Fashion Dreamer Review (Switch)


Helping Muse’s dreams come true one outfit at a time


Released: November 3, 2023
Available on: Switch
Genre: Fashion and Communication
Developer: Syn Sophia
Publisher: XSEED Games, Marvelous

Oh boy, it’s time for my Fashion Dreamer review.

At the same time though, I think I’m in a good position as someone going into Fashion Dreamer. While I do know about the Style Savvy franchise (it stinks the closing of the DS eShop was the catalyst as I would have loved the games as a kid), I only played the demos. I was also only able to afford one Style Savvy game before the eShop closed and I have yet to play that one yet (hopefully I will this year though). So while I don’t have the experience of playing them, I am aware of what they offer.

Taking a big turn from Style Savvy, Fashion Dreamer has no story. You are given the basic framing of the game. You learn that Fashion Dreamer takes place in a digital platform known as Eve where people all over the world connect through fashion. Your character avatar, and other people’s characters, are called Muses. As you can guess, Muses are a way to express yourself without words through how you customize their appearance and the way you dress them. You’ll customize your Muse, your Muse’s idle pose, and your profile (your name and your favorites for each category) before you head into Eve proper. The first hour or so is dedicated to the tutorial where you’re given the basics by a Guide Muse giving you some information and quests. You’ll also be introduced to the the concepts of Cocoons, which are just places in Eve where Muses just hang out, and the first one is Cocoon HOPE.

After the tutorial, which kind of ends and leaves a lot of stuff unexplained, you’re left to put together outfits for others to your heart’s content. Online Mode will also be unlocked after the tutorial, which will have other player’s Muses appear in Cocoons as well as the clothing items they style. Player Muses do take up a mix of empty spots and Character Muse spots. This tidbit may not seem helpful, especially since Online Mode is recommended (which I agree wholeheartedly), but if you’re only in the mood to progress Character Muse friendships and don’t want to see other player’s stuff, offline mode is ideal in that situation.

Anyway, so the gameplay. Fashion Dreamer is all about its gameplay loop of being a stylist. You go into a Cocoon you want to be in, walk around, and you can style any Muse that has been spawned. By the way, the outfits you put together for Muses are called Lookits. You have the usual tops, bottoms, dresses/one-pieces, socks/leggings, outerwear, shoes, hats, and earrings. Sadly, other accessories like gloves or necklaces are tied to the clothing item and there are no bags. Each Lookit will also reward you with a bonus of two of the game’s five currencies. I’ll go over the different currencies when I get to the systems they interact with, but they are E-points, Lucky Coins, Bingo Tickets, Gacha Tickets, and Creative Keys (keys aren’t rewarded as a Lookit Bonus).

There is a bit more going on when you make Lookits, though. If you’re going to be playing in Online Mode, there are two different Muse types: Player and Character Muses. Player Muses are other players and talking to them will show you their profile so you know what their favorites are and their wishlist item. You do get the Bonus, which may or may not be affected by hitting their favorites, but your Lookit does get sent to that player’s Lookit Mailbox where they can see how you styled them and Like any items that they want to use (gaining you a lot of E-points). Meanwhile, Character Muses are NPCs the developers made and features one of the progression systems that you can hook onto. Character Muses have a few lines they can say before and after you do their Lookit (which some are pretty funny) and they have Friendship levels that you raise by styling them. Character Muses will have a Wishlist for their Lookit which you ideally will satisfy, like using a specific color or item. You’re scored with 1-3 Hearts and given the Bonus when you complete their Lookit. The Hearts, which are Lookit Bonus, Color Bonus, and Cleared Wishlist, are used for leveling up your Friendship with them as once they get three the next time you talk to them will be a Friendship Up request. These vary from making a Lookit and not making one, but they are a source of more Character Muses being added to the spawn pool as well as patterns, customization options, and poses.

This is probably just a preference that I have, but I don’t like how positive Character Muses are. They like anything no matter if you threw together items that didn’t match what they wanted. I don’t miss clients going “Hmm well, I secretly wanted that, but this is okay too”, but I lowkey want sassy or sarcastic comments. Also, I do see a potential of these Muses having micro-stories. They all have a core personality they all play into (and with 200+ Character Muses you’ll run into duplicates sooner or later) and this could be used to slightly differentiate them. It doesn’t have to be anything big, just small comments that you can easily overlook until Friendship Level 12 (which is when unique rewards stop). Like Lackadaisical Daisy working towards getting her driver’s license and saying she was able to get to the beach, the Muses that wanted to feel grown-up feeling grown-up finally (or realizing it’s fine if they don’t dress professionally), and Follower Fawn making progress in keeping up on trends (or realizing it’s okay not to).

