Beefstrong is one of those obscure indie developers that, to be honest, should stay obscure. And that's not meant in a bad way. But the way Beefstrong makes games and the visual identity and the design and EVERYTHING about Beefstrong games simply can not work in the mainstream games industry. It's so novel, so unique, so radically different that there is no coterminous creation in the realm of 3d space. It's unabashed in its identity, and that naturally makes it into a marmite-like product, except in this case the vast majority of people will walk away in the first 10 minutes, confused about its appeal, and the remaining 5% of people will fall madly in love with it.

I'm in the latter group. If I wasn't trying to be objective here, this -- along with any other Beefstrong game -- would be an easy 5/5. Yes, it's a crudely-made game with a hilariously low budget. Yet, there is a notion of artistic merit here that is severely lacking from the majority of the games industry. These small, undiscovered passion projects are amongst my favorite in gaming -- and Beefstrong does passion projects better than almost anyone else. '

A while ago there was an Atlantic oped that game shouldn't have stories, as they are the "medium of material". THIS is the perfect poster child for that line of thought. This is a game obsessed with material, and what emerges is an incredibly cohesive creative vision.

Overall Rating: 4/5 (Masterpiece)
on a side note, this also reminded me a bit of Mary Flanagan's criminally underrated 2003 game [domestic]