The ending is too abrupt and I would have loved to spend more time with the cast, but I’d much rather a game leave me wanting more instead of dragging on and wearing me out hours before credits roll. The World Next Door is a compact little gem that introduces a style and concepts I’d love to see more of. This feels like just the start of something bigger, and I hope the developers get the chance to keep building on their world.
The World Next Door isn't perfect, but is shows that Viz is - for now, at least - willing to take on a project that's a little different and oddball. Colourful, creative, and generally well designed, it's worth forgiving this particular title its teen B-tier narrative tropes.
An amazingly underrated game! With an interesting story, fantastic characters, and a fun combat system, The World Next Door is a guaranteed good time and an absolute must play!
This is a very visually appealing game. The price might be a little too high but I bought a controller for PC just so I could properly play this game and I´d say that it was worth it.
If there’s any other significant complaint to levy against The World Next Door, it would be that it’s so short. Duration of a game is always tricky to weigh in a review: there’s no set number of hours that a game has to be, after all, so saying a title is or isn’t too long is frustratingly subjective and hard to convey to other people. What I can say is that The World Next Door is so unique and entertaining that it’s a shame to see Jun’s adventure come to a close when it does.
While the storybook art style and writing boost the overall experience, there isn’t enough substance for me to recommend The World Next Door. I did enjoy aspects of what I played, but there is a brevity and incompleteness that holds it back from being more than just a unique experiment. The puzzle-based combat is a really cool idea that needed to be used more and in different ways. If this one sounds interesting to you, I would wait for some kind of discount before jumping in.
The World Next Door is not a title that’s going to rock anyone’s world, but it’s a good title that would be worth checking out for someone wanting something a little different. The puzzle combat system is enjoyable but could have benefited from further development to flesh it out a bit more. The story isn’t extraordinary but is still an enjoyable journey despite its anticlimatic ending. The game takes about four hours or so to complete, so it isn’t a huge time commitment. The world of Emrys is an interestingly designed world that can be fun to visit but is also not a bucket list destination.
Outside of the art style, The World Next Door feels generic and doesn’t do enough to make the adventure feel exciting. I expected something to pay off in the long run, whether it was the story, my choices, or time I spent with characters, but I instead ended the game saying, “That’s it?” It made me feel like I wasted my time getting to know this world and the people who inhabit it.
The World Next Door is an ambitious action-puzzle game with some interesting narrative and RPG elements, but unfortunately wears itself thin trying too much with too little.
O jogo tem uma ideia ótima, mas o enredo não é tão bom, tem tudo para ser um jogo bom mas falha completamente, o jogo não incentiva nem um pouco conversar com outros personagens, e se o jogador não procurar, ele pode ficar o jogo inteiro sem saber detalhes do jogo, fornecidos por um NPC. E o jogo é muito pequeno, umas 5 horas de gameplay
This game is about four hours long, which would be fine if it weren't for the fact that the story/plot of it almost completely fails to follow through. Several plot hooks and world building elements are brought up and then never actually cashed in on - generally speaking, the world building was weak. This would perhaps be fine if this was a gameplay focused experience, but it isn't. The combat is alright, but it would get old quickly, and the controls/mechanics were not always very responsive during it.
I was enjoying myself pretty well until the abrupt end where very little is resolved, which is very bad given the fact that it's a largely VN style story-telling experience. The plot was what I was there for, and it completely let me down. Apparently there is an NPC that will tell you more about the plot if you manage to find them several times during the story, though the game never encourages you to do so and unless you haphazardly decide to talk to him every round, you can play the entire game without knowing he exists. I WAS trying to seek him out, but apparently I missed him once or twice, and thus was never told what the plot is. This is made worse by the fact that the game rarely rewards you for talking to random NPCs, so it could easily feel like a waste of time going after them.
I was very disappointed by where this story went and by how little it used its own world/plot hooks. Even worse was that the characters were decent and the aesthetics were nice. You don't know how much you the story is going to drop the ball until the ending.
I bought this for the puzzle aspects which is actually pretty fun in multiplayer, but extremely limited. There's no single player puzzle play, just the story which is a visual novel. The writing is poor, as in most VNs, and for the easily pleased.
SummaryAn addictive mix of lightning-fast puzzle battles, powerful storytelling and immersive visual novel elements, The World Next Door follows Jun, a rebellious teen girl trapped in a parallel realm inhabited by magical creatures, who must find her way home before time runs out.