The Amazing Digital Circus and its consequences. Though honestly, they were sliding down that path even beforehand. The last season of Meta Runner was a trash fire and Murder Drones was starting to have a lot of Glitch's now-inseparable tropes being forced in by the end.
Gameoverse was in production far before ADC released. The production of Gameoverse went from 2015 to 2026. ADC was started in 2022 and finished 2026.
Maybe some of it rubbed off on Gameoverse, but I think it's more likely they just came from a similar place. There were shared influences like Glitch that might have pushed it, but that's speculation.
That's all to say I don't think it's fair to say anything in Gameoverse was heavily influnced like that.
that sounds like it wasnt even actually in production for 11 years but rather the idea had existed since 2015 and then only started production relatively recently
upon: some googling i an correct, the show only started actual production that other studios would call production, in 2024, so before 2024 that show was not in production, it was an idea that someone was trying to get produced
the funny part is those who actually watched the show and not just some youtuber criticizing the show know this isn't accurate: tadc had panic attacks but it also displayed its characters experiencing their traumas in other ways, like how gangle was depicted throughout the entirety of episode 4, or ragatha in the bar scene, or ribbit being excluded by jax after giving jax her backstory of being an ex-mormon and how jax specifically excluded her in a way that resembled the exclusion practices of mormons, or the ENTIRE character arc of jax, how she tried to reject her femininity, how her mother's manipulation probably causes her to view kindness as manipulation which basically permeates her entire arc
if you actually want to think about how trauma affects people, it's all there
The first episode is a pilot... y'know, an episode used to see if the entire series should get a green light or not. The point of a pilot is to be judged, not a teaser
edit: Three awards back to back, is someone botting me?
the Always Sunny pilot is honestly a fucking slog when compared to even just three or four seasons after it. i'm glad it wasn't shot down just because of the weak pilot
But do those shows have a refined version of the pilot releasing later as the first episode or did they just continue on from the weak pilot? I know what gamoverse will do...
Now to be fair, pilots can also be a way for the people making the show to see the criticism people have and change a few things for a full series in response to that.
My example being the Hello Neighbor Show.
It’s pilot? ABSOLUTELY HORRIBLY BORING! It is bad, and isn’t even canon to the full show.
The actual show? Unironically a good show because the people behind the show saw people didn’t like the pilot and went to make the show better in response to that.
Like by that point I had already kinda thought “Oh yeah we’ve seen Theodore killing already so this episode is just letting us essentially see a few extra situations of Theodore murdering or majorly hurting people.”
And then he bombed the school and my jaw dropped (especially when right before that his silhouette appears in the steam like he’s in an old slasher movie or something lol)
(And unrelated to that part but I honestly love the animation on the Shadow Man. It’s so jittery and unnerving. Like it’s way better than how the Shadow Man was like in the game)
The problem with Glitch tho is that they treat "pilots" like first episodes. I don't understand why they call them pilots. Traditionally a pilot is supposed to be a working concept, many shows develop very differently from them as they tweek through feedback. Just look at like Steven Universe's pilot or Bobs Burgers.
So creators aren't given a chance to tweek their course and get pigeonholed into what they layed out in what's technically episode 1. I understand they call them pilots because part of the idea is getting community interest and funding for the project. But again, with Glitch, creators get trapped into that original concept
I agree about the "a pilot is to be judged" part, but I found strange that we are discussing stuff that hardly shine trough a pilot episodes, likes deepness of the writing (still is a good thing to remember that a simple writing isn't inherently a bat thing) or characterization.
Personally I liked the pilot, looks very good, the idea behind the show could be interesting. Is it perfect? No, kit didn't impress me at all.
If you ever saw Gundam the witch from mercuries pilot, you will not find neither the main character of the show or nor the main theme of the first season
There's a difference between not liking something and saying it doesn't deserve to exist because you personally don't like it, that seems a little harsh.
I'm not a fan of it either but I'm not gonna just say "because I personally don't like it I don't think it should exist." It comes off as extremely narcissistic.
If I don't like something, alright I won't watch it or play it but I won't say it's bad because I personally don't like it, it just ain't my thing that's all, I don't like the monster hunter games but that doesn't mean I despise it with every ounce of being or wish it disappears I just don't have a connection to it that's all.
