Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is despite its childish and outdated appearance a game for a mature audience. You play the role of Recette, a girl whose father ran off to make a fortune but instead left his relatives with a debt that has to be paid in full or else Recette will lose her place of residence. In order to pay off this debt, Recette is helped by a fairy called Tear who suggests turning her house into an item store. The player takes command of Recette and has to make choice that will lead to generating more profit at the end of the day. In order to do so, the player can go to the market to buy and sell goods, they can buy and sell items from and to shoppers that visit the store or they can go dungeon-crawling by hiring a hero and bring back items for use in either "fusion" (Read "crafting", it creates an item that's usually worth more than the sum of its parts) or simply to sell for a profit directly Each day is divided in 4 time-slices. Opening the shop costs one time-slice, going dungeon-crawling costs two. Going to the market and back to the store also costs one. Since you have to pay off a certain amount of your debt each week, time management is important. Just going on dungeon-crawls won't net you any cash unless you can sell off the stock you found. Should you not be able to pay off your debt any given week, you will lose the game. But do not despair: your hero-progress, merchant-level and stock will remain with you. It is only the money that you lose (And the story will be set back to day 2). The game refers to these play-throughs as "loops". Unfortunately, after a few loops, you've pretty much seen all there is to the game whether you've ever made it to the end or not. Higher merchant-levels allow you to do a few more things such as taking orders, changing the carpet of your store, reach higher "fusion" levels and you'll meet a few more endbosses in different types of dungeons but that's all pretty meager stuff. You'll still have to dig through countless of messages and constantly adjust the price-counter for even the cheapest of items and you'll spend at least 10 minutes of dungeon-crawling without certainty of getting out alive. There's a lot of repetition in this game and at some point, you might just bored enough to start making mistakes such as not paying attention to whether you're selling or buying an item or being too impatient during a dungeon-crawl. Dungeon-crawling can be rewarding but also incredibly punishing; you are only allowed to carry twenty (20) items and if you manage to die (Which isn't all that hard given how unlikely it is that you'll get a healing item drop at higher levels) you will only be allowed to carry one (1) item with you back to town, making dungeon-crawling a huge waste of time. There's also a problem with the heroes: the first hero (Louie) is the strongest, most easiest to control but he's not fast enough to deal with some of the end-bosses later on requiring you to fall back on other heroes, which are always weaker than Louie is but they might be faster or have a ranged attack which might be necessary to deal with an endboss. Playing with these heroes is like russian roulette: whereas Louie has no problem surviving the regular dungeon levels, the other heroes have a huge problem staying alive during dungeon runs because of their inherent weaknesses and reliance on special powers that it is never certain if you'll make it to the endboss or not. I think this title would be less repetitive if they had put more time into graphics and made the whole item management more complex and perhaps automated it a bit but perhaps the charm lies in its simplicity. After all, it's not a big-budget title.. Personally, I got tired after loop 3 because I found an exploit which would allow me to generate a lot of cash without really doing a lot for it: simply dump all the money you have during pay-day into items, go bankrupt and sell the stock. Suddenly you have a lot more days with stock already worth close to (or more than) the amount you owe for that week. You can also do this if you think you won't make the dead-line because the only thing that isn't transferable to a new "loop" is your bank-account. Then there's the trick where you first open the store and then go dungeon-crawling. If you go dungeon-crawling directly, you won't be able to open the store any more. I'm not sure if this is a bug or a feature, but it seems sort of lazy on the developer's side to allow for such oversights. I don't cheat in games but this is just such a big loophole that it pretty much makes me wonder why I'd try very hard to reach a deadline several times when I can just fail once and sail through the next time. I'd recommend this game to 90's RPG fans and people looking for a simple game that involves some dungeon-crawling and inventory management every now and then.… Expand

It's presented well and is an interesting idea, but what keeps the game from becoming really good is variety. The dungeons are pretty boring for the most part, and store management is not complex enough to be compelling for more than say 4-5 hours. The graphics and visuals are lively and some (not all) of the character dialogue is amusing. This game is creative in its inception but somewhat uninspired in its execution. I enjoyed playing it for a few hours but no more than that. However, I will be keeping my eyes out for a sequel.… Expand

The gameplay itself is very unique. Definitely something you don't see in the markets today. What gives this score lower is the variety of the game. Simplicity is always good, but there is such a thing as repetition.

