Review by Ian Keogh

Token City arcade is a family-run business that’s seen better days, much like the surrounding area. Izzy would rather be there tinkering with old machines her father sources than learning within the structured school system, but on a rare school visit she’s reluctantly partnered with tech whiz David. The unexpected result of them combining to restore a rare old machine features on the sample art. What you’re seeing is literal ghosts escaping from the machine.

From there the problem obviously becomes how to rid the arcade of them, preferably without frying the entire electrical systems, and writing team of D. Bradford Gambles and Spencer Holt ensures this is no easy task. It’s a variation on Ghostbusters, except Izzy and her three friends are nowhere near as well resourced, and the Ghostbusters didn’t have to deal with the Children of the Light.

A sometimes surreal comedy is exceptionally well drawn by Gambles with Holt applying the appropriately vivid colour. The characters are flat and stylised, and while they may seem strange at first they seep into the consciousness via their eccentric characteristics supplied in imaginative page layouts. The devil is also in the detail, with extra imaginative visual touches in the fully rendered backgrounds.

In addition to the comedy adventure, Token City Wondercade is a good-natured homage to forms of fandom, and how loners and outsiders find company via a shared interest. Gambles and Holt aren’t above a few pokes at obsession, though, and they include some clever references that are so obvious when revealed, yet also so well concealed when first dropped. It’s a not a story that hangs around either. There’s always something going on, and the diversions never feel like distractions. The ending is weak in suggesting a troublesome explanation due, then avoiding the comedy of providing it, but it’s the only real shortcoming in a funny adventure well drawn with an appealing cast.