You should probably get better at trying to make an opinion without trying to force it as a fact.
Seriously, it’s frustrating to see how diverse the male characters bodies look compared to the female ones. A tale as old as time sadly. We get it, you have a type but cmon.
And then you look at Crab Girl who doesn't follow the pattern and you get people being like "she isn't depicted as attractive though so she doesn't count." THATS NOT THE POINT OF A FEMALE CHARACTER GODDAMN IT.
I've had this pic in my gallery for quite a while now even before gameoverse, so I guess she's still a part of a pattern lol (bottom says single designed "ugly" girl, which fits her pretty well)
And? The main cast of female characters still have the same body type (plus kit’s dead friends), the promo photo for example. The faces of the series. Maybe witch lady at the bottom will be the exception but that’s still 1 out of 5, compared to the major differences with the guys. It’s lamee.
Still no story mode, new skins are some of the worst overwatch has seen in a long time with almost every one looking ultra generic on top of always going to the same characters (lucio mythic is a rarity in between all trash we have been getting), new characters also having almost zero to no connection to the main story, indirectly buffing many heroes that were already strong and nerfing the ones with the lowest winrates and more problems.
The game IS better than Overwatch 2 don't get me wrong, but to call it a "big comeback" is quite an overstatement, there are many problems that have lingered in the game for multiple seasons that will take them years to fix apparently and with stadium being nuked (the gamemode that was supposed to revive the entire thing) it just feels like we crawled a little bit forward and extended one leg backwards to not let go of old bad habits.
OW story is shit and PVE is boring, I don't know why everyone hammers on about story mode. The only good thing about the Overwatch is the polish and gameplay. If I can play as Doomfist or Vendetta in other games I'd play those games.
I don't like Gameoverse that much, but here is my retort.
This quite frankly isn't a show that doesn't deserves to exist.
I have a hard time validating this as a criticism of any art. Art is an expression of the self. You're basically saying the person doesn't have a right to express themselves.
It doesn't rerally bring anything interesting or original to the table
The art style is rather original and inspired. The show is obviously a combination of inspirations, though. Unlike subversive media, it wears its inspirations on its sleeve. It certainly isn't trying to do anything like what Evangelion was trying to do in regards to Gundam. Gameoverse isn't a deconstruction or a response to anything in particular.
Despite being a show about video games its so bare bones and it feels like creator has never ever touched one before. Levels, coins, and other stuff wow!!!
This one I kind of disagree with. The idea of worlds being independent of one another, and each existing with it's own "win or lose" state that destroys the world is a rather fresh concept. It isn't a concept that hasn't been done before...Madoka Magica comes to mind. But I can't think of one that handles the "apocalypse button" trope quite like this.
This show also expects us to think that Panic attacks are a great way to show trauma and convey deep writing.
This is just purely and assumption on your part. You seem as if you are insulted by the very concept that a panic attack would be used in media simply because it has become a common trope. I agree that panic attacks have been overused lately. But there is not a single thing about Gameoverse that tells me it is attempting "deep writing." Again, it isn't Evangelion. We aren't dealing with psychological jungian theory here. The show is simple in that way, which I would say is more of a taste thing. The weird part to me is you act is if you were led to believe the writing would be deep, which was absolutely never the case for myself seeing anything surrounding the show. My best guess here is you have someone in your life who really really likes Gameoverse and won't shut up about it. I get that. My wife loves Final Fantasy 8, which is a fundamentally broken game on so many levels. But Gameoverse isn't breaking any "rules of entertainment" in the way that Final Fantasy 8 breaks its own game systems.
There are way better ways to convey trauma and show deep writing.
Agreed. I really prefer the Berserk's "don't touch me" type of trauma reaction.
The characters also suck ass. Kit is such a boring main character, like she is not interesting to talk about writing wise or character wise. Every other character is also kinda mid too and they are not interesting.
This is also true. But again, the show isn't exactly going for anything above Pokemon or Dragonball Z tier writing. It achieves what it sets out to do.
People only care about these characters cause most of them are hot.
People on the INTERNET only care about them because they're hot. If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times. If your character designs are good, then you'll get an audience no matter what the quality of your media. Animation cuts its teeth on character designs. If you want your animated show to be successful, your characters either have to be hot or extremely stylized in the way Nightmare Before Christmas is. There are no middle roads as far as I can tell.