This is the most kawaii little indie game that I've ever played in my life. I absolutely love the characters in this, and their interactions with one another. Recette Lemongrass is a gaming icon to me now, haha. Who knew that running an item shop could be so much fun? The only downside, for me, is that the gameplay does get a bit tedious after awhile, especially the random dungeon crawling aspect (which is actually optional, you can run your store just fine by shopping around town and then re-selling stuff for higher prices! Capitalism, ho!).… Expand

This game combines the elements of a tycoon game with elements of a dungeon crawling RPG. It does what it does fairly well, however, the game will frustrate you sometimes when no matter how low you set prices, customers won't buy anything.

This game is surprisingly good. I picked it up during the steam sales not expecting much for ~$4.50. So far I have sunk 35 hours into it and plan on playing a lot more. The game has a very charming atmosphere, the dialog is great the translation is very good, the graphics are nostalgic and remind me a lot of Harvest Moon. The gameplay is versatile and fun. On the one hand you have the great economy-style in terms of running your shop, haggling prices, keeping an eye on Booms and pricerises/drops. On the other hand you have the random generated dungeons you can clear with unique bosses, loot and best of all: tons of adventurers you meet during the game that you can SELL stuff to that they will actually wear in the dungeons. There is plenty of stuff to see and do, not do you just sell and buy stuff but you constantly discover upgrades for items, the shop and your adventurers. As you progress a nice story unfolds and the difficulty is perfect. If you fail to meet the deadline for paying debt the game does a perfect job for those and let's them restart with a boost by keeping items/levels and adventurerlevel+gear.

The crafting system drives you into the dungeons to get even better items than any shop can sell you. After you "finished" the mail story line the game is far from over, new modes are unlocked and you can carry over your old stuff to new challenges (like survival mode).

The game is simply great, the best game I got to play in 2012.… Expand

I had no idea what to expect when I first got this game, other than that my friend told me it was about running a shop. That didn't exactly sell it high, but it was in a pack for $5 so I went for it. Much to my surprise, it was one of the most addicting games I've played. Quite literally I could not put it down, even after I had beaten it. Somehow it manages to get you caught up in the story with great dialogue and well executed gameplay. The only thing I didn't like was the dungeon feature, which seemed out of place in the game and wasn't up to the standard of everything else around it. However, it is entirely optional and easy to ignore with no consequences for doing so, so it isn't a problem at all. Fantastic game overall.… Expand

A wonderfully addictive and inventive little commerce simulator with an entertaining RPG element. While it is very simplistic, the innovation and ideas created a very fun game for people who would enjoy bartering constantly to progress through the game. For those expecting another JRPG, there are better elsewhere, but for a unique economy simulator mixed with an RPG, this is great.

7.5 would be my rating if I could give it. In Recettear you sell items you find in dungeons or that you bought from the store at a higher price to make enough profit to reach your goal every week. The game starts easy, but quickly ramps up the difficulty as you go. Unless you look up a guide or something, you can expect to fail your first playthrough. Fortunately when you fail you keep anything that isn't story - related so the next playthrough will be much easier. The game is repetitive but also addicting. If you like Japanese style games or anime, etc you will feel much more at home playing this. If your a completionist when you play games, expect to play this for a very long time. If you quit once the story is done, I would suggest a different kind of game.… Expand

Recettear is not just for entertainment purposes, the game also has educational value. The game teaches you on how becoming an entrepreneur is both a rewarding and frustrating experience. Fighting through randomly created dungeons for items to stock your inventory or purchasing them wholesale from the market, there is no end to the fun. The takeaway from the game is to never make deals with loan sharks. The exponential increase in paying off the loan eventually doomed me to repeating from the beginning. Although the items stay with you on the next loop, having to run through the same events to unlock dungeons and characters is tedious.… Expand

Very fun indie game. Simple and common gameplay mechanics (used in many japanese games, i.e. Princess Maker) makes the game even better. Nice and beautiful visuals, cute characters, lots of stuff to buy and sell. Some parts may feel a little repetitive, but it doesn't hurt good atmosphere. Btw, the game is bigger than it looks. So... Capitalism, ho!

