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| Lisa: The Painful: a life ruining experience |
Even with all of this the game never really caught my attention until quite recently. I had been looking for some obscure games to talk about for a while, but obviously i still wanted something good, I wasn't about to spend money on a sub-par product. That's when Lisa resurfaced in my brain and I decided to look at it to see if it was worth my time, when to my surprise the game sat at a perfect 10/10 on steam, and it was only $14 dollars as well, so I decided to pick it up. I got the game using a $50 steam gift card and I bought Lisa and another game called Killer7. What would really come as a surprise though is that both of those games became some of my favourite games of all time, and probably some of my most memorable experiences of my life (especially Killer7, but i'll probably talk about that some other time). So, I might as well just get straight into why it's so good in the first place
The story of Lisa is deceptively simple. You play as Brad Armstrong (bald guy pictured above) living in a dystopian society where all women are gone, presumably from some incident never told to the player. Yet seemingly out of thin-air Brad finds a wrapped up baby girl in the middle of the desert. And he and his friends decides to take her into her care. The thing about Brad is that he grew up in an extremely abusive household and lifestyle. He lives with his father Marty Armstrong and his baby sister Lisa, with his dad living in a broken down shack of a house constantly abusing Brad by throwing things like beer bottles at him and just generally showing zero signs of compassion, and it seems that Brad does all the caring for Lisa. Unfortunately right from the title screen we see Lisa, presumably near the age of 8-10, having hung herself, presumably from the toxic living conditions. So, while in this dystopian world, Brad takes this drug called "Joy", an anti-depressant to help him cope with his PTSD of when he was a child. So when Brad finds the baby girl in the desert, he decides to keep her, to give himself a what he claims to be a "second chance", naming the girl Lisa. Until eventually some bandit gang kills most of Brads friends and takes the girl. So Brad decides to embark on a journey to find her, for better or for worst.
An important thing to note is that Lisa: The Painful does not pull any punches when it comes to its themes. I'm sure I don't need to explain the possibilities of there only being one little girl left in a world full of bandits and gangs, deprived of any sense of enjoyment. Of what kind of themes can come into play, so if dark story's or horrifying subject matter is too much too handle then I would not recommend purchasing this game. I'm not going to go too in-depth with that kind of stuff in this but it's just important to note for anyone interested in purchasing the game.
I'd like to go over a few smaller points first before I really talk about the amazing stuff in this game, first off, I'd like to talk about the graphics, you've probably noticed its pixelated, as are many of these types of games. pretty uninteresting at first but the game manages to have some very clever moments. For instance there are moments in the game where Brad will have flashbacks to when he was a child, when this happens the background, usually just mountains in the distance, but during one of these traumatic flashbacks the scenery will have a nasty red tint to it and the background will turn into this strange bloody root type things, kind of looking like meaty spines entangling into each other. This isn't pixelated it's realistic and and gory, and it can be a huge juxtaposition just talking to some guy in a house, and then leaving said house only to be greeted by this. It's extremely clever especially considering the limited technology.
I'd also like to mention the music, honestly, it's unlike anything I've heard in a game before. The music is so alien, and this fits the tone extremely well. Even in the supposed "happy" music, there's still some undertone of horror that's prevalent with each track, not only are they extremely memorable, but they also sound good too, I've left some links to my favourite tracks, if you'd like to listen to them, ====> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkwXKL0F9Fg
So obviously a great soundtrack and clever visuals isn't really that deserving of a 10/10, so is there a bigger reason to this games critical acclaim, well yeah.
So as stated before, we learn about what were dealing with from the very beginning of the story, Brad wants to go find Lisa, the last girl alive. This is what the beginning consists of, just detailing Brads troubled past, his use of joy, and what his motivations are. This goes for around 5 minutes, and when replaying the game can feel pretty long-winded, but it helps set the stage of whats to come on this journey exceptionally well.
The journey only truly starts when you meet a man named Terry Hintz, who got chased up a tree by a puppy, you agree to kill the puppy for him, this is where we get introduced to the combat in the game. The game is turn based, meaning each character takes turns attacking each other with different moves, some moves make enemy's uncomfortable, some moves inflict poison, some hit multiple opponents, some set your opponents on fire, and some boost your team-mates. It's all about choosing the right moves at the right times. There's a lot more to it, but that's the main gist of it. Also, something I really appreciate is that a lot of moves make sense in the world of Lisa, for instance, one of your party members can has the ability to twist the opponents nipple, which has a 50/50 chance of either pissing them off or weirding them out, pissing them off means they do more damage, and weirding them out means they do less. Another character throws legal documents at opponents, which not only confuses the opponent, but also gives them paper cuts, and during the game you can come across a party member that drinks tons of alcohol, so for one of his moves, you replace his drink with gasoline, which he then vomits on the enemy, making the enemy more susceptible to fire based attacks. Not only does this provide an extra layer of gameplay to moves, it's also just really funny (especially the legal document one, that one always makes me laugh).
That's another part I love about this game, the humor. It's all dark as hell, but it's the only bit of happiness your getting out of this world. It's noticeable right from the beginning that it's going to be funny. For instance, near the beginning there's this guy that's keeping the last of the kids in the world (all five of them), and one kids playing with a match, which he accidentally lights, the guy taking care of the kids then says " hey! be careful there, excuse me sir, could you please get me that bucket of water?". so grab the bucket that's three feet in front of him and throw it on the kids, only for them to ignite into flames, the guy then says " you fool! that was my prized bucket of gasoline!". The screen then pans over to a mountain extremely far away with the bucket of water on top. Maybe I'm just crazy but I found that pretty funny, hey, you take it when you can in this game.
