YMMV / Buckshot Roulette

• Awesome Music: The soundtrack composed for the game features a nice selection of ambient, peak time techno and dark electronica. Special mention goes to "Before Every Load", "Socket Calibration", "Monochrome LCD" and "You are an Angel".
• Broken Base: Some players have been divided over the Steam version of "Double or Nothing", where not only has the Dealer's previous Artificial Stupidity been tweaked enough that the computer now plays very competently (and dangerously) most of the time, but it includes new items not seen on the itch.io site's original version. Some appreciated the randomized items and difficulty, though not all were well-received, like the Expired Medicine, and felt they affected the overall great balance of luck and strategy the game once had. The "1000K achievement" is now insanely difficult to reach since luck plays a bigger role in surviving rounds than ever before.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome: Despite the supposed advantage to taking another turn if a self-targeted shot results in a blank, most players will only fire at the dealer if they have no way of knowing what's in the shotgun. This is advantageous in terms of probability no matter how many blanks and live rounds are in the shotgun, but relying on this strategy becomes murkier when items are thrown into the ring.
• Funny Moments:
  • Any time the Dealer shoots himself with a live round. It’s very amusing to see him make such a foolish mistake.
  • The Dealer keeling over after taking the Expired Medicine, which has a 50/50 chance of healing 2 charges or taking one away (previously 40/60), is also pretty funny since he just suddenly smashes sideways onto the floor. Especially if he did it in attempt to heal his last remaining health point. Taking the Medicine yourself and failing the cointoss is also amusing, because you just kind of tilt your head briefly, and cue the Smash to Black like you just consumed the deadliest substance in existence.
  • The Dealer's item animations will either be unnervingly intimidating, or using them in bizarre and nonsensical ways. Tossing the adrenaline off to the side without using it, slamming back a can of beer in one gulp, or just politely clasping handcuffs on himself despite not having wrists are all stand-out examples.
• Good Bad Bugs: If the Dealer has both a magnifying glass and beer on the table, it may use the magnifying glass first, then use the beer to rack the shotgun if it's a blank. Due to an oversight in its AI, the Dealer will assume the next shell is also a blank due to thinking that the gun is still loaded with the shell it looked at, resulting in a very high chance of it shooting itself in the face.
  • While it will still do so in the normal game mode, the Dealer's AI in Double or Nothing was overhauled for the Steam release and will now accurately count the shells.
  • At the end of every round of "Double or Nothing", any unused items the Dealer or you still had on the table are removed...except when you continue a new game after doubling your winnings. This puts the player at a huge disadvantage for the first round of a new game, as the Dealer is very likely packing some serious combo-damaging items, whereas the player will have fewer/weaker items. If you can survive this round, the items will reset as normal again.
• It's Short, So It Sucks!: One of the few complaints about the game, as most players beat it in roughly half an hour. This was addressed with the addition of Double or Nothing mode, which allows the game to continue however long the player wishes and rack up a higher score. Given the game sold for $1.20, most don't hold the game's length against it too much, as the content they got for the price is widely praised.
• Low-Tier Letdown: The new Expired Medicine item in "Double or Nothing" is often seen as a worthless by players. When originally included on Steam, it had a mere 40% chance of healing you, or it would damage you by a single Hit Point. Most gamers would never use it unless they were in a hopeless situation. Worse, the Dealer prioritizes on healing himself after being shot, and if he has Adrenaline, will steal yours away and possibly recover 2HP. The item has seen a Status Buff from the developer, where it now has 50/50 odds of healing you, but even then is still seen as an inferior item to the cigarettes in most circumstances.
• Magnificent Bastard: The Dealer is the demonic and enigmatic runner of the shotgun roulette game in the seedy nightclub, who entices its opponents with money to sign a waiver and play their game, even managing to convince and beat God himself. Maintaining its games fair, even reviving the player when they lose during a round to continue, the Dealer uses various tools during the games to its advantage while going against the player, maintaining its demeanor while keeping a tense game against the player. Cutting off life support for the final round, the Dealer takes its defeat with grace, and if the player wins, gives them the prize money AND the shotgun as it presumably dies.
• Memetic Mutation: It's a popular trend on Tumblr to redraw the table with a character from another series in place of the Dealer. Unsurprisingly, most of these redraws feature characters who are some flavor of Ax-Crazy.
• Nightmare Fuel: The entirety of the game, of course. The title screen / banner already featured the nightmarish Dealer, and the game is as nightmarish as one would expect from the title and premise.
• Spiritual Successor: The game's tone and graphical style are clearly inspired by Inscryption and the credits explicitly Shout-Out that game's creator, Daniel Mullins.
• Nightmare Retardant: While the random inclusion of a bloody "General Release of Liability" form with God's name on it is a pretty effective Wham Shot, it becomes a bit funny when you apply some Fridge Logic and realize that this means that God 1) decided to come to a random nightclub to play Russian Roulette, and 2) was capable of being killed with a shotgun. Either someone with Suicidal Overconfidence who Answers to the Name of God came to the club and lost, or God Is Inept.
• That One Achievement: Getting 1000K (winning over 1 million dollars) or Know When to Quit on the Steam version of "Double or Nothing". It is insanely difficult to last against the Dealer that long to pull this feat off, when there are no retries. Expect to get annihilated if you get very bad luck with items.
• That One Attack:
  • The handcuffs are one of the most dangerous items for the Dealer to have, as it gives the Dealer multiple turns to screw you over. Because the player takes the first turn after each load, this means the Dealer is more likely to build up a full table of items, and it will combine them to take off multiple hit points from you more often than not. It's particularly nasty in Double or Nothing mode, where (on the Steam version) the Dealer will actually count shells and act accordingly, the health pools tend to be smaller (often dipping as low as 2 or 3), and one lost round will end your run. And if it has handcuffs along with multiple magnifying glasses and a handsaw or two, you can pretty much just kiss your ass goodbye.
  • The other item you never want to see on the Dealer's table is the magnifying glass, because it allows the Dealer to actually make informed decisions based on what it sees whereas it resorts to guessing just like the player under normal circumstances. As a result, having a magnifying glass means the Dealer will use its items intelligently rather than just throwing them out on a whim.
• Unconventional Learning Experience: The game unwittingly teaches you the importance of learning probability in mathematics, it helps immensely to learn percentages and fractions as it can help predict which shotgun shell will kill you if you're not careful.

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