I started playing the game yesterday evening and now I'm already at 18 hours. After finishing the debt part starts the Endless game part, in which you slowly start discovering the other adventurers and thanks to Arma's story, you learn the fate of your own father.
To be frank I was extremely sceptical at first. I played the demo but it left me neutral. But when the full game started unveiling itself, part after part, I started being more and more addicted to it, to the point that I started doing everything, completing everything to the max (merchant level 99, charme level 99 and bilions of pix). And I have yet to finish the story.
Maybe objectively this is not a masterpiece, but it doesn't matter. It's so ridiculously addicting and rewarding that It's a pleasure to play. Something I will probably keep playing for long time, even after finishing the story (which seems ridiculously big).
Really an amazing game. Congrats to the developing team and to the translators (even though they distorted the translation a little bit, matching it to the /b/ way of speaking).… Expand

Recettear is a game that should be fun. You run an item shop, you quest for new items, and sell those items to people. Along the way you make friends and a pile of money. Simple enough to grasp, or so I thought. This game is so needlessly filled with dialog that is takes away from the fun. I'm all for a tutorial or a few helpful hints, but after 40 minutes of playing I hadn't even opened my shop for the first day yet. All I was doing was reading dialog AND not good dialog. It's not like there is a story line that will keep you on the edge of you seat. You are a young and very ditzy girl who is partnered up with a loanshark fairy. The fairy tells you everything you need to know to run a shop. She tells you, then you repeat it back to her and make a ditzy joke to go along with it, then she reiterates, and you make another ditzy joke. This goes on for what I am certain forever. Steam has me clocked in at 94 minutes of play time and I don't think I can take anymore cyclical dialog. I really hoped they would just shut up and let me play this game, but I have a feeling it will never end. Did I mention I can't find a way to save my game? I had to quit after 40 minutes of play and when I returned it made me start a new game. I had to go through all the dialog again. Yes it lets you skip, but you're pressing Esc 10 times just to play for 5 minutes. Who are these people that are giving this game all these good reviews? Wall of crits hits for 1463!… Expand

Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is an unexpectedly fun and challenging game with both RPG and store management features. definitely a good buy and a great game.

A simple but fun game indeed. For a 10$ game (it's on sale on Steam by the time of this review) Recettear is worth your money than many downloadable XBLA or PSN with the same price point. If you like Japanese text adventure games (not the same as western text rpgs) this game is good for you. Sure, the mechanic is simple, you run an item shop, do trading, raid dungeon to find some rare loots while trying to make enough profit to pay back the debt and seeing some interesting story unfold... but that is the purpose of this kind of games anyway (to get involved in the story like reading manga or watching anime... if you want complex game mechanic you should go for WoW or something of that extent). The dialogs are cute and funny and have a lot of references to Japanese pop cultures (it made me laugh so hard when I saw the game made a homage to one most loved Japanese character) and the voices are nice. The only complain I have with the game is that the dungeon-crawling session of the game could have a little more actions players could perform such as jumping or blocking, now the limitation makes it feels like a really toned down version of Izuna or Shiren's... but overall this is one nice, cheap and interesting game to play.… Expand

Recettear is a bit repetitive but will keep you engaged for some time. Its main elements are dungeon crawling and store management. The story might be a bit boring but the characters are fun. Visuals and soundtrack are OK. Definitely worth to try it out.

