Sayanara Wild Hearts is a hyperstylized rhythm violence1 game about lesbian biker heartbreak. Simple arcadey third-person shooter mechanics lead the player thru a prestige tunnel of technicolor spectacle in delightfully gay palettes. As in Touhou, the narrative context for the stream of projectiles and collectible hearts is the relationship between the player character and a series of women; their love affairs abstractly dramatized as bullet hell micro-challenges, variously exacting or forgiving.
Romantic tension, evoked mostly thru animation and electronic pop music, imparts a visceral electric thrill to the gameplay experience. Navigating bullet patterns takes on some of the frisson of a good yuri visual novel. Getting to know the level design concept of a given narrative arc ludonarratively harmonizes with getting to know a cool woman. Coming to understand what she wants from you- in the form of anticipating an obstacle or reward- evokes a feeling of dancing: a rhythmic give-and-take colored by shifting interpersonal dynamics.
The particular combination of game mechanics shifts between each track. Each specific configuration gets highlighted once or twice, among enuff variations to keep things feeling novel thru-out the game's LP-length playtime. Like a big pop song, a playthru is short, but so finely polished and elaborately decorated that it immediately compels one to repeat it. Personally, I would have been happy to spend more time piloting a little café racer thru narrow city streets, but I have to applaud the starkly brisk pace.
Thematically, the game falls apart in the final level. What looks at first like a nostalgic revisiting of the game's various character designs and stage gimmicks begins to take on an unsettling, "Spotless Mind"-like sense of unreality as character after character is replaced by a single woman- the player character's own reflection? Literally projecting our own face across their remembered image reduces most of the cast to mere symbols (even tools) of our protagonist's personal psychological journey. It feels wrong that this is presented as a cathartic victory. It feels like a failure to appreciate the fleeting beauty of our experiences, of others in their own whole individuality. These are not the women I loved!
It's as easy to forgive Sayanara Wild Hearts for this late misstep as it is to forgive its adorable demon women for exploding my motorcycle with laser beams. Charm and romance carry us thru. In conclusion, please make more psychedelic gay arcade games, and I will keep playing them forever.
1 As coined by Marc Flury and Brian Gibson to describe their own game, Thumper: https://youtu.be/ckm8_SEIXQM