Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia.
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In case you've been wisely keeping out of the loop, Mixtape released last week to a series of rave reviews online. I went ahead and played it, giving it a 74 in our but it didn't connect with me in the same way as other reviewers.
Rather than a game simply being allowed to release and be somewhat divisive, however, Mixtape has found itself in the unenviable position of being wrapped up in another one of those tedious culture war things. Now, some critiques levelled are somewhat rooted in reasonable stances.
Annapurna Interactive was founded by Megan Ellison, the daughter of billionaire and Oracle CEO Larry Ellison—who, among other things has been vocally and financiallyIf you don't want to put money towards Annapurna on those grounds then, hey—fair enough. I wouldn't resent anybody for doing that any more than I would, say, boycotting Microsoft over itsWhat doesn't make sense to me are the accusations that this is evidence that Mixtape has somehow been astroturfed for positive reviews , or, more bafflingly, that developer Beethoven & Dinosaur is somehow trying to be a"fake indie.
" Speaking bluntly, I don't think that a game developer making zero effort to hide the fact they've got a publisher, in a game with a huge amount of expensive licensed music, can be reasonably accused of any sort of duplicity. Sometimes coming-of-age stories come from expensive places. Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.
Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors And, as ever, the"it's too woke!
" Angles are also tedious. Particularly because Mixtape isn't even that socially progressive, and I'm saying that as someone with more pronouns than productive follicles on my head. Stacy Rockford is clearly bi-curious though her sexuality is never"explicitly" confirmed.
The closest Mixtape comes to making a point on social issues is in Morino's relationship with her dad—he's a strict cop and, the game implies, a second-generation immigrant who grew up in 1950s America. This is something the story nudges at, but Morino's resolution with her dad happens almost entirely off-screen aside from her initial blow-up moment, and it's less of a focal point than Rockford's parting with Slater.
No, I don't think Mixtape's been astroturfed, or that the praise for it is insincere. What I think is occurring has more to do with the kind of game that Mixtape is.
It's what makes itMega Crit co-founder says he wasn't bothered by the Steam backlash to Slay the Spire 2's beta balance patch: 'It's difficult for players to feel like they're heard'This musical RPG is doing important work by letting you beat up music snobs, but I really stuck around for the painful punsI'm not saying it's"nostalgia bait" or"nostalgiaslop" or whatever nuance-stripping label someone might hypothetically slap on it. I mean to say that it is a storyMixtape is a videogame that'll either speak directly to your heart, or it'll clash with your lived experiences.
There's an argument to be made that it's deliberately saccharine—a representation of a fantastical '90s suburban America so idealistic that it borders on, and could even be read as, a heartfelt parody. I, for one, am from the UK, but I also had a much less wild and wonderful teenage experience.
My late teens were characterised by cosy house parties with cider our parents bought us just so they knew where we'd be chundering . As a result, Mixtape only charmed me insofar as I think it's a beautiful, lovely little character drama. One that pulled some laughs and"awws" out of me. That some people think it's an all-time great, and that some think it's just okay?
That's about as shocking as finding a fork in a kitchen.
" Other reviewers might think differently, and that's kind of the point. I'm not sitting here secretly grinding my teeth because I don't think it's a masterpiece and IGN's Simon Cardy does. Just as I'm not letting my blood pressure rise at scathing criticism of the thing—some of it's even very fun to read.
In other words, some disparity between what you think of a game and what a reviewer might say about it, or a disagreement between outlets, is not the sign of some broader conspiracy. I think the spread of reviews for Mixtape are exactly a consequence of the kind of game it is, of the nostalgia it's trying to capture—that some people think it's an all-time great, and that some think it's just okay?
That's about as shocking as finding a fork in a kitchen. Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer.
He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.
Mega Crit co-founder says he wasn't bothered by the Steam backlash to Slay the Spire 2's beta balance patch: 'It's difficult for players to feel like they're heard'This musical RPG is doing important work by letting you beat up music snobs, but I really stuck around for the painful punsHelp! The Millennium Bug made all the robots in my mansion go berserk, and only Homer Simpson can save the dayDrawquarium is one of the most relaxing sandbox games I've played in a hot minute, even if it did remind me I have zero artistic skillBest gaming laptop 2026: I've tested the best laptops for gaming of this generation and here are the ones I recommend.
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