Games I’m playing in April

My video game sessions have been all over the place lately. This text will be less about overarching themes and more down to earth, including what I’ve been playing in the last weeks or so.

Cyberpunk

** Spoilers only for Cyberpunk **

I have been exploring all main endings in Cyberpunk. By main ending I mean the main choices we have to pick to reach Mikoshi inside Arasaka Tower. I’ve been choosing to always go back to my body. I did two missions so far and unlocked the Aldecaldos ending, which was very good and promising for V. It was the ending where I got to maintain Judy as my romance option without having weird things happening. I romanced her more for the story development than for the vibe I got from her. It’s not a character I’m very attracted to. I think Panam’s friendship is much more valuable in the game than any romance. In hindsight, I could have gone without romancing anyone in the game.

After unlocking the ending and watching the last scenes as well as the credit scenes I got the feeling that there was hope for V and that Panam wouldn’t easily give up on V and would try to save her by any means necessary. That’s the value of a good friend. From Judy, I got the same feeling as I always did. She wanted to run away to “find herself” and I happened to be in the right place at the right time, getting away from Night City, and she took the ride. Me being there or not was just a detail. That’s the Aldecaldos ending, not Judy’s, which makes me think romancing/befriending Panam is some sort of a canon.

After that ending I unlocked the Rogue/Silverhand ending. I enjoyed it and it was a bit easier to reach Mikoshi than with the Aldecaldos. Once again I defeated Smasher in a fight I wasn’t ready for because I’m playing a type of blade/shotgun glass cannon, and once again returned to my body. The ending was very anticlimactic because I was beyond help. I didn’t have a family to support me even though I was the queen of The Afterlife. More people surrounded me and applauded my feats but less people did actually show the drive to help with my short lifespan. Of course, Judy was the first to jump ship on her quest to find her place in the world. Why waste any time in the company of a terminally ill person, right? Judy isn’t the kind of person you’d want at your side if you’d find yourself in a similar situation, but the odds of finding someone like her in real life aren’t slim. After a nice mission in space and an ending clearly open to interpretation, the credits roll and we find our closest acquaintances wanting to know how V is doing.

My last ending will be accepting Hanako’s deal, but I don’t remember much of what the deal was. I decided to level up a bit more and do some jobs and gigs before trying the last mission. I finished all of Regina’s requests and visited some more places in Night City while taking NCPD side jobs. Once again I plan to return to V’s body if the ending allows it. From what I’ve seen there’s variations to the endings if we choose to give V’s body to Johnny but there’s only so many times I can kill Smasher without getting bored.

Valkyrie Elysium

One weekend, I was exploring my collection of Playstation games and noticed I still had Valkyrie Elysium installed. I checked it and my save was from almost a year ago. I decided to give it another try. I wasn’t that far from the end-game, but still had a good portion of side-quests to complete. I may have abandoned the game because the colour palette was very pastel and not in the most pleasing way, the colours and volumes had very similar tonalities, the landscapes looked a bit flat, and my eyes got tired from the scenery. However, the combat is good and fun and it’s where the game really shines both for new and experienced players. After re-learning how to use magic, combos and my einherjer, I adapted myself to a number of combat situations, used elemental advantages and finished regular enemies and bosses alike.

I went through all side quests and unlocked some progress and combat trophies in the process. Since I was having fun, I tried to complete everything before the last chapter, but I didn’t collect absolutely everything, only prioritising the side quests and the flowers. When I was ready to enter the last chapter I was meant to choose a path. I used a guide and saw that my progress would naturally land on the true ending. I wanted the trophy for all four endings, so I took the easiest one out of the way. Then, reloaded the save and went for the true and arguably the most difficult ending while I still had the energy. It was difficult and during the fight with the last boss my Playstation crashed. Fortunately it wasn’t on the second phase and thank the gods (and the devs) for checkpoints. Using my rage as fuel, I finished everything and watched the ending that tied everything up.

