A Smörgåsbord of Pain

This game does a lot of unusual things that I'm not even sure how to react to. I can't tell yet if I love this game or hate it, only time will see. But I'll describe my experience.

This is the second Anastasia the Power Pony game. I liked the earlier one; I went into it expecting a My Little Pony story (which I would have loved) but instead found an original pony-based setting. This time around there are even more differences that show how the two series aren't really connected (for one thing, in the naming of the characters). I did forget some aspects of the setting which made it very funny when the game completely condoned all manner of violence against llamas but urged you to not injure ponies at all, giving the impression of pony ultra-racism (I think the first game had a reason, I just can't remember it, so it's not actually pony racism I believe).

The game itself has several acts, and here's where the new style of stuff comes up.

In the first act, we are in a restaurant with some snobby coworkers. There's menu-based conversation but we can also examine the area around us. Suddenly, we are recognized, and we must escape subterfuge and/or fighting, all while our dreary coworkers drone on in the background, commenting on our actions. To my surprise, the space is huge; I strongly strongly strongly recommend reading all feelies before playing the game. I imagined this huge space was to have a complex combinatorial puzzle of evasion, but I just used brute force (this map will return later).

Afterwards, there was a fight scene in an alley. You can't save or undo during it, but you can retry or continue. Having not read the feelie that specifically describes combat, I floundered at first, trying stuff like 'jump back' (which worked I think, or maybe step back), and HIT PONY (frowned on due to probably-not-pony-ultra-racism). I took the trash can lid at one point and it let me defend.

Rather than give up, I wanted to keep trying. It's clear the author was hoping that they could implement enough actions that someone could intuitively type whatever they want and have it work, usually a laughable idea in a parser game (there are just so many things to account for) but I wanted to make the author's vision work. As you fight, you get more commands suggested, and COMMANDS gave some more. There are several ways the fight can end. I ended up thinking that I needed to use the same three moves over and over (Spoiler - click to show)(sidestep, duck, and jump) but once they started double-teaming me that didn't work anymore, so I tried using (Spoiler - click to show)THROW and TRIP but it kept saying it did or didn't work for what seemed to me arbitrary reasons. I finally followed the signs more carefully and was able to win. It felt rewarding, but part of that rewarding feeling was wrangling an unruly combat system. So, again, I couldn't decide if I loved it for getting it to work or hated it for being hard to figure out.

A couple acts later we return to the restaurant and have a big all-out brawl, just like the pirate ship in the last game. And the purpose of the 20-something room buffet is revealed: we have to attack making puns!

Now, this just seemed to me like a really bad idea from the other. You have to do stuff like 'RAMMING NOODLES' or something with the ramen noodles. I was deeply skeptical because so many things don't have obvious puns (like lutefisk). And some early things I tried didn't work at all (SAVAGE someone with a SAUSAGE, MASH them with MASH, etc.). How could the author possibly include all possible puns? It seemed like a lost cause and I died a lot.

Then I saw everyone chucking stuff at me, so I chucked stuff back, and it seemed to do something. Regular attacks worked a bit as well.

Spoilers for next bit.

Again, I can't tell if it's genius or horrible. What to do wasn't clearly communicated, but that made figuring it out more rewarding. It reminds me a bit of the draw of older games like the one Garry Francis loves on CASA, where the parser is terrible and getting around that is half the fun. This parser is not terrible, but the many activities with wide-open state spaces makes trying to understand the game as much of a puzzle as the game itself.

Story-wise, the game is a classic street-level superhero story, done well in the classic style. Rather than innovating with big plot twists, the author has instead added lots of jokes and characterization.

Overall, I had fun. I think experimentation like this is what drives the community forward in the long run; someone has to take the gamble on something new. So, bravo. The music worked well for me, too.