industry, it's a place where journalism dropouts end up. You're ignoring all basic sense to jump to frankly infantile generalisations like "generally you do not go into an industry that doesn't pay well for the money" No. You child. Many, many people in the world take whatever damn job they can get.
If you think reality is what it is then that's pathetic
Well, that certainly explains your delusional, childish and exceptionally foolish outlook.
No they weren't. I loved it and one of my favorite games of the year. I'm not a paid reviewer (though wish I was). It just really hit with its intended audience. Not every game is for everyone. I don't get why folks can't also understand that.
I agree. As a “hard core gamer” maybe it just arrived at the right time. I was going through some shit so I didn’t really want to focus on building a character or stats I just wanted an escape and mixtape nailed that vibe. Had it arrived today I may not have liked it so much.
Also being a child of the late 80s this game was pure nostalgia for me.
Mixtape was the creator (Johnny "Galvatron") fondly recalling his youth of committing crimes and not having responsibilities. He said in an interviews that as a teen he did worse things than what the characters in the story do, and the cast of Mixtape are awful people. The story isn't about maturing, its about lamenting that you can't continue to be a parasite.
I’ll be honest, I do sometimes really miss being a teenage shitass. The lack of responsibilities, doing whatever moronic thing we chose any given day! Good times…
It felt very reminiscent of some 90's movies that us late gen X/millenials are nostalgic about. A lot of the reviewers probably fall into this age bracket.
In saying that, I was in love from the get go and then got bored and gave up a few hours in at the dinosaur park.
The fact that they went with us insomniac for such a style of game instead of a different developer is a little annoying. Imagine if they went to fromsoft and had them develop a wolverine game instead
I enjoy those games too. Trust me. You will enjoy Mixtape if you enjoy games like that. Lol. It has all kinds of humor and some interesting parts in it. Also good music.
I actually really loved it. I thought the writing was fun, the interactivity was a good amount and creative enough, especially within the genre of visual novel. All the ideas were pretty interesting to me and loved the execution. It was like interacting with a music video playlist.
Definitely my taste.
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u/Zarvanis-the-2nd Sep 11 '26
It was amusing watching Lets Plays of Mixtape because some people tried to push the boundries and were frustrated by how shallow and railroaded it is, while others barely touched the controller and it played itself most of the time. I saw someone get an achievement for avoiding all obstacles in the shopping cart sequence and they didnt touch the controller once during it. I dont actually have a problem with it essentially being a lightly-interactive movie, but the writing had better be fantastic if you're going to do that (and it wasn't).