Promise Mascot Agency is great on Steam Deck and PS5, but what about Nintendo Switch?
Promise Mascot Agency from Kaizen Game Works launches for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and PC this week. Ahead of its launch and alongside our full review, I've been playing the open world narrative adventure mascot management simulator across three platforms and multiple devices to see how the game scales, Steam Deck recommended settings, and more. Since the game has been patched a few times across platforms, the settings and impressions below are with the latest patches as of this writing for PS5, Steam, and Nintendo Switch.
While I adored Paradise Killer from Kaizen Game Works, I was floored at how ambitious Promise Mascot Agency is the more I played it. Having now put in over 32 hours across platforms, I still haven't gotten my fill and I keep booting up the game to drive around, get more collectibles, and just soak in the vibes. The heavily stylized visuals are only enhanced by the superlative soundtrack and voice acting in Promise Mascot Agency. If the demo is still available when you read this, give it a shot. It is more than worth your time. This article will not have any story spoilers, but it will feature some screenshots from later on in the game for the PC version.
Promise Mascot Agency Nintendo Switch port performance impressions
Since Promise Mascot Agency didn't have a Nintendo Switch demo and is a game targeting only the current generation systems on PlayStation and Xbox, I wanted to cover this version first as I imagine many were curious how the open world would feel on Nintendo's hybrid console. After having played the Steam release for a few days prior to getting the Nintendo Switch code, I was a bit worried because it was a bit heavy to run on PC. There are some issues like the in-engine cut-scenes running poorly or some ghosting (likely thanks to the post-processing used) when moving the camera, but the overall experience is better than I expected. It targets 30fps as opposed to 60 on PlayStation 5, and the performance during gameplay never bothered me.
The Switch version also has touchscreen support for menus which I always appreciate having in games, but it lacks video capture support. Capturing screenshots works though. I hope future updates can improve the performance of the in-engine cut-scenes. Right now the performance in those scenes and the pop-in for both foliage and some objects while driving around are the major issues with the Switch version. I wasn't bothered by the performance in the six or so hours I played of the Switch version. It is definitely a big downgrade compared to the PS5 version in areas like water, textures, and environment density, but is better than I expected. I hope this one gets a Nintendo Switch 2 upgrade or patch to allow for a higher frame rate with better visuals on the go.
Promise Mascot Agency PC graphics options
Promise Mascot Agency on PC has an auto detect option based on your hardware and graphics presets (custom, low, medium, high, ultra) available. These adjust (and you can also adjust them individually across a few levels) textures, shadows, anti-aliasing, post-processing, effects, foliage, view distance, world detail, volumetric fog (on or off), sky quality (low or high), and water quality (low or high). This menu also lets you use the game's own auto-detection options for your hardware. It has a listing for the CPU and GPU usage also at the bottom.
Promise Mascot Agency has separate display options that let you adjust screen mode (fullscreen, windowed, and borderless), resolution (720p to 4K), upscaling technology (none, FSR 1.0, and XeSS), upscaling quality mode (automatic, ultra quality, quality, balanced, performance, and ultra performance), sharpening percentage (only for FSR), frame rate target (30fps, 60fps, 90fps, 120fps, unlocked), toggle frame rate smoothing, toggle v-sync, field of view, and motion blur level (0 to 100). Beyond graphics and display options, it has a few notable accessibility and control options as you can see in the screenshots above.
Promise Mascot Agency Steam Deck impressions
The developers have mentioned how Promise Mascot Agency is playable on Steam Deck, and while it does not have an official rating from Valve as of this writing, I can confirm it runs without issues on the handheld. I played it on both my Steam Deck LCD and OLED models. I had to tweak some of the settings for a stable frame rate above 30fps with good visuals, but I imagine most will be playing it without trouble out of the box. It also supports 16:10 correctly despite the photo the developers posted on Steam showing it at 16:9 on Steam Deck.
Promise Mascot Agency is not a game you will be playing at a locked 60fps or higher on Steam Deck sadly. If you stick with the default settings in detects when you launch the game for the first time, it opts for a mix of medium and high settings with FSR 1.0 set to quality and both frame rate smoothing and v-sync on. With this, it can hit 60fps, but struggles in many of the open world areas, especially with a lot of density for buildings or foliage. Promise Mascot Agency also has full controller support, Steam Cloud support, and supports the Deck's 16:10 aspect ratio as I said above.
Promise Mascot Agency Steam Deck recommended settings
The developers definitely did a good job with making Promise Mascot Agency work well on Steam Deck as you can tell above, but I would recommend tweaking some settings. If you want to stick with the default option, I would limit the Steam Deck's screen to 40hz using the quick access menu. This will provide the most consistent experience. I also recommend opting for XeSS at Quality instead of FSR 1.0 at Quality. I tested this on both my Steam Decks and was happy with the results. The settings if you want to leave some headroom for the hardware would be using the medium preset, turning shadows to low, and then using a 40hz refresh rate on the screen with XeSS set to Quality.
Having played Promise Mascot Agency across Switch OLED, Steam Deck OLED, Steam Deck LCD, and ROG Ally, the Deck OLED delivers the best handheld experience right now by far.
Promise Mascot Agency PS5 impressions – DualSense features and more
I was immediately impressed with how Promise Mascot Agency used the DualSense controller features when I sampled the demo. It also looked a lot nicer than the game did on my handhelds. I decided to also cover the full game in my comparison and I'm glad I did. Promise Mascot Agency scales quite a bit above the handhelds on PS5 as you'd expect. It runs well with a 60fps target and has much more density in the world than the Switch release. It also looks excellent on my 1440p monitor. I didn't notice major ghosting issues like in the Switch version when panning the camera quickly as well, but it does seem to use some post-processing on PS5 to stabilize the image.
The DualSense features include adaptive trigger support (which you can tweak or disable), haptic feedback, and the controller's light bar color also changes when you boost while driving. I was curious if these features are also on PC, and it seems like the implementation is not as good, but you do get support when wired and have Steam Input disabled based on my testing on Steam Deck over the docking station.
Overall, the PS5 version is very polished, looks great, and feels excellent to play. I also tested it on the PlayStation Portal after playing a few hours on the console and it is good to have the full DualSense experience on it in Promise Mascot Agency as you'd expect.
Promise Mascot Agency ROG Ally issues and potential Windows problems
Promise Mascot Agency seems to have shader-related stuttering on Windows. This wasn't an issue on Steam Deck as expected, but regardless of the settings I used on ROG Ally, there was hitching when driving around and during a few transitions. This even happened when using 720p and ultra performance upscaling on the low settings. I just could not get the game to run without hitching on ROG Ally. While I only experienced this on my Windows handheld, James said he also noticed similar shader-related stuttering on his desktop. I hope this can be addressed with a shader compilation when launching the game because it is a shame to see it happen in a game that relies on driving around an open world for a majority of the time. Things settled a bit later on as they do for shader-related issues, but I would play this on Steam Deck if you have the option over ROG Ally. Even though the latter can push for better visuals, constant hitching while driving around is not remotely fun.
Promise Mascot Agency launches on April 10 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and PC (Steam).