60%Wii

I'm not very familiar with Rockstar productions (and Rockstar tropes), but for a game introducing itself as a GTA-like set in a school, Bully feels very harmless and can be pretty tender at some points. You're not playing the bully, but a likeable hooligan fighting bullies. Of course you can do sheananigans, even bad things at some points. You can be a bully but you're not supposed to want to. I read that right after the announcement, Rockstar fought a major uproar, so maybe they changed their minds during development, but as far as I'm concerned, that's for the best. It results in a very well written game, with solid characters, a lot of regressive but never offensive humor and a fun distorsion of GTA codes. The first chapter, in particular, is a masterclass.

As for the core game, it's, guess what? GTA set in a school. I guess this was fun mostly because I've never really digged into classic GTAs. I've played a few hours of them, I know how they work, but I don't feel the same weariness as other players with this formula. It aged, for sure, and not only on a technical aspect. Some mechanics (rigid save system, pure mission stacking, permanent button smashing) are totally outdated by today standards, and although I tend to think that the GTA formula works better in a close space like a school, Bully keeps giving you more and more uneven content to a point where you can only skip some of it because well, you know: you're not really in high scool anymore, you don't have so much time. Games were made this way back then, but I think the best example of this too-much-stuff mania is that Bully didn't need to have out-of-school missions. As a playground, the school itself was large enough.

So I have mixed feelings but, for once, I don't mean it in a bad way. Bully has cool settings, atmosphere, a functional-even-if-not-deep gameplay, and its story has its charm. I think I will remember that. Not sure I will remember how Rockstar filled this interesting blueprint.