I have a confession: in 2026, I still judge open-world games by how quickly they make me abandon the main quest to photograph a sunset. Infinity Nikki — Infold Games’ fifth dress-up adventure and the first to shove the series into a Genshin-shaped open world — wins that test embarrassingly fast. What happens when a long-running mobile game about clothes escapes its cellular cage, lands on PC and console, and hands me a talking cat with opinions? You get Miraland: a fantasy realm stuffed with fashion lore, garment wizards, and enough collectible sparkle to make my inventory weep. I came for the outfits. I stayed for the Whimstars. I also stayed because Momo is a sassy cat, and I am only human.

Do I need prior knowledge? No. Infinity Nikki doesn’t directly follow its predecessors, though it keeps the core duo: Nikki, human stylist, and Momo, sassy talking cat. The story drops them into Miraland, a realm with fashion-related lore and a history implying some war among eight garment wizards. I say “implying” because I spent a good chunk of my time not fully getting what was going on. The translation is much improved from my Love Nikki days, but the narrative still over-explains some ideas and under-explains others. One conversation had me listening to Nikki and another character go back and forth about a repeated sentence, and I began to question my own sanity. The lore books, thankfully, are excellent. I often preferred those flavour texts to the main plot; they gave Miraland the background history the quests kept teasing.

The open world is the real star. This is the first time the series has gone open world, and it is bloody gorgeous. Every blade of grass, stone fence, and babbling brook looks stunning. I regularly stopped mid-sprint to use the photo mode, which is dangerously good. I clicked through every pose — each with subtle animations you can cycle through for a frame-perfect shot — fiddled with lighting and framing, and captured sunsets and moonlight reflections on lakes. I could leave a snapshot so friends could visit my photo spot and take a snap alongside me. Is that necessary? No. Did I spend far too long doing it? Absolutely.

There is no better pairing for a pretty landscape than beautiful threads, and I had a hard time finding clothing I disliked. Giant princess dresses, pyjamas, sneakers: the variety is huge. I had occasional clipping issues between pieces that definitely should have coexisted peacefully, but mixing and matching crafted, collected, and gacha-pulled items was a joy. The ability outfits are the clever bit: fishing, bug catching, animal cleaning (yes, it is adorable), floating, combat, and story-specific outfits for things like electrical repair or violin playing. Additional outfit options come from banners, but they are cosmetic changes rather than mechanical upgrades. Good. I do not need my fishing rod to have a different hat to catch the same fish.

I regularly got lost collecting everything. I picked every flower, caught every bug, sneaked up on skittish birds to wipe their wings, and scrubbed a cat’s paw while every animal received its own adorable cleaning animation. The ability outfits made material gathering painless, and materials feed crafting, which feeds my outfit addiction. They also help collect Whimstars, a skill-tree currency that unlocks new outfits, small stat boosts, and extra rewards. Whimstars are also one of the many ways Infinity Nikki stuffs small puzzles into the world. Some are standard platform puzzles where I nab a star off a roof. Others ask me to find a hidden star shape in an area, or hop into a domain and puzzle out a path with blocks, balls, and the ability outfits I have picked up.

The mini-Nikki outfit, which lets me shrink down and ride on Momo’s back, is a highlight. I used it to navigate small crawl spaces and weight-based puzzles, and I wish it had arrived hours sooner. The final zone I visited had tons of verticality: shrink, hop on Momo, get fired through a cannon, crawl through a tunnel, or use big cat claws to hop up a rope. That is the kind of playful world design I wanted from the start. It also made me realise how rarely the game asks me to use my brain. Movement feels great, but it is rarely used for tight or complex platforming. The dungeons are visually inventive — frog-filled sewers, bright-white rooms with floating bookcases — yet their paths rarely branch out. Almost all of Miraland’s mysteries are easily solved, and at times it feels infantilising.

The lack of challenge is most obvious in combat. It is primitive: Nikki throws an orb and one-shots the vast majority of enemies, called esselings. Most enemies stay stationary or fire the odd projectile. The orb can be a pain to wield; I had moments where it shot straight over an enemy’s head because the game could not comprehend that I was slightly uphill. The one mercy is speed. Encounters end incredibly fast, even bosses. The chapter seven boss was a highlight, giving me MMO-meets-Super-Mario-Odyssey vibes, but I felled it in about 90 seconds and felt a little gutted. I want Infold Games to stop being scared of difficulty. The groundwork is there.

Styling battles remain, and I am glad. Every clothing item has tags — playful, cool, retro, ballroom, elegant — and scores in each category. NPCs give themes, but the tags matter more than the theme. That means I presented some downright ugly outfits to opponents, which is the classic Nikki way. I have a soft spot for a fashion battle system that rewards me for throwing together a crime against colour coordination. It takes more of a backseat than in previous games, and I am mostly fine with that, though getting high scores can require funnelling materials into individual garments.

Speaking of materials: even for a gacha, Infinity Nikki is oversaturated with currencies and growth mats. There is a staggering array of systems and items, and even different methods for the same thing. A palette-swapped version of an outfit depends on how I obtained the outfit. A five-star banner pull needs one material. A four-star crafted outfit needs something completely different. Sometimes I need a duplicate set, too. It is classic gacha obfuscation, and even as a battle-hardened veteran of the genre I got dizzy. I did peruse the shop, and it seems on par with other gacha offerings: a battle pass that looks like a Hoyoverse carbon copy, premium currency for shop-exclusive outfits, and offers ranging from about $1 to $50. On the permanent banner, I was guaranteed a four-star item every 10 pulls and a five-star item every 20 pulls. The game also avoided duplicates until I completed every outfit the banner offered. Is that ultra-generous? No. Is it robbing me blind? Also no. It sits somewhere in the middle.

What I loved 😍	What made me side-eye 🤨
Gorgeous open world and photo mode	Story that over-explains and under-explains
Ability outfits and animal cleaning animations	Combat that is almost too primitive
Whimstar puzzles and mini-Nikki	Dungeons with few branching paths
Styling battles with chaotic outfit math	Currency and material overload

By 2026, Infinity Nikki has had time to settle into its free-to-play rhythm, and I still dip back in for the views, the outfits, and the small pleasure of matching Nikki to whatever landscape I am wandering. Despite its over-easygoing nature — which feels like Infold overcorrecting to make an inclusive experience — I fell in love with it. I cannot wait to soak in more picturesque landscapes and dress Nikki to match the vibes of wherever I am. Ultimately, that is what it is about: dressing up, having fun, and sharing the views with pals. I just hope Infold Games stops being afraid of making things hard, because Infinity Nikki already has the groundwork to stand with the gacha greats. Would I recommend it? If you want a challenge, bring a snack and lower your expectations. If you want a beautiful, generous-in-spirit dress-up playground with a sassy cat, welcome to Miraland. I will be over here, photographing a lake and ignoring the main quest. Again.