Beautiful Desolation from The Brotherhood and Untold Tales is a post-apocalyptic African sci-fi adventure on Nintendo Switch. Learn more in our Beautiful Desolation review!
In Beautiful Desolation from The Brotherhood and Untold Tales, you’ll take on a post-apocalyptic African sci-fi adventure on Nintendo Switch. It stars Mark and Don, two brothers who find themselves sent far into the future that is ruled by highly advanced technology. You’ll end up making new friends and enemies along the way based on the choices you make. Will you ally yourself with the local warriors who seem to be fighting the good fight, or will you go at it alone as you face giant monsters and deadly robots who can end you in a blink?
The Brotherhood took Beautiful Desolation to Kickstarter back in early 2017, with a $120,000 goal to bring the game to life. Thanks to the support of more than 4,000 backers and Untold Tales acting as publisher, Beautiful Desolation has now found its way to the Nintendo Switch as well. After backing Stasis from The Brotherhood on Kickstarter in 2013, I was definitely looking forward to seeing what the team would bring to the table with Beautiful Desolation.
One day when Mark and his wife were driving to go see Don, who was having some substance abuse issues, they’re caught in the middle of a huge storm. While this is going on, a massive monolith called the Penrose pops into the scene, which sends their car – and other cars around them – flying around. The car lands with a ton of force, and this, unfortunately, leads to the death of Mark’s wife while also leaving him in a wheelchair for a bit. The Penrose has technology unlike anything seen before, which helps society make a ton of progress. Ten years later, Mark and Don reconnect during a very dangerous mission when Mark asks for Don’s help to reach the Penrose and copy some information. It is then that the brothers, as well as a dog-like guardian robot – are zapped into another time.
The game is presented from an isometric point of view that pays homage to the classics of ages past while doing its own thing, presenting gorgeous and very detailed settings to explore. Beautiful Desolation looks great both in Docked and Portable Mode, not to mention that the game features lots of gorgeous CGI video cutscenes. On top of this, the game is fully voice acted, with more than 40 characters to meet, each one of them voiced by African actors, with multiple dialogue options and thousands of lines of story to experience.
You’ll move around with the left analog stick, interacting with objects or talking to other characters by pressing the A button. You can press the – button to get a short description of all points of interest in each area. This is an easy and fast way of learning more about all objects near you, as well as seeing what you can grab and add to your inventory. All items can be reviewed in your inventory by pressing the ZL button. If you want to get a better view of your current location, you can zoom in and out with the L and R buttons as needed.
Any of the items that you have added to your inventory can be used as-is with specific points of interest. To do this, interact with a point of interest, highlight the item you want to use, and press the X button to do so. If you need to combine some of the items in your inventory to create something new and useful, highlight one item, press the Y button, and then highlight the other one before pressing the A button. You’ll be going over this during the start of the game, which will act as a short tutorial and set up the background story for what is about to happen.
There is an in-game achievements system for Beautiful Desolation for you to work through. There are 28 objectives in total for you to complete, with five of them hidden. For the rest, you’ll get a title and a short description that could help you understand what you have to do. As a heads-up, the first one will unlock as soon as you start a new game, with the rest unlocking based on the many choices you make.
If you’re a fan of adventure games with a sci-fi twist, then you’re going to love Beautiful Desolation. It’s a gorgeous game, with an interesting story, puzzles to solve, more than 40 voice-acted characters, and many secrets to find. If you buy Beautiful Desolation on Nintendo Switch, be sure to go into the Extras section. Once there, you’ll be able to claim a free copy of the game’s soundtrack, as well as a free copy of its 80+ pages art book. Just scan the corresponding code with your smartphone, and you’ll prompt the download in seconds! Beautiful Desolation is out today on Nintendo Switch with a $19.99 price.
Disclaimer
This Beautiful Desolation review is based on a Nintendo Switch copy provided by Untold Tales.
