BRAZILIAN DRUG DEALER BEFORE 4: It's a Meme's World and We're Just Blasting In It
Listen: This is definitely not the first time I’ve come across this specific hyper-niche brand of absurdism in video games. I’m not sure exactly what it is that makes gaming such prime ground for over-the-top dedication to bad art styles, whimsy, absurdity, and avant-garde presentation.
While I could go on and on about how versatile video games are as an artistic medium, doing so in a review for BRAZILIAN DRUG DEALER BEFORE 4: DEMONS FROM THE PORTAL TO HELL I OPENED ARE STILL IN THE FAVELA AND NOW I HAVE TO SAVE MAMADAS FROM RONALDO doesn’t really seem to be the most appropriate place for it.
BRAZILIAN DRUG DEALER BEFORE 4—or just Brazilian Drug Dealer 4, which is the first game in the series I’ve played—has a reputation that precedes it. You can even buy a physical copy of Brazilian Drug Dealer 3, complete with low-resolution graphics blown out of proportion with a sheer “graphic design is my passion” panache. And while the whole thing is an obvious joke that screams of streamer bait, it’s actually a game that follows a solid tradition and ends up being fun, too.
I can address the “fun” and “tradition” parts simultaneously. While this can certainly be viewed as a meme game, it’s exactly what I would expect from a Quake mod—which is what this essentially is. It’s not really a fully unique game, instead using gameplay and enemies straight from Quake, just reskinned with some behaviors tweaked. There are some extra movement abilities thrown in for good measure, too–like the ability to double jump and air dash.
Don’t get me wrong, there have been enough changes to at least call this a Quake “total conversion,” but to me, it’s definitely just another Quake mod—and that actually wins it some points in my book.
I spent a lot of time in my youth (you can tell I’m old because I say “my youth”) downloading mods for Doom, and later Quake and Quake 2. I know mods are still around, and while turning enemies into Thomas the Tank Engine has always been popular, I distinctly remember turning all of the Imps in Doom into Barney the Dinosaur.
There are definitely worse games to use as a foundation, because Quake is one of the best first-person shooters of all time. And, in my humble opinion, it's exactly the type of game every modern “boomer shooter” should aspire to be—unless they’re specifically going for a Build Engine or Doom clone feel.
Because Brazilian Drug Dealer 4 just reskins a lot of weapons and enemies to function like their Quake counterparts, I felt right at home running around and blasting… okay, whatever the hell it is I’m blasting. Honestly, I have only a vague clue as to what’s happening here. While I think being Brazilian might help a bit with the context, even then the entire thing feels like an inside joke I’m not a part of.
To summarize: I don’t care about the meme content, and while I appreciate the presentation for its audaciousness and for pulling off exactly what it was going for, it’s not really “for me” and it detracts from the underlying shooter.
While you probably don’t play a game like this seriously, I had a hard time finding it amusing in any sort of humorous way. Again, I feel like I’m missing context, or maybe I’m just too old. But if you want some good gunplay in your meme game, having Quake as a (barely) concealed framework is a winning bet.
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