Aggretsuko: The short timer strikes back

 

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The steam vents release: Aggretsuko: The short timer strikes back

Today is a match 3 game based on the Netflix show called Aggretsuko. This game gives you a large insight beyond what you see on tv. As you beat several hundred levels you unlock a lot of mini-episodes in this game. Sadly every video is subtitled only. 

Starting off you don't get much to work with. You get access to a menu with a mailbox for all the rewards you receive and access to the episodes. There are two main currencies in this game, coins and a premium currency, blue diamonds. Ritsuko must renovate the new office. She has many themes she can choose from for each floor. 

When you click on Retsko's face, you enter into the main game. You can choose an employee to help you in the level if you have any. You must clear about 10 levels before the rest of the features in the game opens up.

The levels are very simple. You can only move 1 face in any cardinal direction to match them. As you match a specific colored face that works well with your employee, the employee's face starts to fill in. Once it is completed you are able to activate the employee's special ability. As the levels progress, stranger things start to block you. First is a box of files that take several matches beside them to remove them.

When you complete the level you get a screen that shows you how well you have done. You earn employee shards, coins, stars, or other various items. Stars are another form of currency of sorts that will be explained later.

This game has a lot of costly microtransactions in it. You can use premium gems to buy different things but I would recommend not to do that and save these gems for a chance to get new employees.

The next two screens are themes you can choose for each floor of the office complex. You can click on the youtube button to see a preview of what the office space looks like. 

You can unlock new themes the further on you go but each theme costs a lot to unlock. Sometimes there are limited-time themes that can be bought as well and I do knot know if you have other chances to get them again.

Once you progress you get more options that open up. You unlock quests and the ability to join a department. This is where you start building up the office. Each level gives you starts for successfully completing them with many moves remaining.

Most decorations cost 2 or 3 stars to place down. If you have a lot of stars you can turn on auto-complete to be able to build multiple items. Each floor takes a lot of stars to fill up. Once everything is decorated on the floor you can move on to a new floor. You can only choose a theme but not choose what individual items you put into the floor sadly.

You have a friends list as well. I assume that once you add friends you can send each other a heart a day. I did not know anyone that plays this game at the time of this blog so I was not able to test out this feature any.

Daily quests allow you to earn coins and sometimes gems. You can watch optional videos up to a maximum number of times a day. I think the limit was 7 videos but you had to wait 15 minutes between each one.

Along with daily quests, you have more long-term quests that net you better rewards if you manage to complete them. These quests give premium currency or employee shards.

This game has an odd system of progression. When you unlock an employee from shards or from the gatcha, you can then level up the employee. It takes a lot of levels to be able to power-up an employee's ability slightly.

Welcome to the elevator gotcha. Sometimes you get tickets that give you free draws. Without the tickets, you can draw with diamonds or coins. I would recommend saving your premium currency and use them to draw employees.

You can watch one video a day to get a mystery shard. When you get 30 mystery shards, you unlock a new random employee. As far as I can tell, you can get extremely rare employees this way.

Weekly there is a bingo board that you complete to get various rewards. These rewards can give you a good source of mystery shards.

Lastly is a fortune cookie. You have to watch optional ads to get a chance to get 1 of 4 items from a list. Each video has a 15-minute cooldown and as you level up the rewards get better.

Overall:

 4 of 5 cogs.

This game is a very big nod to the Netflix show. The game has a lot of upsides but it suffers from common pay to keep playing games. It takes a lot of employees to level up one to have strong skills. Secondly, some of the levels are extremely difficult to pass and it could take you many tries just to pass a level.

Story:

 5 of 5 cogs.

There is actually a lot of stories but you have to unlock it by beating a lot of levels. There was I think 50+ videos of about 2 or 3 minutes each. These are fully animated and voiced acted scenes but it is in Japanese with subtitles. 

Amount of ads:

 None

No outside ads interrupt your gameplay. You can watch optional ads

Accurate Advertising?:

💯%

Since I preregistered for this game, I was excited about it for some time. This game is a standard match 3 with no click-bait whatsoever. This game relies heavily on name brand to advertise the game.

Graphics:

 5 of 5 cogs.

The graphics are exactly the same as the show. It is all high-quality animations and effects. I can't say enough about it.

Gameplay:

 4 of 5 cogs.

I have to rate the gameplay lower. As stated above, this game suffers from many issues that most mobile games suffer from to get you to spend money. There are some slowdowns and a glitch with departments. The game is just not easy to play for long stretches when these glitches do hit.

Free play:

💯%

You can earn a lot of stuff just by playing and you don't need to pay to make a significant amount of progress.

Fun factor:

🍱 A game you can play during your lunch break, over a nice bento box.

Are you an indy programmer or game dev?

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