Things I've Learned:

- I have anxiety about not utilizing every second of my existence for something productive.

- It’s okay for nothing to happen. Moments occur, and it’s just as important to enjoy those as it is to appreciate the natural nothingness that life has as its base.

- Task-hunting can give purpose, but experiencing each instant as it is gives fulfillment.

- Discovery and the pursuit of newness shouldn’t take you away from treasuring what you can already explore.

- My experience was both heightened and weakened by not knowing Japanese. I felt even more engrossed with the childlike discovery this game roots itself in, but there were moments I felt lost that might have been solved by knowing what the dialogue was saying. (this is really the only negative I have to say about this game, and it's not the game's fault at all! if the proposed English translation releases, this game will be an easy 10/10 for me.)

- I had a pretty good summer. Even though it's not even spring yet.

you can create your own pitching animations that will be performed in-game. if that doesn't make this better than most other baseball games, I don't know what does.

this game allows you to customize a lot, actually. choosing to play as one of apparently over 4,000 real japanese high school baseball teams, creating your own team outfit, flag, and song, all to get absolutely demolished in the first game of the tournament.

the baseball here is solid too. batting feels incredibly satisfying when you get a good hit in, fielding happens automatically yet you can override base-throwing, and the pitching is alright. definitely not perfect; sometimes it feels like you can't do anything to do better and the systems are a bit janky. the game overall has a really shtunky feel to it which can take some getting used to.

unfortunately there's also a language barrier to get through, but once you do, you can expect a pretty fun baseball game

definitely a clear "something's wrong" with the hit detection on notes, but I don't think it's as broken as people make it out to be. a lot of the notes are phrased in really bizarre rhythms compared to how you might initially expect them to be based on how parappa actually raps each phrase, which is the big reason I think people struggle with gameplay. I also feel like the game can kinda cheat you at times with certain second/fourth phrases (looking at you, last two lines of cheap cheap and the freestyle section of the final concert).
regardless, the overall Parappa Energy baked within every aspect of this game's design brings me insane amounts of joy and makes this one of the few titles I can fail repeatedly and still have a great time. this silly whatever-animal-he-is has a permanent place in my heart.