Verdict
Rune Manufacturing facility: Guardians of Azuma is a smart time stuffed with farming, adorning, and forming friendships. The sport actually is amusing, with a captivating tale and many to do, however the efficiency on Nintendo Transfer can go away so much to be desired because of muddy graphics and pop-ins.
June 9, 2025: We added a efficiency analysis of Rune Manufacturing facility at the Nintendo Transfer 2 on the finish of our overview!
I really like farming video games. I actually do. I have by no means performed a Rune Manufacturing facility sport, regardless that, so I jumped on the likelihood to study Rune Manufacturing facility: Guardians of Azuma, and I wasn’t dissatisfied. Smartly, most commonly. The sport provides an enormous vary of items to do and quests to stay you occupied, however it seems a bit of missing on my OLED Nintendo Transfer.
Guardians of Azuma is packed together with your same old comfy, healthy, farm sport fare. You’ll fish, furnish your villages, construct them up, transfer other folks round, and naturally, farm an infinite number of vegetation. You’ll head out into the fields and hit some enemies, and take down some bosses if you are at it, then head again house and whisk away that particular any person for a date on the teahouse.
An important factor I need to cope with first is the efficiency of the sport on Nintendo Transfer. It runs superb, however it seems iffy. I have had no crashes, display tearing, or any actual body fee problems, however the aesthetics did undergo quite. Trees and furnishings pieces pop in as you method, and NPCs are very jittery till you are just about them. Textures can take a second to load, leaving the trails, mountains, and rock faces searching blurred and flat. Total, loading occasions may be faster.
The Transfer 2 model of Rune Manufacturing facility would possibly repair a few of these problems, and there could also be fewer at the PC model, too. Then again, in the event you best have a Transfer – particularly an OLED – it’s playable. It may not glance superb, however it is a actually amusing farming and control sport that sucked me in, and will have to have the similar impact on you if you are partial to the ones genres.
A handy guide a rough word at the screenshots on this overview – someone who is ever moved Transfer screenshots to their PC is aware of how crispy and low-res they get, so the sport is not as unhealthy because the screenshots make it glance, however you’ll see the loss of textures and muddy graphics.
Now that that is out of the best way, let’s dive into the gameplay. You get started out as a mysterious Earth Dancer who is crash-landed in Spring Village, with a significant case of amnesia. Quickly, a small, high-pitched sheep introduces itself to you and follows you round. It isn’t reasonably Genshin Have an effect on’s Paimon, however it is shut sufficient. You are just about started working instantly to assemble fabrics and connect up the city, together with making pals with other folks after which, y’know, saving the sector.
You are made village leader actually temporarily – whilst this can be a frightening promotion, it is transparent that Spring Village wishes your ornamental contact. You get a sizeable plot to fill with homes, industry constructions, and farms. The extra you farm, the more cash you’re making. However do not overlook to assign your villagers to different jobs, too. They may be able to accumulate fabrics, guy the shops, and additional down the road, ranch and fish for you.
I actually were given into the village control facet of this sport. I felt attracted to it once I went to do a Guardians of Azuma preview previous this yr, however oh boy, did it get its claws into me. From laying out waterways and rice paddies to creating certain each and every village has a basic retailer, saltern, and a minimum of one udon cart, I have were given my fingers complete.
There are a large number of tutorials to start with, with cutscenes interspersed. Guardians of Azuma means that you can take all of it in stride, and drip feeds new mechanics so it is not overwhelming abruptly. This is to mention, you sooner or later have an entire wheel of equipment to make use of, however you get them steadily through the years, so you are now not dropped proper in questioning what on earth the parasol does, or the flaming sword, or the drum… they every provide you with particular abilities and feature other makes use of in battle, from therapeutic to blowing enemies away in a powerful gale.
I have never touched at the battle a lot but, as it is not the principle focal point of the sport, however you do wish to take down bosses to development the tale. Fortunately, you get teammates to take with you. Hitting bond stage one with characters unlocks the facility to have them as teammates who can assault, heal, or debuff.
You’ll simply support your prowess in all spaces by way of upgrading your guns on the blacksmith and unlocking new abilities within the a lot of ability bushes. I am not going to lie, I forgot about this till about 8 hours in, then had such a lot of issues to spend I slightly knew the place to start out, however now all of my ability bushes are healthily padded out. There is additionally an issue possibility if you wish to have simple battle, or specifically onerous – the tale, novice, and difficult modes will swimsuit other gamers.
The tale unfolds as you play, in fact, however I may not break what occurs – that is as much as you to expose. Whilst I’m actually, actually taking part in this sport, I am very keen to peer what it seems like at the Nintendo Transfer 2 – and even on PC. The unique Transfer’s efficiency is not nice, and whilst I am pushing on with it, I will’t in just right religion suggest it if higher choices are in the market.
Rune Manufacturing facility: Guardians of Azuma Transfer 2 efficiency
The primary sport I attempted on my glossy new Transfer 2 was once Rune Manufacturing facility. Whilst there’s a large growth in how the sport runs and appears, it wiped a couple of hours of my development, for some explanation why. Regardless of, I’m going to simply rebuild my villages whilst taking part in at the next body fee and and not using a jittery neighbours strolling previous.
As you run round, your persona seems crisper, however some bushes and rock formations within the overworld are nonetheless very smooth-looking, and now not in a great way. There is nonetheless a small quantity of texture pop-in as you method stone statues and different detailed pieces, however it is not probably the most noticeable factor.
Above, you’ll see a screenshot evaluating the similar house as in a screenshot of the sport at the unique Transfer previous within the overview. Guardians of Azuma runs significantly better, so if in case you have the sport and a Transfer 2, the $10 improve is worthwhile.
This may occasionally but make it onto our record of our favourite comfy video games, and if you are considering of swapping to the Transfer 2, you’ll see which different upcoming Transfer video games are freeing along Guardians of Azuma.