Potata: Fairy Flower review for Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox One

For the life of me, I can?t figure out what it is about Potata: Fairy Flower that makes me feel so indifferent towards it.

I mean, it looks pretty nice. The art style might be best described as Westernized Vanillaware, which basically means it borrows a little from games like Muramasa: Rebirth or Dragon?s Crown, except all the people — and particularly the game?s titular heroine — are dressed appropriately. It?s not the most original-looking world, and nothing is going to wow you or jump off the screen, but I?ve certainly played lots of games that look a whole lot worse.

Likewise, as puzzle-platformers go, it?s mildly challenging. None of the puzzles are super hard, nor is any of the platforming, but when you mix them together, you?ll probably find that you die a reasonable number of times. Between the fact that Potata: Fairly Flower isn?t meant to be some tough-as-nails platformer and the aforementioned kind graphics, that?s probably the right difficulty level.

Even the story and the humour are mildly engaging. The game follows a novice witch — the Potata of the title — as she saves her village from some evil and learns more about her powers along the way. There?s the odd joke along the way as she meets talking mushrooms and other fairy tale-worthy characters, but I?d be lying if I ever said I laughed once. Still, it tries, and for the most part it?s kind of amusing.

I think the problem is that even if Potata: Fairy Flower does a lot of things well enough, it doesn?t do anything incredibly well. Even if, as I said, it looks better than plenty of other platformers — and, for that matter, it?s got more competent gameplay and a more engaging story than many of its competitors — there are also plenty more platformers that do all of those things much better than this game does. If you just want something that?s good enough, it?ll do, but I feel like there are lots of other games out there that you should probably play first.

OverGamez provided us with a Potata: Fairy Flower Switch code for review purposes.