and Roger Switch 2 review – short and bittersweet

GameCentral catches up on an award winning indie game from last year, which has now been released on Nintendo Switch 2 and mobile phones.

In July 2025, Japanese indie developer Yona launched visual novel and Roger for PC and the Nintendo Switch. His goal was to create something that could ‘express the protagonist’s situation, the setting, and emotions not through words, but through gameplay itself.’

The game went on to receive nothing but acclaim from critics and has won multiple awards, as well being nominated for the Game Beyond Entertainment category at this year’s BAFTAs (where it lost to Despelote).

Now, and Roger has seen a release on the Nintendo Switch 2 (as well as mobile phones) and having played it, we can say it absolutely deserves all the praise. The problem is that it’s difficult explaining why without completely spoiling it.

The best way to describe and Roger, without giving too much away, is that it’s a series of minigames interspersed by short dialogue sequences. As for the plot, all we’ll say is that it starts with a young girl, Sofia, waking up to find her dad missing and a stranger she doesn’t recognise sleeping on her sofa.

It’s an eerie start to the game and things only become more uncomfortable as the stranger interacts with Sofia, constantly downplaying her concerns and insisting she take some unspecified medicine while Sofia’s own grasp on reality seems to fall apart.

The game does a very good job of emphasising Sofia’s growing distress, not just through the minimal amounts of dialogue but through the oppressive music and dark and moody colour palette, which clashes nicely with the very simple art direction and character designs.

This extends to the minigames themselves. Unlike, say, WarioWare, which gives one-word descriptions for its microgames, and Roger deliberately never tells you what you’re meant to do, demanding you experiment and work it out for yourself.

However, none of the minigames are particularly complex, so you’re unlikely to ever struggle figuring them out. A lot of them usually require you to just click on unmarked buttons to trigger an action, such as opening a door, while others have you clicking and dragging objects or moving the cursor across the screen.

However, and Roger very quickly starts using this simple structure to make you feel the same confusion and panic as Sofia feels. When brushing her teeth, for example, you need to click buttons for every step of the process, but you don’t know which one does what until you click them, resulting in instances such as brushing without toothpaste or putting the toothbrush down before she’s finished.

The game also likes to throw multiple buttons at you that don’t do anything, usually during Sofia’s most panicky moments, requiring you to constantly click on all of them until you find the right one to progress.

and Roger does break things up with moments of levity and calm, as highlighted by a shift to brighter colours, softer music, and more relaxing minigames, like hoovering a floor or finding the right route to a bakery.

These sections last just long enough to almost make you forget how the game started, before the darker mood gradually seeps back in, leaving Sofia (and you) unnerved and baffled as to what’s going on.

We apologise for the vaguery, but and Roger needs to be experienced as spoiler-free as possible, since the story’s true nature and themes are subtly revealed as you progress.

The very ending perhaps plays its hand too much, as if it’s afraid players won’t get what’s going on, but it still makes for a perfect lightbulb above the head moment when you realise the symbolism behind every minigame, making everything in retrospect all the sadder.

For all its subtlety and messing with expectations, and Roger doesn’t pull its punches, especially with how nearly anyone can relate to its themes to some degree. Even on a second playthrough, we got a teeny bit misty-eyed come the very end and we know some people have been left a bawling mess by the time they hit the credits.

The whole game is extremely short and can easily be completed in less than an hour, with almost no replay value, which would be points of contention under normal circumstances. But and Roger makes perfect use of its short runtime and is clearly designed to be a one and done experience.

Plus, it’s incredibly cheap at only £4.29. At the time of writing, it’s actually discounted to £3, and while it controls fine using the Switch 2’s analogue sticks, the console’s mouse controls are the ideal way to experience it. Although we’re a little surprised there’s no option to use the touchscreen since the minigames would have lent themselves well to it.

What’s important is that and Roger is the kind of experience that could only ever work as a video game. Yona could have tried to tell this story as a short film or as a comic, but it would lose much of its impact.

You’d never truly feel Sofia’s varying emotions – her anxiety, her loneliness, her frustration – if you weren’t seeing her journey through her eyes, and the ways and Roger obfuscates its story couldn’t be replicated in any other format. Combined with its brief length and low asking price, there’s really no excuse not to play and Roger.

Formats: Nintendo Switch 2 (reviewed), Nintendo Switch, PC, iOS, and Android
Price: £4.29
Publisher: Kodansha
Developer: TearyHand Studio
Release Date: 17th July 2026
Age Rating: 7

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