Baldi’s Basics is a rage inducing pile of dickbags that brought me to the point of mental
frustration on the same level as talking with someone who consistently and unironically
uses the word hecka.
It made me scream, it made me yell and it literally brought me to rage quitting while
streaming it.
I would have gladly taken a reverse catheter pumping sesame seeds backup my urethra in
exchange for never touching that game again.
And then the internet had an idea…”Let’s make a Baldi’s Basics fan game, only bitchier
and bullshittier with some dude who is probably Russian named Viktor Strobovski.”
*sigh* This game.. is my nightmare come alive.
It’s Baldi’s Basics, but on crack with a stick up its ass.
There’s more going on.
It's more confusing, scarier, weirder, and all around just creepy.
Now I’m assuming it's a Baldi’s Basics fan game, specifically because its almost
exactly the same in terms of style, gameplay, and “story” so to speak.
However, Mr. Dr. Nose, which is me assuming the pronunciation of the creators name, didn’t
bother to specify that it is indeed a Baldi fan game.
But..it totally is.
And a game made in the shadow of another brings about the never ending question: Which one
is better?
It’s this question that’s asked with sequels, we see it with prequels and with games made
by the same developer or in the same genre, *cough* Pubg Fortnite *cough*.
But rarely ever do we have this debate with a fan game.
But the event of having fan game made after Baldi’s Basics poses a unique circumstance.
It allows for a true debate as to which is better because the original game could barely
classify as a game.
Alright maybe that’s a bit harsh...but as much as I hate to admit it, there’s actually
a lot to talk about when comparing these two things that resemble video games.
So stick in your catheter and stock up on sesame seeds, we’re going to find out the
truth about Viktor Stromboni and Baldi’s Basics, the real truth!
Hit it!
Intro
Now I need to make a bit of a editorial note before we go any further.
You see this download page for Advanced Education with Viktor Strobovski?
This guy is releasing new updates in less than a week, sometimes as quick as 3 days,
which works out great for a Let’s Player, but not for a channel like us who takes multiple
days to make a video.
So there will likely be changes to the game between the creation of this video and when
you actually see it, however the video’s point will still ring true!
So just be aware that he may have added in more stuff we didn’t cover, but if necessary
we can do another video on this game since it’s getting updated so quickly!
Sounds good?
Cool.
Alright let’s start off by taking care of the blatantly obvious.
These games are super similar in a lot of ways right?
You’ve got a dick of a teacher, he wants to hit you with his prefered whacking apparatus,
and you gotta get out of his school.
Each game allows you to answer math questions strewn about the school that are in notebooks.
Answering questions wrong makes the teacher more angry, which equates to him speeding
up with a greater desire to whack you.
The schools can be somewhat difficult to navigate on your first time through because a lot of
it looks exactly the same.
But that’s part of the difficulty built into the games, you need to actually know
the school layout pretty well.
Once you get all the notebooks you can escape the school and you “win” so to speak.
Those are the basics of both games, but if we look at Viktor Stroganoff, we can see how
he has adapted his school from Baldi’s.
First off, it’s much bigger and more confusing, there’s an outdoor area, a medical room,
an actual cook in the cafeteria, many more items laying around, and tons and tons of
classrooms.
Recall that Baldi has seven notebooks you need to solve...well Viktor actually has three
more notebooks (which makes ten) AND a secret eleventh notebook after that.
His questions are way more involved, can include multiplication and division - like you actually
need to do real math to solve his problems.
In addition to that, if Viktor Stromboli actually catches you, you’re treated to this: which
is way scarier than this:
Now we all are fairly used to jumpscares on this channel (thanks FNAF), but there’s
obviously a massive difference between these two.
Baldi’s isn’t really…
scary, or a jumpscare.
He’s kinda like foxy from FNAF 1, he just kinda appears and you are like, “oh.
I died”.
Now with Viktor, scary stuff happens!
There’s animation, there’s setting, there’s darkness, and it makes a huge difference in
the feel of the game.
And with games that are supposed to be indie horror, the feel and the setting create a
lot of that necessary creepiness.
Baldi is very bright, colorful, not really scary in any way (it is a parody after all).
But with Viktor Strongbad, you can feel it, you know something isn’t right.
It’s obvious in his voice, it's obvious in the school, and it’s obvious in his “I’m
gonna kill a hostage every hour” voice modulator.
Everything just puts your hairs on their tippy toes.
If we’re going for atmosphere, Viktor Strobe Light has the obvious advantage here.
