When you think of Square Enix, you often think of Final Fantasy XVI, Dragon Quest, and a bevy of classic role-playing games. They have a huge history of hits…and then they have little oddities that are satisfying and yet, kind of weird in concept. The latter of the bunch is where Little Goody Two Shoes falls. It’s a game that consists of RPG elements, a dating sim (to an extent), a horror-driven narrative, and just a heavy dose of unsettling gameplay.
In other words, the game is the most un-Square Enix published title that I have come across in a while. At least not since Power Wash Simulator.
Get your grandma’s house in order, strap on those fancy shoes, and let’s get going on this journey into the weird.
Story
The story Little Goody Two-Shoes starts well enough. Our main character Elise gets caught up in a bad storm and finds herself lost in the woods. Bullheaded and determined to make it home unassisted by dudes, mainly the manly villagers she meets up with during her struggle to get home, she makes her way back to her grandma’s house safely. When she arrives, she finds someone has ransacked the house and gone through her things, a situation that leaves Elise pissed. When she finally finds the culprit, she learns that the lost woman is not from around Elise’s parts and that she was mysteriously attracted to Elise from dreams and visions she had of the main character. And then things get weird.
The beginning of the game’s story establishes a few things. First, you get a good dose of the warped humor that the game contains. While you are expecting a fairytale scenario akin to any Grimm’s tale, Elise establishes her dialogue at the forefront that she is not ever going to be a damsel in distress. Considering the visual assumptions and setup of the game, you are led to believe otherwise, so getting the first personality dose of Elise is beautifully cold and unexpected, but well-placed.
The story also establishes a future branching path for dating. When Elise meets the woman who broke into her house, she has choices and responses to make to the mysterious woman. Elise can either go down path A to love, or not at all. It’s an oddity that a game like this has such a strong dating sim presence in the story, but that one gameplay element shifts and changes how things go as Elise’s adventure progresses forward.
This narrative also shows off some RPG elements that include a survival component, where Elise must eat as she goes through her journey, a mini-game task-based element, and helping people out with side quests that do and don’t influence the story. All these things mixed with a strong horror-filled story make for an interesting journey. The story is so centric on the gameplay that you have no other choice than to be interactive. Again, it’s all oddly satisfying.
A strange tale, though simple execution
The main part of the gameplay was two-fold – interacting with people, including on a dating level, and how branching choices went once the interaction was done. This was the crux of the gameplay and for the most part, it worked. For example, when I began to date the first person I met, it turned out she had some issues, which branched Elise’s story into a creepy adventure that put our main character in a dream-state demonic castle that was more than difficult to get out of during the playthrough. That is how the game progresses and how it is built, where you make choices, those choices equal more choices, and before you know it, you’re in a demonic castle avoiding enemies and trying to make it out alive. In all honesty, the experience seemed well-thought-through design that ended up being a helluva rush.
What’s interesting is that the game sets up this innocent storyline and slowly starts turning it into this unsettled horror tale that only Stephen King could be proud of having built. I’m not sure if I have ever experienced anything like this before with a game from Square Enix. It’s so unnerving and it’s not comfortable, but, again, it’s a rush to play, as you want to see how dark this can get. And it will reach a very dark mode.
As for the actual execution of the gameplay, the RPG portion kind of glosses over what you would expect from that type of gameplay. There’s more collection, avoiding enemies, and solving puzzles than what you typically find in an RPG experience. The focus of the gameplay seems to be squarely on the dialogue and branching choices, occasionally pulling the design towards an interactive novel rather than anything of typical RPG substance, and, honestly speaking, I don’t think that is a bad design decision. I do think it is the right choice considering you don’t want to overcomplicate a game that is towing the line towards ‘too much’. You want the player to focus on the story, the choices, and the consequences of the narrative, and to occasionally find a break in the narrative action with RPG elements that feel familiar. This gameplay construct featured in Little Goody Two-Shoes runs well when focused mainly on the story.
More than just a story
Now, when you’re not going down rabbit holes and ending up in the presence of demons, you’ll find these delightful side quests and chores that await you to help tame the horror that is most certainly going to fill your brain. The game features a survival component to the process that forces you to do chores to earn money. Those chores could be as simple as retrieving eggs for a woman in town, or it could be as fun and complicated as chopping wood for a woodsman without chopping birds, goats, and whatever accidentally makes its way to the chopping block. With each chore, you gain money, which allows you to buy items, such as food to replenish Elise’s energy and stamina. Chores are a great way to detach from the horror story of the game and just give yourself a break, and a necessary evil when it comes to keeping Elise’s stamina from going kaput.
The side quests are just what you would expect from side quests. People around town need something or they want you to explore/seek something, and you’re rewarded for your efforts. It’s a good way to explore, and with such a gorgeous-looking game it’s not hard to want to travel around. Money and tasks completed are just wonderful motivational tools to encourage walking around.
Speaking of exploration, I found this to be one of the more interesting parts of the game. You’ll find this out early, as you will occasionally happen upon items that represent parts of the landscape Elise lives in. For example, as I was passing a rock formation, I noticed a symbol. The symbol stood out from the rest of the gorgeous backdrop, so it stuck with me for a better part of the early half of gameplay. While I was in town, I discovered a parchment with an enchantment or something on it and saw that the symbol on the parchment matched the symbol on the rock. Being curious, as I enjoy exploring games, I went back to the rock and found a cave entrance. Within it, there was a special item, and as I pressed on, I found that the item came with a killer demon. That demon killed the shit out of me. The fact that caves and items are just lying around and have no real relation to the main story, but end up being something interesting, is outstanding. That motivated me to keep exploring and keep a look out for anything out of the ordinary. If you’re looking to silently encourage your player to enjoy a bigger world beyond the story, that’s the way to do it. Hell, Bethesda Softworks makes a living from that concept.
Overall, the gameplay is a wonderful hodgepodge of the right elements. You have a story leading it all, choices that will make you want to revisit for different endings, and small side quests that will remind you that Square Enix does a great job of publishing RPG games. Little Goody Two Shoes is a lot on paper, but it works when mashed together.
Visually stunning, a work of art
In all this relationship-building, demonic destruction, and a bevy of chores, there’s also a work of visual art that makes up the chassis of this game. The art style of this game is better than expected, and in some respects better than it deserves. The parallax-ing background art and the way that the visual design mixes a 90s top-down RPG experience design with modern-day video game technique leave the experience more than memorable. I would have never expected ray tracing to be present in this type of game, but it is. I also would have never thought this type of game would feature hand-drawn detailed environments and intricately drawn characters that help push the narrative out even more. On the surface, this looked like a cheap anime at best. When it starts, you’ll quickly find out how wrong that sentiment is about the visuals. It’s one of the better 2D, top-down RPG games I have come across in some time.
Also, WOW about the music. Just WOW. It compliments the visuals perfectly.
On that sweet note, let’s wrap this review.
Conclusion
Little Goody Two Shoes from developer AstralShift is a hodgepodge of well-put-together intentions that all work out beautifully. You get this innocent backdrop and this thick horror-filled narrative that drives it all. While it might seem like a simple RPG that typically is found in Square Enix’s past published works, the underbelly is more expansive than that and the multiple endings make you want to revisit the warped experience.
