Fantasy Life

This game is absolutely charming and a lovely surprise. [Issue#116, p.84]

Addictive and perfectly suited for a portable platform, Fantasy Life may well be the most pleasant video game surprise of the year.

We love the amount of freedom we can find here. We can either play it as an RPG or as a life simulator, or anywhere in between. A great experience full of surprises.

Blending all these aspirations - and inspirations - through a coherent adventure might feel like a dream, but it became a reality with Fantasy Life.

Advertised as a "life simulator", Fantasy Life is actually a pretty standard action RPG crafted with amazing care and sensitivity. It's fun and gorgeous looking, albeit somewhat repetitive if you strive for complete every task and master every class.

Fantasy Life could be one of those games that you fall instantly in love with. With a lifespan that goes beyond 100+ hours of fun and thousands of different quests to accomplish, it's the first RPG and Social Life-Style game that makes us wonder if this is the righteous path to follow in upcoming years.

A great, addictive game that should please the fans of Animal Crossing, simple RPGs and Harvest Moon. [08/2015, p.79]

Fantasy Life is a very ambitious project, able to fulfill its ultimate goal, which is to immerse the player into a fantasy world, with a lot of things to do and a lot of places to explore. Fantasy Life is one of the best games for 3DS released in 2014.

Level 5 and 1UP Studios have done a wonderful job of creating a lighthearted adventure that should be on any completionist's radar.

A very addictive and enjoyable game that focuses more on the tasks for your jobs opposed to the standard RPG format with beautiful its gameplay and almost flawless gameplay.

It’s easy to pick up and play for a little while without committing yourself, and it’s got the lighthearted charm of a game that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Though the story and gameplay are a bit mismatched, there's a lot to do and see in this game's charming world.

For handheld gamers this holiday season, the pickings remain slim, but Fantasy Life offers an idealized imaginative antithesis to all-out action like you’d find in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS.

An impressive debut for a brand-new IP whose clever and well thought out design catapults Fantasy Life into the upper ranks of the 3DS library.

If you're looking for something to scratch that Animal Crossing or Tomodachi Life itch with a little more substance, Fantasy Life is the game for you.

Though the pacing is sluggish and some of the quests a little too redundant, the kooky characters, silly humor, and incredibly addictive gameplay kept me fishing and forging well after the final credits rolled.

Fantasy Life is a charming action RPG mixed with a surprisingly deep job and class system.

While there are issues regarding ease of use and the inane storyline, Fantasy Life is a ton of fun to play. Fantasy Life is an excellent choice for fans of the job-based JRPG looking for something light hearted, or for those who are looking for Animal Crossing with more action.

It is lovely, cutesy and a bit childish, but we do not care. Level-5 has got us hooked on Fantasy Life. We love the unexpected situations, the sweet life in Reveria and the combination of talking, fighting and playing mini-games is tons of fun.

Fantasy Life is part RPG and part Animal Crossing. It's not well balanced as the aforementioned title, as the mini-games can be a little bit too repetitious, but has its moments.

Fantasy Life successfully combines a social simulator feeling with role playing mechanics in one of the longest games for Nintendo 3DS. If you like Animal Crossing, you should give it a try.

A cute RPG with tons of contents and a small touch of Animal Crossing's variety. The cartoonish graphics and the childish style are great for a young audience, but its fun gameplay can be satisfying for every kind of player.

If I had to criticise what is otherwise a brilliant value package, it is the woefully disappointing story and the way it doesn’t warrant much emotional investment. Luckily the desire to max out your character and become a master of the many fun and diverse occupations more than makes up for it.

Providing quality gameplay in both its life sim and action RPG aspects, served up with all of the colourful wit and charm anyone could ask for, it serves as a jewel in the crown of memory of a games studio that helped create some of the most memorable role-playing video games that ever graced the medium.

The main story may seem to end right as it starts getting good, but the jobs are worth staying around for, making Fantasy Life a lengthy and interesting simulation RPG.

Fantasy Life is a colossal adventure game with RPG elements and which offers an almost endless amount of content for the player to get lost with. Packing nearly 100 hours of gameplay with all the extras and side quests, Fantasy Life could use a faster pace for its main story mode and some flaws on the multiplayer mode could use an additional touch, but any fan of adventure games and who appreciates a touch of RPG will be more than happy with this piece.

