Freshly Frosted (Switch) Review
Release Date: June 10, 2022
Publisher/Developer: The Quantum Astrophysicists Guild
Platform: Nintendo Switch (Reviewed), Steam, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Price: $9.99
I think it best to start this review with the best compliment I can give Freshly Frosted: This is what mobile gaming should strive for. For anyone who is addicted to those free match-three games/time dilated turn based idle games/et cetera, Freshly Frosted is a neat puzzler with 144 levels to wrap your brain around. It respects your time and lets you play at your own pace. It doesn’t push you with bonuses or make you risk power-ups you may or may not need. It will even give you a tiny hint with no penalization (not that there’s a point score to worry about) and, if all else fails, let you pause and skip a puzzle without yelling at you. Freshly Frosted further cements my feeling that a one-off, well crafted game can provide more quality gameplay than any freemium game any day.
Freshly Frosted’s narrative is insanely simple: a narrator describes how she likes to sort ideas in her mind, imagining her ideas as a variety of donuts, all popping out of the oven/fryer and in desperate need of a good frosting. Or sprinkles. Or whipped cream. Or cherries. Or just all of them. Each level has an order of particular donuts, and stationary ovens, topping machines, and delivery trays. All you have to do is lay out the conveyor belts and make the donuts. At first, the puzzling is simply in making room for the belts, as you cannot move any of the other machines. Early on, they stop labelling ovens and delivery platforms, and soon you even have to worry about joining and splitting conveyer belts, or sending donuts through alternating doors and platforms. The puzzle progression is fair and doable, but sometimes even a simple one can stump you if you aren’t thinking the right way, and the fact that a quick pause and skip can let your brain do something else, instead of being simply stuck on the same puzzle for weeks on end is a godsend. I know that would kill any freemium game, but this is the way puzzlers should be.
I’d say my only gripes with the game are that pretty much all levels are graphically similar (donut shapes change but don’t really effect gameplay), and that you can solve a puzzle, know it works, but still have to follow the conveyors through to delivery which can feel tedious. I do absolutely love the narration though, as it never discourages you, only giving friendly reminders if something is off in the system.
Freshly Frosted feels like how mobile games should be, offering little puzzles with reliable rules that you can pop out on a whim when you have free time (making Switch the best place to get it!) I’ve enjoyed my time making the donuts so far, and look forward to finishing the dozen dozen factories in the title.
Pros:
-Very encouraging, like a freemium game done fairly
-Cute visuals and a very happy and positive narrator
-Simple puzzles progress fairly and get tricky as time goes on
-The ability to get hints and/or skip levels at no detriment to the player or game
Cons:
-Only one hint if you are really stuck
-There are only so many donut shapes and background colors
-Even sped up, some of the longer levels take a while to “resolve” to victory
Special thanks to The Quantum Astrophysicists Guild for providing a code for review!