The last time I saw Mime Michael (╥_╥)

There are a total of four Cocoons, each with a different theme and layout. You start with Cocoon HOPE and you unlock the others when you hit Follower count milestones. Thankfully, you gain Followers through doing Lookits as well, with the amount depending on a couple aspects. One of my fears was that this would be gated by real people having to follow you, making it a popularity thing, but it’s not as it’s a value the game grants you making them NPC Followers. That said, you can still follow other players as well as other players can follow you. I unlocked the second Cocoon in 4 hours and unlocked the last Cocoon and saw the credits in 8 hours and 15 minutes.

When you start out, you won’t have many clothing items saved in your wardrobe. Luckily, when you’re styling a Muse there is a Quick Pick selection page with a couple pieces from each item category (though this is absent when doing Friendship Up requests). This is definitely helpful during the early game where you don’t have that much and even late game if you find yourself missing something like sandals. Though, the Quick Picks won’t always have what you need to complete the Wishlist so this is where your own personal wardrobe inventory comes in. You can add more clothing items to your inventory in two ways. The first way is giving a clothing item a Like which will send it straight to your inventory. If you see any clothing items that catch your eye on a Muse, in a Lookit someone did for you, in a showroom or in the Pop-up Area, you can send it a Like (or even Like a whole outfit) so you can wear it permanently and use it yourself in Lookits you do. I say permanently since there is a mechanic where you can try on the clothing items or even the customization options the Muse has (like their makeup or hairstyle). This is not only useful to see how it looks in action, but also to do photos without actually changing your outfit.

You can also make your own clothing, though this aspect is a bit misleading. You only alter the clothing colors. You work with pre-made patterns which you decide what colors each section will be. Two currencies interact with the item creator, technically three. You do start out with a few patterns available to you, but you do unlock more and more as you level up your brand by making more clothing items. While there are some patterns that are free, there are a lot that are locked. You unlock these with Creative Keys, with the cost raising depending on the rarity. You also can’t make the item unless you have enough E-points and how much it costs also depends on the rarity. Creative Keys are gained through leveling up Friendships (I believe) and through Events; while E-points are gained through doing Lookits, photos in your Eve Log, Bingo, and when other players Like items you used in Lookits (which is the main advantage to playing online as you’ll be swimming in E-points since it gives 10,000 per Like). There are also consumable patterns, which will just use up the pattern rather than using up E-points. You gain these consumable patterns through the Gacha Machines using Gacha Tickets (another currency). I don’t like consumable patterns at all and I especially don’t like the Gacha Machines nor the Gacha rates.

When you first design your own item, you’ll also get to make your brand logo (which you actually have a lot of different choices and ways you can do). So not only will you see brands from the game’s (basic) brand, but you’ll see other player’s brands and others will see yours (and maybe you’ll have a surreal moment where you see someone using your branded items).

There are a few key features that are in every Cocoon. There are two different Bingo Machine types and these are a source of E-points (mainly helpful for offline players). These do require Bingo Tickets, another currency, to have a number or picture drawn and there are a couple different multipliers that will increase the payout once you get Bingo. Though, it is a bit annoying that you can only do 1 Bingo Ticket at a time and I did find them reset if you leave the Cocoon. There are also vending machines where you can buy photo items with a different currency called Lucky Coins (gained through raising Friendships or as a Lookit bonus reward) and the Gacha Machines where you can get consumable patterns. Each Cocoon has different inventory for the Gacha Machines and I’m pretty sure for the vending machines as well. As for rooms, there’s the Pop-up Area which is basically where you can see popular or trending items as well as see what’s the fashion trend if you want to maximize your Like and Follower gains. If you’re Online, this is a great source of all different kinds of clothing items. The Salon Area is next and this is where you can alter your Muse’s appearance in the mirror, talk to an adviser to get recommended makeup looks (which are unique to the adviser and Cocoon) and see what’s trending. The Salon Area also features the Photo Egg which allows you to take pictures will a bunch of different backdrops (that are unique between Cocoons). And lastly, there’s Showrooms. You can decorate your own showroom, with purely decorative items (bought with E-points as long as you have a high enough brand level) and clothing you designed, and you can go to other player’s showrooms to see what they have and maybe Like an item or two.

