Reviews by Zoe Victoria
Aced the aspec options
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This Review Is 99% Me Raving about How Much I Loved The Platonic Routes, May 30, 2023This is one of my favorite hosted games I have ever played. The story and characters are engaging, the worldbuilding is beautifully done, and my favorite part personally? The way the ace route is handled!
I'm aroace, and personally romancing characters in games makes me uncomfortable. But since I don't speak romance, it's sometimes hard for me to understand what the romantic choices are since I'm pretty affectionate with my friends. But thanks to the author's foresight I can simply hide the romantic options, so I don't end up putting my PC in an unwanted situation.
But something that I like even more than being able to disable romance is that it doesn't stop me from making connections. Being able to have a route with a character I like, but having a platonic route instead of a romantic one is something I did not know I needed until it was presented as an option, and I think Hidden Sanctum handles this phenomenally. I can be close with a character in a platonic way without the game unintentionally (or at least I hope it's unintentionally) making it feel less valuable or fulfilling than the romantic route. Games where you have to romance a character to save them/get the best ending, anyone?
I just realized I haven't really talked about the story, whoops. I love the way the magic system works: being chosen by a certain supernatural entity based on the person you are and gaining powers from that. The author does a wonderful job of making you feel the magic of the powers, and the Sanctum location. And all the characters are pretty fleshed out as far as I can tell, and very well written. (Spoiler - click to show)My only complaint is that the "plot twist" of who the bad guy is isn't really a twist at all, so much so that I'm not even sure if it was intended to be a plot twist, or even a reveal.
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