Palia on Switch Impressions: A Cozy MMO With Promise

mmorpg.com:

In Palia, humanity is the past… or at least, humanity was the past. Palia starts with a giant purple void and a halfway-decent character creation tool. I do love a good character creation tool.  After crafting the perfect human, I was thrust into a world where the legendary human race was supposed to be extinct.  No one seems to know exactly how or why humanity died off or, more importantly, why they’re reappearing from nowhere.  One thing is certain: this cozy little town just got a lot smaller.

Ever since Palia went live on PC in August, people can’t get enough of this cozy MMO adventure. It plays like a hybrid of several other games in the genre, like Animal Crossing , Disney Dreamlight Valley, and Stardew Valley .  It only makes sense then that Palia would come to the cozy game machine itself, the Nintendo Switch.  

There’s nothing better this time of year than to snuggle up with a good video game under the covers with a cup of hot cocoa.  Palia opens up a world of endless possibilities as players build their own relationships, homes, and communities. But how does Palia hold up on the limited hardware capabilities of the Switch?

To answer that question properly, we need a baseline for comparison.  There is definite bugginess in Palia .  The Nintendo Switch caps the framerate for Palia at 30fps, but there were many times when it was clearly much lower than that. Other times, things in-game that I should have been able to interact with like animals, trees, and NPCs were completely unresponsive.  Nothing is more creepy than having a sentient cat-like creature who stares blankly into your soul without actually responding.  It’s like dealing with a real cat.  

Another such instance of this was during a hunting