Review: ReStory Chill Electronics Repairs
- Guilherme Ribeiro
- 7 hours ago
- 5 min read
Open your own repair shop and fix all kinds of electronics.
THE GAME
ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs is an electronics repair simulator developed by Mandragora and distributed by tinyBuild. Taking over an old electronics repair shop in Tokyo in the 2000s, your goal is to manage the shop, repairing all kinds of devices from that era and helping local citizens with their electronic problems. Assemble and disassemble video game consoles and cell phones, buy parts, repair electronic devices, and try to keep the bills paid to keep your shop open.
MY IMPRESSIONS
Perhaps it's impossible to explain how satisfying an electronics repair game can be. ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs puts you in the role of a repair shop owner, where you must disassemble, clean, and repair a wide variety of electronic devices from the 2000s. And the game does this in the most satisfying way possible, since all the controls and sounds while working on the devices are very good. The calm atmosphere that surrounds the game also greatly contributes to the setting, which doesn't feel pressured to rush you to do anything. Although there's a time cycle, deadlines for repairs, and bills to pay, it's almost impossible for these things to cause you any kind of worry. The idea behind ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs isn't to work frantically, but rather to appreciate the activity and immerse yourself in a nostalgic era spanning the 2000s. The game is in Brazilian Portuguese, allowing the player to follow the game's story. The game's art is beautiful, and the realism of the electronic devices is charming in itself, bringing a great deal of realism to the game, which emulates well-known devices like the PSP and Xbox, or features fully licensed devices like those from Atari.
You'll have two types of customers: online customers, whom you can choose to serve or not, and in-person customers, who are recurring characters with their own stories. It's this second type of customer that guides the game's story, which, despite its simplicity, strives to create interesting characters with their own stories, though these stories intertwine, as they are all frequent visitors to that neighborhood. Despite this, even though you have dialogue choices and different paths to follow, it all boils down to repairing electronic devices. Often you'll have to repair specific devices that require a license, and to obtain it, you usually just have to pay for it, thus unlocking a new device for your arsenal. You can also upgrade your equipment and unlock new tools for repairs, such as a soldering iron or a paint sprayer, but I confess that the basic tools are much more fun than the tools that are introduced later. Your computer will be your best friend, helping you buy new parts, used devices, new tools, and much more. You can also decorate your shop, buying accessories that improve its comfort.
As the game progresses, you can enter assembly competitions, which consist of assembling an electronic device from scratch in the shortest possible time, but you must do it in the right order and without help; otherwise, you will have to assemble everything from scratch again with the clock continuing to run. This part of the game is for those players who won't be satisfied with just the tranquility of ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs and need a challenge, or for those who, after assembling the same device a hundred times, want to test if their memory is still good.
Despite seeming like an endless repetition of assembling devices, the constant acquisition of new electronics and tools aims to prevent the game from becoming monotonous, but the player needs to be aware of this, or they'll end up assembling the same things nonstop without even realizing it, just like I did. Assembling the electronic devices is satisfying because of how fluid each connection is and how satisfying the sound is. ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs is the typical game to play while listening to a podcast or to relax between stressful activities, but be careful not to get swallowed up by the game and lose track of time.
ACHIEVEMENTS
In general, the achievements in ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs are basically about playing the game and experiencing everything it offers. Using all the mechanics a certain number of times, buying and upgrading tools, purchasing licenses, paying bills, winning assembly competitions—in short, play the game and, naturally, you'll get these kinds of achievements, since it's quite difficult not to get hooked on repairing electronic devices. In addition, some achievements require you to do things differently from the standard, usually linked to the passing of days, such as going ten days without buying new parts, working seven days straight without stopping, or spending 365 days in the game. They seem difficult, but there are ways to get around them in a less laborious way. However, there are achievements linked to the game's characters, and this is where it gets complicated. Without giving away too many spoilers, at a certain point, you will have to make a specific choice, and there are ramifications of what happens. And of course, there's an achievement for each one, but the problem is that the game save is unique, which will usually require the player to start the game from scratch more than once. There are also different endings, so adding these factors together, getting 100% of the achievements will be a bit more work than it should be, since the game presents itself in such a straightforward way.
CONCLUSION
The first few hours of ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs captivated me so much that I didn't notice the time passing. Tinkering with the devices is very satisfying. Every connection, every screw removed, everything is an orchestra of sounds that hypnotize you, and you don't want to stop. Despite this, the following hours aren't as exciting, not in the sense of being bad, but rather that the game doesn't go much further than that. And that's not a bad thing, but it also doesn't surprise you. The tools that are introduced aren't exciting; I even preferred it when I didn't have access to them. I don't know if it's the way I'm playing, but it seems like the game drags on more than it should, even if I rushed just to advance the story; it seems like the game stretches out to have a slightly longer story. The fact that it has multiple paths also bothered me a bit, since I don't see myself having the urge to restart a game of this genre from scratch just to see other story paths, which clearly isn't what attracts the player. In the end, none of that matters, because ReStory: Chill Electronics Repairs is a game that manages to stand on its core, which is the fun and satisfaction of fixing electronic devices. And it does that very well.
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