We live in a cynical world. I’m not a fan of Jerry McGuire, I’m just keenly aware that the constant onslaught of terrible news, bleak outlooks and overbearing reality tends to keep a person down. As a result, we often see that reflected in media with music that catalogs our demons, movies that celebrate the darkest of antiheroes, and games that focus on dark and often depressing circumstances to propel forward a narrative that is rarely, if ever, positive. Even my favorite visual novels and RPGs tend to lean into the bleak. So it can be a little difficult to sit down and honestly, openly take in a game like My Friendly Little Island Deluxe. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find that this little indie title, albeit brief, is earnest and truly a pleasant place to visit.

This looks exactly like something my grandmother would have gotten me for Christmas in ’92.

Niklas Drude (under the moniker playinstinct) is an artistically minded retro developer who specializes in games that capture and focus on the Game Boy aesthetic. Partnering with Caracal Games (who brought us Star Overdrive), My Friendly Little Island Deluxe is an entry in a series known as The GB Archive, which seeks to both preserve the development of Game Boy titles as well as make sure they’re available to a wider audience. As a result, each of their Switch entries is more of an immersive experience. Rather than simply boot right into the game, you’re given an overlay that mimics the feeling of picking up a Game Boy, putting in the cartridge and starting the game. Far from being chintzy, these actions give a bit of gravity to the action of starting the game, even if the physical element isn’t really there.

As for the game itself, the title really says it all. My Friendly Little Island Deluxe is a quaint adventure around making an island more and more inhabitable for folk who show up. Some ask you to accomplish tasks before they move in, like collecting coconuts or obtaining a cool set of horns built into a headband. The main player simply walks and jumps around the island, grabbing coconuts and other knickknacks to make the visitors happy, and then watch as the island expands with more and more people living there. Ultimately, you end up with a very full island of tiny characters from who knows where, for God knows why, existing harmoniously on this island where you just happen to be. There is no greater purpose than simply being a good neighbor and ingratiating others onto this little slice of heaven for ya’ll.

And somehow, Mt. Fuji is in the distance, giving me a general idea of where the island is.

Collecting coconuts is a vital part of the gameplay, for both the economy of it all and also for leveling up your character. Coconuts gathered gradually amass in your inventory, and you can dump them into yourself and choose to raise either walking speed or jumping height. Both are important to eventually reach more difficult spots on the island, including the coveted white coconuts that are worth three times as many points. There’s a gradual increase in “level up” points, so you can’t just spam-gather ten coconuts again and again till you’re maxed out. Still, the benefits of increasing your abilities are invaluable, and you cannot attain certain aspects of the game (and thus complete it) without some conscious gathering for yourself. In this way, the game reminds you that you need to make sure your own needs are being met while meeting the needs of others. 

For such a simple concept and execution, My Friendly Little Island Deluxe is wonderfully put together. You’ve got a day and night cycle that gradually transitions as you change screens, with coconuts regrowing and certain elements only being visible/accessible at different points in the day (particularly in the post-game section). Despite being only a few pixels high each, there’s a distinction for all of the characters, letting your growing number of neighbors stand out and be unique. The soundtrack does this as well: starting with a very lonely, almost monotonous beeping ambience, it gradually grows and expands, adding more and more to the overall scoring until it’s a gorgeous symphony of chiptune to represent the totality of your island’s community. It’s a degree of choice and construction that makes for a fantastic, if constrained, sound design.

Sapo speaks the truth, DON’T IGNORE IT.

Moreover, the partnership Caracal Games allows you to explore how to work this game in a grander scope for visuals and “authenticity.” There’s a variety of filters to cycle through in an attempt to capture the quality and visuals you might normally get from a Game Boy title, and they have varying degrees of success. As a result of it being designed to look best on the small screen, I highly recommend to use the wallpaper option and keep the screen set to a fixed box. I mostly enjoyed keeping the “lights out” mode on, but the optional sensation of being in your room by a desk lamp has its own degree of charm. Stretching the display out across the totality of the Switch’s real estate looks…bad. I mean, that’s my opinion on the matter, but I feel it looks pretty wonky and don’t recommend it.

You can get from the beginning to end of My Friendly Little Island Deluxe in an hour, maybe less, but it’ll be an hour well spent. There’s enough gameplay here to make it more than a simple walking simulator, and there’s some quaint and fun personality injected into everyone and everything you meet. From different hats to bone dry jokes, this is a passion project that doesn’t profess to be anything more or less than what it is. More importantly, there’s nothing sinister or insidious inside. Given that I became aware of Drude’s work thanks to the upcoming Buddy promotional game, I fully expected there to be some kind of reveal, but there’s nothing of the kind. The only twist was when I realized I forgot to save and had to do the whole thing over again, but that’s strictly user error.

I have no reason to doubt Tako’s commitment to business.

Every family has the one game they played incessantly as a kid, even if it wasn’t one of the big titles of the system. My Friendly Little Island Deluxe has that kind of warm, nostalgic atmosphere to it that brings a smile to my face. It’s cozy, it’s short, and it’s got just enough to let you come back time after time and replay the brief but satisfying buildup. While this might not be for everyone, if you grew up in an era where four AA batteries and a clip on light were your nightly routine, then you might find a nugget of memory echoing across the pixels and landscape within this game. I enjoyed it, and I hope you give My Friendly Little Island Deluxe a chance to delight you as well.

My Friendly Little Island Deluxe is available now on PC , Nintendo Switch, and Nintendo Switch 2.

Reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2.

A copy of My Friendly Little Island Deluxe was provided by the publisher.