Have you ever wanted to play a cozzy management sim where you run your own item shop in a colorful fantasy world, only for the harsh reality of crippling debt to strolle around the corner to haunt your very existence ? Then dont worry, Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is her to fulfill that dream.
Recettear is an Item Shop management game where your the one taskd selling all but the most important items to the heros of a fantasy world. Its a game I had my eye on for a long time. The kind of game where it keeps popping up in various gaming magazines, youtube videos or in barging bin sales. For whatever reason I never picked it up through out the various stages of my life despite always beeing curious, mainly about its wonderful sprite work. Well now I sat down and gave this odd niche title a chance to see if the actual game is a good as word of mouth has lead me to believe.
You embody Recette. A naiv Anime girl and recent owner of an item shop because her father just went up and dissapeared, leaving her with a truck load of financal debt. Soon the debt collectors of course come knocking and your tasked with paying back every penny owed or face beeing evicted from your own home. Fun. And thats pretty much the big picture. There isnt much of a plot aside from your main goal of not becoming homeless. Slice of life is the best word for Recettear. You will of course met tons of quirky characters that all have unique personalities. Comedy is very much the focus of the writing. That can be a problem if the jokes dont land, but luckily the translation, however accurate it might be for 2007, has more hits then misses. My favorite thing beeing the sometimes way too real news messages on top of the screen. There is nothing like stocking up your cute store with scarfes and ham sandwiches, only to be informed in passing that “The race war is still going on in the north”.
Of course the big hook is the management side of the game. To Recettears credit, under the anime exterior, there is quit a complex economie under the hood. You will be selling items to different customers, both named and unamed. They all have unique wants and budgets that have to be considered. As you progress through the months their wallet size will increase and you will learn at what price range everyone will buy. You can all also crash the economie if you happen to flud the market with too many cheap items, wich is always a treat. The more you sell in a row, the more you will build up a combo in order to gain merchant levels. Your Merchant level will allow you build out your store or stock more inventory. Basicly if there is a task you would have to consider when opening a real store, Recettear has you do it. Saying all this: The game does a real poor job in breaking down all those systems.
I can see an argument in how its simulating Recettes real inexperience in handling a bussines but thats not a enough for me. Some basics are explained, others are explained wrong and then again very important stuff is not told to you at all. Like how the combo system works or how a price increase in the market will allow you sell items for a mark up of 250% pretty much everytime. Information like that is vital to not hit a game over. Although a Game Over is ironicly not the end of the world. The image of your cute anime girl sleeping in dirty carboard box may be harsh but you will just be set back to day one. Reseting any events that happened but kepping all your store progress and inventory. A Game Over is still enough of a punishment but the devs made sure that your not completely back to 0, keeping motivation high. There is also a dungeon you can hire different heros for in order to scaving for rare items. The Dungeon is a trap I tell you. Its a waste of time and money in wich you will not get enough out of to make a real dent in your debt. Aside from the dungeons beeing really boring, its a activity best suited for the post game. Focus on selling and buying items until you repayd your debt. I do recommend some light reading on the wiki too, making your journey a bit less confusing once you take your first steps.
I had a lot of fun with Recettear, it really satisfied my inner number cruncher. If your only in it for the action rpg part, Recettear will dissapoint you but it often goes on sale for almost nothing and there is never a bad time to widen your horizon. Overall the charming presentation and gameplay loop is worth a look. There is lots of post game content too and I still have an urge to play more of this cute existential nightmare. Capitalism ho!
Recettear is an Item Shop management game where your the one taskd selling all but the most important items to the heros of a fantasy world. Its a game I had my eye on for a long time. The kind of game where it keeps popping up in various gaming magazines, youtube videos or in barging bin sales. For whatever reason I never picked it up through out the various stages of my life despite always beeing curious, mainly about its wonderful sprite work. Well now I sat down and gave this odd niche title a chance to see if the actual game is a good as word of mouth has lead me to believe.
You embody Recette. A naiv Anime girl and recent owner of an item shop because her father just went up and dissapeared, leaving her with a truck load of financal debt. Soon the debt collectors of course come knocking and your tasked with paying back every penny owed or face beeing evicted from your own home. Fun. And thats pretty much the big picture. There isnt much of a plot aside from your main goal of not becoming homeless. Slice of life is the best word for Recettear. You will of course met tons of quirky characters that all have unique personalities. Comedy is very much the focus of the writing. That can be a problem if the jokes dont land, but luckily the translation, however accurate it might be for 2007, has more hits then misses. My favorite thing beeing the sometimes way too real news messages on top of the screen. There is nothing like stocking up your cute store with scarfes and ham sandwiches, only to be informed in passing that “The race war is still going on in the north”.
Of course the big hook is the management side of the game. To Recettears credit, under the anime exterior, there is quit a complex economie under the hood. You will be selling items to different customers, both named and unamed. They all have unique wants and budgets that have to be considered. As you progress through the months their wallet size will increase and you will learn at what price range everyone will buy. You can all also crash the economie if you happen to flud the market with too many cheap items, wich is always a treat. The more you sell in a row, the more you will build up a combo in order to gain merchant levels. Your Merchant level will allow you build out your store or stock more inventory. Basicly if there is a task you would have to consider when opening a real store, Recettear has you do it. Saying all this: The game does a real poor job in breaking down all those systems.
I can see an argument in how its simulating Recettes real inexperience in handling a bussines but thats not a enough for me. Some basics are explained, others are explained wrong and then again very important stuff is not told to you at all. Like how the combo system works or how a price increase in the market will allow you sell items for a mark up of 250% pretty much everytime. Information like that is vital to not hit a game over. Although a Game Over is ironicly not the end of the world. The image of your cute anime girl sleeping in dirty carboard box may be harsh but you will just be set back to day one. Reseting any events that happened but kepping all your store progress and inventory. A Game Over is still enough of a punishment but the devs made sure that your not completely back to 0, keeping motivation high. There is also a dungeon you can hire different heros for in order to scaving for rare items. The Dungeon is a trap I tell you. Its a waste of time and money in wich you will not get enough out of to make a real dent in your debt. Aside from the dungeons beeing really boring, its a activity best suited for the post game. Focus on selling and buying items until you repayd your debt. I do recommend some light reading on the wiki too, making your journey a bit less confusing once you take your first steps.
I had a lot of fun with Recettear, it really satisfied my inner number cruncher. If your only in it for the action rpg part, Recettear will dissapoint you but it often goes on sale for almost nothing and there is never a bad time to widen your horizon. Overall the charming presentation and gameplay loop is worth a look. There is lots of post game content too and I still have an urge to play more of this cute existential nightmare. Capitalism ho!