Laughter Through Tears

Choice of Rebels: Uprising is an interactive text game from Choice of Games. I previously reviewed their game The Daring Mermaid Expedition, and have also played several of their other games, notably the Affairs of the Court trilogy. As implied by the name, the game's plot involves an uprising against a corrupt empire in which you, the player character, play the role of both instigator and leader. As in all Choice of Games offerings, this game is rich and divergent, with hundreds of choices large and small that can affect the outcome of the plot.

One of the game's main strengths is in its worldbuilding. The world of the Karagond Hegemony is richly drawn and thoroughly outlined in the attached codex, which is accessible from the game's stats screen. The centuries-old empire has swallowed up the nations that preceded it and morphed their religion into a doctrine in support of their brutal hierarchies. This world order is held in check by theurgy, a vastly powerful kind of blood magic restricted to elite practitioners, and requiring the yearly sacrifice of thousands of serfs to power it. The game does an elegant job of intertwining the cultural and historical elements of worldbuilding with this deeper, more metaphysical aspect of the plot. While at times confusing, it also provides a richness that long-time readers of epic fantasy can appreciate.

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I would heartily recommend COR:U to any fan of epic fantasy and interactive fiction who feels ready to stomach its themes of slavery, human sacrifice and dehumanization.

Crossposted to hazelgold.net. 

I'm in the process of writing a long, complicated review of Choice of Rebels: Uprising, but as I was working on it, I realized that it's not perfectly spoiler-free. For the benefit of people who prefer to go in as blank-slate as possible, or just aren't interested in slogging through my lengthy reviews, I thought I could post a brief, non-spoilery bottom line review.

Choice of Rebels: Uprising is an epic fantasy text adventure from Choice of Games, one of my very favorite game studios. It has all the hallmarks of the first novel in an epic fantasy trilogy, except that it's interactive. You play the protagonist and control their choices. The breadth of choice is huge. As in most COG games, the player can customize the PC's gender and orientation. Unusually, this game allows you to play the PC as asexual and/or aromantic. I played my first rebel as an ace lesbian, for example.

The premise of the story is that the PC will initiate and eventually lead a provincial rebellion against a ruthless conquering empire called the Karagond Hegemony. The Hegemony maintains and suppresses a vast underclass of slaves for human sacrifice, which they claim is necessary to power the blood magic that protects civilization. Their entire religion revolves around justifying imperial brutality. I found the game dark and violent but not gratuitous, though opinions might vary.

The quality of the prose is high and the worldbuilding is meticulous (and meticulously documented in a codex that's accessible throughout the game). The non-player characters are compelling, although Breden is by far my favorite. The level of customization of the player character is more than acceptable, and places an emphasis on varying responses to the Hegemony's imperialist policies. You can play as a skeptic or as a defender of the purity of the faith. You can play as an impoverished aristocrat or as a helot (slave). You can win the day by your wits or by the sword, and often even talk yourself out of trouble, which is my favorite approach.

It's a good game and I recommend it strongly to anyone who thinks any of the above themes might interest them. Though the game's plot has a satisfying conclusion, I'm extremely looking forward to the inevitable sequel.

In preparation for my very first Yuri Game Jam, I found myself browsing some of the best-loved entries from jams of years past. The one that stuck with me most is undoubtedly Syrup and the Ultimate Sweet. This is a cute and quirky adventure with a mildly romantic tone. You play as Syrup, a self-proclaimed candy alchemist and the owner of the only mundane candy shop in a village occupied entirely by witches and magical creatures.

Syrup is an endearingly grumpy character, devoted to her discipline but a little lacking in social skills, and surrounded by an equally endearing supporting cast. Her best friend Pastille is her only employee, in charge of dealing with customers and all the aspects of managing a shop that Syrup herself just isn't very good at, while she works in the laboratory, creating fanciful candies. She carries on a friendly rivalry with the witch Butterscotch and her familiar Toffee, who are also her best customers.

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You can download Syrup and the Ultimate Sweet through itch.io or play it online through your browser. The browser-playable version has a slightly different interface, but I found both versions very playable. For a better look at the game's art, check out Nami-Tsuki's Deviant Art account, or find the game's music on Bandcamp.

Crossposted to hazelgold.net.

"Concerning the Mystic Marriage of the Earth and Sun to Beget Works of Great Virtue and Power...

The title went on for another half page."