On the next day, I unlocked the normal ending, which is the one we get if we play the main story from start to finish without detours. It wasn’t what I was expecting if I was expecting anything at all. It felt just like an ending. After that, at last, the alternative ending to the normal one was an endurance trial of many bosses and my hands weren’t collaborating at all. I died once but in the end I won the fight and unlocked an ending that, even though it wasn’t on the same positive tone as the true ending, still felt very satisfying.

I enjoyed some of the other game modes but didn’t stick around. I wasn’t interested in getting the platinum because I had to play the game all over again on hard, grind a lot for the SSS weapons, have S-rank in everything and I wasn’t really feeling it. Moving on, I continued playing Cyberpunk and installed Valkyrie Profile Lenneth. The latter has a very interesting story from the get-go; there’s absolutely no doubt it’s a game I’m going to enjoy. However, it’s a traditional jrpg, and since there’s a learning curve I decided to wait for a time when I had the good energy to dedicate.

The House in Fata Morgana

Then, I got sick. It wasn’t anything serious but I just couldn’t be playing in my living room and had to lie down. It’s where the Nintendo Switch came into play, pun intended. I didn’t want to play anything in particular, just a little help to fall asleep. Some games just find their way into our hearts and more often than not those games are visual novels.

The House in Fata Morgana (THiFM) was sitting in my downloaded games for ages now. I don’t have a physical edition because importing Limited Run games to where I live is a fortune in shipping and taxes, not to mention the rarity tax. I found a nice sale and bought the game for a price I felt was very fair and within my budget. Also, the most complete version of the game is on the Switch, Vita, and Playstation 4, if I’m not mistaken. 

The game was exactly what I needed. It started slow; it’s not heavily choice-based, apart from the last half and endings, and it’s as dark as only some visual novels can be. It tells a gothic story with the romanticised flair of mediaeval times, cursed witches, haunted mansions, ruined families, tragic relationships, mysterious characters and many, many secrets. There’s no over-the-top anime banter, even when reading lighter conversations. After all, we really need those moments of respite in order to survive the story, trust me. I’m playing it first without a guide, but I think that if I’m not right at the true ending I may be very close.

Nobles, commoners, human nature, superstitions, fear, poverty, abuse, power, faith, sexuality, love – everything constitutes the mould from which THiFM came into existence, bringing life to a story full of horrors and despair spanning different generations. Maybe I’ll write a bit about the story, but I think it’s such a great game to play/read without reading anything about it first. It’s what I’m doing – just enjoying the surprises I find and the shocking revelations from the witch.

Cyberpunk: sex, romance and murder

I mostly play jrpgs, but after 100 hours of Unicorn Overlord, I needed a break. I have some games for Playstation in my backlog and I don’t normally collect for the console unless I find something at a good price or an exclusive. I bought two more Vanillaware games, Odin Sphere and Dragon’s Crown, which I intend to play later. However, I still had a copy of Cyberpunk 2077 laying around and never got to it after picking it up some months ago. I have a faint idea that the game had serious problems when it came out. If it had, it doesn’t anymore, just the occasional crash here and there. The most annoying one happened on a mission with Claire to participate on a street race. I suck at driving but, for some reason, I ride her pickup truck – aptly called Beast – fairly well. So I was in the middle of the first race and the game crashed. Then, I finished the race and won, and the game crashed. Then, I finished it in second place and the game didn’t crash. Well then, second place it is. I never experienced those crashes anymore and won the subsequent races. After we finished she asked if I’d help her kill her husband’s murderer during the last race. I obliged because I’m not in Night City to be a good person. I kill whomever I want, when I want, how I want and go to bed with everyone I fancy and pay for sex without a second thought.

In jrpgs we have to save the world to get the girl we like in the end. It’s real work and dedication. The character development is also so extensive that by the time we reach the end we have spent a while choosing the right things to say, advancing through a support level system, giving gifts, doing things together, a bit like in real life. In Night City, and also a bit like in real life, we can pay and have someone fake their interest in us. It’s the perspective from the other side. Since I’ve never paid for sex in real life, I might as well try it in a simulated environment and the experience was acceptable. I went to bed with a character after getting an sms to meet and it felt completely random because I didn’t know what was going to happen. It was that unlikeable Corpo executive woman right at the start of the game, when I was still getting my bearings. After the mission where she offered me money to retrieve a Militech drone, I didn’t accept it because I didn’t trust her intentions, and chose the less likeable dialogue options. So, by the time I got her sms, I chose the option «Shame. Was starting to like you…» not because I did but because I was being sarcastic. And then, bang, I ended up in bed with her. I enjoyed Night City.

