The discourse has been absolutely insufferable about “Mixtape” since its release last week. It came out swinging with surprisingly strong reviews, and we all know that games that don’t involve shooting people in the face are never allowed to score well on aggregators.

The half-hearted fake outrage is going strong as always. It’s somehow the woke mind virus and “not really a game.” It’s all trite and boring, so we can write those dicks off right away. Fuck ’em.

Then there are the much more reasonable complaints about how the game represents class and race. Is this a game fetishizing the rich kid experience of the ’90s? Maybe! It’s at least worth considering. Why is the soundtrack so, so white? A reasonable thing to ask. For something that revolves so heavily around curating the perfect playlist, it definitely could use some more variety.

But even taking all of those sincere critiques seriously, that doesn’t mean you have to skip the game or kick it to the curb. It’s a good idea to internalize good faith criticisms of things you enjoy. Humans are capable of nuanced interpretations of media. I believe in us.

With the (scare quotes) “haters” out of the way, let’s deal with the 10/10 scores and hyperbole in the other direction. I can see how a person born in a very specific place and time could play this game and be bowled over with emotion. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug, but it’s pretty far from a perfect game.

Despite the fact that I check the vast majority of the demographic boxes for “Mixtape,” my mind remains unblown. There’s just not enough to sink my teeth into here. It’s a fleeting good time, but I’m not left with any interest in where the characters go from here. I can’t imagine what a “Mixtape” fanfic would even look like. Is it just a playlist in prose?

When talking through my feelings on the game with Jared, I stumbled on the TV/movie comparison. When you have to tell a story in about three hours, you end up sanding off all of the edges to keep everything moving. That has upsides for sure, but it leaves me wanting.

The “Life is Strange” games are more navel gazy. Shaggier too. Lots of slow, awkward moments that don’t go anywhere, but somehow make the characters more three dimensional. Heck, I’ve thought much more about the characters from “Bugsnax” than I have from this game. That’s at least a little damning, right?

Stacey and crew are simple sketches of people that don’t seem to imply much going on beyond what’s shown on screen. That’s just fine for a $20 roller coaster ride, but I don’t think it could really sustain a proper fandom.

My prediction is that the glowing reviews will tarnish with time. That’s fine! Reviews depict a singular moment. It’s okay if that doesn’t last forever.

All of this is to say that I like “Mixtape,” but I’ll never love it. It’s a “Grant Game” for sure, but it’s a middling example that I’d be surprised if I revisited ever again.

Sometimes the answer really is in the middle of two extremes. What d’ya know?

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Image credit: “Mixtape”