A Foretold Affair

This game left me conflicted. On the one hand, the art, story and characters are excellent. A lot of time and effort obviously went into this project. There were some minor bugs and typos, but nothing too distracting. Completely worth the money. On the other hand, I could never quite get a handle on the MC, Buffalo Seer. Sometimes I loved her, sometimes I couldn't stand her, sometimes I was just... confused. She kept zigging when I wanted or expected her to zag. Also, the route setup felt strange; as the game went on, there seemed to be less and less interaction with January, which made me very sad. In the end, I lost interest somewhere in the middle of all the capturing and re-capturing and sped through the rest of the plot. Maybe I did something wrong, or maybe there's something I'm just not getting. In any case, most of this game was awesome. Especially January. I highly recommend this game to people who are more talented at figuring out MCs than I am.

A Foretold Affair is a very uniqe Otome Game, and I instantly fell in love with it. It offers three different love interests (male, female and agender) and each one of them is quite adorable in their own way. You decide which one is your future spouse at the beginning of the game, as you see the marriage in a vision of your future. However, even though your marriage is foretold doesn't mean you haven't go through some hardships until the day finally comes... - The wiritng is very well and it's easy to get attached to the characters (including the MC) - It has a very beautiful and atmospheric soundtrack that suits the mood of the game - The characters and background are lovely as well - The world of the game is unique, with their own society and rules (but the main focus lies on the relationships!) Even though the main story stays the same, your choices pretty much alter the dialogues, so it offers great replay value, at least once for every love interest. So the game is quite lengthy. You can easily see how much love and effort the developers put into this game, and it deserves much more love and attention. If you are a fan of otome games, I would recommend this game. It also has steam achievements and trading cards!

A cute, little romance visual novel. Takes place in a post-apocalyptic world, steampunk-ish style. Very queer-friendly & diverse: + Choose the protagonist's pronoun (they, he, or she) + Protagonist implied to be asexual + Potential relationships with a man, woman, or enby + Two romance options have darker skin, the protagonist's skin color is never revealed Cons: - I felt it could've used an epilogue to show how things turned out in the future. - Art gallery didn't include backgrounds. - CGs were overall good, but I feel the artist could use practice drawing hands. - A few typos here and there.

A Foretold Affair is an excellent and entertaining story where the romance is flipped on its head: rather than wonder who you'll end up with, you have to convince the person you KNOW you're going to marry that this is for real, all while dodging bounty hunters and traversing a floating island in the sky. The characters are all entertaining and have great personalities, and, in an interesting twist, there is no restriction on the kind of relationship you can have. Whether you represent your main character, Seer, as a man, woman, or gender neutral, you can have a relationship with whichever of the three love interests you want. The art style fits well with the steam punk theme of the story, and the character designs are great. The music is great, and really works with each scene, helping you get into the mood of the story every step of the way. Overall a great experience so far, and I'm eager to go through each route and see how things play out!

The world have its own system, and history to be behold of. Yet you barely get to know a fraction of it. What this game focus the most is, the interaction with character of intrerest. And the change of dialoug with the choices you do. They will provide different information about themself and a bit of the world too. Yet the world itself will remain a mystery to us... And there is a story of runnning .. and running from ones pursuers. But that is bascially just there to force the characters know each other from the events. And all the events are the same on each route, so you can skip the most of the text if you have played one route. Luckly the skip button is a very trustworthy companion due to it stops on the smallest change of text, so you wont worry about to miss anything. And the reason for their journey will not be told at all, it just ends .. No one will tell, why there were hunted to begin with ... ( But maybe .. one can figure it out anyway with all the information .. ) There are three different endigns with each of the love interests, ( Also there is an achievement for that too ). Which is, different ending dialoug .. That is all. The three love choices are enjoyable to get to know. Since I liked all of them, all containing their own charm and quirks. And how all of them bond togheter, and have their of growth of change within them. Especially how the main character personality transpire is the most drastic one. From completely obsessed to more understanding. Since due to the beginning, a vision tells of happy marriage, and become blinded by the future. The scenary is beautiful, with the sketchy lines full of life, yet still portrays clear image of a forest. Their could been a bit more CG:s .. The proportion are okay, but still .. their hands could be way to small, that is something that kept bothering me .. The colouring is splendid, the shading and lightning really brings out a solid form. The background music is different piano pieces, each beffiting the various scenes. One more stressfull and another calmer etc. So.. there is not much of a story in this game. It is mostly based on interaction with one character, and how they handle the idea of knowing the future. And I enjoyed it though, it was not as I expected.. Since it could be a bit boring with just being on the run. But the characters made up for that, since as I mentioned are the main center of the entire non-existing plot. The reason I bought this game is because I liked January's design .. And I got what I wanted. So I am no disappointed. Heee. And his route was the best one <3. So I liked the game overall, yaay.

