Origami Paradise Review

Make Your Very Own Paper Zoo

If you ever wanted to try origami and have your own zoo, then this game might interest you. Origami Paradise is an idle game developed by Seasun Corporation Limited and much like other idle games, its goal is to be a relaxing getaway. Make money by having paper animals live in their paper habitats to unlock more habitats, more animals and make more money. You see? Easy! So, why was I not relaxed while playing it?

In the beginning, I found it extremely overwhelming. When you first start playing, they throw you into the gameplay and suddenly a lot of things start appearing on your screen. Most of the features just appear without an explanation of what they’re for or how to interact with them. And it wasn’t as intuitive as you might think. You always need to be clicking something. Be it to clean the animals, collect achievements, or do the challenges. And you may say, “Well, that’s to keep you entertained, silly” but to always be doing something doesn’t mean it’s fun. On the contrary, it takes away the relaxing aspect of the game and replaces it with meaningless chores.

As Relaxing as Feeling Your Sock Slide off Inside Your Shoe

Notification markers stress me out. That’s the only reason I’m up to date with my email. Origami Paradise is always notifying you of something in-game. Always. Like, many of the features have a notification alert at all times. For some, like the shop or the scratch cards, the only way to get rid of them is to purchase the items offered or watch the ads.

A lot of these features to “help” with the progress of the game will require watching an ad. But there are too many things that require watching one. The scratch cards, for example, will give you coin and token coupons. Or the chests, that are some sort of gacha system that awards you decorations, some of which have bonuses as well. I will give them a point for trying to make it less of an excruciating experience by giving you occasional ad passes and rewards after watching them a certain number of times. Unfortunately, it didn’t help much. I, for example, opted for ignoring the aspects of the game that required watching an ad unless it was absolutely necessary for completing a challenge. Which, much to my dismay, is more often than I’d like.

One feature that is worth noting is that you can customize your paper animals and your islands. As you complete challenges or send your origamis exploring, you will earn stickers and outfits to customize your animals. You can also buy them at the store with gems. This is a nice feature for people that want to make their islands more unique.

Forgettable

I will confess that I didn’t get far in the Origami Paradise. I know there are more areas to build and plenty of animals to unlock, but I honestly couldn’t bring myself to keep playing. I was bored. And I kept forgetting about the game’s existence. And when I didn’t forget, I was stressed. It’s a cute game, but it’s not that cute; the progress doesn’t really feel like progress and most of the gameplay is more tedious than fun.

I see what Origami Paradise is trying to do, and I appreciate the effort, really, but it falls short. There’s just too much and too little at the same time. I do think the game has potential. It’s just a matter of refining some aspects and making it less aggressive with what it offers. Like making the visual space feel less cluttered or not pushing the many activities as often. For now, though, I would only recommend it to people that want a highly customizable paper zoo. Besides that, there are plenty of other idle games that do a better job of relaxing you.