Ultimately, it may not have delivered as much variety as I was hoping for, but with the right expectations there's still a good amount of job-flavored questing to be had.

The easiest way to describe Fantasy Life is “Skyrim for children”. The developers were aiming for a game where a world would be as open as possible, and where a player would be offered a variety of interesting activities not necessarily related to monster-slaughtering. And they hit the mark. [Dec 2014, p.76]

Fantasy Life appeals to the dad in me because it teaches kids that work can be fun. It encourages kids to think that jobs – even real ones like tailoring and carpentry – are like a game.

The battles and minigames are not very challenging, but you’ll get an very relaxing mix of roleplaying and life sim in an idyllic world with loads of opportunities.

Once again, Level-5 brings a very good title to the Nintendo 3DS with Fantasy Life. It maybe not the greatest RPG ever, but it's fair to say that there is a gamble there, an idea to make this game different, even with all those classic elements around. At the heart of this vision, the job system, which makes Fantasy Life so addictive. Unfortunately, the game is far too easy, too slow and not so interesting from time to time.

Fantasy Life is charming little action RPG. In many ways it looks like a Monster Hunter with a less steep learning curve and a wider range of activities to perform, but in the end it stands on its own thanks to the nice class system. Too bad that few cumbersome choices in the game design, the relatively poor technical compartment and the annoying story keep the game from reaching better highs.

Often very pleasurable, even if the main missions drag. [Issue#255, p.42]

The leveling system, different classes, and questing are all really fun elements that make Fantasy Life a role-playing game worth checking out. But be ready for an uninteresting, wordy, and overbearing story that gets in the way of the fun that the title does offer.

Don’t let yourself be fooled by the easy controls of Fantasy Life, as this new Level-5 world is a lovely one to discover. Backtracking is not great, but with that many content we cannot really complain.

You never truly become the character, and that's the reason why this virtual world does never feel fully interesting.

The feeling while playing Fantasy Life is that this is an experience for those less used to playing JRPGs. It's not a particularly difficult or innovative game in its mechanics, and it does not offer many surprises except consistency and certainty in the different crafts and freedom given to the player.

You'll need to cycle through a fair few jobs to progress rather than being free to stick to just your favourite. [Dec 2014, p.81]

This game will not appeal to everyone, but those who wants a different take on a simulator game that strays into RPG territory may wish to start their own Life in Reveria.

Fantasy Life proposes that simple skills such as sewing and mining are worth devoting one’s existence to. But by hewing to the constraints of traditional RPG design, these are best enjoyed as means to other, more vicious ends: stitch up your cloak so as to take less damage from enemies; pound that iron into a stronger, mightier blade. You can play the game as a Tailor. But you’ll want to switch over to Mercenary soon enough.

Fantasy Life starts off enjoyable, but it nosedives quickly, leaving you with an experience disconnected from the potential of the world and its inhabitants.

This is RPG lite, Animal Crossing plus questing, and for some people that's absolutely fine. [Issue#153, p.124]

After an ambitious start and far too much repetition, the magic is drained from Reveria and, in the end, all you’re left with is the mundane.

Fantasy Life tries to bite of more than it can manage to chew. After a positive start and a fun setting where ordinary jobs is as important as a warrior and mage the game gets repetitive and dull. Fantasy Life is to slow and shallow to be an epic adventure in the style of Final Fantasy, yet to rush in tempo to achieve the same state of mindfulness as Animal Crossing. In the end it's a pleasant but forgettable experience.

Fantasy Life fails to capture either the lazy, pleasing routine of village life seen in Animal Crossing or the sense of urgency from the strongest Japanese RPGs. In its eagerness to offer variety, Fantasy Life somewhere lost its focus.

Still, despite its flaws, there is a lot of fun to be had in Fantasy Life. The job system is extensive and mastering each skill compulsive, while decorating apartments provides a nice break from the repetitive missions.

In lieu of depth, the game almost always substitutes repetition. It may have ample charm and smart progression systems, but life in Fantasy Life is more mundane than fantastic.

Fantasy Life lets you partake in every step of the adventuring process, from item creation to monster slaying. Unfortunately, the copious backtracking and bland narrative make this adventure rather boring.

A fun mix of influences and career paths, but the game doesn’t make being a mercenary or magician entertaining enough – let alone a tailor or woodcutter.