The coming-of-age genre is one that’s well explored in film. Every generation has its own pantheon of classics that manage to say in two hours what all teenagers have felt at one point during the best and most tumultuous parts of most people’s lives.
Mixtape, the latest from Beethoven & Dinosaur, may just be the best example of that genre in the video game space, and one of 2026’s must-experience games.
Mixtape succeeds because it captures how impossibly massive and important it feels to be 17. The game follows three teenagers at the end of the 90s in a small town in America, on the brink of the rest of their lives.
Leading them is Stacey Rockford, a music obsessive who sees her life through the guise of soundtracks. Every moment has a perfect song; the gang’s final night together is little more than an opportunity to put together the perfect mix.
This mix, the eponymous Mixtape, is what frames the game’s adventure. That adventure, a task almost as formative and universal as teenagehood itself, sneaking out and getting drunk. Like the mix itself, the gameplay of Mixtape is a mashup of genres. The game is a series of memories from the friend group, which are depicted via mini-games. One minute you’re framing photographs in an abandoned theme park, the next you’re skimming stones, and after that you’re playing baseball.
Much to Rockford’s delight, each gameplay chunk is expertly soundtracked. It would have been very easy for this game to feel like the annoying guy at the record store lording over you with his music taste, but instead it feels like a cool older brother introducing you to his favorites. While I recognized about half of the music, the other half went straight into my own digital mixtapes.
Some of these gameplay sections are stronger than others, but Mixtape knows this, too. You’re never forced into doing anything for too long. There’s always going to be a new mechanic to play with, or a new song to hear.
This is a very rare case of the soundtrack itself being a spoiler, so I won’t list them here, but there wasn’t a single skip on the tracklist. Mixtape sits alongside the likes of films Mid90s and Submarine at the top table in terms of soundtrack quality.
“Some of these gameplay sections are stronger than others, but Mixtape knows this, too. You’re never forced into doing anything for too long.”
Visually, the game combines soft, bright characters with psychedelic visuals. Mixtape also incorporates live action footage for some of its more out-there sequences to great effect. The explorable areas of the game, largely confined to the main character’s rooms, have a huge amount of detail and feel authentically like a teenage bedroom, even if they are suspiciously clean for a 17-year-old to have been living there.
The main trio, Stacey, Cassandra, and Slater are warm, likable, and charmingly lame. Slater answers questions with “Cha?”, and describes his small collection of upper lip hair as a “wilderness.” Cassandra, who joined the group after rebelling against her strict family, gets an interesting arc that manages to ask questions of the nature of the friendship group, and Stacey as a lead character, in a short space of time.
Mixtape isn’t a long game by any means; you could finish it in an evening, but it manages to fit in a lot of character development. Writing teenagers in any medium is difficult, but Mixtape pitches its main cast very well. I’d have liked to have known these people when I was that age.
Stacey is deeply dramatic and full of the self-confidence of youth. She’s absolutely sure she’s going to head to New York and become a superstar, and feels every emotion very deeply. She breaks the fourth wall and introduces every song with an infectious sincerity.
She’s a relatable character who made me reflect on how monumentally important everything about that time in my life felt. The sense that if you don’t know exactly what you’re going to do when you leave school, and execute on it, you’ve failed, and you’ve missed your opportunity.
Every teenager has experienced heartbreak, a backstabbing friend, or even a minor falling-out that feels all-encompassing. You’ve sat in the car, looking out the window, and imagined yourself in a music video to whatever melancholic tunes blasted from your iPod Touch.
“Mixtape isn’t a long game by any means; you could finish it in an evening, but it manages to fit in a lot of character development.”
That is quite literally one of the levels in Mixtape. Silly from the perspective of someone entering the third decade of their life, but hugely important to their teenage self. Mixtape is kind to the angsty teenager we all were.
Like the best work of the genre, it makes you nostalgic for a life you never had. I didn’t grow up in America, nor did the game’s writer/director, Johnny Galvatron, but that didn’t stop very real feelings of longing for the town of Blue Moon. It’s impossible not to conjure the memories of your own high school friends that you’ve not seen in 13 years, but at one point felt like unimpeachable staples in your life.
“Everything feels huge. Everything’s heavy. Everything’s the end of the world. Ya’ know?” This line, said by Cassandra to Stacey as the time runs out on what will likely be their last day together, sums up everything it is to be that age. Few games, if any, have captured that spirit quite as well as Mixtape.
I felt moved playing Mixtape. It’s not a gameplay tour-de-force (though the stone-skimming minigame is surprisingly addictive), but what it does offer is a compelling story, likable characters, and an excellent soundtrack. It’s the kind of game I can see myself playing every few years, in the exact same way I’ve revisited the coming-of-age stories from my adolescence that have meant so much to me.
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