Needy Girl Overdose (Or Needy Streamer Overload as it was localised as) is a 2022 visual novel that you may or may not already be familiar with. It centers around a lonely NEET girl named Ame trying to make it big online while donning the persona of OMGkawaiiAngel-chan, a real life internet angel.

Of course, the world isn't so easy. The goal is to get to one million followers within 30 days, and it's gonna take a lot of masturbation, drugs, and self-harm to get there!! 'w'

I'm not gonna get into super into explaining everything here bc I'm sure there's a thousand other pages and videos and you can look at for that instead, so I'm just gonna write about what I like and some of my thoughts here.

Please note: I will be addressing spoilers here! I have 100% completion on the game and have seen all endings.

Personally, I really like Ame/Kangel bc she is just... horrible. And I say that lovingly. She's desperate, she's perverted, she's resentful of her fans, and judgmental of others. Intended to be a jirai girl, Ame is an exaggeration of every BPD stereotype out there. She's so cute💙💜💗 I know some people who can't stand her bc she reminds them of people they've met though LOL

Personally, I have a thing for two-faced characters who will lie and do anything to gain favour with others, so she is very moe moe to me. The fact that she clearly made up P-chan to cope with her lack of real love or even friends is just so... kawaii... she's so pathetic 'w'

Anyway, I also really enjoy the music as well, the original OST by Aiobahn is a banger that I listen to fairly often (even if the tracks are short and mostly remixes of eachother... RIP).

As for the vocal tracks -- I remember being in the stream where they premiered the Cubism songs, and when I saw Sasuke Haraguchi's name come up in the video I was like "huh... huh...??" I think it had been before his songs got super duper popular, so not a lot of people in the chat caught on, but I saw it and got SUPER excited. Cubism wasn't much like his previous works, but when they showed Cubibibibism after I was like YOOOOOOO!!!!!! I still listen to it a lot.

Another appeal for me is honestly... the merch lol. I actually spend a lot of money on the official store (or at least, what they also sell through Amiami) bc I REALLY like the apparel they sell. It is pricier as it's meant as subcul fashion, but hnnnng I love wearing my huge Kangel shirts and sweaters. I've been tempted to get some of the cute bags and wallets too, but they're so out of my style that idk if I could justify the pricing... wehhhh ;w;

Not to sound like a freak, but I honestly really like the endings where she kills herself. I love "bad end" scenarios, especially when they get real bad for the protagonist.

In this regard, Dark Angel is definitely my favourite ending by far, and I honestly love her dark fallen angel attire. This ending is so tragic and dramatic, it's great. The fact that the player's screen also gets covered in blood when she kills herself is a great hint that P-chan isn't exactly her boyfriend.

A wave of darkness, enveloping the abysmal internet... the internet dark angel has descended... Kangel Falldown Mode!

Internet Overdose is also really good, though it's more just Ame losing it once and for all. I like that both this and Dark Angel span multiple days of interactions -- some of the endings are otherwise so quick that they just kinda made me go, "huh? Something happened?"

Comment te dire adieu is a really interesting final ending/payoff for the rest of the rest of the game, and it honestly kinda caught me off guard as I went in blind. It was a really neat surprise though.

So, gonna get real judgmental for a moment here.

Similar to the bastardisation of Serial Experiments Lain online, I keep seeing Ame being glazed as an "omg so relatable" e-girl that everyone wants to be. However, this is completely missing the point of the game -- like, sometimes I wonder if half the people who faceclaim her even played the same damn game as me.

I think Kangel is intended as a criticism -- she is a horrid, self-centered streamer who plays up being what she hates online to earn money and get attention. She hates what she does and despises her fans, but she's addicted to the validation she receives because she has nothing in real life. P-chan isn't real and her main pastimes are masturbating, cutting herself, doing drugs, and playing games.

None of the endings where she stays online and gets popular are good -- she's absolutely miserable in all of them. The only endings where she doesn't end up dead or having some sort of a meltdown involve her quitting the internet (or at least streaming).

Like, no doubt people can relate to Ame -- I can certainly relate to her, especially if I look back on the super low points I've been at in my life. I've been that kind of self-destructive, attention-seeking online person before -- but it's not something to idolise. I guess it's similar to the fascination some people in western spaces have with claiming to be "jirai" online, where they're completely ignorant to the actual history and connotations of the subculture of the first place, when really they've just stripped it down to the fashion (dark girly) and stereotypes.

Now, I don't mean to write this in a "actually I understand the game better and in a smarter way than everyone else 🤓" way, because I think the game is pretty straightforward by openly showing again and again how hypocritical Ame is. Maybe it's all irony and I'm just too serious to get it. But I really do like a lot of the game's reception is missing the main point it was trying to show.

Anyway, the anime is set to come out this year in April, and I'm sure it will be like 9/11 for this game's fanbase bc it'll be more accessible than ever, and I can only imagine what's going to come out of it. Personally, I hope the anime is at least not garbage, because game -> anime adaptations never go well (though based off the visuals, it looks like they're doing something completely different from the game). I'm praying it'll be pure denpa, but I guess we'll see what we'll get...