{"id":117666,"date":"2020-09-06T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-09-06T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/reviews\/nintendo-switch\/ary_and_the_secret_of_seasons"},"modified":"2020-09-06T15:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-09-06T15:00:00","slug":"mini-review-ary-and-the-secret-of-seasons-a-cut-price-zelda-with-a-unique-mechanic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2020\/09\/06\/mini-review-ary-and-the-secret-of-seasons-a-cut-price-zelda-with-a-unique-mechanic\/","title":{"rendered":"Mini Review: Ary And The Secret Of Seasons &#8211; A Cut-Price Zelda With A Unique Mechanic"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"media_block\"><a href=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/reviews\/nintendo-switch\/ary_and_the_secret_of_seasons\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/reviews\/nintendo-switch\/ary_and_the_secret_of_seasons\/small.jpg\" class=\"media_thumbnail\"><\/a><\/div>\n<aside class=\"picture embed pictures\" id=\"screenshots\"><a href=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/108303\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/108303\/900x.jpg\" alt=\"Ary and the Secret of Seasons Review - Screenshot 1 of 6\"><\/a><\/aside>\n<p>Jumping into <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/switch-eshop\/ary_and_the_secret_of_seasons\">Ary and the Secret of Seasons<\/a><\/strong> \u2013 an action-adventure title \u2013 we\u2019re immediately reminded of <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/gamecube\/legend_of_zelda_the_wind_waker\">The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker<\/a><\/strong>. We\u2019re introduced to our heroine Ary, who, by playing with her toy figures, recounts an ancient story of an evil mage vanquished by a legendary warrior. Before too long, Ary is whisked away on her own adventure where she will encounter evil hyenas, crumbling ruins, and various puzzles. It\u2019s a strong start to a game that unfortunately couldn\u2019t retain our interest thanks to poor combat, lacklustre visuals, and distracting glitches.<\/p>\n<p>The overarching premise of a world turned upside down by mixed-up seasons is told wonderfully through well-orchestrated cutscenes and impressive animation. The characters ooze charm and we were immediately taken with the story\u2019s protagonist. It&#8217;s a bit disappointing that the plot forces Ary to dress up like her brother, Flynn, in order to progress with her mission, but thankfully the game doesn\u2019t dwell too much on this particular aspect. There are also plenty of colourful characters to meet and converse with as you traverse the magical world of Valdi, and the environments feel much more lived-in as a result.<\/p>\n<p>In terms of gameplay, you gain a wooden sword early on, and you can attack enemies with it in a similar fashion to 3D Zelda titles. Unfortunately, the combat feels incredibly disjointed and is often riddled with glitches. We found ourselves on multiple occasions completely unable to execute a parry, leading to unnecessary \u2013 and <em>frustrating<\/em> \u2013 deaths. This issue eases a bit as you progress and purchase more powerful weapons from vendors scattered throughout the land.<\/p>\n<p>Thankfully, though, a large part of the gameplay is focused on Ary\u2019s ability to switch the world\u2019s seasons, and this is far more impressive. By tapping down on the D-pad, Ary can create a dome that stretches out across the land, flipping the season to whatever is immediately opposite. This means that lakes immediately freeze over, allowing you to safely cross, and enemies turn into frozen blocks that you can push around and use to climb high ledges. It\u2019s really well done and isn\u2019t something we\u2019ve come across that much before.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve mentioned Zelda a couple of times here, but it wouldn\u2019t be fair to go into this game expecting the same level of polish and finesse. The graphics are average at best and don\u2019t look anywhere near as good as its PS4\/Xbox One counterpart, and the number of bugs becomes a bit exasperating after a while. Regardless, Ary and the Secret of Seasons makes up for this with a well-told story, a fantastic gameplay mechanic centred around seasons, and a well-realised world filled with unique characters. It\u2019s not a game we\u2019d urge you to rush out and purchase immediately, but if you\u2019re after an action-adventure fix, you could do a lot worse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jumping into Ary and the Secret of Seasons \u2013 an action-adventure title \u2013 we\u2019re immediately reminded of The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. We\u2019re introduced to our heroine Ary, who, by playing with her toy figures, recounts an ancient story of an evil mage vanquished by a legendary warrior. Before too long, Ary is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117666\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}