Not long after, I was in another district ready to meet Evelyn and there were some folks on the street. A guy asked me something and I was so overwhelmed checking the menus and trying to learn the game that I said yes and paid a small fee. I honestly thought it was a mission of some kind. I went to bed with him, or I’d rather say, he went to be with me and that was it. So, I learned how it worked and approached a woman standing on the other side of the street and this time, armed with knowledge, I asked if she wanted to go with me and I paid the fee. I think I went to bed with more people but now, after some hours of gameplay, I don’t remember. In real life I have a preference for women, or I’d rather say, for people who identify as women, despite the body they were born with. One day I was talking about trans issues with my wife and I asked if she would consider staying with me if I transitioned from female to male. The question was relevant at the time because it came from a period where I had to figure myself out. She said yes, she would stay with me. She earned herself rank S++ with me without even knowing it. To those who are curious, I’m still very much a cisgender woman, however that realization didn’t come without some soul searching.

In Cyberpunk, people perform their gender freely and have all types of sexual preferences and fantasies. They also have agency, wants and needs. I met Panam and I was on a spree getting into bed with everyone in my way, or killing everyone in my way, depending on the mission. We were paying for a hotel room and she insisted on getting a room with separate beds. I still made an advance but she said no. Later down the line, another opportunity arose. I had to test the game. I made my advance and she said no again. Ok, a second no is much more awkward than the first one and by then I was just being creepy. I felt ashamed, but at the same time it’s only natural that not everyone is into us, contrary to jrpgs or L-word. Panam likes our V (it’s the name of our character) and that’s what matters. I see her as an annoying friend that’s always getting into trouble and calls me screaming for help and the help always involves me failing at stealth and killing everyone on my path and then getting scolded for it. I like Panam.

In jrpgs our character is usually a young boy. A clueless, naive boy for whom all the female characters fall for no matter what he does. Everyone says yes and the agency is on him to choose his partner. His love interest is by default in love with him. The only thing we have to do as a player is to rise in the ranks until the option to romance is prompted. In games like Persona 3 Portable we can romance several people (I’m not sure if we have to, to get max social link, but I think so – they changed that in Reload) and in Fire Emblem Three Houses we can only give our ring to one person. If the person is female she’ll always be interested in our character if we’re playing as male, as long as we get the A-support rank. In case we play as a female Byleth the same-sex romance options are more limited. If we play as a male Byleth and happen to be gay or curious, there’s only one romance option. This sends a message, doesn’t it? Or am I reading too much into things? All in all, thank the goddess that Rhea is bissexual. It was the only thing I wanted to know, since I refuse playing as a guy in jrpgs if I have the other option.

Back to Cyberpunk, no really means no, much like the no I had to give River Wards when we were having the conversation. I had no intention whatsoever in landing on a relationship with him, but the way they structured the conversation left a tightness in my chest. Still, I had to be true to myself. River is not my type. The last mission of his storyline was great and it had a good dose of creepy moments. The way his parents died when he was young was gruesome and like out of a home invasion horror movie. The mission went well, as much as things can go well in Night City, which is not much, just enough to get by. Then I jumped into another set of quests and I was hunting Cyberpsychos across the city as instructed by Regina.

By this time I’d already driven on my motorcycle collecting tarot cards. They have beautiful designs and I recommend getting all of them. However, the first cyberpsycho came before the tarot card hunt and I thought I had to kill him. After a while Regina started getting a bit passive-aggressive with me because I was killing what she saw as test subjects and it was most desirable to make a tiny bit of effort to keep them alive in order to save them. Well, I didn’t know about that! The last half of cyberpsychos were handled with care and in stealth mode or using my blades to defend from bullets, parrying melee attacks and doing counterattacks, or using quickhacks. Using defensive combat was as effective as using stealth. I had to take a break from my killing spree but the reward was nice in the end – probably could be nicer if I hadn’t killed the first half of them – a Playstation trophy popped and it’s always good when it does.