I wasn't expecting much from this game, and it blew me away. Sure the pixellated graphics could be better, they're very cute but not refined, and lack of animation. Yet, this game is MUCH deeper than it looks, and it's huge, in fact, the game is bigger after the game "ends" (but I won't spoil the story).
How to describe this game, it's similar to Harvest Moon, except that you harvest treasures in dungeons. And you own a shop. What could be just a strategy game doesn't really shine through its story, but through its characters. Each of them has a sould, and a role that isn't necessarily obvious when the game starts. Of course, you've got to love cute anime stuff in general, that's a requirement to play this game. So I've been disappointed by a lot of blockbuster games, while this "little" game appeared to be amazing. Really expecting Recettear 2 with a bigger budget.… Collapse

I found the game more than fun enough to do 2 New Game + runs back-to-back. Plus the overall story, and the localisation in particular, is absolutely brilliant.

It's been a while since a game has grabbed my attention like Reccettear. I'm having so much fun playing this game it's hard to really describe. Let me go into a pros and cons for my review though to keep things simple. Pros:
- Great focus on the core aspects of the RPG experience: earning money, collecting loot, levelling up. Extremely well executed and integrated with each other.
- Really polished presentation, great translation on the part of the publisher Carpe Fulgar.
- Fun story, great characters.
- TONS of replayability as the dungeons are randomly generated, tons of different heroes, lots of items to collect. - Managing your item shop is way more fun than I expected. Cons:
- Resolution is limited, best to play in windowed mode.

Highly Recommend!!!… Expand

Quite a repetitive game after mastering all the basic. Could be made better by increasing the amount of time in a day. The Dungeon was not really great & could be made better. Overall game play was still OK for me. Many variety of items to sell and obtain. Although felt those random encounter where you character will talk to other people was a bit redundant. Good casual game.

Very nice and relatively well-executed game concept. The adventure section lacked certain characteristics to really make Recettear really stand out but as a whole, the gameplay is solid, fun, and addictive.

Simply wonderful! Recettear is one of the most fantastic and original RPGs I've played in the past few years. Classic graphics and game-play with a different spin of the main character being an new item shop owner trying to pay off a debt, instead of an adventurer. The game is split off into two sections, store management where you sell items at the right times for the price that will get you the most profit. It wonderfully works in the concept of supply and demand as you get actual news on market updates sometimes more than once a day on what item prices are up and what ones are down. Along with the store management is going to the market or merchant's guild to buy items to sell in your store, or to help with dungeon crawling.
The second part is the dungeon crawling. On the days you need a large boost to your store inventory or ingredients for crafting, you can hire an adventurer from the adventurer's guild to go to a dungeon with you. This is where you will control the adventurer as your main character follows behind. Using the adventurer you will fight off enemies, picking up items that some drop and opening chests to usually get items/treasures. The good part about dungeon crawling is that you get items that you can sell for 100% profit, minus the fee to hire the adventurer. Lastly on the dungeon stuff, the adventurer you hire will level up through the process of killing enemies, like any RPG, which is a good thing because they will be stronger and you can later move on to bigger and better dungeons, but it is also a slight hindrance as well, because the stronger and more experienced an adventurer becomes, the more it will cost to hire him or her. As the game progresses through the story, you will be able to hire different kinds of adventurers. I'm giving this game a 10 because it is a solid RPG, with a fun and whimsical story, that has familiar game-play while still feeling quite original. I've played many RPGs in my day and I can say I've never before played a game like Recettear. The people that rate it real low because of a lot of dialogue have clearly never played a classic RPG, or they have been spoiled by playing too many fully voiced RPGs.

One of the other reviews says says that the store management isn't complex enough to be compelling for more than 4-5 hours, the problem with saying that is that it shows that they didn't play very long, because I've played 16 hours and I'm still getting new facets and challenges to running the store. The game doesn't give you all the ways to run your store right off, it treats those like any abilities learned in an RPG. As you get more experienced at running your shop and level up as a merchant, you gain more things that you can do, like decorating your store and new ways to sell things to your customers.

Finally, I would add that just because it doesn't have the latest newfangled sparkling graphics and gimmicky interface, doesn't mean that it isn't an original title. The story and store management along side the classic game play is what makes the game original. The art and graphics(classic around PS2 era JRPG type) are solid, fitting the style of the game and the story.