I think OP also misses that theb
game worlds are generic on purpose, not only as an homage to the corniness of games, but because theyre not supposed to be special. The characters have seemingly already visited dozens of worlds and watched most if not all of them die. They've become disillusioned with the repetition of things. The characters of Kits old world are directly paralleled with generic npcs in Flipper's with the implication that she sees the same "loveable side characters at homebase" over and over again. It is dramatic irony that Flippers thinks his quest is the most important in the world without knowing that there's a million heroes just like him and his actions are pointless. It is a reality Kit has to face evertime she sees a hero as righteous and oblivious as she was. Once his world ends, its right off to the next one. The misery and fatalism of it is intentionally stark
There are certainly worse shows out there. I think if you compare it to the average show on nicktoons, cartoon network or other cartoon channel it's pretty good. Definitely deserving of at least 8 episodes if not more.
I'm just gonna hone in on the Evangelion reference because what I love about that show the most is that the imagery is largely meaningless. All the crosses and angels and biblical references don't actually mean anything. The creators just thought that stuff was hype. And they're absolutely right.
My larger point is that gameoverse is trite but inoffensive. I don't vibe with it but I don't vibe with hockey and I'd never say that it shouldn't exist. Op just needs to let personal distaste start and end with that.
This is the dumbest misconception about Evangelion... all the christian imagery and names all do have meaning. Yes, they went for the name "Genesis Evangelion" and some of the designs based on christianity simply because it was cool, but during the show they lean heavily into it and use a lot of symbolism. The symbolic value of NERV fighting against Angels, or Asuka's Wall of Jericho, or the Tree of Life in Gendo's office, Adam and Lilith, Lance of Longinus or Kaworu's obvious parallels with Jesus are meaningful even if the choice initially was for the cool factor. It's not like they just threw in the christian imagery, it was all still very deliberate
I wouldn’t say I outright hate it but it’s so absurdly average and boring. This feels like something that should have been made 10 years ago, and Wreck-It-Ralph already did this idea but much better anyways.
That’s a very loose description. If you’re vague enough, any two stories are the same. “A villain traveling to another game” is one plot point they have in common, that’s not the same thing as identical plots, and isn’t even accurate because Ralph went to Candy Racers to win a medal, not because he was trying to stop a villain. The plots are completely different. One is about a “villain” trying to free himself from labels, the other is (so far) about stopping worlds from ending
Also I would like to say, it's the pilot and they already gave us a panic attack. I dont give a shit about these characters yet, why would I care about their panic attacks when I dont know anything about them yet?????
Also this universe is fundamentally flawed, you either suffer under a tyrant or your entire world just implodes.
This kind of made me think, what if soneone introduces to such reality some omnicidal motherfucker like Lich from adventure time or Batter from Off? Because it really looks like the only sensible and fair conclusion to such reality
What an interested paradigm to be put in. It almost makes you wonder how a character would deal with such a fatalistic reality or perhaps if there are other mechanics in this world that are yet to be discovered. Maybe there might even be some sort of arc in how the characters conceptualize their lives that allows them to find the motivation to try and find a happy ending for the world, even if it seems impossible to do. Almost like some sort of hero might do lol
No, i mean what if they just introduce a guy who just ends everything? Specificslly in gameoverse worlds context, the world is indeed iredeemably flawed at its very structure. What ive been sayibg is that atleast omnicide could put everyone there out of their misery, as dark and unsatisfyinh as it may sound.
Isn't that the point of the of the bad guy to change the rules of existence in order to create a better system. He wants to change the universe but at the cost of destroying these worlds.
The 'It doesn't deserve to exist' part was so pointed and immediately turned me off on OP's argument. Most art has a right to be shared because some people may like it. (Excluding the actively harmful, of course.)