I still have the police side activities and some minor requests to do before progressing the main story but I don’t know if I’ll finish them. Before I make some progress, I have Judy’s quest to complete. I want to see where the main story goes but I also can’t get enough of Night City and its many secrets. It’s a nice game and much less buggy than Starfield which I also played for hours on end.

Games shouldn’t be this good

For the sake of our time.

Unicorn Overlord was released in March 8th and I waited a few days to get my copy for Nintendo Switch. I thought that such a cute game should be a perfect fit for the OLED screen and handheld gameplay. I wasn’t wrong and so far I only played a docked session once. The game was developed by Vanillaware and the concept phase was initiated at about the same time 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim was in production – another great game that I haven’t finished yet. It was published by Sega/Atlus and it seems that everything on the face of the Earth which bears the Atlus name is condemned to be a success.

Unicorn Overlord is a tactical rpg, but it’s not turn-based like I’m used to. It’s real-time where the actions and the order they should be taken – whom to target and in which situations – are previously set by the played into a number of units on the menu screen. Then, those units are taken into battle and the outcome takes place automatically. 13 Sentinels’ combat is a very, very simplified form of real-time strategy, but I loved it, so I had an idea about how the combat would develop in real-time. Some people mentioned Ogre Battle 64 as the predecessor of this type of combat and we can easily see the similarities between unit builds, classes, maps and interface. No matter where the inspiration is, the combat is very addictive and many late nights are a given.

This is where we can try different setups and choose each unit’s leaders

Unicorn Overlord tells the story of Alain, the son of Queen Ilenia who fell to Galerius’ rebellion in Cornia. The game starts with the battle between both Ilenia and Galerius, also known as General Valmore. Queen Ilenia asked Josef to protect little Alain while the castle was under attack and Josef took Alain to an island called Palevia, raised him and trained him into a fine soldier and future ruler. Alain would later lead the Liberation Army against the established Zenoiran Empire, and with the help of the Unicorn Ring, turn the leaders siding with the Empire into their former selves. Alain soon discovered that the ring had the power to dispel a curse altering the minds of former leaders and commanders into accepting the rule of the Zenoiran Empire.

With this knowledge in hand, Alain sets to Cornia first, to expand the Liberation Army, together with Scarlett, Josef and Lex. Scarlett is then kidnapped by Galerius and Baltro and this event starts the first story arc in Cornia. Unicorn Overlord has a lot – and I mean a lot-lot – of recruitable characters. All have backstories and Alain can unlock rapport conversations with them to learn more about their personalities and motivations. It works like a social link from Persona. If they battle together, interact at the tavern or are given gifts, they increase their rapport points. After a certain amount of points a conversation can be unlocked and accessed from a stabilized region. The funnier part is that all these characters have also rapport conversations between a selected number of other characters they’ve previously met. Considering that we travel across the nations of Cornia, Elheim, Drakenhold, Bastorias and Albion imagine the number of interactions available. It’s a lot of worldbuilding and character development.

An example of a rapport conversation between Selvie and Alain. We are all beset by spirits of the dead.

The game isn’t exactly an open-world but it doesn’t have the same linearity as other games where some areas are locked prior to story progression. The quests and side-quests are stage-based. One stage consists of a combat encounter and after clearing the encounter we liberate a city and access its facilities. However, in case we are so inclined we can access higher-level areas and there’s no barriers holding off the progression. If we desire to access Bastorias before clearing Drakenhold, for example, it’s possible to do it. If we manage to clear a level 30 encounter we can access Albion after clearing Elheim and before clearing Drakenhold – which is the nation we should visit after Cornia. I mean we should, but we don’t necessarily have to. The game adapts itself in case we visit a higher-level area first.