I would not recommend this game for a few reasons. The premise for the game and the story is interesting, however the real game and story turn out a real bore, there isn't much of choice or ending. The only meaningful choice is the first one, the rest are for fun. The developer let their ideology leak into them. There are literally a full no reason conversation with some NPC about "society forcing women to wear dresses". And the whole debacle pronoun and agender. This is butchering the English language.

This game is highly underrated, the art is gorgeous and the story is unique and well-written. Piper (Female) is an absolute peach, January (Male) is a precious gentle man and cinnamon roll, and Kea( Agender) is a lovable tsundere that stole my heart in every route. Perhaps, it was the choices I made, that shaped Buffalo Seer's personality to be so, but she/they/he ( I'll say they for now) was hilarious. The way they treated everyone in the beginning except their significant other was hysterical. They are a little peculiar, and there were times when I was like, what the heck are they saying lol, but it was for the most part a good kind of odd. I would even say I found their quirks to be charming. I wish this game had more of the attention it deserved, the writing was very well done, and the story is interesting and lengthy. I would personally really love a sequel. Thanks, GB Patch for another excellent game. Also, side note Trinette is gorgeous, her teal/turquoise hair is everything and I would love a route for her. She promised me a date, and I never got it.  Also, Duke January with his hair down, is a work of delicious art.

