Review: Loddlenaut (Nintendo Switch) – Pure Nintendo

Set on a distant alien planet, Loddlenaut plunges you into an environmental mission to clean up the pollution left behind by a long abandoned corporation. You play as a custodian trained to plumb the depths of the aquatic terrain, with your trusty bubble gun that allows you to collect up the litter and goop dirtying up the world.

The gameplay is simple. You have to keep track of how much oxygen you have left in your tank as you venture out into the various regions you need to clean. Your bubble gun can only collect a limited amount of junk before you have to empty it into the allocated recycling bins. These create useful materials out of the rubbish you find, which you can then use to upgrade your equipment and build new kit to clean more effectively.

Loddlenaut offers a handy tracker to let you know how much progress you’re making with each area you tackle. Once you get far enough through the game, you can build a tracker which covers the entire region. This makes it easy to see how well you’re doing, and is satisfying to see. If you’re away from a region for too long, nearby pollution can infect your clean areas, so you have to keep on top of returning and maintaining a positive state.

The region’s natural flora and fauna gradually return to each area as you reach critical points in your efforts. Flowers and fruits bloom that you can use alongside your recycled materials to build. Creatures will appear to populate the thriving areas, and some will even bond with you.

Loddles are axolotl-like alien creatures that will approach you covered in gunk. If you clean them and nurture them, you can replenish their population and help them to develop into exciting new species. You clean them off, settling them into a new home, then it’s up to you how you take care of them. The different fruits you collect—as well as different treats you can make out of combining them in various ways—can be fed to the loddles, which evolve in different ways depending on which treats they eat. There is a handy loddlepedia guide where you can keep track of all the types you’ve collected and how many you have left to find.

The Loddlenaut map is not huge, but there are plenty of fun secrets to find nestled around that make it worth exploring. Entire secret areas are hidden behind tunnels you have to find in crevices in the rock face that could easily be mistaken for shadows.

The environmental message of Loddlenaut is baked into its premise, but it doesn’t feel heavy-handed while you’re playing. As well as clearing up natural habitats clogged with litter, there are also abandoned buildings left by the corporation that once colonised the planet. These have the corporate branding all over them. Even once you’ve managed to clear up those areas as much as possible, there is only so much you can reclaim. You can create brand new nature reserves out of them, but even through the flourishing plant and animal life, the logo shines through, creating a stark reminder of who is ultimately responsible for the destruction of the planet.