A combat encounter. This will be a win with some damage to my unit.

After Cornia, I decided to visit Elheim to know more about the temples and because the Great Sage was about to give a revelation. I had no idea that I was terribly underleveled – my units, not Alain – for the area and I didn’t have many options to deal with magic. However I managed to recruit some crucial characters that helped me clear the first encounters and then everything progressed naturally. By the time I got to Drakenhold I was massively overleveled for the area, therefore Drakenhold should be the first stop after Cronia’s arc to those who worry about being overleveled. Since I don’t, I also unlocked Bastorias and met some adorable furries and then I left the area to progress the story as guided by Josef. This semi-open-world flair is extremely exciting to explore for the first time, because you know that you technically shouldn’t be in certain areas but you can, and then the rest of the game reconfigures itself to accommodate those choices.

The beautiful area of Elheim – or Elfheim – as I like to call it

The same freedom we get from the traversal does also apply to the innumerable possibilities at customizing our units. Each character has a class and each class has advantages and weaknesses against other classes. Some classes synergize better than others. All the information about classes is explained through characters in the overwold outside the forts or inside the menu. It’s a bit of a learning curve but the information is easily accessible in the library where we can find which classes work better against each other. Around the forts we often get tips about class weaknesses or natural shortcomings – for example, accuracy – and which accessories help mitigate that.

In the tactics menu we can prioritize actions according to the character’s skills and in which conditions an action is taken. I haven’t fully grasped the menu and all its possibilities, but changing the priorities and conditions of certain skill use and then seeing it in action is very satisfying. Certain weapons, shields and accessories provide the character with extra skills and it’s never a bad idea to check how the introduction of new skills affects the tactical actions the character will take in battle, meaning if those actions are given the right priority or if they’re relevant for the character in question. All classes can be promoted to its upgraded form, where the character can get new and better skills as well as a new accessory slot, or a weapon slot to dual-wield.

The tactics screen with battle conditions and categories

The art style is gorgeous in all its forms. The vibrating colors, the character design, the little portraits changing during dialogue, the 2.5D overworld, the landscapes and backgrounds, the food design that leaves me salivating – it’s everything. The little cutscenes are drawn in 2D, the characters are voiced and there’s dialogue boxes. The art style is very unique to Vanillaware. Even in their other games, the art plays with perspective, with light and shadow, and with character proportions. It’s dynamic even though the characters are static because some proportions, like bigger hands and feet, give a sense of movement and reach. At the same time it doesn’t look very exaggerated; it’s just right.

The stuff of nightmares

I wasn’t expecting this game specifically. When I heard about Unicorn Overlord I was expecting something less addictive, for starters, and much less complex in its mechanics. Since I’ve only played 13 Sentinels, I’ve only gotten the visual novel part of the Vanillaware experience and I thought Unicorn Overlord would be very similar, just in another setting. I haven’t been able to put the game down since I started playing. The other games I’m currently playing are on hold and even though I already have two more Vanillaware games on their way I don’t want Unicorn Overlord to end. Brilliant game!

Hacking souls and time

Last weekend, I made some progress in Soul Hackers 2 and I am right at the end of the game. The crazy dungeons inside the Soul Matrix got a little more complex to navigate. Saizo’s Soul Matrix is still the hardest one in my view, however I managed to complete a few more things before I finish the story. I reached 4F with all my companions, but only managed to get enough Soul Level to finish Milady’s 4F and get into 5F. There, I couldn’t open any other gates without loads of Soul Level. I’ve read that the amount of Soul Level we gain from hangouts increases significantly in new game + making it possible to complete a 5F from any character and unlock an achievement.

I completed all requests from Madam Ginko in order to get items, money, upgrades, lower prices to summon demons, what have you. It’s very important to stay on top of her requests during the playthrough to make things easier in the end. I completed all The Lost Numbers DLC quests involving a new character called Nana. She was on a journey to find information about her father, a person who worked for Yatagarasu  – an organization that protects people from demons – while also learning about the story behind her true nature. This lead us to a new dungeon where we could grind to our heart’s content and defeat powerful bosses.

