Tamashika is not for everyone, and it is bizarre. I don’t expect it to blow up, since it’s excessively lean at times and lacks direction or guidance. Yet, I think it’s aggressively trying to make a name for itself, but it struggles to really say anything. Loud and chaotic, Tamashika plays nice enough, but it’s hard to discern what it’s trying to prove or to whom. Ultimately, I’m looking forward to returning to see if I can pick up anything that I might’ve missed, but as it is, it’s something you need to invest time into each week.

TAMASHIKA is borderline experimental. Therefore, it won’t be for everyone. A pure first-person shooter that holds no ambitions of plot or extended play. Developer quicktequila asks little of the player outside of growth. Whether that growth comes from patience or hardened reaction forge from repetition, the result is the same. Its kaleidoscope of feedback, colors, sounds, and stuff smother the player, gnaw at them. Like a chant, it summons you. Stay a bit, leave, come back. Things will be different but the thrill will be the same.

TAMASHIKA is a weird, fast-paced FPS that doesn’t need an overwhelming amount of content to prove its worth. The balance of visual craziness and audio cues turns each run into a skill-driven rush to kill every enemy on screen and get to the end of the level as fast as possible. And with how tight the core mechanics are, it’s hard not to love every second of it. The game is extremely small, and I mean, only one procedurally-generated level small, but I still couldn’t stop myself from playing that same level over and over until the next day comes, and I can try a completely new level to top the leaderboard.