Platform: PC | Demo Length: 1 hour
Fates Masquerade is an animated, manhwa-inspired political romance visual novel about a young woman called Seraphina Montclair as she tries to find out about her noble past – one that she can’t remember.
In order to do that, she applies to the royal palace as a governess to see if she can get any clues. However, doing so puts her in the line of sight of both royal princes: Prince Maximilian, AKA The Crimson Reaper, known for his bloodshed on the battlefields; and Prince Lucian, the “kind” prince who hides a more conniving side.
The game advertises itself as an animated visual novel, making use of Live2D rigging to bring the characters to life, along with two unique routes and several endings, including both true and many bad endings — all of which are represented in a branching system rather than a standard save-and-load feature.
My Impressions
Right from the start, I was extremely impressed with how dynamic the presentation was. In addition to the Live2D rigging, the game makes use of camera zooms, camera panning and character positioning to bring the scenes to life. Normally with visual novels, the text does a lot of the heavy lifting, such as adding small nuances, but scenes like Seraphine seeing someone shake their head are visually shown to us, which I really appreciated. It made me forget I was supposed to be “reading” a visual novel.
That said, the rigging is not perfect, as sometimes characters do come off as uncanny with certain expressions. But for the most part, it works really well. I particularly enjoyed the close-up scenes with the princes, as I felt they really made the moments feel more personal.
The game also advertises how every choice matters, but that some choices can be questionable – and I severely underestimated how questionable it would be. The dialogue choices were absolutely hilarious, as some were extremely out-of-pocket or unhinged, to the point that it’s as if the game was making a mockery of itself. But the thing is that these “bad” options would actually be the correct choice for raising the prince’s affections.
One example was Seraphina admitting that she hopes the prince’s engagement fails so that she has a chance with him — to his own brother. And he liked it.
But it works so well because even in the plot itself, Seraphina is extremely unhinged herself. She is already an “outsider”, so a lot of her actions are attributed to her not being of high society, but these traits flow well into the dialogue choices. It makes her an extremely fun character to play.
This also extends to the princes, as they had more personality than I expected from them. Even from this short demo, it already portrays how loveable and amusing they are that I genuinely don’t know which one I would choose.
Speaking of amusing, I must commend the comedy in the game because I laughed. LOUD. Many times. The writing is extremely well done, and even though I’m not usually a fan of court drama, I am hooked.
Would I Recommend It? YES! ✓
My initial impression of the game was completely turned on its head. What I expected to be a high-and-mighty royal court drama became one of hijinks and mischief, and I am here for it.
As a demo, there is already an impressive amount of care and detail put into it. I’m excited for the full version when everything is as envisioned and of course, see where Seraphina’s chaotic nature takes her next.
You can try out the demo to Fate’s Masquerade on Steam.
This game was reviewed as part of the Fall in Love Visual Novel Festival on Steam.
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