So after you save Terry Hintz he decides to join you (even when asked not too). This is where you then get back to your house to find most of your friends dead, "secrets out Brad, they found her". So now with your new found follower, you go on a quest to save Lisa. This is where the game really opens up, you'll get to an area with tons of caves caves, a climbable cliff and multiple paths, from here, your free to explore the world to your content. Around here is when I found out about an important mechanic of Lisa, Joy. The drug I mentioned previously not only has story relevance, but also gameplay relevance. You can take Joy during battles, doing so will make that character extremely powerful and demolish every thing that stands before them, the problem is that if you don't keep taking Joy your character suffers withdrawal, meaning they will do little to know damage for a long period of time, this is genius. This isn't something where just told is bad, you as a player get to experience how Joy effects the individuals, through visual story telling and most importantly gameplay. We'll come back to joy later.
So now the world is your oyster, you have so many places to go and people, and the people you meet may be the most memorable part of it all. Now that your off fighting gangs, you need a team, so that was my first mission, and a mission it was, there are over 30 unique party members in this game, all with there own personality and backstory. Usually you have to complete some task to have them join, or for many can just pay them mags. What are mags you may ask? well that's the currency in the game, there called mags because there pornographic magazines, yep, that's the currency in this world, porn. A pretty funny form of currency, but on deeper reflection just makes you more worried to what may happen to Lisa. Anyway, a big selling point of the game is that there are tons of people that you can recruit, each with there own unique character. For instance, my team consisted of Brad, a hyper spiritual buff guy, a raging alcoholic, a cocky archer, and a masked wrestler. You can only equip up to three party members, not including yourself. At first to me it seemed arbitrary to have so many unique party members when you could only equip three, but as you continue in the game you find out that your party members can die, as in, literally die, gone forever. This can usually occur when playing the Russian roulette mini-game, or there can be certain mutant creatures that can do the same.
That may be the biggest selling point of the entire experience, the fact that your decisions matter, every choice you make isn't just something to vaguely increase the depth of the game with the allusion of "choice". No, even near the beginning of the game, you encounter a gang that gives you a choice, either hand all of your belongings over, or they kill Terry Hintz. There's a lot to consider with this choice, on the one hand, you only just started the game and are bound to find better items, but the truth is the same with Terry as well, so it's extremely difficult deciding. There's another part where you can either have a powerful party member die or get your one of your arms cut off, so every attack that uses that hand is now un-usable. These types of decisions are littered through out the game, hell, even resting is a risk in itself. For most games, resting would mean a break from the action to get all your health back. But the places you rest at are in the open, on the ground. So a lot of the time you wake up only to have a party member be kidnapped, and have to go kill the people that took him. And even if you get to the people that kidnapped your guy, if you don't have enough mags to trade, they'll just kill him and then kill you. Every decision in the game has some tangible effect that has consequences.
Finally I'd like to talk about the story. First-and-for-most this is an entirely character driven story, meaning that the story either lives or dies depending on the quality of it's characters. I usually like to do these review type things spoiling as little as possible so that if someone decides to take my recommendation then they can have the most unique experience possible, so I'll basically be saying nothing about the story, but I can full-heatedly say that the story is a definite 9/10 for me. It basically nails everything on the head in terms of its progression, with tons of twists and turns around every corner, the story will keep you guessing even when the game ends, and has so many emotional kick to the ball moments that it may cause physical pain. And the ending, oh man, if you weren't sufficiently depressed before the end then get ready to permanently hate the rest of your existence, because the ending fails to disappoint. Brad goes through one of the most heart-wrenching character arks of all time and the ending creates such a swirl of emotion that you feel so conflicted with the morality of Brad. It's probably one of my most favourite endings to a game ever, and the true ending of the game will confuse as much as it will enlighten, I seriously can't stress enough about how good Brad, and for that matter every main characters character ark is. I just hope you find it as mortifying yet satisfying endings of anything ever.
even after saying all this, it's probably super unclear as to why this games so good even still, and admittedly it's very hard to culminate into words about its quality, but I'll try my best.
Lisa: The Painful is a grossly engaging trek through an unendingly interesting yet mortifying world which engrosses the player into its seamless environments which detail the horrors of said world. The player through the eyes of the main character Brad Armstrong will experience these horrors first-hand leading the player to truly grasp the severity of his quest and will experience Brads ups and downs which will alter how the game will continue, making the player feel like there actions have an importance which will directly effect how the game is experienced. Not only is Lisa refreshing story wise but also when it comes to gameplay, the game has 30+ characters to join your quest each with there own personality, and finding these companions is all ways enjoyable too as the game has a great sense of humor which is prevalent through-out the game which always nicely balances the darkness of the story, leading Lisa to be an enjoyable experience from beginning to end. In conclusion Lisa innovates video games as a whole with it's refreshing story and gameplay and manages to basically perfect the tropes that came before leading to a an unfamiliar yet resonant atmosphere that keeps you interested with it's dark tone and brilliant story but always manages to stay entertaining on a basic level but incredibly deep on another.
Those were my thoughts on Lisa, I apologise if I spoiled anything major for someone. But I hope I did a pretty good job with that
Overall I give Lisa a 9/10
