OmoTomO

Genre: Puzzle

Players: 1-2 Co-Op (Local)

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Review:

OmoTomO is a Puzzle game originally released on mobile devices in 2019 and brought to the Nintendo Switch in 2020. This is a game that has you maneuvering snaking vines in a miniature zen garden, with the goal being to ensure that the “head” of each snake ends up at a well.

The presentation here is good, with the zen garden nicely rendered in 3D, with everything apparently taking place within a game case. Shogi pieces are used to select which level you’re playing, in keeping with the game’s theme. This is backed by traditional-sounding Japanese music and a Japanese-style drum effect in the game’s menus, also quite appropriate for the themes of this game. The only thing here that seems odd or out of place is the vines themselves, with their odd snakelike heads and glowing eyes seeming somewhat alien and out of place in the otherwise placid surroundings.

As for the puzzles themselves, this is a combination of a sliding block puzzle and Snake, with vines moving until they hit an obstruction and players needing to make use of this to maneuver them into the proper positions. It’s nothing groundbreaking, but it’s so easy to pick up that pretty much anyone should be able to figure out how to play it.

There are a few features here I need to mention before finishing up – one that’s in the game, and one that isn’t. Firstly, this game does have a multiplayer Co-Op option, but this basically allows each player to control a separate vine instead of both being controlled by the same player. I don’t feel like this gameplay is particularly fitting for multiplayer play, and as such this mode seems tacked-on. However, while this may not harm the game for its inclusion, one thing that isn’t here and should be is touchscreen controls, which seem like they’d be ideal for the game, as well as an easy thing to include, as the mobile versions would have already had touchscreen controls. However, for whatever reason it’s not here, and players will have to be satisfied with a more traditional control scheme, which works fine, I suppose.

Outside of its nice, placid presentation, there’s little about OmoTomO that’s ambitious or noteworthy, but it’s ultimately still a decent Puzzle game, and players looking for some decent spatial brain-teasers with a pleasant presentation will probably find this game to be to their liking.

tl;dr – OmoTomO is a Puzzle game that has you guiding vines to wells in a zen garden. It has a nice, peaceful presentation, and gameplay that’s easy to pick up and play, although not in any way innovative or outstanding.

Grade: C+

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