The more I heard about Saturday Morning RPG, the more I was intrigued. It was a sleeper hit sort of RPG, themed after the classic cartoons and culture of the 80's, and was one of the few games handpicked by startup Limited Run Games for a physical release. Instead of shoving the existence of 80's culture in your face, Saturday Morning RPG seemed to bathe and flourish in it. There’s even one point a character that hints to the classic early 90’s flick, The Wizard. Yet, Saturday Morning RPG puts so much respect to what it wants to praise, that it forgets to leave anything for itself. Let’s look more into why so much of the game is cemented by lost potential, that it starts to feel hopeless.

Gameplay

Saturday Morning RPG takes heavy inspiration from 80's games like Pokemon, Final Fantasy, and more, and tries to put it’s own spin on it with unique items and more. But, the more I played it, the more I realized it didn’t work as an idea. Although your move-set becomes more limited and hard as you progress a fight, (which is a nice addition) every one of these attacks is equally boring, and involves quicktime events and timed minigames. It’s at these parts where Saturday Morning RPG feels straight out of a mobile game, and it’s only the other aspects (such as exploration) that save it. Since it’s flaws are heavy in it’s core system, Saturday Morning RPG gets it’s entertainment value crippled by this.

Story & Audio

Something that definitely wasn’t intentional with Saturday Morning RPG was it’s writing, which comes off as cringy and humorless. This, much like the gameplay, hurts the certain aspect in which it’s placed even more. Luckily, the story redeems itself with a focus on nostalgia, which is also present in the audio. It’s one of those things that manages to move your attention from the more exhausting elements.

Design

My biggest problem with Saturday Morning RPG is likely it’s design. It has a lot of ideas that are good stand-alone, but don’t clash properly. For example, the pixel art style looks weird on polygon enviroment, the cringey humor cheapens the plot, and more. With this, the game also suffers a lack of proper gameplay instrumentation, taking far too long to change the direction of enemy repetition, gameplay loops, and more. It’s rather cruddy.

Conclusion

Saturday Morning RPG is a game that has a lot of good ideas, but doesn’t have the right resources or expertise to properly persuade them. The more you play the game the more you discover the ins and outs of this, making the games problems more entertaining than the game itself.

Saturday Morning RPG gets an 5/10. (Flawed)

We’d like to thank Mighty Rabbit Studios for sending us a code for this one!

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