Traveller’s Refrain Review

Traveller’s Refrain is a game that will make you feel sleepy. I don’t mean to suggest the game is boring, far from it. Rather, this isometric Zelda-like has a meditative thoughtful vibe that brings on a state of mindful chill that could, just could, make you briefly close your eyes. For a few minutes. Just make sure you’ve got your little wrist holders on to avoid any unnecessary damage to your Switch when you nod off.

Traveller is a rather mysterious fellow with a lovely, well-trimmed beard. Awaking in a dream-like forest, with memories of past traumatic events clearly haunting him, our surprisingly trendy hero must journey on a quest of discovery, learning more about himself and this world he now inhabits in the process.

If this all sounds a little navel-gazing for you don’t worry, developer Red Essence Games smartly follow the show-don’t-tell model, getting out of the players’ way for the most part and keeping dialogue brief. As such, you pick up on the melancholic mindful elements in brief breaks between all the action, rather than being subsumed in sadness by never-ending dialogue.

Exploration and puzzling are where Traveller’s Refrain excels. Puzzles are basic but satisfying, demanding you find and light all the beacons, as an early example. It’s nothing you haven’t solved before, but these puzzles are well delivered. Even better, there are some fascinatingly fresh characters to encounter, many unlike anything I’ve encountered before in an RPG.

Visually distinctive, meeting new NPCs is the real drive behind your journeying. It also helps that everything looks sumptuous too, the hard-drawn cartoon aesthetic is brimming with details, and full of flair, creating a distinctive game world to explore. No mean feat when your game is set in a forest, likely the most done to death setting in all of video gamedom. That and ice levels, I guess.

Combat is reminiscent of a calmer version of Hades. Traveller can dodge dash with the best of them, nimbly avoiding flailing stone golems, sentient giant blobs of gloop and enormous plumes of flames. Armed with numerous close combat weapons over the course of this sixteen-hour adventure, the risk-reward of Traveller’s Refrain’s combat is clear, the player must get in close to dish out damage, before rapidly escaping enemy reprisal.

That’s not the only weapon at Traveller’s disposal, as he can also strum out a tune or two on his guitar. Basically, his wizard book, spells are summoned by flicks of the thumb stick in different directions. The player has to remember these, rather then being constantly prompted, though you can remind yourself of the inputs in Traveller’s song book. As such, there’s a delightful sense of risk as Traveller stands still to strum his guitar in the middle of a bunch of foes in a desperate attempt to heal himself. Get it wrong and it’s game over, get those inputs right, and you have a chance.

It’s exciting stuff, with hordes of enemies on-screen at anyone time. Though this isn’t without its problems, as Traveller may be fast and smooth in his movements, but the frame rate on Switch 1 certainly isn’t. In handheld mode, the game is almost unplayable at times. Even when there’s no onscreen fireworks, and Traveller is simply running back and forth, the frame rate chugs along like a particularly decrepit diesel train. Docked is better, of course, but the frame rate still struggles far more often than it should. Which is a real shame, as there’s some great Zelda-akin puzzling and exploration to be had here.