And there it is. If asked to describe my experience with Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi: The Genie and the Amp in two words, I would nearly instantaneously reply with, "Shit sucked." However, I feel that to truly comprehend the intensity behind that statement, you have to realize the subtle nuances of shitfuckery that make up this game. My friend, who I completed the game with, said, "This is the worst game I've ever completed." I think I may have to agree with this statement. Sure there are worse games out there, but I rarely waste enough of my time to complete these gaming abominations.
Why is this game so bad? Well, considering this a 2-part review, there's a whole mess of things I could say (and have already said). However, to sum up the biggest problems with this game, I need not say more than, "It doesn't work," or, "It's broken." Now, granted, I'm not talking CheetahMen 2 broken, because we have proven that it is actually possible to beat this game, but not without a fight. "Oh," I hear you say, "You mean, it's difficult, right? You mentioned that in the first part of your review." No no, your fight won't be against the enemies in the game. You have to try and tackle the much stronger foe of shitty programming. I didn't mention this in my first review because I hadn't encountered it yet.
In the majority of the video games that I ENJOY playing, when I hear the word, "glitch," I tend to think of things like silly graphical glitches (i.e. seeing through Mario's head in Mario 64 with those awful camera angles). I had heard of more serious "game-breaking" glitches in other games, but I hadn't really personally encountered one before... until now, whereupon instead of merely encountering one, I encountered about 3. The first one we ran into was pretty baffling. My friend and I were fighting hard. He was almost dead, but I had nearly 75% of my life, so it seemed like we would be fine. He died, rendering him a ghost that can only do a tiny fraction of the damage a living character can do. I was still alive and kickin' until suddenly WHAM! My life disappeared, my character fell to the ground and immediately vanished into thin air. This wasn't the result of a magical item or a secret move... my character just disappeared. After a brief swearing session, it had come to our attention that we didn't actually get a "game over." My friend had to continue to fight the mid-boss as a ghost and my character was unaccounted for. Needless to say, this took forever and absolutely should not have happened. Upon reaching the next checkpoint, my character reappeared and we were eventually able to clear the level, but this is a pretty HUGE glitch (and actually happened at least one other time throughout our play-through). "How could it get any worse?" I thought. I simply had to keep playing to find out.
How many beat-em-ups have jumps that impede your progress and will take your lives if you fall in them? Albeit not a lot, there certainly are a few that come to mind, such as that obnoxious bridge jump in Double Dragon. I was a little surprised to see this happen in this game, but it wasn't something I hadn't seen before. Upon sinking into a tar pit, we found ourselves being sent back to the beginning of the section of a level. It was pretty weird since neither of us had fully "sunken" so to speak, and generally being in tar up to your knees wouldn't constitute a death in a video game. This game likes to break the rules... regardless of whether or not it does so intentionally. Despite finding this to be bullshit, it wasn't unreasonable. At least it wasn't the beginning of the whole damned level. We repeated the section, carefully jumping over the pits and rapidly jumping out of them to avoid knee-high tar fatalities. We made it past them and got into one of the usual brawling sequences. Much to our surprise, pleasure, and displeasure, we were actually playing well and not receiving much damage. Suddenly, without rhyme or reason, we stopped moving, and were sent back to the beginning of that section of the level, just like when we'd "died in the tar pit." Ahhh... "And there it is." It all made sense now. We never died in the tar pits, and you can't die in the tar pits. The game randomly glitched and sent us backwards. My friend and I literally stood up and started shouting, "What the fuck?!?!" for nearly 5 minutes.
I believe there's only a few possible explanations for this occurrence. The obvious answer? This game had some terrible programmers and evidently even worse testers. I think the true answer lies beyond this though, as this game is clearly a product of evil forces. It is my presumption that this "reversing" glitch is intentional. I believe that on the easier difficulty, this wouldn't happen. However, knowing that the only people who would bother to beat this game on the hard difficulty already have some seriously masochistic tendencies, the programmers decided they would torture these poor fools further by randomly, but intentionally, throwing players backwards in the game forcing them to repeat various sections.
The other, more optimistic way of looking at these glitches is the "Divine Intervention" theory. This theory states that there is a kind and loving God who tries His very best to ensure no one suffers the entire duration of this game. Throughout the game, a higher power has been constantly trying to get people to stop playing. He works in mysterious ways, sometimes actually causing pain by continuously making players lose. When Satan's power is strong, however, some individuals will continue to play regardless of these frustrations so the higher power attempts to make players believe the game can't be beaten by causing repeat glitches that force players backwards. Unfortunately, there are rare occasions in which His glory is left unseen, and the power of Satan prevails, leaving lost souls doomed for an eternity (10 hours or so) to suffer in the Hell that is, "Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi: The Genie and the Amp."
Whichever theory you believe in, just remember one thing. The only way you can truly beat this game is to never play it.
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