The Mystic Marriage is a historical fantasy taking place in the fictional European principality of Alpennia, beginning in the year 1821. Both a romance and an adventure, its primary plot revolves around Antuniet Chazillen, last daughter of an Alpennian noble family that has been disgraced and all but destroyed. Antuniet's life is bleak and devoid of most comforts and securities she'd been raised to. She'd been a scholar and her access to continuing her studies is severely restricted so, like many young women in her position, she makes a strained living by tutoring more wealthy students. The only bright spot in her life, if it could be termed such, is her single-minded quest to redeem her family's reputation through the art of alchemy and her discovery, mostly by chance, of a singular alchemical text.

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Heather Rose Jones' Alpennia series consists of: Daughter of Mystery, The Mystic Marriage, and Mother of Souls.

Crossposted to hazelgold.net.

Finally starting to catch up on my reviews.

I tried out the prologue for the new Voltage game. It’s technically a period piece, which is mildly interesting, and it’s prohibition-era, which under different circumstances would probably intrigue me more. Except that there’s already The Blind Griffin, and while it’s very short and has no female love interests, I enjoyed it tremendously the three or so times I played it through. Plus, the heroine of TBG is just fantastic.

Anyway, the new game. Only the first few routes have made their appearance, but the prologue handily introduces all the many, many (many!) love interests. A little clumsily, but at least it’s super clear on what’s going on. There are about seven or eight male love interests, and one woman.

This is the story of a brash and outgoing girl of indeterminate age (if I had to guess I’d say no older than twenty) whose overprotective mother was worried about her hard-partying ways. So she sent her to live with her stern uncle. In Chicago. Which is clearly the best place in which to protect a young girl from the seedier aspects of life, such a good place that they even named a musical after it.

The MC is full of vim, and is meant to be quite clever and qualified. She doesn’t super sell it, though. It takes her the entire prologue to figure out what was immediately obvious to me as a reader, which is that her temperance campaigner uncle is secretly running a speakeasy under his shop. But anyway, she’s a lively and strong-willed girl, and that has its appeal. Runs a little close to “feisty” for my tastes but it’s hard to tell from such a short sample.

Verdict: I don’t know if I’ll get into it. Then again, it’s definitely better than L&L and I read almost a dozen episodes of that before I gave up. The background art is beautiful. The sprites are nice also, a style much more favorable I think than L&L’s had. It also remains to be seen whether there’s an overarching story to the different routes. Bottom line is, Astoria is still the best. If you can’t get more of that, fanfic is the only way to go.

Crossposted to Tumblr.

After having been playing it pretty regularly for about a month and a half, I believe I might finally be ready to make my review of Kisses and Curses. There are 5-6 routes (depending on how you count) and I played two of them to the end, then quit halfway through another. Now I'm dipping my toes into a fourth with hopes of clarifying something about the reasons why I DNFed the last one. I've been trying to review this game for ages so getting this out of my system will be real nice.

In other game news, I made a thread for Wreath of Roses on the Lemma Soft forums, the mythological birthplace of so many OEL visual novels and dating sims. My concerns about text games and game writing and etc. are more or less validated, but it's okay.

My fall's reading has been not nearly so prolific as the summer or spring had been. Since Icon wrapped up in October, I still haven't finished the small pile of graphic novels sitting on my shelf, gazing at me, forlorn. NaNoWriMo happened and I was focused on trying to break barriers in my own writing and, frankly, November had been a rough month for everyone.

It's a good thing I started out with Lumberjanes, then. This comics series, bound up in four-issue trade paperbacks, hovers somewhere between young adult and middle grade. Though nominally a fantasy adventure book, it's a little more unrestrained in its fantastical exploration than I'm used to seeing in YA. The art style is vibrant and compelling, but the human figures are stylized enough that the age of the protagonists stays ambiguous. The summer camp environment and the bright and cheery atmosphere give it an overall middle grade vibe.

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Lumberjanes is a delightfully chaotic adventure, and I recommend it heartily to anyone looking for something bright and beautiful to read.

Crossposted to hazelgold.net.

Some of the posts on this blog receive very regular hits, regardless of how old they are. Hits from Google, or from social media of the shareable kind, where someone might decide to revive an old-ish post and give it second wind. It’s easy enough to trace my most popular posts through this method, as well as by the hit-count which WordPress provides. It’s almost as easy to get to the bottom of why these posts in particular receive more attention than others.

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Crossposted to hazelgold.net.