One day I couldn’t sleep, so I decided to fuse many demons with the money I had. Now my compendium is over 90% and I’ll maybe take it to 100%, something I could never do on a playthrough in Persona 3 Reload without a guide. With the DLC we also get some powerful demons for free from the start, but I decided to ignore them during early game because they were too overpowered. What I enjoyed the most about the game was the cyberpunk atmosphere, the art, the palette, and the interactions with demons and companions. The game is a feast for the eye, the soundtrack can be a bit limited but I already got two favorite songs – COMP Smith and Eyes of the Iron Mask.

This is as far as I got before I enter the last dungeon, or what I think is the last anyway. My two main characters – Ringo and Figue – are becoming more human by learning through interactions with other humans. They are machines made in human’s image, created by Aion, a big sentient AI, maybe composed of many other life forms, born from the digital footprints of humans. The purpose of their creation was to save the world from great danger, of course, but things didn’t go as expected as they never do. When human emotions formed inside our character’s personalities every action gained a new significance and by consequence emotions started getting in the way of what was otherwise a very objective mission. One of them went rogue and now it’s up to us to fix the world, before saving it.

These demons are adorable

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During the weekend, I decided to go back to Steins Gate Elite. It’s a visual novel with primary focus on time travel and creating a time machine. I started reading it some months ago but it was a bit on-and-off, the story and the characters weren’t captivating enough at first. So eventually I abandoned it and played many games in between. Steins Gate was that VN that I would read when I didn’t want to play or read anything else. Okabe was very irritating and over-the-top and I could only tolerate him in very small portions. This time I was a bit under the weather and the best thing I could do was going to bed and reading a VN that could work as a pathway to a good nap. I was at the end of Chapter 4 and initiated Chapter 5. From there on, any idea of a nap diluted in the hands of time and I was very much glued to the screen. It must have happened a little before a certain character was killed. I was instantly shocked and I had to read on. Okabe changed a lot, so much so, that I found myself wishing for his nonsense at times.

Suzuha and Okabe

The suffering and confusion brought upon Okabe during his time leaps was palpable. At a certain point even I was giving up hope and questioning the point of saving the world to be. During his hopeless mission to save a special someone he would try again and again at changing something, anything, a few hours or days before a tragedy in order to prevent it, even when it was obvious that the end result would stay the same. At this point we understand the motivations of the cast of characters, especially one that came from 30 years in the future. Real time passed so fast from then on that I ended up unlocking my first ending. The game went full circle and I stayed with Mayuri and Daru in a peaceful world, all of my friends were gone. Very easily I unlocked Suzuha, Moeka, Lukako and Faris’ routes. For Kurisu and the true ending I needed a guide.

Makise Kurisu

The good part about using a good guide was that I could choose the right sms answers for the true ending and then save the game when I was one answer short. With an answer left to trigger the true ending we can instead see Kurisu’s ending and then reload the save. The funniest part was that, after I watched her ending and wept and laughed and everything, I engaged the true ending and it was exactly the same thing. Same scenes, same conversations, but I couldn’t skip them. Then the credits rolled and I thought I was doing something wrong and checked the guide again. They wrote something like “read on, trust us” and trust I did.

*** Light spoilers true ending, continue to next paragraph ***

What came after was a very substantial part of the game because it was long and tied a lot of loose ends from the beginning. Everything we see at the start of the game is explained and I didn’t notice any major plot holes. However, I played the first 4 chapters a long time ago, and I don’t remember every little detail. Kurisu’s murder in the Beta attractor field, where the game starts, is explained and that moment is revisited by Okabe and Suzuha. Okabe gets a message from his future self and finds motivation to rewrite the narrative of that worldline by use of deception. It’s genius! However, I would have enjoyed watching the deception taking place, I mean seeing the reaction of the real Okabe from that worldline. Also that shift between dead Kurisu and alive Kurisu was triggered by a worldline shift I didn’t see. I didn’t see it but Okabe certainly did because he jumped to an attractor field – Steins Gate – where everyone is alive and living their sweet lifes. In order to start anew on an attractor field without any known convergence – a new start for humanity – Okabe had to save Kurisu, and that he did. It was a beautiful ending especially because of everything that happened in order to get there, all the heartbreaks and so on.