Review – A Foretold Affair, an indie visual novel from 2017. 4.5 hours to finish I only played the male romance route, as a heterosexual woman, so that’s the perspective I’m speaking from. Player Character: The protagonist is masked and hooded, leaving their appearance and identity deliberately ambiguous. In theory, this lets the player project onto them. No point in that, I can’t relate to them at all. They are reckless and alien as they aren’t from a culture like ours so there is no point in trying to project anything. Their ambiguity only serves to make them more alien in this case. Their behavior seems rooted in a bizarre, hyper-isolationist culture—almost cult-like. It reminded me of the “factions” in Divergent, but even more extreme. There is a line about how they aren’t seen as individuals until a coming of age ritual where they get a mask to hide them even better from each other. The game attempts to reflect the PC’s upbringing through odd behavior. That they believe in love and feel it, yes. Did they ever seek it out before? Do they like or want sex? They seem to be asexual. So I can pick their pronouns and gender but I can’t pick what romantic structure they want, odd choices all around. Plot and Structure: The story's pacing becomes repetitive. The cycle of someone gets kidnapped, then rescued, then someone else gets kidnapped happens multiple times, seemingly just to drag out a short trip into a weeklong journey. It feels artificial, and clearly contrived to force camaraderie among characters. Ya, it got boring but I wasn’t here for world building, I was here for choices and character romance. Choices: Aside from selecting your route at the beginning, your decisions seem to carry very little narrative weight. Most choices only alter surface-level dialogue. For example, I was once given the choice to run away or stay. Even if you choose to flee, you’re back where you started within a few minutes, and the game proceeds. The Male Romance Route (January): This route left me deeply unsatisfied. There’s a common complaint in indie otome games: when developers include one token female love interest, it often feels half-baked. The assumption is that it was written by someone who isn’t bisexual or lesbian and so, badly, make a stab at what they think a lesbian relationship would be like. That same kind of disconnect is painfully obvious here, except flipped. This male romance route feels like it was written by someone who isn’t attracted to men. And perhaps, are against basic traditional romance structures such as monogamy. The romantic arc is all over the place. Main character leaves behind their entire culture for a vision of married bliss to a man they’ve never seen. They meet him, show him the same vision and he is IMMEDIATELY on board. There must be emotions in these visions or something. We then have to deal with THE PLOT. Along the way, we learn very little about him. His mom died, leaving him his title. He’s 26. And oh, by the way… People around him have set up an arranged marriage for him to make sure he has kids. It that okay with the main character that he needs to father a child with a woman neither of you has met, purely for the sake of continuing a noble bloodline? Oh boy, that sure IS NOT A PROBLEM with the main character. They are legitimately nonchalant about such a pesky detail. I’m not even sure if this meant they were only married in spirit and he’s actually married to the noble lady? Or if the noble lady just serves as a surrogate? There’s no emotional consideration for the surrogate mother, as the main character declares that although this other woman may receive his semen, she will not receive an ounce of affection from January for January will only love the main character. There is no reflection on consent. No opportunity for the player, myself, to prefer 100% monogamy and choose that. The MC later seems to pity the woman and comments that they should share a kind word or two if they ever run into them in the hallways. @_@ Neither even question the morality of the arrangement. The implication is clear: if you romance January, he will impregnate someone else, and the player just has to accept it just as the main character is hard written to accept it. I can only imagine this whole storyline was written for the asexual or male players to enjoy? Why couldn’t I control the MC enough to say, oh no, I’m fine with breeding as I have picked she pronouns and gender and imagine myself to have girl parts. let's leave out the whole surrogate mother plan? To make things worse, there's a point in the story where January emotionally abandons the protagonist after they literally lose a limb. During this time, it’s the agendered character, Kae who steps in as emotional support. Crazier to boot, the chemistry and emotional connection between the PC and Kae is more believable than anything I saw with January. It left me wondering if Kae was the author’s true favorite. An absolutely lost opportunity to explore the idea that our choices matter more than seeing the future and choosing to break it off with January altogether to pursue Kae. Or even just go back to the culture we’d left. Eventually, January returns and offers a sincere apology, which the PC immediately accepts in there usual, “No harm, no foul” sort of way.. There’s no meaningful reckoning for his actions—just a tidy resolution that ignores the depth of the hurt. They were hurt! Hurt badly! Emotionally all over the place as their bloody stump ached and they struggled even to feed themselves. Seriously! Interesting Themes, Poorly Explored: The game does raise a few intriguing psychological themes such as culture shock, body dysmorphia, injury-related disability, and how certainty about the future can blind us. But these ideas are introduced and then quickly glossed over. A potentially life ending injury in the middle of nowhere? magical medical tech to the rescue! The weight of losing a limb ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ with what you see as your “self” ? vague optimism to the rescue! A sudden unexpected homesickness? Ha, in that isolationist culture, were they even really your friends and caregivers anyway? Better off without them! Final Thoughts: I cannot recommend this game based on the male romance route because of whatever the ♥♥♥♥ was even happening there. And it seems the developer intentionally downplayed the romance arc in favor of broader themes. In response to a similar review, they stated: “The way we handled January's route—it’s problematic for a proper romance route, but we had other priorities that beat that concern out.” That may be fair from a storytelling perspective—but if you’re advertising a romance game, then romance should be a priority, at least on the chosen route. If I select January’s path, I expect to spend meaningful time with him. I’ll get to know the others on their own routes.

overall a good Visual Novel. can recommend it. the price of the game is to high but in offer for like -50% alright.

A Foretold Affair takes place in an intriguing steampunk fantasy world that I'd love to see revisited in another visual novel one day. There was something really relaxing about the experience of reading it, even in the story's darker and more serious moments - it just has a really nice atmosphere to it and all the main characters are lovely. My favourite was the protagonist Buffalo Seer, who stays sweet and cheerful throughout all the hardships they face while exploring a new world and learning to live in the present instead of obsessing over the future. I would recommend it to anyone who's interested in visual novels that stray from the typical tropes of the genre.