YYWTGRSHYGNLSYCT - First Impressions

A few days ago Yahtzee Croshaw released a video about how he's been playing a lot of YouTube Playables to the point where it's worrying. Most of those games are very cheaply made, with numbing gameplay loops that do nothing to truly engage.

… So anyways there's this game called YEAH! YOU WANT "THOSE GAMES," RIGHT? SO HERE YOU GO! NOW, LET'S SEE YOU CLEAR THEM! ("Those Games" for short) which is literally exactly that. A game featuring games that appear to be like the generic ones you see in ads — and that's exactly what they are.

I only got the first one, and to be honest I enjoyed it! It is 100% self-aware of what it is, and it's exactly as advertised (unlike the ads this is based on lol). It's exactly what it says on the tin, ir really is "those games" but without all the ads and microtransactions, and with the actual games shown instead of something somehow worse.

It also has a unified and intentional art style. The menus really remind me of Gamecube and Wii games, with colourful pattern backgrounds and big bold buttons.

The game features five minigames, but I've only really played three of them as of writing, which I'll quickly talk about now:

Pin Pull is a game where your goal is to help the little stickman. In some levels he wants to get a treasure that is blocked by deadly enemies, which you have to take care off before letting them through. In other levels you have to kill all of the enemies while keeping the stickman safe. This is probably the flagship game of the set, and it has the most levels at 100.

The mechanics are actually built upon very cleverly! With most things interacting with each other in meaningful ways that are actually explored quite well! This is definitely my favourite.

Parking Lot is based on those Rush hour puzzles. There's cars of different sizes in a parking lot that you have to fully clear out. All games feature a star ranking system and this one is by time, so you do want to do it as fast as possible, though sometimes that is hard due to the controls.

Also there's "baddies" that completely reset your run if you hit them, which can get a bit annoying sometimes, but are fortunately not difficult to plan around if you pay attention.

The last game I played is Color Lab, which is based on those test tube puzzles. This one is very satisfying to me, especially due to the trial and error aspect. It is easy to fail and have to retry, but fortunately it isn't that long and it doesn't take any time to get back in the zone! Though admittedly, like with the Parking Lot, I am not a big fan of the time limit.

I haven't really played much of the other two games (Number Tower and Cash Run) to really write about them, but they do fit in with the others very well! I just haven't been in the mood to play those to completion.

In conclusion, the game is quite fun! Admittedly it does have a few small issues, the controls are pretty janky in some games and not too intuitive for the menus, and you can't remap them at all. That might be in theme with the game? However, that doesn't mean that it's a good thing, not at all.

Still though, the game won me over with its self-awareness and style! This isn't the type of game I would usually recommend, but if you really want to get only a small dose of video game brainrot, there is no better option!

Oh btw, this image from Yahtzee's video made me laugh