Let’s move onto story, yes, we’re actually going to discuss the story, or lack-thereof
within these games.
Baldi’s Basics has a very simple story, you’re going back to school to collect your
friends notebook.
Your teacher is insane, and you gotta get out before you get a beating.
If you manage to get every question wrong and still escape you’re rewarded with the
most headphone warning necessary ending of all time wherein Filename2 essentially tells
you that he’s trapped in the game and to get out.
Roll credits, you finished.
Now with Viktor Strobilations, if you manage to get all 11 notebooks and still get out
you turn around, only to find Viktor right behind you, congratulating you but also letting
you know the journey isn't over.
Essentially we’re looking at a completely done game and a quickly updating alpha.
So what we’re really looking at here is the original idea and someone else who came
along and made it objectively better (in terms of graphics and scope of the game).
Myspace and Facebook, Oreos and Double Stuff Oreos.
Pubguh and FartNite.
It’s not exactly an original concept.
Taake something people like, make it better than the original, everyone loves you and
forgets about that other thing.
Right?
WRONG!
There’s a massive difference between this Baldi’s Basics and any other game that can
be compared to a successor.
Baldi’s Basics was specifically made as a Meta game!
It was created at a Meta game jam.
The entire point of the game was to poke fun at the education and indie horror genre.
We covered this in our Baldi’s Basic’s Story You Never Knew, but it has an incredibly
important impact when discussing the goods and bads between Baldi Basics and Viktor StrawHat.
It opens up the idea of a game being judged based on its purpose for creation.
And personally.
I like that.
In this particular situation it makes a lot of sense why Baldi is such a crappy looking,
earlobe splitting, sesame shoving, hate filled bag of dicks for anyone playing it.
It’s supposed to be bad.
The entire game is a parody of two other genres.
It wouldn’t be much of a parody if the game looked good and felt good would it?
So when you look at Baldi under the lens of a parody, things make a lot more sense.
Of course it isn’t scary, it's making fun of scary games.
Of course it isn’t difficult math, its making fun of education games.
Meanwhile Viktor Strongyloidiasis over here made a school...based off of a parody school.
So….where does that leave us?
Well it really depends on how you look at it and if you take the purpose of the games
into account.
If you just look at the games on a base level, there’s no question that Viktor Strampoline
is the better game.
It’s bigger, has consistent updates coming out, is likely going to get more levels, has
a better challenge, and an evolving storyline.
But if you take into account that Baldi is a meta game that is literally making fun of
games like, Advanced Education with Viktor Strompedia, then it really seems like Mr.
Dr. Nose didn’t really understand the point of Baldi’s Basics to begin with.
That is, unless Viktor was created to be a parody of Baldi, which was a parody in and
of itself.
Um...yeah...No I think this guy just wanted to make a game and knew more people would
play if it looked like a game that was already popular.
Not hating on that, I’m just saying that riding off the coattails of a trend is a legitimate
strategy for getting the world to experience your work.
And experience Victor Stogolov this world did.
Also real quick did anyone else notice the cook’s forearms look like pizzas?
Just me?
Okay nevermind back to the conclusion.
Personally I like Baldi’s Basics more.
I really enjoy the idea of someone creating a game that pokes fun at indie horror and
education games and does a really good job of exactly that.
Viktor Stroaway doesn’t really have a purpose.
The creator either saw an opportunity to get a lot of attention by creating a game like
Baldi’s Basics or enjoyed the game but didn’t stick to the same parody principles when creating
his own.
Not that there’s anything wrong with taking inspiration from existing titles, but I feel
like the game lost a bit of the spark that made Baldi so unique when dropping the parody
in favor of...something that’ll get clicks.
Again, not like that’s a bad thing but safe to say I struggled with this game.
Cut to ryan raging from stream
But I’d like to pass this question on to you guys.
Do you think Baldi’s Basics is better because of the purpose of the game, or are you more
in the camp of Viktor because it's just the better game overall?
I’m very curious to hear what you guys think.
That’s my take on Advanced Learning with Viktor Strobovski in comparison to Baldi’s
Basics, and incase you do want to watch me and Grant (the Story You Never Knew boy) stream
games like this and others check out our Twitch channel: Twitch.tv/Treesicle.
We stream every weekday at 3pm Pacific time!
Come hang out, join the chatfam, and help us as we fail our way through the gaming world!
Don’t forget to ring that bell to make sure notifications are working so you’ll actually
know when a new video is released.
But that’s all for me today.
My name is Ryan and I’ll see you all next time, or on Twitch!
Toodles!