Well it's a good thing that I have waited for the 17 volumes that were available as DLC at the time to be added into the updated PC release when it came out on consoles.
But after playing through the whole game with skipping a few dialogue stuff so I don't have to play for far too long, looked up a walkthrough guide to get the good endings and just wanted to wait for Act 3 to come out... yeah I just stick and prefer the game's Point and Click Adventure style gameplay instead of a visual novel.
I want those 7.3 hours back, Hussie!!!
But after playing through the whole game with skipping a few dialogue stuff so I don't have to play for far too long, looked up a walkthrough guide to get the good endings and just wanted to wait for Act 3 to come out... yeah I just stick and prefer the game's Point and Click Adventure style gameplay instead of a visual novel.
I want those 7.3 hours back, Hussie!!!
tbh i really don't like the art or writing x_x i'm disappointed bc i love all the hiveswap trolls but i felt like friendsim doesn't add much to their characterization. imo they were even a bit ooc. def play it if you're dying for content while waiting for hiveswap act 3, but it doesn't feel canon to me and i didn't even find the jokes to be funny. not rly worth it.
exists basically so people can make tiermaker tierlists of the characters.
.... uh, anyways, here's mine https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FRDeQA0XIAQDubr?format=jpg&name=orig
.... uh, anyways, here's mine https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FRDeQA0XIAQDubr?format=jpg&name=orig
The UI and everything just feels very cheap and unfinished. The characters are fun, but there's 36 of them and it starts to feel a bit like a chore half-way through.
As far as gameplay goes, every single episode is the same - two choices, 3 endings (wrong on first choice, wrong on second, right on second). There's no penalty for getting it wrong, so it's basically just lots of reading. Like Homestuck.
As far as gameplay goes, every single episode is the same - two choices, 3 endings (wrong on first choice, wrong on second, right on second). There's no penalty for getting it wrong, so it's basically just lots of reading. Like Homestuck.
Friendsim is okay, but it's pretty messy, the quality of the routes varies widely, with some being good and others being awful, the latter also applying to the game's ending which is, to put it lightly, a nonsensical disappointing mess, if you are curious to see then I recommend just seeing gameplay as you will not be missing anything by playing your self, especially because nothing of what is developed here is followed up in Hiveswap ACT 2, including the personalities of some characters.
Really the thing that I feel I appreciate here the most, beyond all other elements of what Friendsim does, is the way it's a goofy visual novel with the simultaneously lowest and highest stakes one could have. On one hand, you're in a constant tightrope where your character is likely to get killed through the most minute, stupid interactions possible, and yet, the entire game is based around largely low stakes, chill character interactions with the ultimate goal of just, making friends with a bunch of goofy characters. It's all just some goofy fun that makes for a mostly great vibe game, but it ends up being kinda muddled thanks to the wildly disparate quality of everything from route to route. It's kinda ridiculous putting a lot of sprites back to back and seeing just how terrible some of them look, but that's still not as distracting as the writing side of things.
While you've got a lot of routes hat feel pretty similar in vibe (in a good way) being just like I said, low stakes hangouts with quirky characters, there are some choices that entirely miss the mark. Of these, the biggest offenders are whenever things try delving further into the weird, overarching story that the game tries to establish, usually leading to a lot of boring expositional dialogue vaguely relating to timelines and fate and stuff, or they're a certain pair of routes in the last couple volumes, specifically those relating to Marvus and Lanque. Not only does the writing quality feel like a severe dip in places to the point where it feels like a poorly written fanfic, but they're oddly horny in a way that just, really, really doesn't vibe, especially when as said, most of this has been about making friends with others and nothing more. To have these two characters be inexplicably thirsted over by the protagonist is not only total whiplash from most of what else is going on, but it's made all the worse by the fact that it just feels weird and creepy in how it's framed. Still though, even with there being some tremendous dips in quality and a general sense of inconsistency, I still had a good time with this, and think that it was a wonderful chillout game for a bit of comfy fun.
While you've got a lot of routes hat feel pretty similar in vibe (in a good way) being just like I said, low stakes hangouts with quirky characters, there are some choices that entirely miss the mark. Of these, the biggest offenders are whenever things try delving further into the weird, overarching story that the game tries to establish, usually leading to a lot of boring expositional dialogue vaguely relating to timelines and fate and stuff, or they're a certain pair of routes in the last couple volumes, specifically those relating to Marvus and Lanque. Not only does the writing quality feel like a severe dip in places to the point where it feels like a poorly written fanfic, but they're oddly horny in a way that just, really, really doesn't vibe, especially when as said, most of this has been about making friends with others and nothing more. To have these two characters be inexplicably thirsted over by the protagonist is not only total whiplash from most of what else is going on, but it's made all the worse by the fact that it just feels weird and creepy in how it's framed. Still though, even with there being some tremendous dips in quality and a general sense of inconsistency, I still had a good time with this, and think that it was a wonderful chillout game for a bit of comfy fun.
i’d say a good 75% of the routes are excellent reads, but the sudden “sexual predator trans boy” shit at the end (and the toxic behavior from the writers that followed) sort of ruins it for me, and like pesterquest its difficult to separate it from the other homestuck media its been written alongside