Game: Button City
Genre: Adventure, RPG, Action, Arcade
System: Nintendo Switch (also on Steam, PS5 & Xbox Series)
Developers | Publishers: Subliminal | Stride PR
Age Rating: US E | EU 3+
Price: UK £15.99 | US $19.99 | EU € 19,99
Release Date: August 11th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Stride PR
Button City is a narrative adventure about cute animals, friendship, and arcades. Released on Nintendo Switch, Steam, PS5 and Xbox Series. Subliminal created Button City in partnership with WINGS Interactive, an investment fund focused on indie games from studios with women and marginalized genders as members of development teams.
Fennel the fox
You play as shy Fennel the fox as you explore a diorama world. In this world, you can also play exciting arcade games, and meet cute animal friends. As you explore, you’ll take part in a high-jinks story to save the arcade from a greedy fat cat who threatens to tear it down.
Fennel is a shy little fox who just moved into town. Fennel’s Mum is busy with her new job and doesn’t have much spare time, so Fennel is left to fend for himself. Moving into a new house and a new area Button City, Fennel is shy and a little withdrawn, he spends a lot of time in his bedroom playing video games and hasn’t made any friends.
Off on an Adventure
His Mum sends him to the local Mart Mart to collect some lunch for her. It is here that Fennel makes new friends. After discovering the local arcade, Fennel learns that the Arcade is facing a crisis. It is under threat of being shut down by the fat cat Peppermint Pepperbottom!
That can’t be allowed to happen as the new friends Fennel has made are part of the Fluff Squad, who are in a competition to be champions of the arcade game Gobabots. After joining the second place Gobabots team to help them climb to the top and win the coveted Golden Gobabot prize, Fennel and his new friends get swept up in a whirlwind adventure to save their beloved arcade from being shut down.
Button City is built on little dioramas stacked on top of each other. Each diorama represents one area of Button City, such as Fennel’s house or the Mart Mart. To move to the next diorama you simple press the B button and scroll to the diorama you want to visit and press B again. This system works very well as there aren’t any loading times or waiting to move, it’s instant and I love it.
The Herbs
All the characters in the game are anthropomorphic animals. Their names all represent herbs, such as Fennel himself and his friends, Chive, Saffron, Lavender and Sorrel to name a few. You’ll fulfil some quests for the animal folk of Button city.
Solve a few easy puzzles, collect new outfits, make lemonade in a mini-game and collect rubbish from around Button City. All in the hopes to unlock new ways of standing up to Pepperbottom. Or take a break to play Gobabots as well as other arcade games like Prisma Beats and rEvolution Racer.
Arcade games
The inclusion of the arcade games is a fun feature of Button city. You can challenge some of the cute animals you meet in and around Button City to a game. Like Gobabots which is a 4v4 shooter game where you collect enough fruit to make the biggest smoothie! Or rEvolution Racer, atake on classic arcade racing games, where you race about in tuned-up electric cars. Or try your hand at Prisma Beats, a rainbow rhythm game with funky visuals and some pretty awesome tunes, hit the right notes on the beat and show off your best dance moves.
Personalities and a Homage
The cute animals in Button City all have their own personalities that shine through as you play the game. From Chive the rabbit, who is handy with a screwdriver and likes to tinker with tech. Chive can also be a little sarcastic and is wheelchair-bound. Then there is Lavender who is the creative one of the bunch, she loves drawing and writes fan fiction. Even the secondary characters have their own characteristics and story to tell. Such as Chive’s grandpa, who is slowly losing his memory and forgetting who Chive is!
The developers have done a great job in bringing diversity to each character in their personalities and appearances. It’s been done in a way that makes you care about characters as you play the game. Button City is kind of like a homage to the old days of gaming arcades, where kids spent their time hanging around playing their favourite arcade game. There are also a few pop culture references in the game to look out for, I don’t want to say more on those as I wouldn’t want to spoil the fun of finding them for yourself.
Visuals and Controls
Visually there no denying that Button City is full of bright vibrant colours. With its low poly art style and quirky chibi characters, I really like the look of the game. There is one thing though I did notice about the visuals. They can be a little hard on the eyes after playing the game for a longer session, or maybe that’s just my old eyes.
This game is a huge homage to classic arcade games as I’ve mentioned and that also comes through in the upbeat, happy music that plays as the soundtrack.
Control-wise Button City is joy-cons controls mostly. You can use the touchscreen for the menus and also move between the dioramas. Both controls work as they should and the game runs smoothly.
Conclusion
Button City is a game about friendship, growing up, the importance of community and saving the things that are significant to you. It’s a perfect game for a relaxed, stress-free gaming session, spent in the company of adorable Fennel and his friends in the Fluff Squad.
Final Verdict: Two Thumbs Up 