Just because you don't like the piece of media doesn't mean it shouldn't exist because someone else may like it. To speak with so much viscera for something as minute as a show on YouTube does not shine well on the OP immediately. It makes me think they hold a bias and I'm thus inclined to take the other side of the argument. Keep the distaste at the end of your argument, get defensive when you've already made your point. Stuff like that gets me so annoyed.
meh, I think Glitch's pilot system could be heavily improved since they force the pilots to also be the FIRST episode, and the start of a series is always rougher than the rest of it. Like it's way harder to portray what the average episode will be like when half of what it's doing is introducing basic dynamics/lore/etc
Rambo is a pretty good way to show trauma and suffering from PTSD, although you might count his breakdown as a panic attack if you squint
Joshua Graham from Fallout New Vegas (and many other examples from the same game) is another masterclass in writing someone with trauma, and although he foes not have anything close to a panic attack, his trauma seeps from his bandages.
Ok but you have to keep in mind this is a game with a wayyyyyy longer span than the pilot of gameoverse. The game has a lot more time to play with characters, and it's part of an established series. Gameoverse is a pilot for a show that doesn't exist and so it has very little time to hopefully get people to invest in the concept
Guts from Berserk was raped as a child by a man his adopted father shared a mercenary band with. If I recall, he sold a night with guts for the equivalent of beer money. As an effect, Guts is very defensive about being touched and has extremely realistic triggers.
i think saying it doesn't deserve to exist is kinda mean.
on the other hand, my main problem with this show is how much it tries to make you take it seriously so fast, and make you feel for stuff you barely had any time or reason to connect with.
taking another glitch animation as an example, imagine that the kinger's scene with pomni walking while holding their breath was in the first episode.
or imagine if the lord of the rings skipped the whole scene in the shire where we get to meet the characters and makes us care for them.
if you watch a clip with no context of the gameoverse realistic panic attack and the corny learnosaurus dialogue, you'd think it was a clip from the final episode of the season, or before the climax of the show, but no, it's in the first episode.
and it's not only that one scene, it's almost everything, even the dumb dolphin with the ultra annoying voice had it's sad emotional moment at the end; when malice appeared at the end of the episode revealing that she survived and will continue to torment kit, i didn't think "oh my god, she survived! and she's joining syntax!", instead i just thought " oh, the girl that i don't even remember her name and appeared for 0.04 seconds at the beginning is gonna keep appearing, cool".
overall, i feel like the show it's almost asking you to hype yourself up with the characters and story, rather than they hyping you up. only thing i can say they hype you with is with the animation
Literally the only thing I hear that's "great" about Kit is that she's hot. The jokes in this pilot made me cringe a lot too, like the dolphin saying he wants to kiss a girl dolphin... Wow. Hilarious.
I also think the voice direction with the dinosaur was really bad. Why would you make a cute dinosaur sound like Gruncle Stan or some elderly smoker? It would be funnier if that was intentional and they did something with that, but they didn't. He just has that voice and it doesn't even remotely suit his character.
I really don't see the appeal of this at all. One of the most wildly overrated cartoons I've seen already and it only has one episode.
what I dont like about gameoverse is that the rules of the world seem pigeon holed into only allowing a single type of game to be represented. any game that doesnt have a clear cut "hero" and explicit "end/win state" just doesn't work, and for a show about video games I wanted to see more representation of a wide variety of video game genres overall, as this excludes so many genres inherently
That’s what I said and thought as well. Kit doesn’t even look that attractive (and her body looks a bit thin and unnatural besides her huge ass gloves)
"To be honest, this show doesn't deserve to exist. It offers nothing interesting or original; it’s Glitch’s second show—after *Meta Runner*—to focus on video games. Despite being about video games, it’s so hollow that it feels like the creator has never actually played one. Levels, coins, and all that stuff... wow!!! It’s just not interesting."
That’s a fair opinion. However, rather than just the presence of coins or platforming elements, the first episode actually focuses on how a platforming world—when viewed by an outsider who isn't bound by its rules—comes across as rather simple and "silly."
"The series also expects us to believe that panic attacks are a great way to depict trauma and add narrative depth. They aren't; panic attacks have become a cliché in independent media. There are far better ways to represent trauma and convey narrative depth. While panic attacks can be a useful writing tool, they are currently being overused."
It’s certainly possible to depict it better, but I’d argue that this is a fairly successful and direct portrayal of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Just because it isn't original doesn't mean it isn't effective.
"The characters are terrible, too. Kit is such a boring protagonist—there’s nothing interesting about her, either in terms of how she’s written or her personality. The rest of the cast is equally mediocre and uninteresting. People only care about these characters because most of them happen to be attractive."
