the gameplay sucks, but that was expected. here's how it sucks: beyond the standard final fantasy battle sequence, the player is required to engage in various stimulus-response tasks in order to make his abilities effective, the simplest being a standard attack where you wait for your weapon to flash and then left or right click, depending on desired effect. the response window is pretty large (i suspect it narrows at higher difficulty levels) so you'll only have trouble pulling it off if you're not paying attention or too drunk/stoned. more "complicated" interface puzzles make you mash certain wasd keys before clicking and the most complex make you hit specific wasd keys before clicking.
i recommend you play this game drunk and/or stunned.
it's obvious this is a console game ported over to PC and it mostly makes the translation. mostly. the fart mastery mini-games didn't translate at all and are frustrating as hell as you try to emulate a turn stick with wasd. it wouldn't nearly be so irritating were it not for the fact it goes through the full "howto" intro sequence for every attempt. PROTIP: ignore everything but the gastrointestinal waveform. that said, you only have to do that four (4) times through the entire playthrough and you can make up for it by using a mechanical keyboard which basically amounts to cheating on the sphincter clenching mechanic, i.e. mash a single key as quickly as possible. PROTIP: get a mechanical keyboard and use two fingers to lightly press the 's' key and you'll max out your shit inventory in no time.
the only interesting part of gameplay is inventory and ability management. one thing they did get right is that higher level items are not necessarily better in holistic terms. you can build some pretty imba item combos if you're halfway clever, e.g. combine the +250 hp every time you heal patch with the heal 50 hp every time you attack patch and a weapon which attacks five (5) times per round in order to heal 1500 hp every round you do a normal attack. it's been a while since i've played a single player game so these all seem ridiculously overpowered to me but fuck the computer. fuck it hard.
oh, there are also pathing puzzles but those annoy the shit out of me so we'll skip it.
but forget about all that shit. this isn't a "game" per se (one (1) gold star) but an extended, interactive episode, and here is where the "game" shines. imagine a south park episode, all south park episodes really, where trey and matt are no longer held down by the constraints of cable television and can really let their freak flag fly. the game constantly mocks the player and video gaming in general. on a more subtle note, different buddies react differently to changes in environment. take butters into the bank for a good example. and for a final PROTIP: get the david hasselhoff, ideally before the end of the second day. totally worth it.
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