Yes, Your Grace

Got the game on sale and it was worth every Cent. Albeit you play it a couple of hours on a few evenings you dont notice the time clocking. Every week you have to decide on the petitions your Subjects and other Lords forward to you as well as some family drama with 3 daughters producing plenty of it. You face the grim alternatives between making naive to ruthless decisions and every sinlge one somehow influencing your personal and Kingdoms fate. There are rather bleak outcomes at times and if you do not play careful at times you can sink your boat quite easy. Usualy the game puts no time constraints on you but there are moments when a very slim blue bar ticks down leaving you with limited time to decide. In the end i reloaded once bcs i missed a decision for a lack of understanding the controls but lived with all the decisions i made and barly survived with some personal losses all crisis that was thrown at me. It felt good with some grievances and i think that shows that the game makes you care about your life as King, your family and kingdom. The game entertained me to the end but be aware that there is a very high probability that you have to sacrifice what is dear to you and you need to be able to stomach that! I liked it as it made me care the utmost for the consequences. I would buy it again!

This is a truly fantastic and beautiful visual novel with (I think) very light kingdom management mechanics. Pros: - Beautiful graphics and music - Voice effects really set the tone perfectly for each line of dialogue - Being the king and making decisions on the throne is just fun - All choices feel brutal, like there's never any "correct" choice or "best" choice - The game felt largely like it respected the decisions that I made Cons: - Too little variety on a second replay to merit replaying over and over. - If you're doing too well on your first run, it's hard to see how things could go differently (i.e. how many branching "paths" there are). - Kingdom management mechanics are fairly light - There's definitely a sense of "correct" choices in that, by making certain choices over the course of the game, you can ensure that more characters survive rather than fewer (there are definitely a few different ways to make all characters survive, but most of the variation in choices seems to be between "everything is going poorly" and "everything is going okay") All in all, I recommend it for anyone who enjoys visual novels or heavy story games with some strategy mixed in.

I enjoyed the playthrough to the end. The managerial aspects take some thought but are not terribly taxing. I wouldn't label it a relaxing game but its close. There are only two currencies to track and manage, but plenty of ways to spend (and run out of) both. The story itself is good, although the killing off of some characters was unexpected and somewhat brutal. Graphics are vintage and fun. I plan to give it a few more playthroughs to see if the ending changes based on choices made. Although I won the battle, I feel as though I lost the war with no proper heir so I'm curious to see if that's always the case.

TL;DR If on sale: Good buy. Else: you're probably better off spending your money elsewhere. This game is great. I wouldn't pay the full price though. If you find it on sale for under 10 euro it's a great buy (If you don't mind it being more of a interactive book rather than a game). I liked the story and loved the soundtrack. The spritework is also very nice. It is not without issue however. The game sufferes from being too linear and has occasional minor bugs which do not affect gameplay but are slightly annoying. It is also not well suited for replayability. Another thing which I have found disappointing was the sprites in-game being reused quite commonly. Also, Some of the decisions and general content in-game is quite questionable (mostly regarding your under-age daughters). It's justified by the game being set in a medieval period but it still feels a bit iffy. I don't think it is quite deserving of the 4 star rating I have given it, I would have rather gone for 3.5 stars but that isn't an option here. I therefore I decided to follow the rules of math and rounded the .5 up, hence the rating.

Got this game on sale (protip: you probably should) and wasn't expecting much aside from some light-hearted kingdom management sim, so I must say that it surpassed my expectations quite well. Without spoiling anywhere near as much as other reviews, be aware that this is the Middle Ages. Dark Medieval Times, quoth Satyricon. Even with a king to enforce the rule of law, life oftentimes remains nasty, brutish and short. In spite of your best efforts and wisest counsel, tragedy is sometimes unavoidable. Keep this in mind before you decide to don the crown, for uneasy hangs the head that wears the crown and this is no flowery, shojo visual novel you're dealing with here. I didn't choose my review's title to be cute. So keeping all that in mind, this game will most likely be an engrossing experience for those willing to embark on the grave task of the monarch. You will have to engage in some tricky resource-juggling on occasion, but nothing too overwhelming if you're prudent and practice some fiscal conservatism (this isn't real life, you don't have the option of running a massive deficit). Gameplay mechanics aside, this is one game that actually managed to get me emotionally involved, so credit where it's due as no game has succeeded at that task since Dragon Age: Origins. The soundtrack also deserves praise as well as the world-building and some clever cultural references sneaked in (Wojtek, you absolute mad lad). If you're not afraid to go on an emotional roller coaster, I'd say give this game a chance. Ruling a medieval kingdom isn't neverending sunshine and rainbows, but the best tales rarely are.