izigame.me

I'm sorry it's so long, but I just typed out each issue and then committed to how many I found, even if it ended up being long. I doubt many of my gripes could or would be patched out/patching in, but I feel like if you wan't to have a not-so-good-but-it's-okay management rpg, then I would say get this one on sale, at least.-
I'm honestly a little suspicious about the massive level of positive comments considering the only tolerable thing is the CONCEPT.

(I'm not mad, just disappointed.)
First sign of Not Great: You can't edit a mainstay of the settings until you're in the game (Ow, my ears). Very annoying, why make these inaccessible?? And the selection menu that pops up when you pick up an animal always lags. I have to wiggle the joystick around a bit before it'll do anything, which got annoying by the sixth pick up and "go to cafe" command, as it does not feel like an intentional design.
I love cats. I adore management/farming games. I got real hyped reading all the reviews, but in hindsight no one (Or at least, the majority) mentions game play, only "chill vibes" and other artistically objective things, of some I disagree with. I dislike the design of the home and the camera unfriendly design. I though the game was glitching out until it registered that no, the strange way the walls and floor above me were flickering in and out of existence is just the camera cutting through the wall.
(I'm sorry to come off as negative, but I was really disappointed here. I rarely leave comments.)
The character creator is fun in several fashions, but I'm not a big fan of how shoe-horned it is into a super narrow aesthetic. (I'm a gal who would like to escape the whole "thicc girl" body type I exist in every day.) I couldn't tell if there was any real gender? It's fine if there isn't supposed to be, but I would like more masculine options beside very rudimentary facial hair if so. (That's a bit nit-picky, but I'm always super into the character creators in these kinds of games.) The sliders sometimes feel a tad insulting at how little they change for some features, and the lack of slider for eye size is unsettling. (PC is staring into my soul with their Power Puff Girls eyes during the entire character creator screen.) :(
I actually enjoy the color sliders, patterns, and gradients, but the selection of the colors using controller is kinda janky, I was lost for a solid minute trying to suss out how to get to the color I wanted. (Could have been entirely user error, but it really doesn't feel very intuitive, especially compared to the mouse and keyboard experience. Are you able to select other spots to save more than one color??) I liked being given some choice about the beginning donated items, theme wise, and being able to tweak the wallpaper and flooring at any time is a plus! The animals are cute, if very simple and set up to be repetitive, which is rough when the animals are the mainstay of the game focus.
The cooking mini game was AGGRAVATING considering the PC randomly runs. (Because, did you know, you have no control over when you run? Your character just randomly gets fast, and boy do you just NYOOOOM through objects! Full on clipping through most things from how hard you smack into everything from the random acceleration. Why??????)
Though I enjoy the concept of suddenly being tiny to cook, it kinda felt like writers couldn't be bothered to try and come up with an explanation or build up about WHY this game mechanic exists. It'd be like a fishing mini game having you open world swim around to catch the fish with just a single button press, and it's very boring at its core.
Having all of the ingredients be so spread out felt like a waste of my time instead of a challenging game (which made it very uninteresting to have to do as a core part of game play). It also felt a little needlessly yada-yada'd with sudden exposition about the topic, and then lack of any interesting backstory to the world building. (I mean, maybe this game is more aimed at gullible children who need to be told everything there is magic and that's how you can do all the things you can do in a video game world, but it felt ham-fisted even in that regard.)
And also, the magic was just brushed off as "It's just magic, it does that".
"It's a core part of the game, and we specifically brought up unprompted mid-tutorial, that these things are done via magic. However, we couldn't be bothered to flesh it out beyond a non-sequitur from the mayor" was the feelings I got. I could be wrong, it could just be poor translation or script-writing..
Dialogue is kinda stiff (Maybe not originally in english and localization is just a little over-formal?) I didn't feel invested in reading what the mayor was saying because I was being spoken AT the entire time. No choices to even just interact with the dialogue like one normally expects in these kinds of games. The over world felt so desolate too, and a little TOO small. Did three laps before I realized I had been going in circles because it took under three minutes to go around the whole things, and that was with stopping to collect every little friend I came upon. (I do like the preset names, they're cute and generally on point! Didn't feel the need to change any of the ones I had collected)
Like, I feel kinda bad bringing up my gripes for what feels like a game designed more for young children to play, but I was bummed out enough to not want to play further. Especially considering I had THIS many problems and I only played for and HOUR. I had even thought as I quit "Oh, hey wait, it's probably in early access! It's coming along great if that's- oh, no, it's full released... alright." Was the exact response.
There's some good bones, but the meat of it all isn't well attached (maybe I just need to slog through a rough opening? If so, look at how poor a first impression that sort of thing leaves^^^)