PlayStation 5 played
The resounding success of Genshin Impact clearly inspired other Chinese gacha game developers – now they too wanted to make their own adventure in the open world. However, over the four-plus years of Genshin’s existence, it has not had many competitors – the only rumored one is Wuthering Waves (whose monthly profits are not yet impressive). But perhaps the fight will be given by Infinity Nikki, the development of which involved the “heavy artillery” – game designer of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Kentaro Tominaga.
Alice in the land of stylists
This is already the fifth part of the series, which tells the story of the pink-haired girl Nikki, but this does not matter – the previous games were ordinary “dress up” games and are hardly known to anyone in our area. In the case of Infinity Nikki, the developers decided to increase the scale tenfold – this is a large and long adventure with an extensive world map, hours of voiced and unvoiced dialogue and many quests. But at the same time, the main essence of the series – the main character’s wardrobe growing every hour – remained in place. Only now this idea is woven into a full-fledged game of such high quality that it’s even strange to be able to play it for free.
In such games there must be a mascot – here his role is played by the cat Momo, who accompanies the heroine everywhere
The plot is a classic isekai – the heroine opens a closet and finds herself in a magical world that she has never seen before. There she meets a goddess imprisoned in some tower for thousands of years, and unwittingly agrees to her request to save the whole world. To do this, she needs to, quote, “revive all the Miraculous Suits.” To make Nikki’s task easier, the goddess gives her the Infinity Heart – essentially, it’s just a big skill tree, which also opens up new clothes with useful skills.
This all sounds strange, but it seems very logical in the game. In Miraland (that’s the name of this magical universe), Nikki becomes a professional stylist who is able to create items of clothing from any available means. She sews some costumes for beauty, and some she needs to use her abilities, and she literally changes clothes on the fly. So you run and reach the ledge of a high rock – press the jump button twice, and Nikki instantly puts on a blue dress, allowing her to float above the ground. Or you need to catch a butterfly – select a net in the radial menu, automatically change into a beekeeper’s suit and you can even catch grasshoppers. When all the work is done, after a couple of seconds Nikki’s normal clothes return – the ones you wore initially.
In this universe, even the wipers look as stylish as possible
And the choice here is huge – dresses, jackets, sweatshirts, knickers, and even socks can be changed, matching them to the shoes you like. Then there are hairstyles, makeup, numerous decorations like earrings, necklaces and tiaras… A female audience will probably be especially interested in this, but men can also be captivated by the process – after all, we all love dressing up our protagonists: choosing stylish armor in “souls”, poking around in the shaders menu in Destiny 2 and so on. Here, all selected items of clothing are visible on the character and you can show them to the whole world – a photo mode with many settings and poses allows you to share pictures with the community and collect likes.
The vast majority of these items are found in the open world, either while completing quests or exploring the environment. Or rather, you find patterns – then you will need to sew finished products using them, using materials, of which there are dozens in the game. Everything that is bad is used: various kinds of plants, wool and feathers that you get when caring for wild animals and birds (in the appropriate costume, of course), and all sorts of bugs and spiders. Since the heroine’s bag is bottomless, and any trash will come in handy someday, you grab everything. To create some things, you generally need to catch fish – fishing is, of course, also present here.
The fish of my dreams
⇡#A world where you can get lost
Collecting all sorts of things cannot be called a routine process – on the contrary, this is one of the strongest sides of Infinity Nikki. Comparing a Chinese gacha game to Zelda seems a little blasphemous, but the work of Breath of the Wild’s game designer really shines here – the open world is just as fun to explore, and it’s easy to get caught up in side diversions on the way to the next story mission. The main one is collecting stars woven from threads, for which we will unlock new clothes and other bonuses in the heart of infinity. The tasks associated with them are constantly different: either you fly on a cloud and collect symbols, then you look for something in the allotted time, or you generally see a gate in the middle of the edge, behind which a funny test is hidden.
For some stars you have to climb very high
But even without the stars there is something to keep yourself busy. You jump on the rooftops and collect valuable currency there or even catch cats, whose fur will be useful for crafting. You come across ruins and try to climb to the very top of a destroyed tower – just because the platforming is fun, the rewards are not important at all. You meet monsters guarding chests and shower them with magic – in this regard, the game, of course, is not “genshin”, there is only one attack and you don’t even need to aim. But at the same time, there are interesting battles with bosses in the spirit of three-dimensional Super Mario. There are also side quests, and most of them are completed right on the spot. And when you get to the story ones, there’s plenty of interesting stuff there too: dungeon exploration, fascinating platform sections, likable characters and not the worst plot – you want to unravel the secrets of a mysterious world in which people, among other things, fall into a coma for no reason.