It isn't hard for this game to shine with with all the samey RPG drivel that tends to be heralded as special and wonderful(usually only because of the graphics). I highly recommend this game to any gamer that is properly familiar with and loves RPGs.… Expand

**Positives**: Very unique. If there's another game out there like this, I haven't heard of it. (+3)
The market system works very well, you buy and sell for a little profit, slowly working your way up (+3)
The game advances at a sensible pace, upgrading the list of items every few levels, so you're never without new items to make a profit on (+3).
There are few buttons that need to be pressed, making it easy to pick up and play (+2).
The characters are, for the most part, lovable (+2).
The item design, prices, and most importantly, in-jokes that come with them, are top-notch (+2).
Bosses are all well-designed, and almost all have a tactic beyond "slash and run", and area always a challenge, without being excruciating (+3).
I'd love to go on, but it's getting too long already.
**Neutral**: They've translated "mataku" (which usually means "geez" or a verbal *facepalm*) as "merde", which just doesn't feel right, but isn't bad enough to deduct points.
**Negative**: Euria. A girl who always breaks your chain of gaining experience from selling items. Once "unlocked", she visits your store, selling goods to you at very inflated prices. This is a death knell if you encounter her early enough (-1). FUN FACT: Euria sounds like 'urea', the waste part of urine! Sounds pretty apt!
Constantly levelling up in dungeons makes dungeoneering very easy for the first few levels, and very annoying in the later stages, where you are about to fight a boss, but want to level up first (to get full health). (-1).
It can be said that the markets fluctuate TOO much, if you buy a somewhat expensive item at low price, and sell it when it's high price, you make a much higher profit than you should, making the game fairly easy if you're lucky enough. (-1).
**TOTAL**: 18-3=15. Recettear is one of my all-time favourite games, and is perfect in almost every way, with some VERY minor exceptions. Worth the unusually high price tag, and MORE!… Expand

I bought this game out of hope for a fresh and intriguing new take on the rpg genre considering it is based on an item shop. I was not disappointed at all. First thing I can say about this game is that is clean and simple with controls and gameplay that is easy to understand and learn quickly. The simple but robust gameplay is not the star, however, it is the straightforward yet addicting story line of a young girl who must open an item shop in order to pay off her father's debts to a finance agency. In order to to do so you must mix both the buy low sell high strategy with the in town marketing centers and hire adventurer's and train them/lead them through dungeons and lairs to find loot and treasure to sell in the shop. It is truly an addicting game in the sense that it keeps you wanting to just sell one more item, go dungeon raiding one more time so you can meet the reachable yet challenging goals set forth by the loan agency. Now, as for the graphics, they are very clean and fun with great character designs and, let's admit it, quite the cute roster of characters and world that they inhabit...not toooooooooooo cute though. The interplay between the main characters and the citizens if the town is great, with the fantastically mundane (chatting about the stars) to getting with fights with...interesting...strangers in town. I definitely recommend this game to whomever wishes for an interesting and unique twist on a rpg that includes a great amount of humor and addicting gameplay.… Expand

I had no idea what I was in for when I read the description to this game but after playing 5 minutes I knew I was on to a winner. An absolute bargain for $20 bucks. Extremely replayable and very very addictive. A must have in your collection.

The simplistic graphics and presentation hide the brutal addictiveness of this (cute) beast. The marriage of a casual merchant sim with a Rogue-like dungeon crawler plus humourous Disgaea-like cutscenes would've netted a 9/10 alone, but the translations... OMG the translations...

-PERFECT 10-

Fun for only about 2 hours. After you've finished the needlessly long introduction, you now realise you have basically had everything this game has to offer. Pretty much all you do is: wake up, go to the adventurer's guild, do some stuff around town, sell items, repeat. The dungeons themselves aren't any less monotonous. They're randomly generated ever ytime, so they're basically repeating halls and rooms with monsters, treasures and next-floor teleporters in between. The interface and low-res graphgics makes the game feel a lot more like a console port from the PS1 console generation, than an original title.… Expand