Potion Permit Review (Xbox One)

STAFF REVIEW of Potion Permit (Xbox One)

Sunday, October 23, 2022.
by Kirsten Naughton

Have you ever been interested in becoming a chemist without the hassle of spending thousands of dollars on traditional schooling? If you’re looking for your desire to heal people, collect things, concoct potions, make friends and bring back a town to life, look no further than Potion Permit. PQube Limited sure knew what they were brewing when they developed Potion Permit. Shall I give you the recipe for my success and journey with Potion Permit? Follow me to my office.

You are a Chemist from the Capital sent to Moonbury Town. Mayor Myer’s daughter Rue has fallen ill of a sickness no one can cure within town. In desperation, he calls upon you to save Rue from dying. Now, to say that’s pressure would be an understatement. To make the matter worse, due to a devastating tragedy that happened years ago, Chemists have been forbidden to enter Moonbury Town. So, let’s just say you’re not welcomed by many towns folk. They aren’t shy about telling you either. What a way to welcome someone that was asked by the Mayor to come help, right?

All that set aside, you have two main places where you’ll be doing most of your work that will be upgradable when the time is right and you have all the requirements to do so. The 'Potion House' which is basically just your house that you sleep in and 'The Clinic' where you make the magic happen. The Potion House is where your cauldron is, that won’t unlock until you do a few tasks for the townsfolk and get accustomed to what the basic functions of being in Moonbury Town is like. You’ll meet some people, walk around, get familiar with the area and then be thrust upon Meadow Range.

Meadow Range is basically your go to place for any materials you will need to collect for recipes. I’m talking Basil, Jasmine, Tree Sap, Bear Claws, Daisies, etc. That’s not even close to a third of the kinds of things you’ll find in Meadow Range. At your disposal, you will have three tools that eventually you will be able upgrade as well to chop, cut and smash your materials to collect them. They are a Sickle, Hammer and Axe. Note, every material has a specific tool you need to use to collect it. You can’t take down a tree with a hammer and you can’t smash a rock with a sickle. It isn’t going to work and you’re likely to just waste time. I learned very early on that collecting everything that you have access to in the few early days of your journey will come in handy later on. Among all these amazing materials for you to make potions with, are enemies. However, you may want to keep an eye on your stamina and health bar, if they get too low, you won't be able to move as fast and your tools may not work so well.

Now, I’m not going into much detail about the enemies (or at least the ones I came upon). I know for sure one of them is a bear and the little yellow guy with legs whom drops ‘Spores’ once in a while after being defeated, the other one is a ball of jelly that may drop items or it may not. But, one ball of jelly when defeated turns into two and it’s rather easy to kill them. Any tool will do. The bear, I’m not going to lie, is a little tricky the first few times. I found early on that if you attack the bear with a hammer, he dies slightly faster. But, that is an easy fix by going to 'Hearts and Sparks' and upgrading your tools. Badabing-badaboom! But do note, you can’t upgrade things until you have your first section of quests complete and the first small part of the story done. The guy who runs the 'Bulk and Build' won’t even acknowledge your existence until you show you have earned your worth a little.

Now, before I dive into the clinic and how to save a patient from dying from something and how that all works, I have to tell you about the potion making system because it’s pretty unique. When you need to make a potion, you first have to go to your potion house and go to the cauldron. Once you have unlocked whatever potion you’ve discovered, you need to then see what puzzle pieces you will need. You heard that right, the potions in Potion Permit don’t need quantities of specific items. Rather, all the items you collect are a particular puzzle piece and they fit in their own unique way. Honestly, when you see the cauldron page with the potion you want to make, it’s pretty straight forward. You choose the item that associates the puzzle piece you need, you complete the puzzle and you brew the potion. Easy, right? Absolutely! Oh wait, I need more materials? It’s okay, you can go back to the Meadow and collect what you need and come back to try again. Once you have collected a material, you can see at anytime what puzzle piece is associated with the item. That way, you’re not spending time collecting what you don’t need and you’re spending more time collecting, completing puzzles, brewing potions and curing patients of their illnesses.

