ARISEN - Chronicles of Var'Nagal

I really enjoy this game and hope it will be possible for the studio to finish it soon! The characters are engaging, the play style is unique and interesting. The story is dark, but there's also beauty and positive aspects in it, and I've had a lot of fun replaying it in different ways. I don't write a lot of reviews, but I really wanted to support this game in whatever way possible as it really deserves the attention and the chance to be properly finished. If you enjoy a good story (even if it is dark), innovative gameplay and interesting characters, I would highly recommend giving this game a try.

The gameplay of this game is amazing. It tells a amazing story following a character that is purely built on your reactions to events. I feel like this game had great story telling. The art is beautiful. The character development and romance is great! I definitely replayed this game a few times because i was so intrigued to see all the outcomes. You cannot quick save, the game forces you to commit on the decision and can't go back to change the outcome. It really gives that choice anxiety lol but it is all worth it.

This Game has great potential and is intruiging, wich is why i recommend it. It is hoever unfinished and an oblivious beta with a huge amout of bugs and will most likley never be finished because the studio has run out of money. The bugs go from spelling mistakes, some placeholdertext over prounoun trouble to confusion over past things that happend in the story. There is a extreme bug that happens if you save and reload in any of Vizeriads scenes wich will lead to the save becoming unplayable and forcing you to relplay the entrire act. Also often enough you will be confronted with the game asuming you now things ore people you didnt meet during your playrhrough and sometimes relaitonships change without an explenation. Sometimes your charakter makes choices that do not seem logical or part of the situation at all. The game has great potential, interesting gameplay, wonderful art and a intruging story, but it is far from finished.

This game is currently early access so take my words with a grain of salt. Usually I would wait until I'm more certain of my opinion before writing a review, but I'm hoping this comment may help the creators further improve. (also warning that this review is a bit long) First of all, the pros: - Really interesting choice system I love the idea of using emotions to answer, and I'm even more excited by that your choices further develop other emotions (I played a character that was deeply sad and I saw more variations of sad emotions I could respond with.) I also like that "joyful" emotions aren't always the "good" answer. For one mission, choosing the joyful option meant brushing off someone's distress and insisting it's a good thing. Similar to how smiling and laughing isn't always the best choice when there are problems (I wish we see more of these nuances. So far I've seen it only a little) - AMAZING art. Oh my god, it's beautiful. Some scenes change from day to night, where you can see the sky darken and the lights turn on. The way the darkening sky is gradual but the glow from the windows is sudden really makes it feel so real. The characters all look amazing too. The CARDS. WOW. each looks absolutely perfect and I'm obsessed that each core emotion seems to be a "race" of humanoids. (Anger: proud lion people, Sadness: melancholy fish people, Joy: angels, Disgust: devils, Fear: mysterious cloaked people) and I can't state enough how magical each card looks. I think I want to own a pack of them myself just to look at and admire The characters have great designs and even the characters we see only briefly (I forget their names but I refer to them affectionately as "acid-man" and "slave trader") have easily recognizable appearances that have me going "*gasp*, It's YOU!" even when they only pop up for a scene or two. (love how when they pop up, they always give us the option to be scared/aggressive to them) - The story The prologue was pretty intense and it really helped me get a feel for how trauma can really shape your view of the world. Several of the characters really had nothing to do with the slave business but still had me looking at them like "you're complacent! You live here and you LET this happen!" when really they basically just strolled up to say hi (I'll mention this in the cons, but I wish there was a way for the character to express these feelings further) - variations between runs (character creation) The way you get treated in some scenes makes can change whether you're a man or a woman. The same goes if you make a trans character (with us getting the option on how to handle it each time). I thought those were just cosmetic choices so I was pleasantly surprised. ___________________________________________________________ And now, the cons, or things I wish were fleshed out a little more: - The relationship system The relationships feel a strange mix of too fast and too slow. I can't quite describe it, but the missions feel short and the result takes a neutral character to friend (where you can romance them) or ENEMY where you can try to destroy them. Dang. all from one mission? The good thing is that it might be reversible with missions. I have no idea how long the final game is going to be, but I'd love it to be long enough for not only the story characters to develop, but for our character to develop too. I'd love it if it's possible to be overly aggressive/fearful in response to everything that happened, and still end up with a good outcome with the characters (especially the slave owners). - The main character (sometimes) Only in certain routes is our character able to openly go "a lot of people died and I'm not handling that well". With Koda it's the main focus, and we see it on a mission with the lizard-man when we visit the arena, but other than that, our interactions with our slave masters are super normal-feeling. These are people that would watch you get tied up to be murdered during the initial purchasing scene if you act too defiant. I'd understand if it was made pretty clear that there was a time-skip so that event is a little more in the past and we're about to function somewhat "normally" in later scenes - variations between runs (in-game) I replayed twice. Once as sad/fearful, and the other as more angry/joyful. I also became friends vs enemies with some of them and I feel like the scenes feel a tiny bit too similar to make multiple runs exciting (although learning new words I didn't have in a previous run is exciting and worth it) Overall I say get the game to enjoy the visuals and the overall atmosphere. It's worth the money for just that. (the emotion cards look so amazing)

Im impressed by this game. Its harder than it appears to find a route.

Looks beautiful. If you like rpg games based on dialogue and decisions (which I do), the gameplay is fun for a bit. Plots and characters seem intriguing at first. But the relationships remain kind of hollow and the dialogues get more dull the further you get. Descriptions like "they act very poilte towards you" or "they say nice things that make you feel good" makes you wonder if these dialogues are AI generated. Basic writing principles like "show, don't tell" seem foreign to the creators.

Quite surprised by this game. It doesn't take long after the introductions to get attached to the characters. And I love the cards! The colors and golden accents are so pretty, I wish I could have the deck in my hands.

Apart from some minor glitches with the wrong version of characters and some characters getting stuck on screen, I really enjoyed this. I really hope it isn't abandoned and leaves the story unfinished. Hopefully there will be an update in 2023.

Je n'ai jamais vu la couleur du jeu de Tarot qui allait avec le Financement.

Même dans son état actuel, le jeu vaut le coup ! J'espère qu'il sera fini un jour