2010-10-04, 02:23 AM
I just finished playing Recettear. It's a quirky indie Japanese PC game about running an item shop. You play as a little girl whose father ran off to be a typical nameless RPG hero and left her behind to pay off a huge debt, which you manage with the help of your loan collector fairy. As you'd expect, a large part of the game is buying low and selling high, but you can also pay adventurers to go dungeon crawling in search of rare items. It's a creative concept, but it wouldn't be nearly as fun if 90% of the items you were buying and selling weren't equips and food that the adventurers can actually equip and use. The game itself is pretty short and only takes about 10 hours to beat, but the massive item library and the existence of several gigantic dungeons that aren't even possible to reach by the time you pay off the debt lends themselves to a massive post-game. I've put more than 40 hours of playtime into it already, and I'm still missing the final adventurer, and I haven't even set foot in the last two dungeons. There's also a survival mode, which could consume a lot more time.
My biggest complaint about the game would be that the postgame doesn't really have anything to do with making money anymore. Some of the best items sell for hundreds of thousands of "pix," but there isn't really any point to selling them. The total debt you have to pay off for the main game is less than a million, and I'm at the point where I can just open store for a 2-3 days and pay off the entire debt, payment schedule be damned. There's no additional challenge in the postgame. This wouldn't be nearly as troublesome if the adventuring portion of the game was a little less bland. Sure, you get more skills and fight harder bosses, but the vast majority of dungeon crawling is still wading your way through the same recolored monsters for a couple dozen floors. Also, the (arguably) best character in the game is available in the first couple of days, which is kind of dumb.
Also, the title theme sounds pleasant, but I hated the actual song that played at the end. That voice sucks.
Overall, I'd still say this is an awesome game for anyone who likes non-mainstream and strategy games. At least try playing through the main game.
My biggest complaint about the game would be that the postgame doesn't really have anything to do with making money anymore. Some of the best items sell for hundreds of thousands of "pix," but there isn't really any point to selling them. The total debt you have to pay off for the main game is less than a million, and I'm at the point where I can just open store for a 2-3 days and pay off the entire debt, payment schedule be damned. There's no additional challenge in the postgame. This wouldn't be nearly as troublesome if the adventuring portion of the game was a little less bland. Sure, you get more skills and fight harder bosses, but the vast majority of dungeon crawling is still wading your way through the same recolored monsters for a couple dozen floors. Also, the (arguably) best character in the game is available in the first couple of days, which is kind of dumb.
Also, the title theme sounds pleasant, but I hated the actual song that played at the end. That voice sucks.
Overall, I'd still say this is an awesome game for anyone who likes non-mainstream and strategy games. At least try playing through the main game.