It’s TAX SEASON! Okay, maybe it’s not, but it may as well be with the ever festive Q1 holiday of making sure your taxes are done. What better way to commemorate such an important time of year than with an adorable little video game all about tax evasion. Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion is a fun little tongue-in-cheek joke commenting on taxes, governments, and modern day work. Along your journey, you’ll meet other vegetables and fruit that work a variety of jobs, from hairdressers, sandwich makers, and video game streamers. Everyone will come across your path just because Turnip Boy failed to pay his taxes. Yes, someone made a game out of such premise.

At first glance, it’s hard to tell exactly what you’re getting into with Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion. It may not be immediately obvious to anyone, it certainly wasn’t to me, that this is essentially a The Legend of Zelda clone. It even makes its own little joke as nod to it when you collect your sword. In order to pay what you owe to society, you will be given a series of mandatory tasks by Mayor Onion, all of them revolving around going to a specific location, exploring a bit, then tackling a nearby dungeon. Rinse and repeat until the game is over.

As you might expect, each area is filled with enemies, which are presented in the form of vegetarian animals (for once, the other side of the discussion is the butt of the joke!) or spoiled food. As you would expect from your run-of-the-mill Zelda lookalike, dungeons are filled with enemies, simple puzzles, items to collect, and of course, it all ends with a boss battle that, once defeated, will grant you an extra health container. It’s the good old gameplay loop that has never seemed to be broken, therefore has no need to ever be fixed.

Puzzle solving in Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion isn’t terribly difficult, which is actually deceiving; it can sometimes lead you to overthink the solution. Sometimes you can be your own worst enemy. Nothing in the game, from the exploration to the combat, is complicated in any way. This game was inspired by the original Zelda first and foremost, therefore not being complex at all. You will usually stumble upon a puzzle that seems impossible to solve at the entrance of a dungeon, but more often than not, all you need to do is go to a nearby room, grab a brand new item, and go back to the entrance to solve what’s now the dumbest and most obvious of challenges. 

The art style of Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion is quite simple, but overall cute. The entire game is designed with a bright and eye-catching colour palette, with the exception of areas filled with sugar or rotten food enemies, which tend to be a bit more dark and ominous. The sound design is pretty decent as well. The music matches each area quite nicely, with bright and cheery music when visiting the main town, slower but welcoming tunes when exploring the forest, or dark and tense music when you’re near the Rotten.

Despite the completely nonsensical premise, Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion ended up being a lot more fun than I could have ever expected. Granted, the game isn’t exactly very long, clocking at about two to three hours to beat, but you can easily extend your playthrough by talking to NPCs and solving their little sidequests. Rewards aren’t exactly exciting, usually in the form of hats and other cosmetics, but hey, it’s an incentive nonetheless. All in all, it’s a fun little diversion where you can pay off your debts while beating up some vegetarians along the way.

 

Graphics: 8.0 All of the cute vegetables and fruits are well designed in their portraits. The world matches the atmosphere that’s being set up.	Gameplay: 7.5 Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion plays like an incredibly simple version of the original The Legend of Zelda. Nothing wrong with it though, especially when it plays so smoothly.
Sound: 7.5 The music matches the established atmosphere incredibly well. Not a whole lot of songs I would find myself wanting to listen to outside of playing the game, but they work great in the context.	Fun Factor: 7.5 Short and sweet. Turnip Boy doesn’t try to stretch out its run time with tedious mandatory tasks that don’t need to be done. There are some extra optional sidequests that, while not exciting, offer a bit of an incentive to make you want to play it for longer.
Final Verdict: 7.5

Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion is available now on Nintendo Switch and PC.

Reviewed on PC.

A copy of Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion was provided by the publisher.