Oh, and you can also take photos! Outside of the Photo Egg of course. You can activate the drone camera anytime where you can take a photo of a Muse you just styled or of yourself (or both). There are some great photo spots you can find in Cocoons. When you’re taking a photo, you can add a filter, change the camera angle or zoom, add blur, and change the pose your Muse is doing. Sadly you can’t alter another Muse’s pose or positioning and you can’t bring the drone lower to the ground. It’s very annoying trying to get a full body picture with the drone camera though. Once you take the picture you can add a frame if it’s a drone picture or add stickers if it’s a Photo Egg photo. I do hope we’ll get more drone frames and I honestly really like how your photos get automatically saved to your Switch’s screenshot folder.

There are also Fair Events. These are limited time events that take on a specific theme and last 3 weeks. During those 3 weeks you’ll be given 14 sets of challenges to do. You’ll basically be asked to do things you already do such as doing Lookits, sending Likes, setting a clothing item as a Hot Pick and send it to the Pop-up Area, and more. Each set will grant you rewards such as patterns, customization options, and currency; as well as rewards for when you complete everything. The items here are exclusive to the Event, but there are non-exclusive items that do get added in as well (I think more Character Muses get added in as well, but I’m not too sure). The thing is…the event item rewards are consumables. There have been three Fair Events at the time of me writing this and I was able to participate in two. I do hope we eventually get a way to get the customization options (like the hairtyles and eyes) and the Photo Egg backgrounds. And, while I do understand keeping the patterns exclusive, either give us a way to get more of the consumable patterns or don’t make it consumable.

Well this is when I get in all of my complaints. Oh boy, this turned out to be too long to confine in one paragraph. For one, the tutorial does just end, the Quest tab is left as a ghost, and a good handful of mechanics aren’t explained. Some aren’t even explained in the in-game tips and leaves you to figure it out or look up. I had no idea you could see the Cocoon’s map (where you can see what’s in each area and travel to them) or change Cocoons without restarting the game, Bingo is confusing when you first try it, it doesn’t tell you how to display items in your Showroom, doesn’t tell you that you can check the Wishlist while doing a Lookit, you won’t know how to change your Muse profile, and doesn’t tell you how to delete items from your inventory. I do wish your Lookbook, which you can save your favorite outfits, could be accessed in the menu. The window that shows your ID is too small and I wished when you input someone else’s ID it takes you to their profile pop-up and not just tell you “they’re already in Your World” or “[Muse Name] has been added”. Or give us an option to specify a Showroom you want to go to by letting us input an ID there. I started playing Fashion Dreamer after a patch with some QoL features was put out. One of the QoL additions was a filtering system for your inventory, which yes please you really need one once you’re deep into the game. I do find it a bit tiring doing Lookits now that I have a lot of items to scroll through. Though, I do wish you can filter by style, patterns, and prints as well. The color filtering seems to also have been messed up. So an item that is clearly purple won’t show up in the purple category (and might not count for Wishlists?). The game just makes me feel aimless as well. Even when I only had Cocoon HOPE unlocked it didn’t feel like I was making progress. And now, when I’m working towards Muse Friendships so I can get the patterns and customize options you can only get through Character Muses (which is also a bit annoying), I feel like I’m making no progress.

