Maybe you'll respect this dead person instead

Adapted from a SpringThing26 Review

Played: 4/7/26
Playtime: 15min, joined Guild

I’m kind of 0-2 when invoking unfamiliar (to me) pop culture properties during reviews. You would think that kind of record would make me slow to employ that particular tool again. But no! I am an equus ferus, untameable and answering to no man! You cannot bridle me with your concepts of “humility” and “lessons learned”!

My usual employment of pop culture comparison comes spontaneously, unfairly, and colors my engagement with the work to some degree thereafter, at least until the work provides something ELSE to latch on to. To MYRTDPI’s credit, this time the comparison was achingly slow in manifesting, until it did so all at once, very late in the game. It is fair to say that this either points to me going 0-3 on these things, or to the BEST possible pop culture riffing - where the initial source is merely the springboard for deeply personal and creative works that ultimately owe little more than inspiration itself. And in some sense, given that there is nothing new under the sun, isn’t that really ALL art?

MYRTDPI plops us, very in media res, into a fantasy world we will struggle to keep up with. Cultures, Institutions, Geography, Biodiversity, all completely alien to the player with no real effort to provide purchase or explanation by the protag. If I’m going to get dunked into High Fantasy (which is not my chosen genre), this is the way I prefer it. Trust me to catch up, don’t spoon feed me. “WTF is going on here?” is a very effective way to batter aside any genre-resistance I might cling to. It helps, I think, that the world building is very aggressive. Almost nothing is taken for Medieval-Europe-granted, to its great credit. We seem to be in a matriarchal world (or at least city-state), where female power is the norm and males are tolerated intruders. Swirling around this, there is magic and swordplay and wondrous, dangerous beings.

It emerges that the protag is attempting to join a Guild, an only quasi-welcoming space of playful aggression and bruises. To do so, he must establish his credentials by satisfying a quest utilizing only his unique magical gifts. With the help of a new friend. From there, the quest is comically abrupt - go underground, fight monsters, win! The work’s brevity is well considered, as this seems intended as a prologue for one or more longer games in the same mythos. By game’s end we have effectively been introduced to the world, the protag, his specific abilities, and some NPCs.

Much like the work itself does, I have shaded the pop culture reference I am about to make. See, the protag owns a magic brazier, from which he can conjure (Spoiler - click to show)one of four fancifully-named spirits to aid him, most especially in fighting monsters. In service of his quest to join a (Spoiler - click to show)combative athletic club of sorts. Would it make it more clear if you envision the brazier as a sphere of red and white? The comparison is limited, in the sense that the brazier has no particular effect after foes are defeated. It is entirely possible that I am imposing a comparison unintended by the author. As counter-argument, I offer the mid-combat text, reporting on damage to your partner. It is a sly echo of “It’s super effective!” Once this pop culture resonance landed I giggled to myself uncontrollably. If in fact this parallel has any grounding, its employment was masterful - shaded until so late in the game it felt like a mini-revelation. Not so much cheapening the work (as such comparisons can sometimes do) but enriching it.

The difference is the dense, specific lore inundating the experience prior. After long beats of struggling to keep up with offhand strangeness while the plot steamed forward, this hit like a moment of clarity. Quite a feat in only 15 minutes of gameplay!

As a prologue, how did the complete work settle? I’m not sure? The fact that I’m not sure is probably a big win for this work. Given how far it is from my default interests, the fact that you are not hearing “great fun but not for me” is no small achievement. Its confident, thoroughly foreign setting, pervasive wry wit and what I perceive as a subversive, clowning reference, coupled with the controlled but frenetic pacing of it all are kind of winning. Certainly winning enough to engage its successor.

Spaceship: Tardis
Vibe: “Spooky Ghost Fighter, I choose you!”
Polish: Smooth
Gimme the Wheel! : If this were my work, I think I would try to pack in just one more sly reference - maybe casually drop that the protag’s name is “Bash Ketchup” or somesuch. Just so overconfident reviewers are not left twisting over whether the reference was intended or not.

Polish scale: Gleaming, Smooth, Textured, Rough, Distressed
Gimme the Wheel: What I would do next, if it were my project.