Arcadia Fallen II

[h1]A worthwhile sequel with some flaws[/h1] As someone who played and enjoyed the original, I was mostly satisfied by this worthy (but flawed) sequel. The story was not the greatest I had ever heard, but it did it's job in telling a low stakes story in a fairly interesting world (even if a lot of it felt like sequal-baiting). [h2]Meaningless Magical Discipline[/h2] One of the major problems I had was with how pointless the option to choose which class you belonged to ultimately was. It ultimately devolved into a handful of mior choices with slightly different fluff dialogue. If you are expecting this choice to have a major impact on the story, you will be disappointed. [h2]Underwhelming Romance[/h2] Another big issue was with the game is how the romance system worked. Being able to choose different options for romance has returned and is a pretty good system that allows for more nuanced relationships. The first few hours has quite a few romantic dialougue options and the characters are interesting and fleshed out. However, once you have "locked in" your partner, the amount of romantic scenes takes a nose dive. This would be fine if this happened at the end of the game after spending a good amount of time with your special someone. [b]Unfortunately this scene takes place abount 4 hours into an otherwise 12 hour (ish) story, only having about 3/4 scenes throughout the remaining 8 hours where romance is even mentioned.[/b] The developers apparently wanted romance to take a back seat to the narrative, and have ultimately made it rather shallow and bland. Adding in far more scenes with your love interest or even allowing us to date multiple people at a time may have alleviated this (though I'm leaning more on the former). [h2]A few smaller problems[/h2] - Character creator is fairly light on options. - Confusing colour selection in character creator. - Ragnar's story resolves pretty randomly. - Pipes minigame is inconsistent. Sometimes its a pretty tough challenge, but most times it is snooze-fest easy. - Story never really surprises you, what you think is going to happen usually does. [h2]Final Thoughts[/h2] Ultimately a pretty solid sequel that builds upon what made the first good, but doesn't do much outside of deepening the lore for an inevitable trilogy. [h2]Score:[/h2] 7/10

Better and longer than first game

Honestly, my only disappointment with this game is that it clearly is setting itself up for another sequel. While I am more than happy to continue my adventures in this setting, I would have liked for this game to have more of its own conclusion; as is, the ending very much feels like an "end of Part 1" rather than a grand finale. But ending aside, I enjoyed this game tremendously and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys their VNs with a healthy dose of solid worldbuilding. Eagerly awaiting an announcement for Arcadia Fallen III!

Great art style with a captivating story.

An underrated gem like the 1st game. I really hope we get a 3rd title someday

yes

I like it. Good Worldbuilding and Art. Enjoyable cast.

Just like the first game, so underrated and such a great visual novel game. Can't wait for more from these developers.

if you like 'wizard academy' visual novels, this is one for you

I really liked the Gala performance.