Nov 11

Nov 11 Review | Shin-Chan: Shiro And The Coal Town - The Kid Is Alright

I don’t know where I first heard of Crayon Shin-Chan, but I know exactly where I second heard of him. Ferrying my friends and I from the pre-apocalyptic city of Las Vegas, Nevada, our otherwise nondescript Uber included a cell phone charger with the frankly off-putting image of a pantless cartoon child, his elephantine member on full display. To Japanese passengers, this may have been a simple trinket from a popular animated comedy, no more shocking than a portrait of Stewie from Family Guy. To me, it was the elephant in the Uber.

At this time in my life, I had been watching anime for about two years, so I knew I recognised the little guy, even if I had never seen the show myself. But lacking that greater context, I couldn’t help but wonder why this driver would have such a strikingly crude charger so casually on parade. I found myself wondering if any old NIMBYs had seen this charger and left a negative review. Did Uber corporate know about this?

Up until Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town, this was the extent of my experience with the IP. But taking this review as an opportunity to brush up on my culture, I decided to watch a few episodes of the anime. This turned out to be easier said than done, as the series is not easily purchased digitally or physically in America, with DVDs often running upwards of $40 on Ebay. We need not discuss the details, but let it be known that I found a way.

…Or so I thought. It turned out that what I had watched was a notoriously inaccurate dub by the American studio Funimation. This “gag dub” added a variety of overly raunchy, edgy, and sometimes downright hateful jokes to the script, at times changing the nature of the story and characters on a fundamental level. After correcting this mistake, I found that the original Japanese version strikes a surprisingly nuanced balance between pantless “Mr. Elephant” dances and childhood lessons that make it hard to compare to popular Western cartoons. Western fans of the series may want to take note, otherwise, they could go into this game expecting a dramatically different experience.

Complicated rabbit holes aside, my vibe detector placed Shin-Chan somewhere roughly between South Park and Peppa Pig. It’s a somewhat crude comedy about a somewhat crude boy, and though some of its jokes are targeted towards an older audience, it also touches on wholesome themes surrounding youth, family, friendship, and self-expression. And due to the series’ episodic nature, that’s really all you need to know to understand this game.

As Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town opens up, five-year-old Shin-Chan (née Shinnosuke Nohara) awakens on the floor of a farmhouse in Unbent Village, a hamlet in the hills of Akita Prefecture, Japan. His paternal grandfather sets the scene: Shinnosuke’s father Hiroshi has been sent to the area for work, and the Nohara family is tagging along for a summer vacation.

After a few days, Shin-Chan’s co-titular dog, Shiro, leads him to the co-co-titular Coal Town. Despite the eerily unmanned train car and the presence of a girl who talks to dogs, the place strikes a fascinating balance between reality and fantasy. Here, our protagonist finds a series of people in need, with a shadowy threat looming above.

Upon Shinnosuke’s return, the elder members of the Nohara family write the Coal Town off as a figment of an overactive imagination, but I’m pretty old myself, and I’m still not sure what I saw. The entire area is dripping with magical realism, as every backdrop twists and warps like an ever-so-slightly melted piece of chocolate.

And oh baby, that chocolate is delicious. The characters may translate a bit awkwardly from their original 2D to the in-game 3D models, but the world they exist in is stunning. Between the dreamlike streets of the Coal Town and the painterly countryside of Unbent Village, this game is packed with the kind of art that can make a player nostalgic for a summer they have never had, in a place they have never been.

The game is a sequel to Shin-Chan: Me and the Professor on Summer Vacation, developed by Millennium Kitchen, creators of the popular Japanese adventure series Boku no Natsuyasumi. Here, developers h.a.n.d. Inc. have done their best to pick up where that team left off, with initial tasks including bug catching, fishing, and meeting the locals. The game’s world is split up by fixed-camera screens, and passing from screen to screen triggers the passage of time each day. Shin-chan can spend as much time as he wants on a given screen, but he can only ever go to so many places each day. Importantly, Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town does not seem to enforce a limited timeframe on any questlines, so there is not too much strategy to the player’s decision-making. This is not a game for brain wrinkles. This is a game for hanging out.

In an early episode of the anime, there is a scene where Shinnosuke breaks out of a daycare in a fun-sized car and cruises onto the driver’s ed practice course, sabotaging his mother’s lesson. The writing in this game reflects a softer side of Shin-Chan, as our hero keeps his pants on and his mind open. Other than flirting with the occasional older woman, his more troublesome side mostly takes a backseat, which leaves room for the summertime narrative to flourish.

Whether it’s fishing across Unbent Village, cataloguing regional fauna, or solving riddles for the local superhero squad, those nostalgic summertime activities are where the game shines brightest. Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town is at its best when it is emulating the things that made Boku no Natsuyasumi so beloved. It doesn’t always succeed at this, but it does a pretty commendable job.

Unfortunately, it’s hard not to feel that the beautiful backdrop is wasted on a game that just doesn’t seem to have much else to offer. Its moment-to-moment gameplay is pleasant enough, but the collection activities and exploration don’t ever develop much beyond their initial premises. After only a handful of in-game days, most of the Unbent Village map had been unlocked, which made the remaining tasks in Akita feel underwhelming.

Despite my excitement when I got to the Coal Town, I was disappointed to find myself railroaded into a series of dull fetch quests, one of which relied on random drops that took me several in-game days to complete. This was not the change of pace I was hoping for. The most unique activity on offer, a trolly racing minigame in the Coal Town, took far too many hours to unlock, and the quests I had to jump through made it ultimately land flat.

Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town is an admirable yet flawed effort at a summer vacation simulator. Its nostalgic spirit and gorgeous artwork make for a comfortable hangout, but as its steam runs out at the mid-point, the vacation can begin to feel more like a work trip. A splash of magical realism brings welcome contrast to the genre’s trademark scenery, but the questlines turn from exploration to exploitation along the way. Though the Coal Town attempts to shake up the formula, I’d rather be fishing.

Shin-Chan: Shiro and the Coal Town releases October 24th on PC and Nintendo Switch.

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