Natari at the Bubble Planet

the game looks lazy at 1st, too much text & less gameplay...not for everyone i guess..but it's unique kind of vn...

Developed and published by the small Taiwanese development group Caliburn Studio Natari at the Bubble Planet was originally designed to be the first episode of a greater project called 《Wakusei Keikaku》. The biggest RPG Maker MV project which the group has created, telling different stories about the characters at various special planets in the Universe. Given this was released in 2017 and sorely lacks distinct polish to the point the creators updated it to remove the steam achievements that caused numerous bugs... I suspect that project is dead in the water. Whilst suffering from many spelling and grammar errors in translation and clunky gameplay its been hovering in my Steam list for a while due to its positive reviews. [h1]Story [/h1] The games background story is quickly rushed through in the intro video, a brief synopsis however is that it follows a young girl named Natari who is making a decision of creature named Bubbles she should bond with, These creatures have seemingly magic powers in very narrow areas (though what they can actually do is only hinted at) they also require compatibility tests with a possible bonding human and a human can only ever bond with two in their life. Its also insinuated that the bubble type you bond with heavily influences your career so on the surface people are encouraged to follow their dreams. However while Natari is basically a blank slate with little personality and nothing is influencing her there are (badly translated) hints of a much darker reality behind the cute and bright world as people are unable to obtain the careers they want due to low compatibility with the relevant Bubble or pressured into taking a different bubble they have high compatibility than the one they desire. However there are also several characters that have bonded with bubbles without taking the official exams and it seems the "Bubbler" title is more of a social construct than a requirement for the bubbles, there is also evidence that not having a bubble does not make you unable to have that skill only that a bubble will give you great advantages (Though its questioned is it really your skill and work if the bubble is helping you?) But none of the above matters as it goes right over Natari's head and has no baring on the plot, basically do all the tests choose a bubble, go to random places for 3 days, choose the specialisation of your bubble, do one last test, congratulations you passed the exam, the end... [h1]Presentation[/h1] The game is visually attractive at a glance however the Art design seems all over the place and of varying quality and styles, images don't match locations and the soundtrack is utterly forgettable. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] In a word clunky, the game itself is very short however each play through takes between 20-40 minutes to complete depending on how much you read the dialogue, there are also various inconsistent areas where the dialogue can not skipped or quickly moved through. Indeed apart from been atypical in design compared to many RPG Maker MV the technical aspects of the game are very poor in implementation resulting in lots of repetitiveness. The minigames and tests are completely unbalanced in regards to one another and whilst I respect the effort to make them different the interface between the choices make the experience unpleasant. Not the worst RPG Maker offender but I won't be playing it again. [b] Pros: [/b] - Free. - Interesting Concept - Multiple endings - Okay Sound Track [b] Cons: [/b] - Tedious unskippable text - Bad translation - Forced to do all the tests each time which don't change so multiple playthroughs are painfuly long. - Test difficulty absolutely unbalanced. Complete playthrough below: https://youtu.be/_1QzxBIxZOA