Tomodachi Life | Game Review

Ah Miis. One of Nintendo’s greatest creations. Yet they never had much life to them. Until now. Tomodachi Life hit Europe and the US just a few weeks ago. And now I’ve had the game for a few weeks, there’s so much to cover in my Mii’s world.

It’s kind of a mix between Animal Crossing and The Sims, but a lot more random. You start off on an island (mine’s called Cinnabar Island) with just your Mii, who refers to you as their lookalike (only slightly offended). You then start filling the apartment block with more Miis and they all socialise and become friends and find love and break up. As the Miis level up with you feeding them their favourite food or playing mini games with them, they get things to play with like a 3DS (Nintendo-ception) or a football and many other things. They’re very needy Miis. But, you can have up to 100 of them!

On a day-to-day basis, you, as the lookalike, solve all their problems in exchange for money, make them happy if they’re sad, buy them clothes or new rooms or hats and plenty of food, solve their love issues or broken hearts. This all happened in 3 days. One of the faults in this is that some of the problems get very repetitive. In the space of one hour, I was asked by Miis 8 times if they could have a new hat. I refused. They seem to struggle to make decisions for themselves either. The random time events that Nintendo showed off so much aren’t that random at all, and most of the Miis sit around doing nothing for the most part, like real people then.

Another slight issue is how easy it is to progress through the game. I had 90% of the buildings unlocked in two days. So it’s definitely a game for the casual gamer with not a lot of time on there hands. There is however, plenty to unlock in the shopping area of the game with the clothes and rooms, which should keep you playing.

What Tomodachi Life does achieve is making use of some of the 3DS capabilities, unlike most of the 3DS games. It makes use of the AR card, which is a bit gimmicky but is good fun all the same. It also makes use of the mic and motion device in the system. What it doesn’t use well is the 3D, rendering the 3DS a bit pointless. Other than that, the game is very easy to grasp and easy to play.

It is an incredibly quirky game with all the random moments. But there is plenty to do, whether you’re just playing for five minutes or five hours. How much the game is gonna keep anyone hooked for very long is doubtful at the moment however, having seen most aspects of the game in such a short amount of time. But it is a very fun game that should keep teens and adults with teen like tendencies addicted for a long time to come. After three weeks of playing, I think I’ve seen pretty much all there is to see. Replayability is a no-no at this point.

7/10

Here's some highlights from my Tomodachi Life!

Holiday in France!

Cinnabar Islanders!

Snail Race!

Take note guys.