Nobody Saves the World is an action-RPG game that knew exactly how to reel me in. I start the game as “Nobody”. With dead eyes and a plain face, I have no recollection of my life. I find myself in a tiny shack in a strange village. But this bleakness instantly dissolves when I realise that I can punch things around me. Flower shrubs and pots dismember at my touch, leaving chocolates and coins behind it. This is fun. I talk to people to learn more. I steal a wand and become magic. I walk around and uncover the foggy areas of the world’s map. I, eventually, develop the ability to shape-shift. I am not just “Nobody”, but several powerful “Somebodies”.
Although it took me close to 20 hours to beat the game, I felt like I had gained life years at the end of it. The trick to this is the imaginative silliness of the game. Nobody’s shape-shifting ability allows us to inherit powers of a variety of creatures. It is impossible to explain the range of the character abilities in this short article, but here goes. At different points in the game, I was an egg hurtling out of a bird’s nest; a speedy rat, gnawing through enemies; and a horse, aiming its hind legs with great difficulty. The tree of characters grow as we play, and eventually, I began to prefer using the powers of the obscenely strong bodybuilder, a magician who conjures rabbits, and a slime-shooting slug.
Where NStW wins, is in its ability to make me play without stopping. The increments are small, but constant. There is always a monster in the vicinity, calling out to me to get its face smashed. And once the dust settles, I realise there is a small area in the map that is just out of reach, and I walk to uncover it. I find myself in the mouth of a dungeon. “It’s always a nice mood-lift to sweep monsters out of a dungeon,” I tell myself. At every point in the game, I was always just one tiny step away from a pleasant, gratifying feeling. This could be in the form of a level up, a character upgrade, a new character unlocked,
a cleared dungeon, or progression in the main missions. Eventually, I finish the game before I know it. I rate the game a full twenty-five magic stars. It is available for the PC via Steam, and the Xbox store. You can get it for free now, if you have the Xbox Game Pass!