Some of us have comfort media — a piece of media that brings us comfort and joy, no matter how many times we revisit it.
One of the questions asked during the WeblogPoMo AMA blogging challenge in Novermber 2024 is "What's your comfort movie/show/piece of media, and - if you feel like sharing - why?" This question was originally asked by Lewis Dale on Mastodon and answered by Kyle, and it gives me a great opportunity to gush about my own comfort media.
In my case, my ultimate comfort media is Cassette Beasts, an indie monster collecting role-playing video game developed by the United Kingdom-based Bytten Studio.
I discovered Cassette Beasts through recommendation from a generous fellow gamer friend who also gifted me the game on Steam. From the moment I started playing Cassette Beasts in July 2023, I quickly fell in love with the game, and after beating the main campaign, it officially became my favourite video game ever.
As for why Cassette Beasts is my number one comfort media and favourite video game, it is because Cassette Beasts reaffirms my taste in video games by combining just about everything I like to see in a video game:
- Companion characters with their own story arcs whom you can team up with in battle and build platonic or romantic relationships with
- A roster of creatures with interesting designs
- Racially diverse cast of human characters that include visibly Black and brown characters
- Unambiguously canon LGBTQ+ characters
- Character creator with they/them pronouns options
- Turn-based battles with interesting mechanics
- A huge world to explore
- Eldritch horrors beyond comprehension with intriguing lore
- Story with an optimistic message about humanity
- Leftist messages, including anti-capitalism and anti-imperialism
- Excellent soundtrack
- And more!
I was invested in Cassette Beasts to the extent that not only I had beaten the game twice, I ended up unlocking all 123 achievements on Steam. Very few RPGs make me want to unlock all the achievements, so it is telling how much I love Cassette Beasts that I am willing to spend time and effort to work for all the achievements. I enjoy every moment of Cassette Beasts, a sentiment I can genuinely apply to only a very few games.
Cassette Beasts has the distinct honour of being one of my favourite entertainment media because not only I like it and find it entertaining, but also I genuinely consider it a well-made masterpiece. The more I played and explored Cassette Beasts, the more amazed I was for how much thought was clearly put into making the game, which only got reinforced after reading trivia about the game on its official wiki.
Cassette Beasts is a refreshing take on the monster collecting genre, from monster collecting mechanic, battle system, elemental type match ups, story, characters, lore, world building, map design, etc. If you have any interest in monster collecting game, I strongly recommend you to check out Cassette Beasts.
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