*** End of spoilers ***

Yes, it was a great read, for sure! By pure coincidence or not, Spike Chunsoft has a sale on Steam right now, so I grabbed Steins Gate 0. The story takes place in the Beta worldline, meaning after Kurisu dies. Poor Kurisu. Her death is the first thing we see when we start Steins Gate and it’s always looming in the background even when she’s right before our eyes. Steins Gate 0 starts about the same way, with some variations and it’s intended for people who read the original novel. The very first scenes are a big spoiler! I’m very curious to see what they did with the story. The old art is wonderful. I would recommend playing Steins Gate with the original artwork and then watching the anime.

Slay the Princess (PC)

Maybe it wasn’t a very good idea to play a game about death right after playing a game about death. However, death is constantly looming, either slowly in the background or right before our eyes. It can be but a little diluted concept in the back of our minds, or it can be announced on a visit to the doctor. It can be a gamble because of our lifestyle, or it can be a gamble because of a diagnosis. It can come due to old age or earlier due to unforeseen circumstances. When people say that we should cherish the moments we have with each other it can come as a big cliche, and indeed it is. You can find the most beautiful words to describe the inevitable but, in the end, it’s very much our nature and the nature of all things living.

Try to imagine a world without death. I’ve tried it many times. It’s the realm of the impossible but we can make the exercise. How many would we be? Would we be constant for all eternity, or would more people be born? How could someone come into existence in a world where there’s eternal permanence? Would there be conflict and consequence like punishment for all eternity, without means to alleviate pain and suffering? Would there be eternal happiness in the arms of a loved one guaranteed to live forever? Would we jump into another relationship after those failed 500 years of marriage? Would there be years and the concept of time even? Would we become of another nature to adapt to a nature without renewal? Why would someone want this? There’s someone who wants this.

It’s very easy to spoil a game like Slay the Princess (StP) or any visual novel for that matter. Even games from other genres are a little difficult to write about if we don’t decide to include spoilers. Hold your thoughts about death because they will be a constant while you navigate StP. Not everything is about death, there’s more to the game and its nature, there’s loops and loops, of constant coming and going, and in the process, we witness love, violence, despair and our own reflected image in the mirror. All of it happens inside a cabin, or in another cabin in another time. The memories remain, but the path is another, although the same. StP felt more like a roguelike visual novel than a visual novel with many routes. It is in fact a visual novel with many routes and sub-routes and sub-sub-routes, but I liked to entertain the idea of a roguelike game where I was constantly dying and could come back to where I started now armed with valuable knowledge only to be surprised that nothing was how it was before.

You have to slay the princess; you just have to. And if you don’t, the world is going to end. What will you do? Look, I did everything or so I thought. I played the game for about 6 hours, and I got about three endings. If you decide to play the game the achievement bar is a good indicator of your progress. I’m at 37% therefore I haven’t seen half of the outcomes in the game. The princess is inside a cabin chained inside a basement. Your task is very straightforward, but which cabin you end up in or which princess will you find depends on your choices. It doesn’t matter if you live or die for the princess will always be communicating something. However, how do we know we have to kill the princess? We have a voice – the Narrator – that tells us to do so. But, since we go back and forth (or only forth) in this loop, how many are they?

The game is not only a quest about slaying the princess and preventing the end of the world. It’s also about the player and their journey to find their own identity. After all, we have to find a clue about why we have to kill a princess in the first place, and where to find some answers as to how to proceed towards the conclusion of our quest. It seems more complicated than it is. Even though it doesn’t look like it at first, the game has a start and an ending, and each route doesn’t take long to complete. The help of a guide for the completionists should come in handy.

Slay the Princess was created by Black Tabby Games and released in 2023 for PC. It has great art and extremely good voice acting. It was one of the indie games I looked forward to playing upon release, in 2023, but I only managed to play it now.