YesterMorrow (Nintendo Switch) Review

It is not always the plot of a game that catches initial interest. Watching Yui swing back and forth on vines in YesterMorrow's trailer, her silver ponytail hair matching the fluid movements as she leaps across holes and over fearsome enemies, the desire to be her and protect her from harm was instantaneous. Who wouldn't love the energetic heroine whose whole world is wrecked by the evil Shadows? Starting in Yui's childhood, the game cleverly weaves in a tutorial into the story, teaching her how to talk to people, run, jump, roll and swim her way about her village, totally carefree and with no worries other than her annoying brother. The sobering monumental event that sees everything Yui knows and love obliterated, sparks a resolve in her that forces her to grow up fast.

Solitude is an aspect to her journey that Yui has to become acclimatised with. She has minimal guidance from people in her childhood, and her future self meets a scant number of survivors whose most useful aid is often information. Patience is indeed a virtue, and plot changing revelations need a passage of time to occur. The barren wasteland created by the power of the Shadows, who are the cause of her troubles, is exciting to explore, because each of the four islands have a distinct theme which contrast each other, from deserts to arctic lands, vibrant forests, and dark underground caves. The significant environmental changes that occur when journeying to the past and future, and between areas, make the world Yui navigates dynamic with changes in the soundtrack, which enhance that contrast. It takes time for her more advanced skills to be both revealed and usable, with new abilities appearing at key plot points, but the resulting progress literally and figuratively opens doors.

The hideous beasts that roam the land look and behave differently depending how old Yui is. Many can be defeated, but since it only takes a few hits for Yui to lose all health and return to the previous save point, avoiding them through precise manoeuvring is a good tactic. Thankfully save locations are fairly dispersed throughout the levels, as are the time changing portals. It can get confusing which time to be in, and exactly where to go if there are long breaks between playing sessions, for explicit direction within the game is limited, but once the destination is found it's simply a matter of solving the environmental puzzles that frequently need time travel to fix.

It is unfortunate that before and after the official release some bugs hindered gameplay. There were occasional crashes at the start of the game. Scrolling through some of the menu features like the maps and information area, to flashes on the screen that were unpleasant and led to a decreased use on that function. Worse still though was the way the game would shudder randomly during gameplay. Given the limited health Yui has, and that precision timing is crucial for some jumps, it severely impacted overall enjoyment to be partway through overcoming an obstacle and then die because the game misbehaved leading to Yui falling. These issues were eventually patched, but impacted heavily on the gaming experience.

An element that was an unexpected, but welcome surprise in this dystopian adventure, was the numerous animals that Yui discovered in the most desolate of spaces. Locating the cats, dogs and other creatures was the easy part, working out how to reach them so they could be petted took more thought and ingenuity. This provided smiles at moments when a puzzle was particularly challenging, and with the menacing aspect of the alien invaders provided Yui herself with hope for the future when life may return to normal.