izigame.me

Edit: I'm genuely having fun with the game, but I'll leave the review as "Not recommended" since people tend to focus on those more.
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If you're into a cozy creature collecting game, with little to no lore nor interesting characters to date, but with cool Zelda-like exploration and dungeons, this game is for you!
The graphics are lovely, pixel art will never disappoint. Character sprites are cute and the spirit's designs are adorable, but this game cannot survive in graphics alone.
Cons:
- The game relies too much on RNG. The combat system, NPC interaction, amount of hearts you get with NPCs... It's specially awful when it comes to combat due to the system implemented: shields you have to break to stun and then damage the enemies. Sometimes you will not get a single shield breaking card, making your other cards useless as you can't inflict damage. Sometimes you'll only get shield breaking cards and now you can't inflict damage. It should have been thought out better.
- There's little to no tutorials on how to get things done (you have to figure out yourself, which isn't hard but it can be annoying).
- Farming is extremely boring and isn't profitable for now (I'm only 4 hours in, so I haven't discovered many seeds yet). Plus, when trying to till/water a tile, the selected tile will just move and it's hard to get to the one you want.
- I'm not sure if you can get rid of the mines you find by breaking rocks, since I don't want a mine in the middle of the pathway leading to my home (there's one already and I want to get rid of it). Maybe you have to clear everything that's in the mine first? I don't know.
- You can only have 3 spirits, if you want more you need to build a barn and some sort of feeder/bed (forgot what it is) for them, else you'll have to let them go.
- The main character has no feeling of self; you are simply an alchemist. The NPCs know you are the new alchemist even though you never introduced yourself to anyone nor sent a letter to the town saying you were coming in.
- Due to the main character being their own character, there's no customization. I'd rather create a character from scratch than play as a character who has no personality and whose only trait is to be an Alchemist (did you know you are an alchemist?).
- The artstyle used for the NPCs' portraits is... bad. Most of the NPCs look ugly with those silly big ol' anime/manga eyes (modding community do your thing please).
- Speaking of NPCs, it is weird to me that all NPCs you encounter are dating candidates. It'd be nice to have NPCs not interested in dating, at all.
- The interactions with the NPCs depend solely on RNG. You have 3 interactions: Talk, Joke and Flirt, with their respective % of success. It's honestly annoying and building friendship with them is tedious. It's honestly discouraging to talk to the NPCs. Not to mention the NPCs' dialogues are extremely bland and boring. There is nothing interesting to them.
- For some reason, whenever you enter a building the game decides to zoom in, making the inside of the building and everything inside it big, which clashes with the smaller and zoomed out pixel art from outside.
- The game suddenly stops sometimes for like a second but resumes right after (it hasn't creashed for me yet).
- Try to avoid talking to the Blacksmith much if you don't want an NPC flirting with you out of the blue; she's too forward, maam needs to learn some respect. Just upgrade your tools and run out of there. Also Paolo being the stereotypical suave Hispanic man who plays the accoustic guitar rubs me the wrong way (probably just me).
- The game soft-locks you/stops working if you use a Shield Bash on an enemy with no shields. You cannot press anything, you have to close the game and lose your progress.
- There's plenty of bugs that have been reported.

Pros:
- The graphics are very charming. The pixel art in this game is very well made and captivates you inmediately.
- I do LOVE the speed at which you walk, and you can run!!
- The combat system is very fun! With a few problems but fun! As someone with no experience with card games, the battle system is very novice friendly and you get the hang of it quickly. Though, sometimes you'll get unlucky and your whole deck will be from your dizzy/stunned spirit - The exploration in the game is extremely fun! You are encouraged to discover different island to fullfil NPCs quests and, in the process, you discover more mines and temples and spirits! (Watch out for the elemental islands, they hurt).
- You can expand and decorate your home, as well as build new homes with different designs!
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I was super excited to play this game, but I was let down by the gameplay and the NPCs. I wish there was more of a bigger story other than helping out Magic Man recover his memories, but once again, I'm only 4 hours in, so I ignore if there's more story to this game than that. I am very excited to decorate and expand my home though, so I'm looking forward to that <3