Dear Leader (iOS) Review

In Dear Leader, Kim Jong Il is embarking on a quest to save the entire world by closing the portals to hell and defeating all demons. He is facing some unwanted trouble on his way from Americans who are looking to take away his weapons of mass protection.

It is a long quest, and our Kim Jong Il can't do it himself - he needs help from his son, Kim Jong Un, and their friends, which, for example, includes the mighty tree llama people. It is a very colourful and surprisingly varied crew of characters, which the player can play as to aid Kim Jong Il on the quest.

The battles do, however, feel very one-sided. The enemies are not dangerous at all unless severely underleveled, and even then, the problem isn't their difficulty (as it is really easy to dodge every non-boss battle), but rather the time it will take to kill them all. While it is sort of thematic that the Dear Leader is killing everyone in his path with ease, it doesn't make for fun gameplay in the long run.

If for any reason the player would get caught off-guard, there is the possibility to both grind and to help the nation prosper by upgrading its many buildings, such as the public eatery. These buildings give different bonuses, ranging from simple things such as extra XP to improved power of different weapon groups.

The gameplay is overall on the weaker end, though. On top of the easy gameplay, there are insane wait times for the North Korea developments, which is the only thing people are likely going to invest time in once the main story is completed, as even the post-game challenge missions rarely have much difficulty than sometimes a timer, which only turns them into cruel gear checks rather than challenging content.

Where Dear Leader does its best job is in the portrayal of our Dear Leader himself and his comrades. The "glorious deeds" are spot on for a satire and are in no way pulling any punches. Sometimes it goes into the realm that some would see as distasteful, though, but fans of dark comedy should appreciate it.

All in all, Dear Leader is exactly the sort of game people are expecting it to be: an over the top parody with functional, yet mediocre gameplay. It is great fun, but it stands and falls on whether or not the player enjoys the dark humour it is filled with.