It’s perfectly fine if you don’t like the characters.
But they are cartoon characters with distinct designs and personalities, and they’ve already established clear relationships with one another—relationships that will surely be explored further.
"That’s all I had to say."
I’ll say it again. Your opinions are more than legitimate, but it seems to me that your criticisms are focused more on what you had hoped to see than on what is actually present in the pilot episode.
"But it's a pilot! You can't critique it like it's an actual full-on episode." GLITCH ACTS LIKE PILOTS ARE THE FIRST EPISODE ANYWAY, SO THEY WILL BE TREATED LIKE ONE UNTIL THEY CHANGE THE WAY THEY CREATE PILOTS!
Gameoverse was very obviously written by a man for a predominantly straight male audience. I found the female characters were rather needlessly sexualized. It's not necessarily always a bad thing when this happens in media, it's just that here it really doesn't serve much of a purpose aside from just being eyecandy.
Might be a hot take for some but I don't like Glitch shows in general, they all have a similar stench about them and most aren't even true indie. They're always "too much" and for some reason try to mimic the industry in various ways instead of doing something actually fresh while falling back into so many cliches and tropes. The independent animations and student films that enter competitions and such and then get posted on YouTube are SO much better than anything I've tried from Glitch, this channel has some real bad content farm habits which is quite sad to say.
“Hate” is a strong word, but yeah it’s not my cup of tea either.
The premise on its own sounds incredibly bleak to me. Either the villain wins or the world gets destroyed. Okay? What about games like Sonic Adventure 2, where the villain’s plan is already about destroying the world? Then what? Guess those worlds are just doomed either way. I’m sure it will be explained more in the future, but at present it feels more like edgy shock value than anything. The fact that the pilot ends with the heroes failing also makes me feel like it’s going to have a really cynical and pessimistic tone, which I’ve never liked in anything.
The characters are fine I guess, just kinda blandly likable (Miss Information is pretty fun tho). But what I really don’t like are the designs, specifically the double standard present there; the boys get to be all kinds of different shapes, sizes, and body types, yet the girls all have to be traditionally attractive with a singular body type, aside from the designated “ugly one”. Come on guys, I thought we had grown out of this!
The fight scenes are definitely pretty fun and well animated though, so there is some unambiguous good here.
Yeah, maybe a 4.5 out of 10. I would be more harsh on it, but this is just the first episode.
One of the things that really bugged me about how the pilot ends is that despite the concept of the story being the subversion where the hero has to lose, we end up right back where we started, with only the "good guys" doing the good thing and joining Kit and the "bad guy" doing the bad thing and joining the overarching villain.
I genuinely don't get the video game critic. Between characters being and acting like video game archetype ( mis information acting like a tutorial character for example), the soundtrack, switching to retro art style and video game like world map, the literal structure of the game in this episode following the very typical game structure of "learning to use an ability during a level so you are capable to use it during the boss, and then the final boss needs you to use all those capacity that you learned", and other smaller stuff here and there like each character having a type of food to heal them. There's a ton of stuff, surface level and more subtle ( I think that the moment a creator starts to think about "would this make sense game design wise, you can't say that they never touched a video game ). Did you actually watched it or just let the episode play and doing something aside?
Every woman is sexualized in this show and they refuse to admit it. “B-but the crab girl” yeah the obvious joke character. If you wanna have a gooner show that’s fine but like at least admit it.
Its like they had no faith in the concept, so they decided to say fuck it and just conveniently set up the episode where the leading heroine and one of her rivals just happen to wear sexy swimsuits, good god its so convenient it hurts.
Genuinely disparaging the sheer number of people in our world who are completely incapable of distinguishing something they don't enjoy and something of which the existence of is morally wrong
And if you know Arin, the guy is a dumbass when it comes to game critisism "object follows patern that circles, object leaves eye-sight, object is gone, walk into the oath of object and get hit"
Arin: WTF man, this is BS how am I supposed to see that
That's not the criticism being made, of all his criticisms this is a strange one to pick because he is almost objectively right. In Link to the Past and the original Zelda the obstacle is laid out to you because of the view of the game, however in Ocarina it is not and therefore is not as fun of a puzzle. Nintendo actually already applied this criticism as the spinning blades don't appear in any other 3D zelda game, they stop after Ocarina, Nintendo must have also thought it was unfair
Just… peek around the corner? Pretty sure Navi tells you how to do this when you are going to the forest temple. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be at a 2 way stop for y’all, cars parked all the way down the street so you can’t see oncoming traffic. Is your solution to just bolt out into the intersection? Or slowly creep forward till you can see traffic?
