Giraffe and Annika

It's a little ramshackle, but care and craft has gone into the making of Giraffe and Annika. There's nothing new here to speak of, but its disparate genres work well together and we had a good time unravelling the mysteries of Spica Island. A great game for kids and the young at heart, we're excited to see what developers Atelier Mimina do next.

I love winding down with a good old relaxing adventure and Giraffe and Annika definitely fits the bill with its charming and chill world.

Giraffe and Annika may be a bit too simple for its own good but its childlike charm makes for a light and delightful adventure game.

Giraffe and Annika is a title from indie Japanese developer Atelier Mimina making its console debut after a PC launch earlier this year. As an adventure title, it's not particularly deep, but the wholesome charm it exudes makes it a very pleasant experience.

Amateurish qualities undermine it somewhat, but there's a quirky charm to Giraffe and Annika that might still appeal to the right crowd

I appreciate when small studios try to come up with ambitious ideas for their debut titles. When they use their rookie naivety to their advantage, not being held back by knowing how hard it might be to bring their ideas to fruition. More often than not, this attitude ends up backfiring, as it might lead to delays, scrapped ideas, or the most dangerous side effect of all, resulting on a game that simply lacks focus. Giraffe and Annika, by indie studio Atelier Mimina, is a perfect example of that.

The biggest sin that Giraffe and Annika suffers from is a distinct lack of focus on top of grandiose ideas that don’t quite land in the way that one would hope. It suffers from the problem of trying to do many things, but not doing any of them well enough to stand out in any meaningful way. Most everything I can say about this game can be traced back to how bland most of it is. Level design, gameplay, and some aesthetic choices are uninteresting and slow. While it does nail a few things giv...

Giraffe and Annika takes around six hours to complete and, after seeing it through to its end, I wish there were more positive things to say about it. The world and its characters are cute, but you’ll be sick of Annika’s whining and the painfully repetitive fetch quests in no time. It has some merit as a starter RPG to introduce young children to the genre, but even then, there are much better adventures out there to spend your time with.