Even my Muse had an emo phase haha

I wished consumable patterns and the Gacha Machine wasn’t in the game. The Gacha Machine rates are so annoying and while I do understand that the consumable patterns are meant to encourage sharing, it just makes me not use them in fear of it not matching with anything or not liking it in the future. Especially for consumable patterns you gain through Events since you won’t be able to get them again. I even used consumable patterns (including Event exclusive ones) without realizing it was one. The multicolor method some patterns use is an annoying coloring method. I wished there was more depth to customization and clothing like having bangs being a separate option and accessories being separate from the hairstyle and clothing. The drone camera is annoying when you want a full body picture and you can’t move it significantly to the left or right. Muse poses being gender locked is so stupid. This one is half on the game and half on players, but ceiling showroom decorations have collision which makes some showrooms impossible to navigate. I play as a female Muse, but I do agree that the male Muses do need some more exciting clothing options. Some clothing are ugly (sorry) and it’s hard to tell what style an item fits in. Most of it just looks cutesy to me and nothing really speaks Cool or Active so I just have to hope (like sneakers and shorts for Active). This can make getting 3 Hearts with Character Muses annoying. Character Muses also have weird spawn rates and you won’t be told why you can’t advance your Friendship with them. I had to find out myself that you can’t raise Friendship unless you have one of every clothing item type. As you can guess, I don’t like many male-only clothing so I did so many Lookits for Mime Michael and of course, when I figure it out, I haven’t seen him for a month. On that note, I do wish Hearts stack so if you go over they’ll roll over for the next level. I do also wish you could zoom in more when doing Lookits. Lastly, I saw others calculate how many Creative Keys you’re given in the game and you’re not given enough to unlock all the patterns. Why? Why even do that? Why have five different currencies in the game? I have to wonder when this game pivoted from a mobile game to a Switch game.

Fashion Dreamer desperately needs an undo/redo button. I cannot tell you how many times I accidently clicked on a clothing item or a color (when making an item) on accident. Or how many moments I had where I was putting an outfit or colors together and thought “yeah what I had before looked better”.

Update: Ver 1.4.0 added an “Undo One” function while styling Muses and adjusted gacha rates

Lastly, I just have to mention the credits. You hit the credits when you hit Platinum Rank and it comes so out of left field and is so long. So. Long. You can’t even skip the credits or fast forward it. I just wanted to continue styling Muses and by the time the credits were done I wasn’t in the mood anymore.

I’ve heard that the possible reason Syn Sophia didn’t put a storyline or other features Style Savvy had (which some have more or less been patched in) is because they’d get in trouble with Nintendo for being too similar to Style Savvy. Honestly, I don’t really buy this. For one, why would having a story or having more depth to the wardrobe cause the alarm to be raised; and two, my first thought when I saw the announcement trailer was how the character models looked like Style Savvy’s. I actually didn’t know Fashion Dreamer was from the same developers as Style Savvy until I saw a comment mentioning it on Reddit. I can see it being too close if the story was about opening up your own boutique, but that’s it. Even if they didn’t want to do a story about working your way up to being a top influencer, we could have had micro-stories with the Character Muses.

In terms of performance, Fashion Dreamer does run well on the Switch. The only times I’ve seen it stutter was when I was going into the Pop-up Area. Other than that, it does take a long time to load in if you’re going online, but I’ll excuse that since you don’t need a Nintendo Switch Online subscription.

To wrap this up with some positivity, I do love the look of Fashion Dreamer. The Cocoons are pretty and do have some cool photo spots. I do also love the character models, which is unsurprising considering they are basically an updated version of the Style Savvy models (which I love), and I do like most of the clothing that’s available in the game. The music, while kind of there, is nice as well. I also love the way Character Muses are named as it’s a pretty fun way to name your NPCs.

Verdict

Fashion Dreamer is a really conflicting title. On one hand, Fashion Dreamer is disappointing and you can’t help but notice the various aspects that could have been better. However, at the same time, I honestly do enjoy dressing up my Muse, NPC Muses, and Player Muses. For me, it’s a great game to play in the mornings or while watching something. I never thought I would have accumulated 30 hours (at the time of writing) in Fashion Dreamer as I thought I wouldn’t like it, but yet here I am still playing it despite the many cons and annoyances that I had. I’m not even forcing myself to keep playing, I genuinely want to. Do I think this game is worth $50? No. Did I regret purchasing Fashion Dreamer at full price? No.

With that in mind, I don’t think I would recommend this to anyone unless you purely like dressing up characters and not expecting anything else. Heck, you might even like Fashion Dreamer if in other games you valued fashion over stats or even have a separate cute/fashionable outfit for when you’re not fighting enemies. I’ve been doing that since I was a kid (especially in WoW, which was the first game I played that let me be in control of what my character wore) and I feel this kind of contributes to why I enjoyed Fashion Dreamer more than I thought. Though, renting Fashion Dreamer before buying it would be the best course of action if you’re able to.

Also, here’s my Fashion Dreamer ID: YaXNaepY3M

RipWitch

♡ ♡ ♡ A witch that goes for anything that peaks her interest no matter the genre. Currently obsessed with the Persona series and trying to make a dent in my backlog. ♡ ♡ ♡

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