As some of you may be aware, in the real world, diagnosing patients can be difficult for even a seasoned physician. Don’t fret, in Potion Permit it’s made very easy. So easy in fact that all the information Potion Permit throws at you in the beginning will slowly start making sense once you get into the groove of making potions, knowing which are needed to have on hand at all times and how to cure your patients quickly so that they can get out of your clinic. In the beginning, after Rue is cured, you won’t get the cut-scene right away, so your clinic can be pretty much 'open for business'. You have to wait a few days until Rymer gets your red flashing light and the sound horn installed. The first time the sound horn goes off, it triggers a cutscene. Any other time the sound horn goes off, I’ve just woken up from sleep and then I’ve walked or teleported into town.

As you start the process of treating your patient, you will listen to what their problem is. If it’s a neck problem, you’ll have a body chart beside their name and their complaints. You’ll find the body part and it will give you one of two prompts. Diagnose or make a certain potion. Making a certain potion is straight forward; go to your potion house, brew the potion, come back and tada, patient is cured. Now, if you have to diagnose a patient, there are two mini games that I’ve experienced to 'diagnose' the issue. One is a rhythm game where you have to hit the correct D-Pad button at the right time. Every miss brings down your score a little on the bar above the activity. Every correct one brings your bar up and when you cross the line on the bar, you’ve solved the issue. The other mini game I experienced was what I call 'Simon Says'. It’s basically hitting the D-Pad in the order it asks you to. Both mini games I felt were super simple and required a small amount of attention.

After all is said and done, your patient is cured. There is an emphasis on the ‘Patient Satisfaction Levels' of the town. Personally, I had no problem keeping the levels to green. As long as you’re paying attention and you don’t let the day timer go down to 0, you should be just fine. Most of the patients that I took care of had a 4 day counter on them. I cured them within minutes of hearing the horn. I also never had a patient die on me either. After you cure a patient you get these things called 'Moon Cloves'. They are a gift you can give to people in the town to befriend you and essentially change their minds that you’re not an evil chemist who wants to destroy Moonbury Town.

With the upgrades to the buildings, such as the clinic and your potion house, or clearing the landslide from an area to open up more of the Meadow, you can gain more respect from the townsfolk and make them change their mind about you. There seem to be two smaller areas that you can work to unlock through your journey if that’s what you choose to do, which will unlock more materials, more enemies and different areas for you to improve that you’re in. The whole idea is to make the townsfolk your friends and to show them you’re not like the chemist before you.

There are times where you won’t have a quest. This would be the time where you can go to the Police Station and help out with a very simple mini game sorting some containers into their categories. You earn a little money and you gain respect from the police officer who runs it. It does take two hours from your time clock though, so keep that in mind. When I don’t have an active quest I forage for materials to either upgrade tools or my buildings, or upgrade areas around me. You can also decorate your room in the Potion House by unlocking different items at the Bulk and Build. Whether you’re waiting for a building to open or you are wanting the next day to come, time is literally of the essence in Potion Permit.

Potion Permit is a akin to a super calm version of Stardew Valley. It’s a life sim and it's a world where you are in control essentially of what you do with your time. Just like Stardew Valley, the town and some of its buildings have open and closing times, so there are things you need to do within certain windows of time. At the end of each day you need to go to sleep in your bed at the Potion House or you’ll pass out. Even with the day and night cycle, the vibe through your journey is rather relaxing. The music matches the style of it being calm and relaxing and there’s not much change in the music even when the cutscenes are triggered.

In terms of what I didn’t like about Potion Permit, I don’t have a lot to say. I think that there isn’t much instruction to what the items are if they are required for you to restore something. For example, the landslide in the beginning of the story, there is a list of things you need to get before it will allow you to repair and restore the area. It would be helpful to have “wood”, “rock” or “money” next to the items.

With Potion Permit having an art style like Stardew Valley, though not as bright and colourful, it was often hard to see what the item was, but eventually you figure it out. The required materials at the Bulk and Build are also hard to read as the required number is in red. I found that hard to see. Gameplay is solid for even those that are younger. The idea is rather straightforward and easy to understand. I’d recommend Potion Permit for anyone honestly looking for a chill time killer because I could spend hours foraging and loving every minute of it. Other than that, I think my time at Moonbury Town is done for now. I’m going to head back to the potion house to have a nap!

**Potion Permit was provided by the publisher and reviewed on an Xbox Series S**

Overall: 7.5 / 10
Gameplay: 8.0 / 10
Visuals: 5.0 / 10
Sound: 7.0 / 10

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STAFF REVIEW of Potion Permit (Xbox One)

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