Thoughts: Goodbye Volcano High
Leave it to a game about dinosaurs to help me reconnect with humanity.
My generation is no stranger to the so-called End Of The World. Remember 2012? What about the ever-present knowledge that climate change is slowly destroying Earth? Or, you know, when we lived through a global pandemic and couldn’t leave our homes? Feeling like everything will end is second nature to us, so Goodbye Dinosaur High, a narrative adventure game from indie studio KO-OP, feels intensely relatable. I mean, we’re not going to be obliterated by a asteroid anytime soon, but the anxiety that accompanies such an anticipated disaster is all-too familiar.
Let’s address the Brontosaurus in the room right away — the art style is not going to be for everyone. I’ve seen a lot of people refuse to play this game due to the character designs. I don’t necessarily fault anyone for that, but I grew to appreciate the nuance of the designs and fashion as the game progressed. The animation is consistently impressive, and at moments it looks exactly like all the anime series it’s clearly inspired by (even the voice acting is spectacular). I believe it’s more than worth getting past the art to get to what really matters here— the story. The setting, characters, and themes are extremely well done, making this easily my favorite of this type of visual novel-style narrative game. Yes, even more than the seminal Life Is Strange, which this game owes a lot to.
Life Is Strange has a great setting and characters as well, but it also had some clumsy puzzles and an obtuse time-travel game mechanic. Goodbye Volcano High’s gameplay gimmick is a rhythm game you play during the musical segments, and it’s way more fun than it needs to be. I was shocked how well it lined up with dramatic moments in the songs, and often found myself rocking out alongside the band. Some of the most powerful moments in the story hit their climaxes during your performances too, so the strength of these minigames help the themes really resonate.
And those themes are heavy. As I alluded to earlier, the teens of Volcano High are dealing with news that a massive asteroid is hurdling towards them, so they’re all on edge. They’re about to graduate and enter their adulthood, but what if they don’t get one? Main protagonist Fang is dead-set on a career in music alongside their best friends, but the dread of it all starts to pull them apart. The characters are all well-observed in their various fears and hang-ups, and their dialogue rarely comes across as cheesy or forced. It also has excellent LGBTQ+ representation, including a scene with the best discussion of trans identity I think I’ve ever seen in media. By the end of Fang’s journey, I found myself deeply invested in their plight.
The most interesting part of Goodbye Volcano High’s design is how it takes advantage of being interactive. I mentioned the rhythm game mechanic already, but it also features a tabletop RPG storyline that acts as a way for the characters to process their feelings another way. It’s a story-within-a-story gimmick that actually feels earned by the time you finish the campaign.
Goodbye Volcano High was already high on my list of anticipated games this year, but it managed to best my expectations. It’s a great example of technology meeting artistry in clever, exciting ways, and a new high watermark for the visual novel/narrative genre. Fang’s story of self-discovery is truly moving, and a great reminder that since we’re all experiencing the big, chaotic, terrifying sweep of life at once, we might as well experience it together— especially if we only have so much time on Earth.
