Promise Mascot Company has the power of a long-forgotten, experimental PS2 sport that will have solely been performed by 12 folks, however these 12 folks would defend with their lives. Its mixture of story and design is unorthodox to say the least, however someway, this open world crime drama administration sim makes all of it work.
You play the position of Michizane Sugawara, a yakuza lieutenant who’s exiled after an important inter-clan transaction goes pear-shaped. Along with his household in bother, his demise is faked and he is despatched to Kaso-Machi, an underfunded backwater city that is residence to the household’s closing hope — a mascot company. As a way to redeem himself and repay the large monetary loss, Michi should restore the company, make some money, and preserve his yakuza household afloat. Two different fast issues: the city has a curse that kills any yakuza males that enter it; and on this world, mascots usually are not folks in costumes — they’re sentient beings.
Very similar to Paradise Killer — the developer’s earlier sport — quite a lot of this info is front-loaded, and it may be so much to take onboard. Nevertheless, when you wrap your head round all of it, there is a complicated and well-told crime drama story to unravel over the course of about 20 hours.
In that point, you have got a lot to do. After you are previous the prologue and preliminary tutorial, you are free to discover the surprisingly giant open world of Kaso-Machi. The island city, constructed across the foot of a mountain, is full of characters to satisfy, duties to finish, and crucially, mascots to recruit. Ever-bound to your trusty pick-up truck, you will drive the size and breadth of the city many instances as you comply with the story and discover the run-down setting, looking for collectibles and upgrades.
All the pieces you do feeds again into the titular company; cleansing shrines across the city supplies you with buffs that enhance incrementally, whereas smashing into pink trash baggage or indicators for the corrupt mayor’s electoral marketing campaign will earn you extra followers. As you progress, the island populates with new mascots to seek out and characters to satisfy, a few of which can offer you extra potential jobs in your company.
So, there’s a lot to maintain you busy within the open world, however what in regards to the company itself? To begin getting cash, that you must recruit mascots after which ship them out on jobs. These jobs are broadly passive, and can run within the background in line with the in-game time. Nevertheless, your mascots will usually run into issues, and also you’re inspired to assist them which, in case you do, results in a minigame by which you do battle in opposition to the problem — getting caught in a door, or knocking over a pile of packing containers, for instance. Utilizing a lot of hero playing cards you accumulate all through the sport, you whittle down a well being bar in a quite simple fight state of affairs. It is fairly amusing and finally turns into a little bit harder, however finally these sequences develop fairly repetitive.
Whether or not you select to have interaction with these or not, your mascots will full their jobs and usher in some money. If you recruit a mascot, that you must sweeten the take care of numerous perks, like a bigger reduce of income, a bonus, or day off after a sure variety of jobs. The higher the perks you select, the happier and extra motivated they will be. These additionally have an effect on the amount of cash you usher in, which is necessary since you’ll use it to take a position not solely in upgrades in your company, but in addition redeveloping key elements of the city, in flip resulting in extra work in your mascots and extra avenues for making a revenue.
On paper, quite a lot of this sounds prefer it would not match collectively, however in observe it really works fairly properly. The circulate of sending out mascots to work, talking with the townsfolk, buying upgrades, and exploring the island is compelling; seeing your funds steadily develop is satisfying, and watching your impression in town and the company as you reinvest supplies a rewarding sense of development.
There’s at all times one thing new to work in the direction of. Possibly it is the sub-contracting, the place you purchase out-of-town companies and make use of mascots to characterize them, incomes you passive revenue. It might be throwing cash at redeveloping key elements of Kaso-Machi, just like the marina or recycling centre, once more rewarding you over time. Ultimately you need to use crane video games dotted across the city to realize merchandise, which might then be bought in numerous locations for but extra profiteering. After which there’s the story, which stored us hooked as we slowly peeled again its many layers.
Mysterious glowing foxes might be working across the open world, and in case you hit them, you will unlock upgrades in your truck, starting from elevated velocity to an even bigger enhance bar, and even the flexibility to glide by means of the air. These extras fill out the traversal properly and mean you can attain extra secluded elements of the map. By way of management, there is a diploma of awkwardness in regards to the driving; it is troublesome to be very exact, particularly if you go off-road.
Mainly all the assorted mechanics and options we have described have been accomplished earlier than many instances, in some instances higher, however Promise Mascot Company combines them in such a manner that all of it feels fairly contemporary. Once more, the best way it meters out new concepts, and drip-feeds story particulars from practically all character interactions, means your time isn’t wasted, giving the sport a pleasant momentum.
Conclusion
Regardless of its disparate components you’ve got in all probability seen earlier than, you’ve got by no means performed a sport fairly like Promise Mascot Company, a sport that smashes collectively a criminal offense drama story, administration sim mechanics, and open world exploration. Whereas there are some tough edges and repetitive features, this hangs collectively due to an engrossing story, compelling development, and weird however likeable characters. Higher than the sum of its elements, this distinctive sport has cult hit written throughout it.
