Tropical Hearts

I’m not without bias as I support the dev on patreon and have also purchased commissions from them. Higher-tier Patrons were given this early access version for free, but I was not and will not be compensated for this review. However, having finished the early access version, I can say this game is a nice combination of dating sim and turn-based RPG. My familiarity is far more with RPGs, as opposed to dating sims- I know of them and watched people play some of them online but this is the first one I’ve played. Shortly after the party arrives for their tropical vacation, they’re soon swept up into a mysterious calamity afflicting the islands. Resort staff promptly offers them an extended stay at the otherwise lovely destination in exchange for their aid in resolving the plight, even going so far as to equip them as well as provide new weapons and cocktails [ bonus stat boosts] via a crafting system. Gameplay allows you to freely explore the resort and islands as you wish, advancing time from morning to midday to evening with every event you choose, with the exception of shopping. Wanna hang out with someone you find attractive, whether it be a fellow party member or the bartender, scientist, or other staff? Doing that will take up 1/3 of the day. You can also opt to lift weights [slight HP increase for Alex after an animation plays], Meditate [slight SP increase for Alex after an animation plays], or forage for materials in a mine or forest, quickly passing time by 1/3 of the day and giving you loot to use to upgrade weapons or mix cocktails. When going on a date and learning about a friend or staff member’s intriguing lifestyle, history, or personality, you’ll be faced with some dialogue choices that will quickly inform you how your affinity toward them is coming along. I appreciate this straightforwardness, which is also present in the combat. When the vacationing group decides to go on an expedition from the same map where you decide between the aforementioned activities, this is where combat begins. You’ll maneuver Alex across points on the map of the new island you’re exploring that may contain opportunities for loot, offer to let you rest, or craft new weapons, accessories, or cocktails. At any time that you stop on most of these points [the rest area and dock where you return to the resort are the only exceptions I recall], you may encounter enemies and a battle begins. If the spot you move to tells you that you can gather loot by performing mining or foraging, you can do so and risk an encounter immediately after obtaining said loot, or come out with loot without being dragged into combat. Thus you need to weigh risks as you try to finish exploring whichever island you’ve gone on an expedition to, while being mindful of how many days you have left to complete that task. Combat does a great job showing you turn order of both the enemy and your party, while offering an adequately diverse range of skills and magical abilities among your 5 party members. The menus showing member status outside of battle, as well as in-battle descriptions, tell you what sort of element [fire, electricity, wind, et cetera] your character has proficiency in, is using when selecting certain skills, or finds painful. The battle screen immediately informs you if you’ve hit an enemy’s weakness. I liked learning how to apply skills to characters to aid each other during battle, and carefully got the party to level 4, saving whenever I docked so I could keep a nice new weapon I crafted or my stat boosts. In that regard I did suggest to the dev that the game be updated to streamline the crafting menu, as you currently have to click each cocktail's ingredients list to see if you have everything needed. Hopefully something like showing a symbol or even just changing the item/weapon entry's color among the list of stuff to craft to indicate "You've got everything needed to make this" will be implemented as development of the game continues. You’re also awarded stat points that you can distribute to your character upon leveling, in addition to the boosts you already get for reaching said level, but I held on to mine just in case I felt I might need to save them for later. I enjoyed learning about Rhea and Marc in particular as I spent time getting to know them, appreciated how Alex’s upbringing affected his [there will be an option to play Alex as a female later after more game development] interactions with them, and also think the shopkeeper Dolores is a cutie as well. I look forward to spending time with the rest as the game is polished further. Music had a nice atmosphere to the island setting when chilling with people and the battle theme was appropriately intense. The artwork of the environments you visit around the resort while dating evoke an air of serenity as well as relaxation and fun. The game’s shaping up to be a sexy escape with the right amount of RPG power and action to enhance such a fantasy.

A quite interesting game about a group of friends having fun on an island group. Story is great (so far) and the combat isn't too bad. The developers also hear the people and their "complaints" about the game and work on them. The first version of the game had some glitch that caused speedrunning to be possible and playing the game for 4 minutes would finish it. After telling them, the bug has been fixed in the next update of the game. The character-artstyle is amazing, and the background can sometimes show signs of WIP or Early Development, but with a team like this working on the game, I'm sure this will be gone in the future. edit: The game has changed a lot since last I played it (back in the earliest build) and I have to say it's becoming ever greater with every update!

