Don’t Stop, Girlypop! is a fun four hours of fast-paced arena shooting, hampered by some middling platforming sections. That said, the chaotic shooting, pink aesthetic, and charming character writing make it easy to look past the platforming issues, to instead enjoy an arena-shooter with a wholly unique vibe.
Don’t Stop, Girlypop!
Developer: Funny Fintan Softworks
Price: $20
Platforms: PC (reviewed)
The publisher provided a Steam code for review
Don’t Stop, Girlypop! has you battle the evil force that is the Tigris Nix mining corporation, which is draining the love from the world and killing the Oasis in the process. The plot keeps it simple, instead letting the Y2K-style pop music and incredible vibe be the driving force behind the shooting arenas.
The aesthetic shines in two particular parts. The first is the radio calls, where a low-bitrate video call comes from a pink flip phone. This is the primary way your handler conveys both story information and your next objective to you, while maintaining the style without sacrificing the delivery message.
The other place is the combat, the star of the show. Don’t Stop, Girlypop! takes the fast-paced gameplay and lack of verticality from the boomer shooter genre and dials the vibes up to 11, pumping pop music into your ears as you tear through each arena. The enemies explode into small pink hearts and display lock-on heart symbols. It creates something that feels almost overwhelming for your senses, which helps you enter a flow state in combat.
The shooting is enhanced by weapons with unique, powerful alternate firing modes. For example, the shotgun can fire out a small black orb, which shoots out bullets in all directions when you shoot it, allowing you to perform crowd control with a weapon that is best used on a single powerful enemy. There’s only a handful of weapons, but spread out across the short runtime, I never felt bored with the tools at my disposal.
You also get smaller abilities, like a sword execution that takes you flying across the map and a reflection that can send projectiles back towards enemies. It runs as close to overwhelming as it can, but the loop of swapping between firing types and using the smaller abilities creates a nice flow state that makes the noise feel like part of the action, making each encounter intense but fun.
Movement is a big part of Don’t Stop, Girlypop!, but it doesn’t always enhance the experience. A big part of the movement is wave dashing, which can be done with a successive combo of stomping, dashing, and jumping, moving you across each level at high speed. In combat, this movement makes getting out of sticky situations feel satisfying, and when the platforming only asks you to move fast horizontally, it feels great.
Is Don’t Stop, Girlypop! Worth Playing?
There are some platforming sections that require a bit more verticality, which does not feel good. Your jump doesn’t give you much air, and even if you have a ton of momentum, it dies instantly when trying to go up. Most levels don’t, but there are multiple sections where you have to go upwards, and it quickly becomes slow and tedious. There are also wall-running and rail-grinding sections that feel fine in practice, but on the controller, it would always shoot my aim straight up, making it hard to navigate.
The Final Word
Don’t Stop, Girlypop! is a fun and fast arena movement-shooter, at its best when you are moving fast and shooting faster. The fun pink Y2K vibes add a level of charm and humor to a well-made, if a bit standard, FPS. The platforming excels at horizontal movement, but fumbles when verticality is introduced. Ultimately, it’s a great bite-sized experience and I was glad to play.
MonsterVine Rating: 4 out of 5 – Good
