Recent reviews by Kokkuri

I want to love the game but game requires internet connection for single player. There is no justification why a you shouldn't be able to play this game in offline and singleplayer mode. Last DLC was added in 2019. and this review is written in late december of 2025.

I bought this game for single player gameplay, so if you are like me just don't get it. If you are into the multiplayer aspect then it might be worth the price.

TL:DR Fun Game - but after just 9 months is being left in a bad state. Game released as online only, introduced offline mode, offline mode is actually worse than online mode. Server shutting down on 30th October so you will experience the worse version of the game.

2nd October: I will trying the game again from a fresh save after the move to offline only, to see if the bugs and performance issues are still affecting the game. This could be a case of miss communication. In such a case I will change this review from a negative to positive. For the time being see my comments below:

Before October 30th - you can enjoy the game as is, even tho game has an offline function it is best to play in online mode (game was released as online only which is a bad take for a puzzler). There is some lag and overall performance issue especially in time based puzzles that require you to move because you have to have somewhat okay internet connection. But overall enjoyable experience. for 30Euro I have gotten so much value I couldn't be happier.

HOWEVER,

After October 30th - game will go into offline only mode, and to my understanding and experience the offline mode is glitch, worse performance than online and has some bugs that can corrupt (allegedly) your save and progress. The newest 'update' from the studio just said that they will not update or fix any bugs after servers get decommissioned and remove any and all online functionality (fair game should have been offline first with simulated online-cop).

This means you will be left with bad experience, bugged offline mode and less enjoyment. I find it sad because you can see how much puzzle designers put into making this game be a fun.

Puzzles range from meh easy to bull hard. I love it for it. It is a shame that studio is moving onto next project before fixing or committing to fix the offline mess. I hope that they will lean a valuable lesson from this game, because there's a massive potential after playing Islands of Insight.

Turnip Boy robs a bank is a 10/10 for me, one of the best short games I have played, and one of the best sequels out there

I will keep this review short, turnip boy is a great sequel because it took what made the first game amazing and re-imagined it. Characters new and old, quest design, story, music. All of those aspects are like in the first game but changed for better.

If you are looking for a great game that's short for single day sitting, funny game (maybe slightly dated) commedy and a game with interesting meta commentary about our society then play this game. (just make sure to play game 1 its about 2h long).

Early Access - Release Version Review

'If you liked Wandering Village but didn't like that the main map was flat this is the game for you.'

Recommendation for devs - If possible create a demo for the game tutorial + one other mountain, limited with mechanics etc. It will help new potential players to see if this is the game for them.

Recommended with a caveat - The game is gorgeous, slightly on simpler side for city builder but with a lot of heart and potential for complexity. However as its an early game there is a number of features that will be implemented at a later stage that will make from enjoyable to either a really good or bad game. (Seeing what the game has to offer now I have high hopes). This recommendation comes with a following caveats:

- Game is in early access, this means some mechanics are not in the game, some will change and some will be added that will change how the game is played (such as player town trading).
- The balancing of the game will change as more mechanics are developed and implemented, making the feel and progression of the game potentially different (for better or worse).
- The campaign is not going to be released until 1.0.

If none of those are a turn-off buy the game, its a lot of fun, as for me those three things combined are making me put the game on hold. I will be refunding the game as I don't think this is what I expected, I should have read that campaign is not going to be implemented until later. However I really wanted to experience (even if limited to one or two chapters, what this game has in store), it is fun to play on the individual mountain but I really seek a rich story that you can see playing the game.

Love the game, full of passion, a bit simple but really enjoyable

Let me preface that the game isn't bad; it's not good either. I personally enjoy my time, but for the price and the hype, this game had pre-release the game is meh.

The Tales of Arise disappointed me.

TL;DR: Good game with a bland story, world design and interface issues, decent fights, and gorgeous graphics. Buy it if found on sale for 20/30 EUR.

Score
Music and Sound of the World ★★★★☆
Graphics and World Building Design ★★★★☆
Difficulty, Fighting and Monster/Boss Fights ★★★☆☆
Story and Side Stories (might include slight spoilers) ★★☆☆☆

Music and Sound of the world

• They're excellent. The music fits the settings, locations, fights, and world just perfectly. This is one of the strongest aspects of this game.

Graphics and World Building Design

• Maps look gorgeous and have a distinctive feel, but they're confusing to navigate; once you unlock a checkpoint, you will be teleporting back and forward unless the game decides nah, you cant teleport now because the story is too important to even tho you can run all the way to the very beginning of the game.
  
• Do you enjoy running from wall to wall? If not, you won't be able to 100% the game. Also, the pattern of each zone is quite similar. It's either a big open field with a drop or two or one time use your magic power to do an action or a dungeon/city with a linear path where you run from a room to a room fighting the same three types of monster over and over again, or you are running from NPC to NPC
  
• Why does this game lack a world map? I do not understand why they haven't put the time to create a nice world map art to show how big each realm/ country is. This takes from the immersion. Rather than feeling like you are running through a section of a more significant place, everything feels close together and small despite the locations being quite big and having massive structures in the background. This kills the enjoyment of the game. You constantly click two buttons to swap between levels of one map because you can't see the whole zone map at once. It's an annoying and stupid design.
  
• The overall worldbuilding is done quite well through the environmental design. Each zone is modelled after a different type of element, so you will see gorgeous savannas, deserts, winter lands, forests, green pastures etc. What annoyed me so far is that they sold the game as using this new type of day/night cycle shadow system, but there's no weather change like rain or sandstorm, which could add to the zones if they were more random occurrences. They could boost or debuff certain elemental attunements.
  
• The Zones are quite static, except of a few occasions where you use mana/cp. The maps are static. I would love to see changes in the terrain like opening new paths or changing water levels due to weather that allows you to reach new places or force you to take an alternative route/ approach. This would give a bit more individuality to each run. It's not necessary, but it would definitely be added to the experience.
  
