Yellow Fins Demo

In the first of an occasional series, I tackle a demo with … not a lot of content.

Demo series

First, this is going to be a short review — the idea is that I can try out a lot more games this way and, hopefully, find some gems worth checking out in further detail. I’ll try to get it written in record time, but still cover the basics of what each game is actually about, as well as what is enjoyable — or not — about it.

Yellow Fins

Yellow Fins is a very classic kind of ‘one button’ mobile game, in which you play something that slides along an ever-scrolling ground, but can also leave it and achieve flight. Hold down the button (B) to pull yourself to the ground, release it to lift off. Collect coins along the ground, and aim for the best score — I guess.

I’ll start with the positives: Yellow Fins looks pretty nice — if you can deal with the feeling the main character is ripped-off straight from The Simpsons. It seems to play reasonably well, and the concept is easy-to-grasp, so this is a simple game to get into, to pick up and play.

Er, that’s about it, though. This really is a mobile game — one you might expect to pick up for free on a phone, but not one you’d ever expect to be sold in a box for a home console. So, whether this kind of thing appeals to you will depend, in part, on how you view the Switch itself: as a casual mobile gaming device, or a proper ‘full-grown’ console. Personally, I go with the latter, so games like Yellow Fins are fighting a losing battle in my case.

It’s not that I object to basic endless runners — I played my fair share of Flappy Bird for a short, crazed period — but something about this particular mechanic just does nothing for me. I find it boring, frustrating, and Yellow Fins doesn’t change that one iota.

Even if Yellow Fins introduces an interesting take on this particular style of game, you won’t be finding out from the demo. It consists of just two ‘levels’ — levels being little more than ‘stretchs of time’ that don’t really differentiate from each other. Unless, of course, that’s completely different in the full game!

Two levels really isn’t enough to be judging a game on. So, this demo must utterly fail on those grounds. Unless it’s actually an amazing demo in the sense that it accurately reflects the final game. In either case, I won’t be following this one up.