Robokku

@DashKappei performance is consistently fluid.

There’s a built-in fps counter that says it’s running at 60

I reviewed it on Switch OLED but have also tested it on Switch 2 and it’s a thumbs-up.

@awp69 no tate mode in the settings that I can see, sorry! Nice idea though

@AlienX agreed. The way Kotaku reported it did come across as a bit dismissive in my opinion, with quotes from Tim Rogers and Tom James, a game translator. I have seen it streamed and seen people get a lot of fun out of it.

Tom James wrote a great essay on Tokimeki Memorial on its 25th anniversary, which I would imagine Rogers read: https://freelansations.medium.com/25-years-with-an-invisible-elephant-in-the-room-6e5402c93960

I think the best way to experience this game if you don’t know Japanese is probably to watch the Action Button review then play the Super Famicom fan localisation.

That is until (if) a Saturn translation hits, which @MARl0 mentioned is happening in their comment above!

Great article @pandaman ! Wasn’t aware of all this business – a fascinating read.

Thanks to the team for a great game @sephazon! And also curse you all for the fragile egg

@Lofoten amazing! Hope the review was informative even coming from a moomin newbie! A really lovely game

@yohn777 Sorry, just saw your comment. As Zverik says above, touchscreen control is just for menus.

Without wishing to get philosophical about it (well, maybe a little…), Dodgeball is an emotional film about dodgeball, whereas Desta is a game of dodgeball about emotions

@kkslider5552000 I believe their first game wasn’t voiced so thought I’d stick a mention in there

Great tagline @BrettPF !

@nocdaes Love that a couple of people are reading this 4/10 review and still want to play the game. I’m really glad the very slender positives of it came out in what I wrote. Couldn’t in good conscience rate this as anything other than “Poor”, but it is truly one of the very best 4/10 games!

@geshem no it’s not 60fps. I’ve seen videos clocking it at 30 most of the time. It feels like a good 30.

@aardvaarkchi it was tested on both. I agree with @samuro but would say at least the black and white tones looks pretty great on OLED. I’ve been paying L.A. Noire in b&w too and that looks pretty awesome.

@Teksetter I don’t recall the info about the game mentioning real-world locations so I don’t think so. Unless Yomi is real

(“Gameplay as black-and-white as the visuals” is a great line!)

@Dm9982 thank you!

@Dm9982 what was the Sierra article you mentioned? Missed that one but would like to read!

That 18% is people making a game for Switch right now. Many of the games developed for PC (e.g) will likely find their way to Switch down the line.

That’s perhaps borne out by the fact that, on every other platform, the numbers working on a game are somewhat similar to the numbers interested in developing for that platform. Switch is the outlier. Why are so many devs interested in it but not developing for it (35% vs 18%)?

One possible answer is that they’re interested in their game being ported to Switch after/alongside the main target platform they’re actually working on.

Also amusing that more people are developing for Xbox One than find it interesting…

Really good article.

Need to check this out
Another great review from @pokemish

@HolyGeez03 @StefanN I thought someone could easily see a game about building train tracks and think there was a creative aspect, like playing with a train set. It’s not like the game gets marked down for not being like that, but it seemed relevant to point out. If you read the review and think the “cons” aren’t an issue for you then hopefully you’ll really like the game.

@R_is_KC @PinderSchloss and the dev said on Twitter that the crystals are just for smashing – although “maybe” an achievement on steam. I quite like that they’re just for fun and satisfying to smash.

@PinderSchloss hate to break it to you… but I don’t think you needed to smash all those crystals to get the key! haha, unless I’m missing something… good effort smashing them all though

@SteamEngenius plenty of lower-priced indie games get picked up for limited physical releases – Limited Run Games, Super Rare Games, etc. – so fingers crossed! (You’d be paying more than a fiver though, true!)

@Astral-Grain Appreciate it seems to be a different review to the one you wanted, but you did miss out the “Squashy resolution, gungy models, asset pop-inning cutscenes” and the screenshots. You will indeed need to look elsewhere if you want to read a review that isn’t this one, though.

@Ralizah actually, it’s always split screen – on both Switches. In practice it’s pretty useful to know what each other is looking at, but would have been interesting to play on separate screens. (Wii U vibes!)

@PessitheMystic yeah, I see the point, but for me a “con” doesn’t necessarily represent a “fault”. I’m not trying to find something wrong with a game; just pointing out things worth thinking about (in, like, 10 words, so…)

Can’t speak for other reviewers, but that’s how I like to approach it.

@-wc- @pessithemystic

This comes up all the time. For me, a con is not saying “Tut, tut, developer, you really dropped the ball there!” It’s telling the reader what about this game’s whole proposition – that I love – might put you off or cause you to dial down my enthusiasm. A lot of my total delight in RtMI is based on a long-standing love for the series, so I’m calling that out as a heads-up to people indifferent to or unaware of the series.

