Best Friend Forever review: A dog-and-dating sim on Nintendo Switch, PC

I came in Best friends forever with a feeling of envy.

Here’s the general premise: You need a fresh start, so you’re heading to a town called Rainbow Bay, where basically everyone has a dog, and there are a lot of single cuties. It is basically an irresistible dream world.

This kind of experience – making friends in a new city full of dogs – is what it is exactly not reachable. When the pandemic hit, places to gather closed quietly and people usually withdrew. The dog park, once a haven for an afternoon out with my little guy, is also closed.

I miss the dog park. Not just the dogs, but, surprisingly, the humans too. Dogs provide an easy opener, something to talk about.

The difficult conversations of Best friends forever reminded me of the dog park, surrounded by other stray dog ​​people. The setting of the game also helps – Rainbow Bay is basically a playground for dogs, and people happen to live there as well.

Image: Starcolt / Alliance

You immediately adopt a dog when you are there – I chose a pit bull named Cardigan from a scroll wheel of cute dog options – and move into a new apartment. “

As a visual date simulation in novel style, these scenarios play out in (mostly) static scenes and through conversation. The great addition is that, in addition to your character in the left corner, your dog is there on the right.

Your puppy will be needed at random throughout the game. Sometimes he is scared and needs a slap. Other times he has poop and you have to throw out the bag. I first enjoyed the control element of this, balancing every conversation with the care of my dog.

I later realized that the dog events were mostly random, and did not affect my relationship with Cardigan or how well he was trained, that was what I had assumed. Even as he continued his Paws Academy lessons with glowing colors, Cardigan remained in awkward places, like at a burlesque show while I was on a date, but the interaction was nothing more than a nasty blip on the screen. No one flinched even!

Image: Starcolt / Alliance

I love it though able to beat idiot when I read dialogue between me and the other characters.

Training comes in handy fan those “dog event” moments, raising a “score” on a profile page that follows attributes like manners, sociability, confidence, smarts, and fitness. Weekly you can do intensive training, which consists of optimizing activities from a selection to increase your puppy’s stats. You choose five activities, each of which will increase a stat, and they will be executed automatically for you. After that, you can spend some quality time with your puppy – eating, bathing or playing with toys. I would not necessarily describe these as mini-games, but they are interactive: You shake treatments in one hand and give them to your puppy.

Great, I felt that the dog training program came secondary to the dating aspect of the game, although I enjoyed watching Cardigan respond to the different care protocols. He the net like his ears that need to be cleaned, which … are relatable.

Image: Starcolt / Alliance

Dating also takes place over weeks, via a data application. Before you go to Rainbow Bay, you can access the app and see a map of the world. A bunch of little notifications appear to tell you where people are looking for dates.

You can choose to meet people at different locations, take one on a date, or do an activity with your dog. Sometimes you can do all three at once! This is where you start managing your dating life, and balance dates with the glorious singles of Rainbow Bay. I appreciated the variety of the cast as well – whoever I chose so far could have juggled so much love.

Oh, I got to know each of the people I met through these casual encounters before I decided who I might want to date; it felt wrong to be in the city with everyone at the same time. Instead, I dated Sacha, a cutie with an Italian greyhound, and Astrid, other cutie who has a big, fluffy, white puppy.

Dating each of these two residents of Rainbow Bay means exploring the city together, to jump the local joints to read their stories as they unfold. There is back and forth dialogue to choose from, but I did not feel that my choices made much difference to how things played out. Once you have had enough with a person, you can continue the relationship to go stable. There are a total of 15 weeks to play for the duration of the game, allowing you to stick with one of your dates.

Image: Starcolt / Alliance

Each of these plotlines seemed separate from each other, and nothing ever really referred to anything else, despite all the characters being friends. I also encountered a few bugs in my pre-launch playthrough, one of which hindered the game’s progress, but has since been patched from the Windows PC version. It remains in the Nintendo Switch version, according to a known bug list on the Best friends forever Diskear, pending approval of the patch. Other smaller bugs were less annoying, as an occasional character model is missing.

I did not necessarily feel that there was much at stake within the dating parts of the games – it seemed like I was wooing my dates, which I did. But that’s not exactly a problem … I did not come up with a dating simulator to reintroduce the terror of online dating and moving to a new city. I enjoyed how easily the stupid conversations came, and getting to know the new faces around the city. It did not feel like there was a big storyline to invest in, instead of a set of separate, easy conversations.

Due to the ease of the interactions, I missed the real dog park even more, where there is always someone new to meet or a nice puppy to chat with. It is absolutely no replacement for it, but in the pinch it will do.

Best friends forever launched August 27 on Nintendo Switch, Windows PC, and Mac. The game was viewed on PC with a download code provided by Starcolt. Vox Media has affiliated partnerships. These do not affect editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions for products purchased through affiliate links. You can find additional information on Polygon’s ethics policy here.