On the internet, everybody is angry all the time. The 2017 release of Getting Over It With Bennett Foddy, then, marked a special occasion: a time when everybody on the internet was mad at the same thing. Pogostuck is trying to replicate that feat.
Pogostuck, a game whose store page unabashedly says itās inspired by Getting Over It, is about climbing a surreal mountain and failing repeatedly. Itās different from Getting Over It in two central ways: 1) the device of your alternating salvation and damnation is a pogo stick instead of a hammer, and 2) you can see other players struggling their way up the mountain at the same time as you. Also, the little people you play as make Mario-like noises that are cute at first but become horrifically annoying when repeated every couple seconds for hours on end. Thereās leaderboards and character customization but no direct interaction between players. Instead, the presence of others mainly serves to highlight your successes andāmore likelyāinevitable progress-obliterating failures.
The gameās only been out since the end of last week, but already, itās produced some very satisfying clips of people falling down mountains. For example, hereās Lirik losing more than an hour of progress shortly after whining about the terrible crime of his fans excitedly informing friends that they killed him in games:
Hereās noted troll (and marshal of one of Twitchās most obnoxious communities) Forsen suffering almost the exact same fall:
The game even got streamer FlashGamesNemesis so worked up that he, er, went on a surprisingly on-point rant about the economy, the housing market, and baby boomers:
And lastly, my personal favorite: Hereās LudwigAhgren giving a big, bombastic speech about how heās the worst in his friend group at Smash and bad at physical sports, but heās got a special āsomething other people donāt, a power that can beat anythingāābefore absolutely eating it:
āAw shitā indeed.
