Quick Thoughts On: Caster
To be entirely clear, Caster is pretty terrible. It’s also a ton of fun, in large part because it’s only just barely holding it together and doesn’t really give a damn if anything makes sense as long as it’s entertaining. Everything about Caster is more than a little insane and nonsensical. It’s always trying new stuff just because it can, and though this means the whole game feels like a crash course in engine experimentation, somehow it works. It really has no business being as fun as it is, but something about running around as an immensely overpowered MegaMan-reject is so stupid I was barely able to keep it together while playing the game.
I have no doubt Caster would be a huge chore if it insisted on imposing any restrictions on you or ever became an actual challenge (though a few moments in the second half begin to weigh the game down), but for the most part it lets you do whatever you want. It doesn’t matter if it unbalances the game or even breaks it in places, you’ve been put into this sandbox to blow stuff up and run really fast and that’s about all I needed.
Caster might be barely competent but I can’t help but admire how little it cares or tries to pretend it’s anything but a bit of super dumb fun. I can’t stress enough how stupid everything here is and how delightful I found it. So, sure, I could tear it apart as an ugly piece of garbage, but apparently I was in the mood for something so-bad-it’s-good and Caster more than fit the bill.
"Quick Thoughts" is a subset of my normal reviews for smaller games which might not fit into a full review but I still have something to say about.