There’s darkness across the edges of Infinity Nikki’s idyllic townscapes and romantic clothes, a traumatic scarring that’s left the pastoral fantasyland of Wishfield — the beginning area in Infinity Nikki’s bigger world of Miraland — on edge. For each lovely robe and pup with twee, cable-knit fur, Wishfield has a merciless, devastating actuality: Violence in a neighboring area has left Wishfield harboring conflict refugees, and mysterious trinkets that prey on individuals’s hopes and desires have residents falling into incurable comas.
The conflict, paradoxically, is the backdrop of Infinity Nikki, a desk setting for the determined world. As an alternative, Infinity Nikki’s story facilities on the coma incidents, which carry Nikki throughout Wishfield’s a number of totally different places searching for solutions. She’ll discover glimmering fish formed like luxurious purses, the ghosts of worn clothes, people imprisoned by lovable fairies, and a stunningly advanced plan to take advantage of the residents of Wishfield’s needs.
Infinity Nikki is the fifth recreation in developer Infold Video games’ Nikki franchise, and the primary of the sequence for consoles and PC: Every prior recreation — Nikki Up2U, Miracle Nikki, Love Nikki: Gown Up Queen, and Shining Nikki — was mobile-only. In apply, because of this Infinity Nikki goes past the franchise’s typical visible novel and trend closet gameplay and pulls Nikki right into a three-dimensional open world that lives as much as the duality of the franchise — a mixing of lighthearted, playful trend battles in a sturdy fantasy world below a shadow of darkness. Infinity Nikki presents it by means of the lens of Nikki herself, ever the one to show to hope.
Picture: Infold Video games/Papergames
Infinity Nikki isn’t an growth or sequel to any of the earlier video games and seemingly operates in an alternate timeline inside the identical world. The free-to-play, open-world recreation begins with Nikki being transported to Miraland and thrust into its society, specifically by the use of a authorities group known as the Stylist’s Guild, which was fashioned to honor the stylist who sacrificed her life for Miraland in an historical conflict of the gods. You see, it’s not essentially weapons that give individuals energy in Miraland (although Nikki lore does embrace weapons). It’s clothes, imbued with powers that can be utilized for good or evil. (Infinity Nikki doesn’t actually clarify why that is, however in different video games, stylists resort to trend battles to resolve battle as a result of a blood curse severely punishes those that use violence.) Nikki rapidly enlists within the Stylist’s Guild and turns into an necessary determine in fixing the continuing mysteries by amassing a number of totally different currencies and assets to construct out her closet to avoid wasting the world.
Whereas Nikki’s overarching aim is to search out inspiration to create a Miracle Outfit that’ll save the world, her first order of enterprise is crafting Capacity Outfits vital for navigating Miraland and its risks. She has equally lovable outfits for catching bugs, harvesting animal merchandise, double leaping, and light-weight fight, known as purification and used solely towards monsters. Then there’s her electrician outfit (self-explanatory), her violinist outfit (used to appease nerves), and her shrinking outfit (which makes her sufficiently small to trip her companion cat Momo). These outfits are collected throughout Wishfield’s areas as a part of Infinity Nikki’s storyline. Whereas Infinity Nikki is an open-world recreation, you’re higher off following the primary storyline and finishing aspect quests together with it; a variety of areas are gated off till the story progresses. That stated, it’s value exploring the areas Infinity Nikki’s primary quest takes you to; the corners and crevices are the place you’ll discover the small print of Nikki’s difficult lore.
For a franchise with such lovely clothes and a storied historical past with trend, there are surprisingly few cases the place it comes severely into play within the story. It’s there, positive — however the considerably optionally available Stylist Duels are the place your closet is most necessary. These are the normal trend battles that the Nikki franchise is thought for, with few modifications: From a closet stuffed with attractive garments, you select essentially the most highly effective, styling across the theme of the duel, to achieve the best rating attainable.
Just like the cellular video games, successful comes all the way down to numbers greater than trend sense — one among my greatest ongoing frustrations with the franchise. Largely, this meant I created tons of god-awful outfits just because they scored nicely. My finest trend was merely for enjoyable, and for Nikki to put on all through the journey (when she’s not in her Capacity Outfits, which change on robotically and out of the blue when activated by a keyboard button push).
I say these Stylist Duels are considerably optionally available as a result of progress on the primary story isn’t contingent on finishing them, however you do want to complete all of them to create the Miracle Outfit and set off the endgame. I ended up utterly ignoring these battles till I’d accomplished every little thing as much as the creation of the Miracle Outfit, once I was pressured to. However that was not by alternative: For fairly a while, the early construct of Infinity Nikki triggered the sport to basically crash anytime Nikki talked to a duelist. (The sport didn’t robotically crash out, nevertheless it mainly locked the sport on a frozen display screen.) Even when I needed to — and I did! — I couldn’t entry this a part of the sport till Infold Video games up to date it with a pre-launch patch.