As for the graphics settings, I just wanted to drop it in somewhere because both I and colleagues played a bit before realising “high” looks much better with no downside. The review is not the list-of-features type so I stuck it down under the line.

There are no “points deducted” because something goes under the “Con” column; I just try to add something useful for you.

Hope that’s helpful. Always appreciate the comments!

@Greatluigi @FishyS

I can’t speak for other reviewers, but I wouldn’t consider a “Con” always to be something the game does wrong or badly or fails to do – especially with 8s and 9s. I’m asking myself, “What sort of person might not love this game?” and trying to just flag up anything they might like to think about before buying.

This was a mini review, too, so you only have 500 words to play with. Those bullets at the end are a chance to add a brief extra comment or idea that I think could be useful to people.

Hope that sheds some light. Really great game!

@Chocobo_Shepherd I wouldn’t say it’s preachy about those values – they’re a good plot device. It just so happens that the game itself also feels very gentle. Even trying again to pursue what I thought would be the darkest ending, stomping on the ideals of the early characters and my own childhood, it still felt a bit too happily-ever-after.

As always, this is a matter of opinion. I put a lot of hours into this game and could have written a review three times as long to be honest! The reason I mentioned the Steam demo is it would be great if people could give it a go to see if it’s their cup of tea.

(And always appreciate the comments!)

@Bass_X0 don’t know which version you’re familiar with but I only just found out that (according to the big W) localisations were quite different to the original, which is cheeky but mostly trades on sentimentalism and family for its stories:

“Funimation acquired the Shin-chan North America license in 2006. Funimation's dub takes many liberties with the source material […] Many sexual references, dark humor […] were added.

“New, previously non-existent backstories were created, as well as significantly different personalities for the characters. For instance. […] Ageo-sensei […] Shinnosuke's teacher was rewritten as a kinky nymphomaniac.”

Not seen it myself but pretty wild that they did that! 😂

@dugan great approach enjoy!

@KevTastic84 "Retro, Micro and TV" is a weird category isn't it? Seems like they tried to name the category after they picked the consoles.

@120frames-please yeah, I seem to remember you liking the last one in the comments. Yes, similar performance to Lone Sails on Switch I believe

@Ricube this one’s a bit longer – maybe twice as long. I play slower when reviewing because I need to go back and check things, take a second look at an event, etc., but even so.

@Discokuningas the whole cat hair moustache was just the go-to dig at graphic adventures for a while. As much as I will always love Monkey Island 1&2 (and no others!), the real golden age of the genre is probably now, with so much variety out there – especially indies: Rusty Lake series, Milo and the Magpies, latest Poirot, Myst reboot, escape rooms like Agent A, Kentucky Route Zero, FAR: Lone Sails… not to mention the accessibility of just about every great game from back in the day.

Really liked this one.

@dumedum this is a straight-up sequel – but it completely works for new players too

@lokozar it’s smooth throughout. Looks like it shouldn’t tax the system and seems not to. Good port.

@larryisaman lol looks like someone proofread it with an itchy pasting finger. (At least, I don’t think that was on my clipboard!)

I’ll see if we can have that tidied up… Thanks for pointing out!

@PJOReilly such a perfect tagline! (By far the hardest part to write, I find 😂)

@impurekind They’re not flaws with the game; they’re only mentioned to help people understand what to expect from it. Excellent game, as expressed in the score (and my tremendous pun).

@N64-ROX I thought it was young urban professional – but your point still stands 😂 Wonder why I wrote that?! Thanks for reading

@bimmy-lee thanks! Slow to the comments on this one but I do always read them

@B_Lindz thanks for that - interesting! To be clear, it’s not like I docked a point or anything. Just thought people might be eyeing up the high contrast with their nice new OLEDs

@Kiwi_Unlimited looking online, key coordinates are definitely the same. I think enemy encounters may cycle through a couple of locations as you visit the floors again, but there are no random encounters. Also, there are clues based on images of map layouts and some of the maps are clearly designed as levels so I would guess they are always the same layouts in their entirety.

OLED people: anyone else find the colour to be really inconsistent at low brightness? I often play in a dark room and it flicks between very warm and very green as I make minor adjustments from minimum brightness (auto brightness off). Once it’s at about 10-15% on the slider it’s mostly consistent. Anyone else?

@DiogoVasconcelos hey, thanks for reading! I hope it came across that I took a lot of enjoyment from the package. I look forward to the next volume

@Solomon_Rambling “great minds” and all that appreciate the comment, thanks

@Fun1sKing next time just close the tab

@Just2Milky kindly supplied by the editor in this case. Those tag-lines are the hardest part to write!

@nessisonett @NightBeast I was surprised to see ABC Murders didn’t review that badly. Glad at least some others thought it was sub-par as well

Fair enough if people did enjoy that – just be aware this game is really different!

@Just2Milky that’s actually not my sub-head, and it’s gone right over my actual-head! 😂