Reverie Was A Pleasant Little Detour

A Familiar Adventure on Unfamiliar Shores

There’s something comforting about a good old-fashioned top-down adventure. Give me an overworld to explore, a handful of dungeons to get lost in, some puzzles to solve, and a collection of strange creatures standing between me and my next objective, and I'd say I'm usually a pretty happy camper. That's the kind of experience Reverie is looking to deliver. Developed by Rainbite, it's hard not to see the Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past influence, trading Hyrule for a fictional island inspired by New Zealand. Reverie sends players off on a quest filled with exploration, puzzles, and plenty of familiar adventure-game ingredients.

Playing on the PlayStation Vita, I found myself settling into Reverie pretty quickly. Its simple controls and approachable gameplay make it an easy game to pick up, and its smaller scope felt like a natural fit for the handheld, any my current ultra-busy lifestyle. This isn't a sprawling adventure trying to reinvent the genre, nor does it pretend to be. Instead, Reverie aims to deliver a bite-sized Zelda-inspired experience, and after spending around six hours exploring everything it had to offer, I came away with a game I enjoyed. Even if it didn't leave much of a lasting impression.

A Colorful Island with a Quiet Story

One of the first things that stood out to me about Reverie was its presentation. The pixel art has a simple but charming style, giving the island and its inhabitants plenty of personality without needing to do anything particularly flashy. It's a colorful little world that's easy to settle into, and I think the developers did a nice job giving the game its own identity while still embracing the retro adventures that clearly inspired it. While I haven't played Earthbound yet (blasphemy, I know), this game gave me those vibes. The soundtrack, on the other hand, didn't leave quite the same impression, though. It's perfectly serviceable and never became annoying, but I can't say there were any tracks that stuck with me after putting the game down. The music you may be hearing now if you clicked the little player at the top of the article was the one standout that played in the game's central hub town of Harikoa. Decent.

Unfortunately, the same could be said for the story. I don't need every adventure game to deliver some grand, emotionally gripping narrative, but I do like having something that gives me a reason to remember the journey. With Reverie, the story was so unremarkable that I honestly struggle to recall much about it, even as I type these words. There's nothing particularly bad about the writing, and the quirky characters help give the world a little personality, but the narrative ultimately feels like an excuse to get the adventure underway rather than something that adds much to it. Not a deal breaker, but disappointing for a game like this.

Down the Dungeon Path

When it comes to the actual gameplay, Reverie keeps things pretty straightforward. Movement and combat are easy to pick up, and it didn't take long before I felt comfortable exploring the island and dealing with whatever random enemies crossed my path. There's a familiar rhythm to the adventure, with new areas to explore, equipment to collect, and dungeons filled with puzzles and enemies to overcome. I particularly enjoyed the dungeon designs, which provided some welcome variety and gave me a reason to keep pushing forward. If you've ever played a game in the Zelda series, the dungeon designs will be very familiar to you. The difficulty is fairly forgiving for much of the game as well, with the more challenging puzzles and encounters only showing up closer to the end. I could see someone not being a huge fan of that, but given the kind of experience Reverie is aiming for, I wasn't expecting a particularly demanding adventure.

Where things become a little less exciting is in the actual combat itself. It's functional enough, and there's a decent assortment of enemies to keep things from feeling completely stale, but most encounters follow a pretty similar routine. Enemies are generally easy to deal with, and I rarely felt like I needed to think too much about how I approached a fight. The game gives you different tools and special items along the way, but I often found myself relying on the basics rather than experimenting with everything at my disposal. It's not that the combat is bad, exactly... it just never develops into something particularly interesting. And as I'll get into next, that lack of depth also makes some of the game's rewards feel a little underwhelming.

A Treasure Chest That's Not Quite Full

One thing I found myself wishing Reverie did a little better was give me a reason to care about all the enemies I was fighting. Defeating enemies occasionally rewards you with health or ammunition for your projectile weapon, and you'll also collect coins along the way. Health and ammo are expected, but the problem with the coins is that there just isn't all that much to spend that money on. Outside of one special item, most of your purchases are limited to things like healing supplies and ammunition, neither of which I found myself needing very often. Before long, I had more money than I knew what to do with, and it didn't take much effort to hit the game's 200-coin limit. It'd be one thing to just amass some funds but I couldn't even do that. I don't know why I found that so disappointing, so it might have been a me problem.

Even so, I think that's a bit of a missed opportunity. When you're exploring dungeons, fighting monsters, and poking around every corner for treasure, it's nice to feel like those efforts are actually building toward something. But in Reverie, I rarely felt much excitement when an enemy dropped coins or when I stumbled across another handful of them. There simply wasn't enough to buy or enough reason to stock up on supplies. It's a relatively small issue in the grand scheme of things, but it does make the adventure feel a little less rewarding than it could have been. After all, what's the point of being a treasure hunter and dungeon crawler if there's not much loot to be had?

A Weekend Well Spent?

It took me roughly six hours to see everything Reverie had to offer, which I imagine might be a sticking point for some players. There's certainly an argument to be made that the adventure could have used a little more room to breathe, especially when some of its gameplay systems feel underdeveloped. Personally, though, I didn't have much of a problem with the length. These days, finding the time to sit down with a sprawling adventure can be a challenge, so there's something refreshing about a game that lets me jump in, enjoy myself, and reach the finish line without asking for dozens of hours of my life.

That said, I think there's a difference between appreciating a game's shorter length and wishing there had been a little more to it. I enjoyed my time with Reverie, but when I look back on the experience, I don't find myself recalling any particularly memorable moments or mechanics that set it apart. It feels like the kind of adventure you enjoy while you're playing it, happily move on from when it's over, and probably don't think about too much afterward. There's nothing really wrong with that, but it does leave me wondering whether Reverie was always intended to be such a simple experience or whether there was potential here that never quite made it to the surface.

The End of the Trail

At the end of the day, I had a good time with Reverie. It's a charming little adventure that wears its Zelda inspirations proudly, offers some enjoyable dungeon exploration, and never asks too much of the player. I appreciated its approachable gameplay, colorful presentation, and shorter runtime, especially as someone who doesn't always have the time to sink into a much larger adventure. But for all the things I enjoyed, I also can't shake the feeling that there was something missing. The combat never really develops, the story doesn't give you much to hold onto, and several of its gameplay systems feel like they could have offered a little more.

I suppose that's where I ultimately land with Reverie. I don't regret spending those six hours on the island, and I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone looking for a simple, bite-sized adventure from giving it a try. I just don't think it's a game that's going to stick with me for very long.

Maybe that was always the intention, and there's nothing wrong with a smaller game knowing exactly what it wants to be. Still, I can't help but wonder what might have been if a few of its ideas had been given a little more room to grow. Sometimes a pleasant little detour is all you need though, even if it's not a journey you'll be telling stories about around the campfire for years to come.