[PREVIEW] Don’t Stop, Girlypop! – Slay (the enemies)!

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For years we have been told to stop trying to make “fetch” happen, because it’s not going to happen. Since the 2000s, achieving this goal has been more of a pipe dream, until Funny Fintan Softworks announced their latest project: Don’t Stop, Girlypop!. The game, scheduled for release on January 29, shows that it wants to embody everything we understand as “fetch”: coolness, freshness, glamour and, above all, a very stylish presentation.

Fast and Fabulous 

Don’t Stop, Girlypop! is a Y2K arena movement shooter that combines boomer shooter mechanics with advanced contemporary movement abilities. The player’s goal is to stop the mining corporation Tigris Nix that wants to deprive the planet of the force that keeps it alive: The Love. Save the world by mastering a fast-paced combat system and become Cupid of death in the most fashionable way possible. 

Even if someone doesn’t play shooters, they are at least familiar with their characteristic features: gathering skills and weapons, quick decisions, multiple on-screen elements, etc. However, one of the key attributes of these titles is their very fast and dynamic gameplay, which is at the heart of our adventure in Don’t Stop, Girlypop!. From the very beginning, the game makes it clear that standing still is not an option, because the faster we move, the more damage we can inflict on enemies and the more we can heal our character. 

It is worth noting that we can gain speed in various ways: from environmental elements to combinations of movements and abilities. Slam, dash, and double jump not only allow us to go faster and avoid attacks during combat, but they are also essential for navigating subsequent levels. An example of this is the sequence involving running away from an oncoming train, in which we have to use the movements we learned earlier in the right order to be able to outrun the speeding vehicle. While most of the action takes place in arenas filled with enemies, such fragments provide an interesting break and help us hone the fluidity of our movements. 

The revolution in pink

Smooth movements contribute to impressive visuals. It is not obvious that a first-person shooter game would be full of pink, glitter, and heart-shaped bullets. Funny Fintan Softworks’ game consistently executes its chosen aesthetic, adding funky background music, writing dialogue worthy of a true girlboss, and allowing players to decorate their weapons with colorful ornaments. The atmosphere is definitely a huge advantage of this production, even though at first you may feel overwhelmed by the large number of elements at once. 

The narrative in this game is also presented clearly to us right from the start – we are fighting an evil corporation using kindness and love. We can learn more about our mission and the world presented to us through telephone conversations and listening to echoes of the past. While the story seems fairly simple and formulaic, it fits in so well with the aesthetics and gameplay, which play the leading role here. 

Don’t Stop, Girlypop! has a real chance of attracting not only fans of shooters, but also people who are not particularly fond of this genre. With its originality and quirkiness offers not only the release of dopamine by shooting waves of enemies, but also the experience of a completely crazy dimension, where fetch happens at every turn and we are the ones making it happen.