• The main find me I will give you costume objective is owls. If you played previous games, you would remember finding Katz. This is one of the worse aspects of the game. The owls aren't hard to find, and their home is a boring place where you only go to receive more costume items. I prefer Katz Korner, which was full of charm and fun little things. I'm bringing this up because this is the main problem of this game. There are too many soulless elements put there for the gamer not to enhance or be part of the world. Basically, it is game logic, oh, we are in these ancient abandoned ruins, yet the torches are brightly burning.

Difficulty, Fighting and Monster/Boss Fights

• The fighting is fine. Its tales a style of fighting that has been used for the past few games. If you played Tales of Zestira of Bestaria and enjoyed the fighting, you will find this a slightly improved and more fluid and fun fighting system.
  
• The monsters are annoying. Some just damage sponges that take a hot minute to kill while they don't do anything more.
  
• Most boss fights are quite simple, especially in the early game. They get progressively harder but usually stay quite fair. Except for this one fight in 3rd realm. The game introduced a new mechanic of stopping charging enemies. The problem is that the mechanic has a time precast which means if you are too close to the boss, you miss stopping him because the stop effect spawns behind the boss. This fight is a sudden spike in difficulty and is quite buggy. I died so so many times from stupid charge stoping animation spawning behind the boss... I was forced to restart to my previous save grind for money and a few levels before stocking up on mana restores and life bottle to beat the bastard on normal difficulty. I can't imagine how hard he can be on higher difficulty.
  
• Also, I had a bug where after a few minutes of fighting one mini dragon boss, the NPCs stopped. They stopped moving, attacking, healing, reviving, dodging. They just stood and died one by one. I was forced to quickly swap between each character, use one or two skills, and quickly swap to another until I killed the stupid mini-boss.
  
• The fighting animations will make you die if you play Law, a melee fighting character. The amount of visual noise and special effects are so annoying. There are times when you will need to dodge back because you can't see what is going on.

Story and Side Stories (might include slight spoilers)

• The story is shallow, with interesting concepts, but the pacing is too fast. So far, I'm just into 4th realm/country. Every story arc revolves around one flavour of the concept of occupation vs freedom and what it means to be free. Do you want to overturn a power-hungry dictator as a slave? Do you want to see a dictator who controls with red fear? Do you want a ruler who establishes equality? etc. You will see all of those, but none will be adequately explored. It is like smelling and seeing a delicious meal but once eaten, it was meh.
  
• The main main story is unaddressed for 2.5 whole chapters. What is the deal with our main male MC, and what is the story with our main female MC. I know they both are going to be addressed, but in 24h of the game, their relationship and individual characters didn't grow or change much.
  
• The coolest fight story scenes are in the engine cinematic. As an example, our main character is kicked through the wall, but why didn't the game force me to play this specific character and see in-game being kicked through the wall? And that triggers the cinematic, not the random boss hp. This happens so often that it is just annoying.
  
• The side stories are boring. There is like one recurring character that is boring and forgettable, and he just gives you a recipe for a new dish every time. The usally are 3 types of missions in the game. 1. Go kill that thing/ group of things, 2. Go bring me those cooking materials, or 3. Go there, kill that thing and bring me the monster materials.
  
• There's a lack of fun or memorable characters or antagonists. All of the villains so far in the game are one-note characters. Hur Dur I'm muscle man I want power, Hur Dur I'm a manipulative man I want to control everyone, Hur Dur I'm a good guy, but my underling is evil/ I'm evil, and my underling is good.
  
• Overall, I believe the game would be better off having a smaller world, but the maps physically change or transform with the story rather than having way too many characters and special gimmicks that don't enhance the story. Or the having less distinctive realms/countries but expanding each realm after beating the main story. Like a new map or two, which are optional, with an additional story that shows the progression of the realm after our main story. Rather the creator

This review is after finishing my first playthrough.

---{Graphics}---
☐ You forget what reality is
☑ Beautiful
☐ Good
☐ Decent
☐ Bad
☐ Don‘t look too long at it
☐ MS-DOS

---{Gameplay}---
☑I don't know where my hands end and controller starts
☐ Very good
☐ Good
☐ It‘s just gameplay
☐ Mehh

---{Audio}---
☑ Eargasm
☐ Very good
☐ Good
☐ Not too bad
☐ Bad
☐ I'm now deaf

---{PC Requirements}---
☐ Check if you can run paint
☐ Potato
☑ Decent
☐ Fast
☐ Rich boi
☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer

---{Difficulity}---
☐ Just press 'W'
☐ Easy
☐ Significant brain usage
☑ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Difficult
☐ Dark Souls
☐ Dark Souls on drugs in 4D

---{Grind}---
☐ Nothing to grind
☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks
☐ Isn't necessary to progress
☑ Average grind level
☐ Too much grind
☐ You‘ll need a second live for grinding

---{Story}---
☐ No Story
☐ Some lore
☐ Average
☐ Good
☐ Lovely
☑ It‘ll replace your life

---{Game Time}---
☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee
☐ Short
☐ Average
☐ Long
☑ To infinity and beyond

---{Price}---
☐ It’s free!
☑ Worth the price
☐ Wait for sale
☐ Not recommended
☐ You could also just burn your money

---{Bugs}---
☑ Never heard of
☐ Minor bugs
☐ Can get annoying
☐ ARK: Survival Evolved
☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs

This game is one of the best purchases I made,

Gameplay is amazing a bit repettive but with random generated path each time it can never get boring,
The fan community is supper helpful and amazing,

If you ever played heartstone and The Binding of Isaac give this game a go its best of both worlds.

Game is a lie and a good one

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