Thank you to Game Freak for sending us a review code for this game!
Little Town Hero is a little project from the developers behind the main Pokémon RPG series, Game Freak. With this connection, you could assume that a lot might be shared between this game and the other Pokémon games from Game Freak, but I came to find that Little Town Hero definitely holds its own identity well. The game has gotten some well-deserved buzz for the composition team that Game Freak makes sure to advertise in each of its trailers: Toby Fox, best known for his amazing music from UNDERTALE, and Hitomi Sato, an incredible composer in her own right with a background starting at the soundtrack for Pokémon Diamond and Pearl and spanning until the modern Pokémon games. With a killer composition team and Game Freak behind it, it’s no surprise that I think Little Town Hero holds some big successes, but it also leaves more to be desired in some places.
STORY
Though Little Town Hero succeeds well in other areas, the story just barely succeeds in doing the minimum. Like most other Game Freak stories, the game’s story begins by naming your character, but that doesn’t mean your character is a blank slate; the hero of this story is as hot-headed as his hair would make him seem. His character traits don’t span too far from this defining point, though. He has a few friends around this little town, too, like Matock. This green haired rival challenges the hero at a few points in the story, and he’s always trying to get a leg up on the hero despite his quick battle prowess. There’s also the more meek Nelz: a friend of the hero and Matock who supports them with from the side with his inventive ideas, helping at various points in the story and in battles this way. Training the hero and Matock in battle is Angard, a soldier that used to work for the castle. And supporting the hero and Matock respectively on your journeys to get stronger are the hero’s mom, Ember, and Matock’s sister, Pasmina.
The general gist of the story is that the hero wants to explore what lies outside of his town, so he trains with his rival to become a soldier for the town’s king. After doing his usual work in the mines, the hero finds a strange red stone. Afterwards, a monster invade s town despite the outside world being closed off, and the hero stops it. From there, the hero has to do other tasks around town, whether its part of the main quest or a side quest, and he has to defeat other monsters he encounters on the way.
The game definitely doesn’t excel when it comes to its story and characters, they’re simple and predictable. And, though many interactions are mildly cute in the moment, they don’t end up adding very much to the game overall. The story in this game does what it needs to do, but doesn’t really succeed in engaging the player past the bare minimum.
GRADE: C
The story and characters are okay.
PRESENTATION
I’ve always believed Game Freak has excelled in their games’ presentations, and this one is no exception. The art style immediately lends itself well to the whimsical and sometimes silly world with its cel shaded designs. The design of the town itself, like the story, is not very complex, but I believe its designs’ strengths lie in its characters. Each one is distinct with different, brightly colored designs. The UI uses color in practical ways to indicate battle actions, too, which I’ll talk more about later. The monster designs fit well with the art style, but seemed generic and a bit uninspired to me.
Of course, the music is as great as expected! It’s not quite at the level of the composition teams’ other works, but it’s still wonderful. The town’s main theme, which you’ll be hearing very often throughout the game, definitely seems designed to be catchy enough to listen to a lot. I’m happy to say I never got tired of it, it’s easily my favorite song in the game. Its changes in instruments depending on which area you travel to was a simple touch that gave even more depth to the song. And, hearing the rival’s simpler sounding overworld theme used as a motif in his battle theme reminded me quickly of Papyrus’ catchy overworld and battle themes in UNDERTALE.
As for how the game runs, and as for its load times, they both have some small problems. The load times can be lengthy when starting the game up and when the game transitions between the overworld and a battle. Sometimes, the music might stutter a bit because of other loading times for smaller events, which was a minor inconvenience, but it didn’t happen often. The frame rate isn’t very important in a turn-based game like this, but the frame rate in this game does have problems when too many objects are on screen. For example, when the camera is pointed towards the town from the mine area, the game is considerably slowed down because it seems like it can’t handle loading a view of the entire town at once. It slows the experience down occasionally, but it wasn’t really a problem for me.
The game’s presentation has some issues in its loading times and frame rate, but these are not big problems when more important aspects like the art style and music are so successful in creating such a fun and cute atmosphere.
GRADE: A
Its art style and music are well done!
GAMEPLAY
The game really shines with its battle system. Although it seemed complex at first, after I understood how it worked, I had fun using it. A turn begins with a series of thoughts, called “Izzits,” that can be converted into actions, “Dazzits.” Each Izzit has a Power cost to become a Dazzit, beginning each battle with three Power points you can use, then gaining more Power as a battle continues. This system allows you to use more Dazzits as a battle goes on. Each Dazzit has an offense and defense, then these clash against the stats of an opponent’s Dazzit, and the weaker one breaks. The Dazzit still standing is damaged and has a lower defense score during following turns, which means it can break easier. Each Izzit and Dazzit comes in three types: Attack, Defense, and Special, which are red, yellow, and blue respectively. Attacks can be used once in a turn, Defense can be used many times, and Special can be used once for a special effect before clashing yours with an opponent’s. Your Izzit choices are randomly selected from your pool of thoughts at the beginning of each turn, which limits your options to managing what Dazzits are available, and what Izzits may be useful Dazzits for that turn or later in the battle. By breaking all of an enemy’s Dazzits, you can either do direct damage an enemy if you have an Attack Dazzit available, or, if not, get a Break Point. These Break Points can be used to switch out an Izzit on a turn if you’re looking for one in particular, or you can use the points to revive Izzits that have already been broken as Dazzits.
Other aspects of the system include the Support that townspeople or other things sitting around your current area can do to help defeat a monster. You’re able to move around a map after each turn by stopping a spinner and moving to other locations in the town, which can give you new support opportunities as you do. Using Support is key to later bosses in the game since bosses begin to have much larger health that makes it harder to defeat them even after breaking their Dazzits. You can also improve your Izzits with a skill tree that can be progressed through using Eureka Points earned after each battle, allowing for more diverse progression outside of many turn-based games’ usual level-up system.
While all this seems like a lot to take in, it flows much more naturally over the pace of the game, and the system gives you opportunities to make mistakes before continuing. With the color-coded Izzits and Dazzits, it was easy to learn each type and their uses, then naturally start experimenting with the other battle strategies after learning the other mechanics in their simplest forms.
GRADE: B+
Great gameplay because of its innovative battle system.
VERDICT
Little Town Hero may not be for everyone with its straightforward story, simple character interactions, and minor, but present, loading issues. However, the game’s art style and music certainly give it a cute and pleasant identity, and its gameplay gives its battles more strategy than may be understood after short play sessions. I would suggest Little Town Hero to anyone interested in turn-based RPGs or other strategy games because of its battle system. This system and the game’s great presentation succeed in giving it more depth, and, for $25, it is totally worth the price of admission just to try them out, even if you don’t think the story or characters will do it for you.
Overall, I liked Little Town Hero, so I’d give it a B.
Thanks again to Game Freak for the review copy of Little Town Hero!
You can find the purchase page for the game here.
I love translation, writing, and talking about video games. MOTHER has been the series that's inspired me the most - from Itoi's writing to the MOTHER 3 fan translation. I research gaming translations and storytelling through games. I'm also making a game called GNOMONIC. I appreciate any constructive comments to help me improve.
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LTH sounds interesting, I be sure to give it a try.