All this is wrapped in a wonderful “package” with a Disney atmosphere, with which the locations look no less fabulous at night than during the day. The animals are charming, the characters are colorful, the music is pleasant, the regions are visually distinct from each other, and the small towns seem alive. And even such a seemingly ridiculous entertainment as fashion competitions fits perfectly into all this. All over the world you find people who offer to impress them with your clothes – you need to wear items with the highest possible indicators like elegance and freshness and, if possible, get the highest score.
Every time it becomes more and more difficult to win stylist competitions
The monetization of Infinity Nikki is based on these mechanics. Obviously, you can just buy your favorite clothes to run around Miraland in them, as happens in many online games, but in this game such things also have a practical use – they provide a significant bonus in competitions. However, whether this is enough for the audience to continue to “donate” in the long term is a question that is still very difficult to answer. In gacha games, you usually spend money on loot boxes with full-fledged new characters, either for the sake of collection, or for their abilities, or because of how well their skills combine with the skills of your favorite fighters, as often happens in Zenless Zone Zero.
Here there is only one character, and they offer to pay either for new clothes, or for resources that you use to upgrade existing things – this also gives a bonus to your performance and sometimes even changes your images. The dresses and other costumes are, of course, very beautiful, but not so beautiful that for the sake of a complete set (which includes earrings, makeup, and items like glasses and chokers), you would want to buy several dozen loot boxes and participate in the lottery. What they are now asking for real money for doesn’t even unlock any of the heroine’s unique abilities – it would be nice if at least some kind of triple jump was activated, but here everything is so far completely sad. For players who don’t plan to pay, this is great news, especially if new story content will be added for free. But the attractiveness of microtransactions determines how long the game will survive thanks to the “whales,” and they feel like there’s really nothing to buy. Although this is a matter of taste.
By the way, you can ride around the world on a rented bicycle. And even jump on it! Just don’t fall into the water with him – he will drown and disappear
What I definitely want to criticize the game for is its terrible interface, which seems like they didn’t try to optimize it – they just piled new menus on top of the old ones over and over again during development and didn’t think much about convenience. Finding something quickly is, at least at first, very difficult. In the main menu there are two pages with buttons that slide down as you progress, and for some reason the quests end up on the second page. There is also a season pass, which for some reason opens separately from the store. There is no way to get to the Infinity Heart Tree from there at all; for this, the radial menu is used in the open world. Switching between items and tabs in different menus occurs either with the d-pad or with the stick, and it is impossible to predict. You skip lines in dialogues “circle”, and select them with “X”. On mobile platforms all this may be more convenient, but on a gamepad it’s almost a disaster that needs to be fixed with patches.
***
Infinity Nikki turned out to be a pleasant surprise and a truly worthy competitor to Genshin Impact. Beautiful graphics (Unreal Engine 5, by the way), a decent anime plot and a large open world in which you disappear every evening, because you want to collect and study everything. The only thing missing is at least some kind of normal combat system and a human interface – now it will break the hell out of it. For the rest, we are waiting for content updates and temporary events; it is very interesting how the game will be developed in the future, and whether there will be compelling reasons to pay for something.
Advantages:
- A very beautiful open world, the story scenes are breathtaking at times;
- The locations are interesting to explore – you are constantly distracted by fun activities, and not even for the sake of rewards;
- Hundreds (if not thousands) of unique clothing items that allow you to dress your character to your taste;
- A pleasant Disney atmosphere both in cities and beyond;
- You don’t have to pay for story content and new characters (yet).
Disadvantages:
- A terrible interface in which you get confused even after several days of playing;
- One-button combat system;
- This is a gacha game, so sooner or later there will be a strong desire to open your wallet (at this stage it does not arise).
Graphic arts
Unreal Engine 5 in all its glory – beautiful, rich and bright. The textures of the clothes, for which the series has always been famous, are especially impressive – the material and texture of the next dress or sweatshirt are immediately recognizable.
Sound
You won’t want to listen to the local music separately, but in the game it greatly complements the fairy-tale atmosphere. The actors in the English version also deserve praise – the vast majority of the plot lines are voiced.
Single player game
A large sandbox with a lot of entertainment that you are constantly distracted by. Plus tons of clothing items to make your Nikki unique.
Estimated time of completion
For version 1.0 there is quite an impressive amount of content, which will take more than one week to study.
Collective game
Not provided. Unless you can share your photos with the community and look at other people’s photos – they are hidden behind hourglasses scattered around the world. There are no PvP modes that were in previous games in the series.
General impression
A worthy competitor to Genshin Impact is a big, beautiful and free game designed to absorb all your free time. If you don’t have a strong desire to fill your wardrobe, then microtransactions (for now) won’t cause any discomfort.
Rating: 8.0 / 10
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