Gameoverse: Don't Call It A Pilot!

Glitch has become more than an independent animation studio from Australia. It has become a full-fledged juggernaut including scores of merch outside of the generic swag you usually see in niche markets and right up on the mainstream toy isles, plus getting a mainstream theatrical release for one of their series finales. Their latest pilot is by Ross O’Donvan titled Gameoverse which has taken the world by storm and was cowritten by Arin Hanson also known as Egoraptor. This all started back in 2009 on the springboard for wide-eyed animators known as Newgrounds as a mini-series and O’Donovan tried pitching it to Glitch although it was put in stasis for years as O’Donovan went to work for Game Grumps. Finally in 2024, it was announced that Glitch would make this a full series. The animation obviously got an upgrade, with real gaming and animation professionals backing the project, plus the shocking part is that even though it’s inspired by retro video games, the animation is done in 2D.

The pilot takes place in a universe where each planet is its own video game world inhabited by a variety of characters, featuring a hero and a villain. If at some point, if the hero defeats the villain, then the entire world is destroyed by an unknown source. This sets up competing factions, one is the Farcade who are essentially the good guys who try to help the villain win, while their counterparts of the Syntax are doing the opposite who gather the destroyed planet’s energy into something called Float which is supposed to be able to restore those who were killed when their planets got the finger. This sets up an original concept with rival organizations battling for simultaneous devastation along with keeping the status quo with no progress being made by the hero in his predestined struggle as the game’s lead character.

This might sound like a remake of the Wreck It Ralph movies with its concept of game hopping, but Gameoverse goes an extra step further outsiders from one reality altering the course of a world caught in its own loop. This can affect how each video game world works on its own physics, making for a diverse selection of game genres to choose from. It also digs into the morality of trying to go along with a program everyone in that world follows while having complete strangers show up and trying to either help or heed their progress.

Gameoverse does have a temple of talent behind the cast with anime actors like Erica (Netflix Ritsuko) Lindbeck and Chris (Not My Vegeta) Sabbot, although Egoraptor playing two of the major characters doesn’t blend well especially his Grunkle Stan voice as the Barney parody dinosaur. The writing also needed some tweaking by waiting to save most of the character motivations until a later episode. Many people don’t like it nowadays when they give too much exposition in the first episode and instead get right to the action, however this door swings both ways and not giving enough can work against it.

One thing that doesn’t most people don’t seem to notice that this is a pilot episode. The story ironically takes place after the original trailer with the Farcade team adding the Learnosaurus to their roster, but there is a big divide between a pilot episode and the first episode. It’s clear from examples like Hazbin Hotel that the pilot and the first episode made for streaming were separate in tone and theme with a totally different cast being added to the series than the plot, an alteration in the animation quality, plus less time spent on people going, “Who is this new character?”. It’s hard to say if Glitch is planning on changing much from the initial Gameoverse episode like giving it a completely redone beginning like what was done with Bee And Puppycat for Netflix. Even though the studio might make huge changes like making it as dark as something like Final Space with concepts like planetary oblivion looming over the characters, or they might make it an absurdist comedy out of a Douglas Adams novel. So, whatever goes on between now with the pilot and when it becomes an ongoing series might be one big chasm to leap.

There’s been some major criticism claiming the pilot relies to much on fan service. Not so much the appeal to old school gamers, but the fact that the two main female characters spend most of the episode in bikinis. This isn’t done in a leering way but in a G-rated cartoon approach. The heroic Kit and the wicked Miss Information aren’t drawn with overtly sexual designs and are instead very generic with a visually retro motif, so it’s nothing on the level of a Dead Or Alive volleyball match.

Gameoverse is still rough around the edges, but there is a ton of potential along the way. It’s not like they’re doing yet another bad video game adaptation such as the old USA Network cartoons based on Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. Instead, it’s an above average homage to gaming culture keeping otaku stimulated with the random comedy and overexaggerated personalities of the colorful cast of characters. It’s not yet at its peak, but the pilot did go out of its way to make a first impression, even if some narrow-minded people see it as a Pibby clone.