Goodbye Volcano High Preview

Goodbye Volcano High is a hand-drawn narrative videogame that feels like a visual novel but gives more of a vibe of an interactive movie. When KO_OP, the publishers and developers of the game, released the demo, I couldn’t deny that I was excited to try it out. After all, I love story-rich games, and I’ve had a long-running love for dinosaurs that has followed me since childhood. Plus, I’m a sucker for a good ol’ coming-of-age story.

Truthfully, Goodbye Volcano High’s demo isn’t very long, you can easily complete a playthrough in 30 minutes, but if you want to go back for more, then don’t worry; you can restart the demo from scratch.

Upon starting the game, you will immediately meet the main protagonist, Fang, a pterodactyl passionate about music. Watching the news, you’ll discover an asteroid coming close to the planet has been causing electronic disturbances. In a way that is accurate for any teenager, you can enjoy myriad jokes and memes about Dinokind’s impending doom.

After the electronics go haywire and you lose connection, Fang receives a message from an anonymous source who claims to be in love with her. Who is it? Who knows. After all, it won’t be much of a demo if we get all the answers in advance. No, that’s only going to be a little source of drama for you and your group of friends to figure out.

Speaking of friends, let me introduce you to the ones who we met during the demo: Reed, your velociraptor bandmate who is dedicated to Legends & Lore, Trish, your triceratops bandmate with a lot on her plate, Rosa, a friend of Trish more so than Fang, who appears to be a little more than a friend. Naturally, I should mention now that there was one other element that caught my and my friends’ attention in Goodbye Volcano High: its focus on LGBTQ+ relationships.

Throughout the demo, we don’t get that much of a clear look at the rhythm aspects of the game that KO_OP mentions on their Steam page. However, due to the Battle of the Bands getting introduced, it’s clear that it will take a more central role in the full game. So far, the demo focuses on introducing us to the characters and expanding on how our choices matter.

You have to make several decisions when choosing dialogue, which is expected from a game like this. It’s all about meeting the characters, but I realise I haven’t even announced my favourite of all characters that we met. I failed to mention Naser in the friends section, mostly because Naser is fairly separate from the rest. After all, he’s the student council president and the brother of Fang.

Through interacting with Naser, I saw a little additional content regarding the characters. If you go on the menu, you’ll find that you can access Naser’s Jokes, which is one of many pieces of extra content that focuses on Fang’s relationship with specific characters. It’s only a small addition, but I liked how it expanded their relationship. I wanted to go back through the demo again to find more extra content by improving my relationship with the other characters.

Overall, I thought the Goodbye Volcano High demo was a lot of fun, and I look forward to playing the full game when it releases on the 29th of August. I can’t wait to see how the full game looks, and if you’re a fan of story-rich games, then this may be right up your alley.