Fight is almost nonexistent; Infinity Nikki will not be the sport for you when you’re on the lookout for complexity on this space. You’ll largely use your purification outfit to shoot bursts of power at little, simply defeated monsters that guard rewards. There are a number of “boss” battles which might be arrange as in the event that they’re meant to be dramatic centerpiece battles, however they fall flat because of the restricted fight techniques. I didn’t come to Infinity Nikki to be wowed by fight, however even I felt upset with these few areas; the sport would, merely put, be higher with out them. There are just a few moments that known as for extra emotional weight, and the lackluster fight left these consequential sequences feeling undersized. Infinity Nikki does have challenges in its platforming, which is discovered all through the world in small moments and elsewhere in elaborate dungeons that really feel like a mad sprint by means of a glittering pink make-up manufacturing facility that’s been overrun with horrible vines.
Infinity Nikki, for essentially the most half, was an absurd pleasure to play, nevertheless it felt prefer it was combating me each step of the way in which. Enjoying an early construct forward of the sport’s launch, Infinity Nikki was stuffed with bugs, each inconsequential and game-breaking. On the smaller finish, these bugs have been the standard kind of factor — floating animal fashions, lacking textures, and inconsistent clicking delays within the menus. However on the game-breaking aspect, the circulate of the sport was severely tousled because of the Stylist Duel points (that means I grinded all of them out on the finish of the sport), and one other bug halted progress on the primary storyline for days till a patch. That’s on high of body fee and efficiency points, like lacking translations, in depth pop-in, and occasional stuttering. These bigger points have been mounted as of writing, no less than on Home windows PC, however a number of of the smaller issues should be current at launch. These bigger points will definitely get mounted, however I’m not assured that every little thing might be solved by launch because of the scope of the sport.
The opposite piece of Infinity Nikki that I’ve discovered laborious to talk to whereas taking part in a pre-launch construct is the forex system. Like some other gacha recreation, Infinity Nikki has a number of in-game and premium currencies used to do every little thing from crafting outfits to rolling for particular, restricted outfits and restoring power for sure mechanics. No premium forex was out there throughout the pre-launch overview interval, and the overview builds have been loaded with the in-game forex for pulling the particular, elaborate outfits. (Suppose the gacha system in Genshin Affect, the place you’re pulling for characters, besides in Infinity Nikki, you’re pulling for clothes items.) These clothes items are sometimes highly effective score-wise, however they’re not Capacity Outfits — these are found by means of gameplay. Largely, the outfits out there to date haven’t been my vibe, both, so I can’t think about spending something to accumulate them.
Picture: Infold Video games/Papergames
However free-to-play video games like this are free for a cause: The developer expects to earn cash elsewhere. The forex used to buy vouchers for the particular pulls known as Diamonds, that are earned by means of gameplay. Nonetheless, to have sufficient to make a variety of pulls, chances are you’ll be incentivized to buy the Stellarite forex with actual cash, which might then be transferred one-to-one into Diamonds. Diamonds are used to revive stamina, however once more, Stellarite comes into play when you haven’t earned sufficient Diamonds. The third sort of forex known as Bling, which is acquired solely by means of gameplay and used to buy objects from in-game distributors, for example.
All of that is to say that Infinity Nikki is advanced all the way down to its core: It’s the story of exploitation, conflict, and needs combined with its candied exterior. It’s additionally the overwhelming menu that’d scare off essentially the most “hardcore” of players, and its sheer breadth of clothes choices, all the way down to socks and footwear, that enable for any kind of fashion. In video video games, trend has all the time been energy, even when it’s not instantly apparent to the common participant. In video games like Elden Ring or Future 2, gamers go scorched-earth to search out essentially the most highly effective gear — a helmet that’s resistant to fireplace assaults, maybe, or a chest plate that will increase injury dealt. Infinity Nikki takes that concept very actually, eliminating the kind of stereotypical violence historically seen in video video games whereas nonetheless holding true to the sequence’ deep, intriguing darkness and shimmering frivolity. Developer Infold Video games has created essentially the most earnest (and typically absurd) story with Infinity Nikki, centered round a historically female worth — fashion! — that connects all kinds of various gamers. What you get is one thing that’ll each bewilder and dazzle you, even when it’s irritating.
Infinity Nikki might be launched on Dec. 4 on Android, Apple iOS, PlayStation 5, and Home windows PC. The sport was reviewed on PC utilizing a pre-release obtain code offered by Infold Video games. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These don’t affect editorial content material, although Vox Media might earn commissions for merchandise bought through affiliate hyperlinks. You will discover extra details about kritikanews’s ethics coverage right here.
