Potion Permit
Released: September 22, 2022
Game Length: 24 Hours
Grade: B-
The Good
Checklist: There is a standard for every feel-good game that comes out nowadays. You get to customize your character. You build-up your relationship with the townsfolk by talking to them, completing certain tasks, and gifting them items. Gradually, you unlock certain events and learn a little more about the people you live next to. This information is provided to you through a database. The game automatically saves and advances to the next day when you sleep in your bed. Resources can be gathered by cutting down trees, breaking down rocks, cutting up plants, and defeating creatures. You can do tasks for the town on either a daily or weekly basis. There is fishing. There is a bath that you can jump in to revive your health and energy. You unlock new zones by gathering enough items and upgrading your equipment. Everything seems to be working fairly well here.
Mechanics: I don't know why I have to preface this but there is no farming. It isn't that type of game. The zones are static and will respawn items after you sleep. You can utilize the teleport system to jump around the map. Each of the buildings are properly named when you highlight them and each of the plants will be visible on the map when you visit them. Instead of showing where people are on the map, you can ask your dog to go find someone for you. The main portion of the game consists of gathering "blocks" of resources and filling out shapes inside your cauldron. This creates a sort of efficiency mini-game where you must determine what resources you need for a specific product. As a chemist, you'll be making potions to heal those complaining of ailments in your clinic, making potions to assist your friends' problems they are too afraid to admit, and become a semi-engineer by making potions to clear out mechanical issues. After making five of a certain potion, you can save your recipes and instantly use them at any time.
Story: What's nice about this game is how they provide you with a reason to build trust with everyone. The previous chemist they had performed experiments that caused damage to the environment. You are there to not only save someone but to assist in restoring the wildlife. You don't technically have to build friendships with people to advance the story. However, it is rather nice to help people with their ailments that aren't visible inside the clinic. Once a person's meter reaches full, you can visit any of the task boards to see where they want you to meet them. Going there will trigger the cutscene and sometimes an additional request will be offered. These can be turned in directly with the character no matter where they are on the map. If you really don't care about making friends with people, you can skip the cutscene (even if it is the first time you are watching it). People go about their daily lives and wander around town doing things throughout the day. They will also be "inspired" by your assistance and occasionally make repairs to the town.
The Bad
Simplicity: The game suffers a lack of complexity. Other than making potions, all the mini-games are very easy. Diagnosis will ask you to repeat three or four buttons, dodge some bacteria nodes, or press some buttons at an alarmingly slow pace. Fishing consists of you pressing one button whenever the line isn't red. The daily town tasks will ask you to shift between two bottles, smash a button as fast as you can, or press a sequence of buttons. The weekly task simply asks you to collect three items around town. Instead of finding what a person likes or dislikes, you receive one universal gift to give people. Half the enemies won't attack you unless attacked first and you do not get hurt when you come in contact with them. Perhaps the biggest problem is how there is no way to know how to get the next fishing rod. The game simply provides you with the quest for a better rod when you use your current one too much. You can cook food, but there doesn't seem to be any special benefit other than replenishing some health and energy.
Cost: At first, being able to find things using a map in a static world might seem rather nice. The problem is that the game sort of requires you to collect everything from an area about 20 times before advancing to the next one. When you visit four areas, this can get tiresome rather quickly. Furniture doesn't become available until later and will cost you as much time it does when it comes to upgrading your equipment. It costs you 500g for each and every color unlock at the tailor. There is also the single decorations that are available for DLC on release that must be addressed.
Technical Problems: There is a reason why I don't usually buy games when they first come out. That's because the game isn't usually polished before the release date. There was no mouse support. Keybinding was almost non-existent. There were several phase issues where people were sitting in the wrong chair, disappearing behind furniture, appearing in front of structures, or repeating lines. It isn't surprising then that the very next patch that came out a week after release was addressing some of these problems. Perhaps one of my favorite "glitches" is how Leano's hook switches to her other hand when facing to the right of the screen. The alarm will show on your HUD whenever you enter diagnosis during a cutscene. Objectives will continue to ask you to deliver the goods even when you use the material for something else. One time the screen was missing assets and another the screen froze when the character never reached his destination. These problems only got worse the further in you played the game.
Summary
Review: Potion Permit is a very interesting game that checks all the boxes. The setting, story, and characters are all great. There is enough flexibility and versatility presented in the main menu and map interface to complete your objectives. Unfortunately, the game released a bit too soon. Lacking mouse support and keybindings makes it apparent that they focused their attention on getting the game out on the consoles. The idea of putting out single decorations for 99 cents each is also pretty crummy. Although the game's primary loop of building potions is brilliant, the rest of the game remains far too simple and stretches far too wide with the cost of items. You may choose to download the demo for yourself to decide, but I do not recommend this game at this time.
10-7-2022