Fashion Dreamer Review (Nintendo Switch)
It is FINALLY here! I’ve been waiting a very long time for this one, and syn Sophia has graced us with the new evolution of Style Boutique with Fashion Dreamer. And I love it.
So, Fashion Dreamer. Is it like Style Boutique? In some ways, no, but in most ways, yes. The core gameplay loop of collect clothing > make people look pretty > receive lovely feedback is intact, and adding a strong online element makes it more satisfying than ever. You don’t have as much of a storyline or as many engaging NPCs, but I’m astounded by how much fun this game is. It pretty much occupies my every waking thought.
First things first, here’s my ID code if you want to visit my showroom or be friends! dnxKMyme3V — request an outfit and I’ll be sure to get back to you.
I think to talk about Fashion Dreamer, I have to first talk about Style Boutique. The DS and 3DS series made its mark by being the best fashion sim in the West, especially in terms of consoles, and would follow you as you manage a boutique.
You’d build relationships with customers, buy stock for your store, dress people up to their liking, and sometimes even submit outfits for runway competitions. It’s fun, it’s chill, and it’s all around feel good. It’s by far one of my favourite series’, and I had begged for a new Nintendo game from syn Sophia for years. With so much content and such an engaging gameplay loop established, it was a dream come true to see Fashion Dreamer revealed.
The jump to being an influencer in a virtual world, rather than a storeowner in a real world, sounds larger on paper than it actually is. As stated above, the gameplay loop remains the same, but now it involves both NPCs and other players.
Make and request outfits (called Lookits), visit their showrooms, and like and thank them for their outfits. The locale may have changed, but this is very much a spiritual successor to Style Boutique. It’s still worth noting that it’s not Style Boutique, although it’ll grow on you real quick.
One thing that may seem overwhelming to you at first is how easy it is to collect new items. All you have to do is “like” an item of clothing, or another player’s outfit, and bam! It’s in your inventory until you delete it (don’t worry, you’re very unlikely to do this by accident). There are rotating boards with new and trending items, and items based on a trending colour, so then you can be on your merry way to create your own items to get your likes in and your followers up. These update several times per day.
That’s another thing this game does incredibly well — you can customise fairly deeply. You can’t create items from scratch, but you can change the colours of pretty much any item (I think every item, but not 100% definite on this), and sometimes this can have a huge effect and perhaps inspire you, or other players, to get creative too.
But, Mitch, what about the boutique I love so much? Well, you’re not selling anything anymore — everything is free, pretty much — but you do have your own showroom that you can decorate to your liking. Dress up mannequins, display shoes and hats, etc, all you need to do is place your furniture and items, then other players can visit and help themselves to a copy of your outfits.
Your showroom is also a great way to earn more points, which in turn allows you to buy articles of clothing in the create-your-own menu. This is partially where the grind comes in, but from what I’ve played, it’s pretty lenient and where you’ll happily spend a lot of your time. When dressing up other players or items in your showroom, it’s worth using items for your own brand (you can create your own cute little logo too), as you’ll get more E-Points when people like them, and it raises your brand level too to unlock more items.
It’s not only E-Points to unlock things you earn, but likes and followers too. More followers means more likes, and these can be used to progress the story to unlock more Cocoons (four differently themed hub worlds), and to earn more points for the above. The create-your-own options and positive loop of dressing up other players, and being dressed in return, is what’ll keep me coming back to this, so it makes sense so many of the mechanics revolve around them.
The best way I’ve found to earn E-Points is to either play one of the two bingo boards per Cocoon, or better yet, create your own outfits and use them to dress NPCs and other players (NPCs can show up in other people’s worlds too), and to take photos of or with those people once you’ve styled them. Of course, what would Fashion Dreamer be without it’s fantastic Drone Camera?
A drone camera is essentially a selfie stick but without the stick. You can take photos and share them, and you have plenty of poses, filters and frames to use. Establishing relationships with NPCs can sometimes unlock a few neat things too. I’m very pleased with the options on offer here, and hope that more will continue to be added, as taking photos is one of my favourite things about Fashion Dreamer.
On a similar note, I hope they expand the Photo Egg system too, which is hella cute. As seen with the image below (and the very first image at the top of the review) these are pre-made backgrounds that you can play in. You can only take photos of yourself in here, but again, you have the same options as if you were using the drone camera, so it’s a damn good place to be. Each Photo Egg has different options per Cocoon, by the way. You can also take pictures vertically, but they looked odd in the article, but they do exist!
You’ve probably realised it already, but this is a gorgeous game. syn Sophia have done an amazing job at squeezing power out of the Nintendo Switch, and they’ve put it all right back in to allowing players to make the most out of fashion. The pose animations — you can pose with a variety of items too — , all of the filters and frames, the showroom options, etc, fashion games have never looked better.
I really enjoyed how different each of the four Cocoons felt, and I’m excited at the prospect that a couple more might be introduced down the line. Given how many fashion styles there are, it would be great to see more Cocoons to reflect those options. You can even create up to four Muses (avatars) on your game, and they share the same progress and items.
What would I like to see introduced in future? Well, it seems the runway will be returning, so I’m excited for that, but I’d love to be able to jump online with a friend to take photos and explore with. In general, more options are always helpful (although there are plenty already), and syn Sophia have already committed to fresh new clothing each month for the forseeable future.
It’s clear that Fashion Dreamer was designed with longevity in mind, and I’m hoping it has a long, healthy life with support from players and syn Sophia, as the creation system and more ways to use online play means that things can feel fresh for a long time.
I’d love to attend time-limited events with other players, maybe even vote on favourite outfits in competitions, and to have seasonal takeovers like they did in Style Boutique. Fashion Dreamer is still new, but it’s off to a fantastic start.
Are there things Fashion Dreamer could do better? Sure. Allowing players to save their favourite outfits, or to search by colour or material (especially as Style Boutique had a really in-depth search system), would be ace. There are a few quality of life improvements I’d like to see, but the game itself thankfully met my incredibly high expectations for it. I love it very much.
I’d also have liked to have seen more inclusive options, including but not limited to more skin tones particularly for anyone with even remotely dark skin as the current options are severely limited, any form of disability representation i.e. wheelchairs and crutches, more varied body types, and removal of items being gender-locked.
I’m not sure what constitutes something being as male or female only, as many items aren’t gender-locked which would traditionally fall under one or the other, but really all options should be available to all players. Of course, the female Muses have the far better options, so it’s hard to not feel short-changed if you’re playing male.
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This review was brought to you by myself because it needs more than the, like, 5 reviews it has on the web. Again, here’s my ID code if you want to visit my showroom or be friends! dnxKMyme3V — request an outfit and I’ll be sure to get back to you. :)
Thanks for reading,
Mitch
