My Friends the Monster Trainers

I love Obra Dinn-likes, and I love Pokemon, so this was a delightful way to spend 45 minutes. The characters were note-perfect archetypes you'd find in any Pokemon game, and the 'mon design was fantastic! I'd go on a Pokemon journey in this region any day.

My relationship with Pokemon is a bit of an odd one; I never played the games as a child, despite being surgically attached to my Nintendo DS from ages seven to fifteen, and didn't even understand what genre they were until I was in high school. When I got my first smartphone, I downloaded a crummy GBA emulator and decided to see what all the fuss was about with Pokemon Emerald, whereupon I ran a team of six Zigzagoons until I couldn't get any farther, then gave up entirely. Later, I did get quite into Pokemon Sun, but for a long time I just figured the franchise wasn't my thing.

It's good, then, that My Friends the Monster Trainers is not about Pokemon, legally speaking. Instead, it's about...well, monsters. Their alignments are planetary in nature, rather than elemental, and their designs tend towards the simple "regular animal that's a funky color" side, which I find quite endearing.

What makes My Friends compelling, to me anyway, is that the gameplay isn't Pokemon inspired in the slightest. In fact, it's a deduction game, not unlike Jamwitch's other titles The Archives of Trevosa and The Case of the Dungeon Descent. Of the three...this one may be my favorite. It's simpler, to be sure, and consequently quite a bit easier. But the interface is fun, the writing is breezy, and filling out each card is satisfying. What's not to like?

My Friends is probably a bit too easy for most adults to sink their teeth into, but it's still a fun little diversion. However, if you want to introduce kids to IF, especially kids already into Pokemon, My Friends the Monster Trainers might just top my list of recommendations.

(Spoiler - click to show)(Vincent, by the way, is absolutely coming back into town to do your mom.)