The Good Life

It may not be for everyone, but The Good Life is a celebration of all things SWERY.

The Good Life is a shambolic RPG that barely hold together, wrapped in the trappings of a rural life simulator. It's tonally stupid and structurally broken, but also surprisingly deep and occasionally self-aware.

While The Good Life still has some annoyances carried over from Deadly Premonition, it’s still a great time with some wacky characters. The transformations and photography are a lot of fun to mess around with, and the life simulation aspects compliment the more relaxed pace nicely.

It’s a dog’s (and cat’s) life.

Imagine living in the happiest town in the world, where everything is all sunshine and rainbows, and nothing seems to be capable of disrupting so much serenity. Imagine having to investigate why this town is so peaceful. Imagine discovering a truly beastly secret. Welcome to Rainy Woods. Welcome to The Good Life.

If you enjoyed the original adventure in The Good Life, a fun RPG by SWERY, you should consider getting the DLC, Behind the Secret of Rainy Woods, which adds 12 new side quests. But is it worth returning to Rainy Woods with photojournalist Naomi Haywood for these bonus quests?

The Good Life is a charmingly silly RPG with a little too much daily grind.

The Good Life is a weird and—most of the time—quite relaxing game made by Hidetaka “SWERY” Suehiro who also made cult classic Deadly Premonition. The Good Life is part-debt repayment sim and part-RPG, as well as being a bit of a murder mystery. It’s a quirky mash-up of genres and definitely has a unique sense of humor that helps to carry it through some of its less polished aspects.

While the daily ongoings of Rainy Woods and its surrounding environment can rustle up a brief oddity or two, Swery and co's latest round of eccentric antics with The Good Life sadly doesn't go far enough in its set-up to feel all that compelling. Let alone, excuse or perhaps mask the otherwise unpolished and mechanically-rough controls and design alike. But where the primarily-marketed pitch of cat-and-dog transformation seldom goes anywhere beyond the briefest of requirements, it's the reliance on overdrawn fetch-quests -- not to mention the ill-measured cost to access resources and landmarks...

Boring, pointless, and jammed with grating characters and obnoxious story beats, The Good Life doesn't live up to its name.

The Good Life is a crowdfunded photography/detective/”debt repayment RPG” title by Hidetaka “SWERY” Suehiro, the wild mind behind Deadly Premonition and D4: Dark Dreams Don’t Die. A quirky and rather charming tale involving a murder, aliens, ancient mythology and sheep, The Good Life is just as much of a mixed bag narratively as it is in the gameplay department. Similar to this creator’s previous efforts, its ambition and imagination is counterbalanced by technical flaws and a myr...

Despite an interesting setting, tedious gameplay and poor performance makes The Good Life a disappointing outing for Swery.