Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass

holy underrated

A fun and cheerful romp through colorful lands and friendly characters. You'll never love anyone as much as [spoiler]Johnathan Bear[/spoiler] loves you. [spoiler]You will NEVER. Love ANYONE. As much as Johnathan Bear loves YOU.[/spoiler]

Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass is one of my all time favorite RPGs and is in my opinion a modern day cult classic. It's hard to fit into a few short words why I love it so much, but while it may seem on the surface like yet another Indie RPGmaker game there's a level of polish that's noticeable throughout the game in all aspects. It's challenging, maybe even a tiny bit grindy, but it's never overwhelming and you can almost always just play better to overcome the obstacles. The difficulty serves the narrative but if you really don't want that then the game has options to make it easier (or harder if you're a real challenge junkie). And boy, do I love the writing. It's not a terribly hard game to understand, but it's a game where you can just sit and meditate on it and find new layers you hadn't even considered before. Uncle Lars is one of my favorite characters like, ever.

fire

Probably the closest thing to Earthbound I've played from the rpgmaker games. Quirky and fun. Highly recommend.

Lots of questionable game design choices but still an amazing hidden gem overall if you have the patience

feels like a love letter to earthbound in many ways, therefore i love it

JatPM has been an insightful, interesting and expansive story with a lot of elements that rivals a lot of games out there (At least with my experience, which might be little). The lore, secrets and challenges you face can be both innocuous and impactful when you realise just how much it will challenge your decisions. And trust me, this game will genuinely knock you off your feet when you realise just how suspenseful it can get. A lot of love, time and effort went into this game and for being less than half a gig for size? It's ridiculously packed. The music as well has been wonderful too. A friend had introduced me to it to begin with, which didn't give me too much of an impression but playing the game has changed my mind wildly. There's a fair few moments where there's a lesson to be learned too, expect a heartfelt moment or two. It got a very large smile out of me at one point... Sneaky devs. To give you a sense of preparation, there will be a bit of item/ character management during your progression, slightly more in the late game. If you intend to try and complete this game to its fullest extent, expect about 100 hours of gameplay. There will be repetition, levelling up and retracing your steps. It's not a "linear" Point A to B. You need some strategy to enemies too. Don't think that you can just powerhouse DPS and think a clear win will be in sight. I'm putting this game at a very high 8 out of 10 and may bump it higher once (and if) I can complete it entirely. I've yet to still uncover everything and look forward to it.