Moss: The Forgotten Relic Review

Moss: The Forgotten Relic (Switch 2) Review

From VR to handheld.

Moss and its sequel Moss: Book II released exclusively for VR platforms in 2018 and 2022, respectively. Moss: The Forgotten Relic combines both these titles in a single package, and re-works them for non-VR displays. While the transition isn’t without its drawbacks, most of what makes both titles as charming as they are survives the transition.

In Moss, you essentially control two characters. One is a little mouse named Quill. The other is a literal stand-in for the player themselves called The Reader. The game is played from The Reader’s perspective, looking down into diorama-like environments that Quill navigates. You control Quill with the left stick while The Reader’s cursor is controlled with the right stick. When playing handheld you can also interact as The Reader using the Switch 2’s touch screen. Quill will engage in platforming and combat, while The Reader can manipulate large objects in the environment and even drag enemies around. As the game goes on you’ll encounter situations where you’ll need to manage both at the same time. At its core, Moss feels a bit like a giant Zelda dungeon. It’s all very linear, but it presents an interesting and ever evolving series of puzzles to be solved.

What becomes obvious very quickly is how inherently Moss was designed to be played in VR. The original game expected you to manage the camera perspective by literally leaning around to peer into the different nooks and crannies of every environment. In Moss: The Forgotten Relic the camera has been reworked as entirely scripted. As Quill moves through rooms the camera will dynamically adjust to frame the action. The problem is that a lot of these angles aren’t especially good. For example, some angles made it impossible to judge platform positions. Oftentimes the camera’s fixed position caused me to not realize I was back in a room I had previously visited, because I could not see the section of the room I had been shown previously. The fact that the player has absolutely no input into the camera to pan or rotate it slightly can be very frustrating at times and clearly conflicts with how these levels were originally designed to work. Obviously, both sticks are already being used but at least on some platforms, gyro support could have been a great way around this issue.

When everything comes together just right, and you fight your way through camera difficulty, there is a beautiful world and great puzzle design being presented here. It should also be noted that the whole thing runs perfectly on Switch 2. Both docked and handheld mode offer 60 frames-per-second gameplay, and the image is very crisp in both configurations. Loading times between areas are also very fast. This is a game that, despite the aforementioned camera issues, feels very well suited for quick portable play.

Having Moss and Moss: Book II together in one package is, from a narrative perspective, a much improved way to experience these games. Moss: Book II is less of a sequel and more just the second half of Moss. The original game cuts off somewhat unceremoniously so being able to immediately swap over to Book II greatly improves that element of the presentation. The move to non-VR displays clearly hasn’t been the easiest for a game so inherently built for VR. And even with that in mind, there are some clear areas where this misses the mark. Still, if you can get past the awkward moments, the Switch 2 makes a great window through which you The Reader can go along with this little mouse on her tiny adventure.

Summary

Pros

• Fun puzzle design
• Looks and runs great
• Unique control setup

Cons

• Bad scripted camera
• Zero player camera control

A review copy was provided by the publisher

Worldwide Releases

Related Content

• Moss: The Forgotten Relic [S2]

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