Very excited to see its development! The characters are very sweet and the artwork is beautiful. I can recommend this game, not least because the developers have put their heart into this project, and it shows. ❤️

I like what I've seen so far. I've only played a little bit, because the game doesn't work very well on my old laptop. Which is a shame, because I want to know more of what this game is about and get to know the diverse and interesting characters. Some of the side characters interest me even more than the main ones. Especially that mystery lady that Alex keeps hoping will show up.

A catchy, indie anthro dating sim that feels like a holiday! The characters are really diverse. You meet all kinds of species, all of them fun and well-developed. But there's more to this story than it seems... Highly recommend it!

Simply the best most snexy game you will ever play 😌💕 (The entirely not biased opinion of Silky’s personal snuggle lizard🦎❤️) (He prevented me from reviewing before, can’t stop me from being incredibly proud!) Go play this game that has been made with so much love and dedication, Silky has blown me away with writing, puns (so many puns) gorgeous art and the unrivaled pear shape of Neelu’s butt 🍐✨

I remember getting this game in Early Access because I stumbled upon it while looking for cute furries, and cute furries I got. At the start, we only had 1 Island to visit, and plenty of dialogue to go through while Alex (the main character) built relationship with his five friends. Then, the time when the game fully came out arrived, and everything that was left on a cliffhanger was solved and not only did I get to date one of Alex's best friends, I also discovered a mystery within the Islands! The writing is really fun and enjoyable, the characters are fun to interact with, and the designs are very well thought and align well with the "element" of the character. I'd say more, but I feel like this is a game you've to experience for yourself. As for me. All I can add is... Tropical Hearts 2, when?

A fun game, enjoyable game play and interesting setting.

The art is nice to look at and I skip most of the dialogue but I'm having a good time!

I enjoyed this game a lot, and though it's not perfect, it achieved what the best dating sims strive for: to make me feel attached to some of the characters and invested in their feelings. Pros: -the characters are very well written and they are all unique! -the art is very cute. -fantastic LGBTQ representation. -mixing in fighting RPG elements to the game was an interesting change of pace for sure. -fighting monsters wearing just our bikinis? ♥♥♥♥ yeah! -the music has a lot of variety and surprisingly didn't get old even after playing for 30+ hours, there's even one ambient track I want to find and add to my music collection, because I enjoyed it a lot. -you can play without the sound on if you prefer in order to have your own music or whatevr on, you won't miss anything important, just the characters saying "woo!" and such. Cons: -The islands and combat section of the game did drag a bit, i feel the islands are a bit too large, and after a while I just wanted to stop fighting random encounters and be done with it. Though I'm thankful they did include a few alternate spots on the islands to leave if you need a break. -There were a few moments where it was clear the game was written for male Alex despite me playing female Alex. Though the game claimed that this was purely cosmetic, there were a few weird immersion-breaking moments because of it. -I zeroed in on who I wanted to romantically pursue pretty early on and neglected the other characters somewhat, so it made for some strange timing in the story, as well as leaving nothing for me to really do after finishing the final island/battle other than break my other friends' hearts, which didn't feel super great. And because I'd sealed the deal with my partner early, it felt kind of like they were absent for the last section of the game. In hindsight I can tell the game was designed to fit a more even pace in your relationships' progression. So if you do play, keep that in mind. Spend time with your other friends too :P -Having to fight through the islands again makes the idea of replaying the dating sim part of the game less appealing. It would have been interesting if they'd added a "skip" to that part of the game for future play-throughs once you beat it. There are relationship progression moments during the island missions, but they're pretty small and you would do fine without them. -I figured there'd be a final romance scene at the end with the person I'd chosen, but there was not. That would have added greatly to the game's ending, which was a bit anticlimactic. -No resolution regarding the surprise villain! I can only assume they wanted to leave it open for a sequel? -This is inconsequential, but I think some more outfits for the characters would have been fun. Overall, I do think this is a great game and would recommend it. I totally did not expect to sink so much time into it... There were a few bugs and numerous typos in the writing but nothing was game-breaking. The appeal of the characters' depth outweighs the negatives and I genuinely miss them now that the game has ended ;_;