{"id":3875,"date":"2017-10-30T18:30:00","date_gmt":"2017-10-30T18:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/reviews\/switch-eshop\/violett"},"modified":"2017-10-30T18:30:00","modified_gmt":"2017-10-30T18:30:00","slug":"review-violett-switch-eshop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2017\/10\/30\/review-violett-switch-eshop\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Violett (Switch eShop)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"\">\n<aside class=\"picture embed\"><a title=\"Screenshot 1 of 3\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85649\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85649\/900x.jpg\" alt=\"NSwitch DS Violett 03 Mediaplayer Large\" \/><\/a><\/aside>\n<p>Point-and-click adventure games are in an interesting spot these days. There\u2019s definitely an audience for them, but it seems that developers go out of their way to make them only cater to that specific crowd. Those who don\u2019t have an affinity for finding hidden messages in game manuals or using an inventory item on every applicable spot on the screen can find them obtuse to the point of being frustrating and inevitably not worth playing. <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nintendolife.com\/games\/switch-eshop\/violett\">Violett<\/a><\/strong> by Forever Entertainment attempts to marry this polarizing play style with something that\u2019s more palpable to the masses; as to whether this works or not is a complicated discussion indeed.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"picture embed\"><a title=\"Screenshot 2 of 3\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85653\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85653\/900x.jpg\" alt=\"NSwitch DS Violett 01 Mediaplayer Large\" \/><\/a><\/aside>\n<p>Violett follows a little girl as her family moves into a new home off the beaten path. As they start settling in Violett\u2019s parents get into an argument, sending the lost girl into her room to sulk. While growling on her bed, she notices a flash in a hole in the wall that sends her into a curious and wondrous world. Unsure of her surroundings, she eventually discovers that completing an amulet is her ticket home. Scared and alone in a bizarre place, she sets off to find some missing gems; if it sounds like a modern day retelling of <em>Alice in Wonderland<\/em>, you aren\u2019t far off the mark.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than having players wander aimlessly trying to find their way, the pace of Violett is structured in a way that almost feels level-like in design. Most areas are accessed through a hub world that is akin to an M.C. Escher painting of looping staircases and warping doors. Once within a new locale, your goal is to poke around until you find the way to each gem for the amulet. There\u2019s plenty of random clicking going on, but you\u2019ll eventually surmise that you have to set off a chain of events in a Rube Goldberg machine-like manner to find your way to the previously unreachable area. The game does a good job of showing you a hand icon when something can be interacted with, waylaying some frustration in a genre that often stubbornly leaves you to your own devices. Even if you can\u2019t do something at a particular point, it\u2019s worth nothing Violett shaking her head because you\u2019ll need to come back to it later.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"picture embed\"><a title=\"Screenshot 3 of 3\" href=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85650\/large.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/images.nintendolife.com\/screenshots\/85650\/900x.jpg\" alt=\"NSwitch DS Violett 04 Mediaplayer Large\" \/><\/a><\/aside>\n<p>While you constantly find yourself wondering what to do next, there is a neat hint mechanic that alleviates those issues if you don\u2019t have the patience. At any point, with no penalty, you can hit the button and the game will point you in the right direction. It in no way just hands you the answer, but it is often a firm enough nudge to keep you going. There are four hints per area, but you can\u2019t access the next one until a timer bar fills up. This forces players to think intuitively instead of spamming the hint button in the hopes that it will teach them how adventure games work. While certainly helpful, it never alleviates the feeling that there isn\u2019t really a logic to adhere to in this game.<\/p>\n<p>It is assumed that if you plan on picking up this game, you know what you\u2019re getting into. That being said, the biggest knock against Violett is that while it offers two control schemes, neither of them feel intuitive. The game suggests you play it using the touchscreen and, as sensible as this choice is, it has a sluggish level of responsiveness. You can also opt to use the left analogue stick to move and the right one to access a pointer, but this too feels laborious because it moves too slowly. Even for a game that is based around patience and observation, this is still a detriment.<\/p>\n<p>The bright spot, and a very good reason to play Violett, is the lavishly detailed lands our heroine finds herself in as she tries to make her escape. You constantly find yourself in awe as you look upon places that are based on real-world locales like bathroom sinks and train depots, but filled with novelties like a giant caterpillar with a man\u2019s face fencing with spiders, or a mirror that lets poor Violett see upon her parents at home, wondering where she is. It\u2019s dripping with detail, which often rewards players with little orbs strewn about for their effort. It\u2019s part and parcel with the adventure genre, but always an endearing inclusion.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"conclusion\">\n<h2 class=\"heading\">Conclusion<\/h2>\n<p>At its heart Violett is a classically designed point-and-click adventure, warts and all. It tells an interesting tale in a world filled with oddity and excitement, but it&#8217;s told in an unintuitive manner that only the most stalwart fan of the genre will likely stick with. It tries to cast its net wide by offering a clever hint system to help players survive its obtuse nature, but nevertheless only the most patient will try to come back out of the rabbit hole.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Point-and-click adventure games are in an interesting spot these days. There\u2019s definitely an audience for them, but it seems that developers go out of their way to make them only cater to that specific crowd. Those who don\u2019t have an affinity for finding hidden messages in game manuals or using an inventory item on every [&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-3875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nintendo-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3875","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=3875"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3875\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}