If you’re watching Game Grumps for gameplay then you’re missing the point of Game Grumps, it’s an ADHD fueled improv disaster. The video games are only there to generate improv prompts and occasionally for Arin to abruptly engage in audio-coitus with Sonic the Hedgehog
being honest the main premise of "main character has to lose or something bad happens" sounds cool but not cool enough to be a whole show. havent watched the pilot though
You know it has no connection to the Game Grumps right? Just Arin Hanson. It's like saying you hate Batman because Zack Synder had a hand in a couple DC movies.
So Gameoverse is 17 years old, the original Newgrounds animation. The creator, Ross O'Donovan, also known as RubberNinja, the scourge of many Mario Maker players, is literally a GameGrump. He knows his way around games. I'm not saying the writing is perfect, after all it is based on a 17 year old show. The panic attack could have waited, I don't hate it, bit let us get a little attached to Kit first.
To be fair it only has one episode. So long as the show itself is out for free to watch I am willing to give it the time it needs to become fleshed out.
Now in saying that yeah the pilot was pretty bad in a lot of ways. The panic attack scene, the sound mixing, etc. There's a lot that they need to figure out real quick or else the series is going to be a flop. Which is sad, because Ross wanted to do this show for years.
I think the big thing I really dislike about Glitch is just how much merchandise they pump out, even on the first episode. It makes it feel a lot more Astroturfed than it is.
I don’t see it as bland. Maybe similar has been done before, but the main characters having to help the "villains" of certain planets to save people is a really interesting premise to me.
What I don’t like about the show specifically is the two ultimatums. You either clear the game and annihilate the world you live in or don’t clear the game and stay oppressed, by an evil tyrant. And what about other kinds of games? Ones that are endless, or cozy ones? What about those ones? They might touch a bit more on them in later episodes, but for now I’m not so sure how this world works.
Tbh. I'll think I'll never enjoy this show at the very concept. It's not that I don't like it. I just don't find the concept enjoyable? I just don't like the idea of our heroes leaving the world as is, the villains undefeated even if it's for their own sake, nothing will ever make things like that okay for in my mind I guess, so watching it feels weird... Like I usually am fine to Glitch's stuff. Hell, I was an Smg4 fan who saw the entirety of Meta Runner 1st season airing at the Smg4 channel first. But knowing Glitch's track record alongside my own experiences with Meta Runner, Sunset Paradise and Murder Drones, I know the show will probably be too short to actually make use of the dynamics that can be built or rushing them. The plot will probably spiral into something super big or moving too fast and discarding filler, which I appreciate now thanks to my experience with Meta Runner and Murder Drones. TADC barely manages to do it in my eyes, balance out character dynamics within a small episode limit and they did it by making episodes mostly filler with plot points sprinkled in sometimes and a movie, yet there's still some complaints overall.
I personally didn’t enjoy how jschlatts character had a poor microphone the whole time, i get it kinda pairs with the robot filter thing but it felt really lazy
the 'panic attack' is so stupid. It gets quickly resolved because a character that knows nothing about kit and her tragic backstory (that we barely see)... learns to be confident?
im ngl i just dislike this show because the week it came out every gaming sub had a post where it was like "the person from gameoverse is in X game wowww"
I wouldn’t be too bothered about the show if it wasn’t for the fact that it had too many plot holes and things that just did not make any sense in the grand scheme of things. Not only that, but the fact that Arin is the voice director and already gave a bad impression with voicing THREE DIFFERENT FUCKING CHARACTERS, TWO OF THEM USING HIS EAR SHATTERING TOAD IMPRESSION is also just terrible because it gives less opportunity for other voice actors to be a part of the project
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u/Ben_ratman 16h ago
“This show also expects us to think that Panic attacks are a great way to show trauma and convey deep writing.” Yeah that’s glitch’s ol reliable