Mail Time Review (PS5)

There are games where just one look at the screenshots or a trailer is enough to tell that they are going to be relaxing and endearing. Games that somehow snuggle up on you and make you feel cozy – an excellent respite from the daily grind of facing unending hordes risen from the depths of Hell. Mail Time is all this and more.

There was a time, well before the phones conquered almost every minute of our daily lives, that people needed a bit more effort to communicate. But the result was elegant and stylish, and had some kind of magic to it, while waiting for a response to a letter you sent was exhilarating. Of course, mail evolved and became mainly electronic, instantaneous, so the etiquette and the thrill largely disappeared in this process.

Mail Time revives the age of hand delivered mail in a tiny village, full of animals with colorful personalities, and various problems from small ones like finding misplaced coins, to big ones such as handing out some vigilante justice. From the moment you take your first steps in this world, you realize you will be part of an intimate and innocent experience.

After creating your character by choosing various visual attributes, you are presented with your task in this magical world: as a novice Mail Scout, it is time to go from learning the various regulations to delivering your first actual letter. The task sounds much simpler than it actually proves to be. The forest full of giant mushrooms, oversized picnic sites and wells, hides a sinuous path along which you will have to successfully complete various assignments.

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The entire story of Mail Time is a gentle lesson about inclusion and how in a world that wants to function there is no room for prejudice. The inhabitants of the forest are of course engaged in various quarrels and their personalities affect the way they weave their relationships. Our character serves as a kind of liaison that helps entangle all these threads, by delivering more than just letters or parcels.

The quests themselves revolve around everyday dilemmas, like one neighbor making too much noise when the other wants to rest, small dramas in a thimble, like one inhabitant being too shy to confess their feelings to the other, or moral lectures about the greedy getting what they deserve. All these small tales dressed up in a manner similar to the stories of La Fontaine with visuals tailored in the manner of children’s tales create a microcosm that targets juniors and adults alike.  

Mail Time is one of the few games out there that create a strong autumnal feeling. Unlike the annoying Pumpkin spice that invades everything in the fall like a parasite, this game presents the season of harvest in a gentle manner with colors that reminds you of falling leaves, pumpkin dishes and the auberge overlay that covers the landscape. The game world itself is a miniature busy micro universe that exists in the shadow of a human world, presented as oversized decorum.

The game itself is not large, but it is detailed. You will be able to explore one big space split into eight different areas and meet 20 more or less friendly animals along the way. Your final goal is to deliver a letter to a mysterious Greg – a mysterious inhabitant of the forest that proves to be truly elusive.

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Since the story is linear, you know that all the detours will lead you to your final goal and an unexpected conclusion. For each successful task you will gather various medals, just like with the scouts, thus having a sense of progression in a place where time seems to come to take a rest.

As mentioned in the beginning the game is a completely relaxing experience, that can be explored at your own pace. The map itself is not excessively big, but there is a verticality to it that takes full advantage of your ability to jump and glide around. That being said, I have to mention that the controls are not exactly precise, and collecting items perched on various ledges may require several attempts due to miscalculated jumps.

The visual style is completely endearing and mixes the most iconic symbols of the fall with the character and environment design you would expect from a kid’s story. Since the entire game takes place in a single relatively large open space, there are no load times beyond the initial one.

Also, there are no fatal accidents, so there is no real need to rely on saves because there is no way you can mess up. Overall, the soundtrack fits the atmosphere, but the change from one area to another can confuse the game and the musical cacophony will break the spell for a second.

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The Good

The Bad

Conclusion