The Mean Story

Brief game. Extremely dark humor.

In the most optimistic terms, it is slapstick comedy, each escalation more outrageous than the next, till one finds oneself face-palm-laughing in shear disbelief at the darkness of it all. (if you've ever laughed at dead baby jokes, this game is for you!)

In the most cynical terms it is a Trumpian daydream. Meta-gaming one's altruism leads to enslavement, and one would do well to note political correctness is not in the character's inventory.

All in all the brevity of the game and one-dimensional caricatures that serve as npc's firmly establish a light-hearted, tongue in cheek framework that allows the game to remain amusing

The Mean Story bases itself on offensive humor and warns you multiple times about it. I'm not really a fan of this, but I can't blame the game for it when it's the entire point. As a game, it doesn't have much to offer -- there's a few ableist slurs, some racism, and a puzzle that consists of tricking various disabled people. It's not very fun to play through.

When you type "AMUSING" at the ending, it asks if you've tried "...not being amused by a story like this in the first place?" The help menu also admits it might say something bad about the author if he found this funny enough to make. It feels like there was some apprehension about publishing this.