Why I’m Worried About Hololive VTubers Streaming Needy Girl Overdose

You might have heard of Needy Girl Overdose, also known outside Japan as Needy Streamer Overload – The game is making big waves in Japan and has gained attention in the West as well, with several streamers picking it up, including Hololive’s VTubers, and this makes me worried.

This story contains minor spoilers for Needy Streamer Overload. You’ll be safe if you played the game at least once or saw a stream of it.

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Needy Girl Overdose game concept explained

If you haven’t heard of Needy Girl Overdose, it’s a made-in-Japan game on Steam featuring Amechan, a girl with a desperate need for approval, who decides to become a cute streamer as she believes everyone fawns over them. The game deals with our relationship with social media and many dark themes, all portrayed accurately enough to possibly revive an IRL trauma in its players, despite the game’s overtly unrealistic developments.

In Needy Girl Overdose, the player needs to manage Amechan’s schedule and her stats, most notably her stress and depression levels. So she can reach 1 million followers without mentally breaking down. However, Needy Girl Overdose is not a happy game and things with Amechan will go wrong as you helplessly watch her take self-destructive decisions.

Needy Girl Overdose and DDLC

Another way to bluntly introduce Needy Girl Overdose is to say it’s the new Doki Doki Literature Club (DDLC), as both are part of the Denpa genre. Games that include highly disturbing content and psychological horror, made to screw with the player’s brain. And just like DDLC, Needy Girl Overdose starts with a content warning that definitely shouldn’t be taken lightly.

While DDLC is a visual novel, as in you’ll likely only go through all of it once, Needy Girl Overdose is a raising simulator ADV in the same vein as the legendary Tokimeki Memorial series by Konami, or Cygames’ latest blockbuster Uma Musume. Players will need to go through several runs of 2 to 4 hours each, to try out different stats builds, and reach over 20 different endings.

Ironically, trying to play Needy Girl Overdose in a relatively safe way, in a first playthrough, without going for the fringiest actions Amechan can take, can be a good way to end up with the Internet Overdose ending. Which is one of the most disturbing endings in the game. This makes me worried about the streamers discovering the game live, including Hololive’s talent.

Hololive’s Kureiji Ollie and Hakos Baelz are streaming Needy Girl Overdose

I personally believe Needy Girl Overdose can have a positive impact on its players who manage to grind through it all (or read about all the endings on the internet). However, streaming the game and discovering it live might be a bad idea, as it could bring back some past traumas.

Needy Girl Overdose isn’t a 100% dark game. It has its fair share of (dark) humor, and content creators who manage to not “take the game too seriously” like the game’s warning suggests should be able to have a good time with their audience. But in my opinion, Needy Girl Overdose is best enjoyed in intimacy, as it could ultimately heal you. But if you stream it, it might break you.

Hololive Indonesia’s Kureiji Ollie started the game, and Hololive EN’s Hakos Baelz started streaming Needy Girl Overdose too this February 6. I am personally worried as I believe the game can easily impact streamers, especially those with a huge audience like Hololive’s tubers. I hope all content creators streaming Needy Girl Overdose will be fine and having a great time with their audiences, and manage to see how remarkable the game is.

There is so much more to say and praise about Needy Girl Overdose, such as how it deals with Japanese subcultures like Menhera, or the game’s graphics and music. And just like our Japanese peers at 4Gamer put it when interviewing Needy Girl Overdose’s writer and main creator Nyalra: there might be no happy ending, but perhaps it will help you find your own form of happiness.

The post Why I’m Worried About Hololive VTubers Streaming Needy Girl Overdose by Iyane Agossah appeared first on DualShockers.