I played Astrologaster and found it great fun. It is 5 hours of amusing historical comedy where you are a "doctor" finding solutions in the stars while trying to get a real medical license. It is entirely voiced and has fun musical bits in between each guest's visit. It is quite simple a game, but for anyone who wants to laugh and enjoys historical content, I would recommend it.
It is really pretty and interesting, but in the end I played it through in 2 hours. Great for a short little experience, but I feel like they could have sprung for a longer story as the potential was there. Giving 4 stars because we got little but what we got was really good! Just needed to get fleshed out more. I recommend you get it on sale.
I played the whole thing through in a few days. I had a lot of fun. The fights can get a little repetitive after a while, but you will have a large party of diverse characters with fun skills, and you can challenge yourself or not. The localisation is a little bit dodgy (a few dropped articles here or there, a few spelling mistakes), the story sounds sort of classical at the beginning but develops in an interesting way with an ending that honestly got me to tear up a little. You will not really have a character of your own to roleplay in the way you usually assume, but I liked the twist on the traditional "create character, adventure around, interact with NPCs" style. I wouldn't say there was anything super groundbreaking, but if you like these sorts of games, I would recommend to you give it a try.
It's funny, it's what it says on the tin. A lot of reading, so keep that in mind. There are some quests that can be ruined by experimenting, but if you read all the clues carefully, you'll get them. It took me a weekend in easy mode, but you could probably complete it in a day if you wanted to. The only reason why I am not giving it five starts is because there is no in-game way to keep track of quests. There should be either a notebook or a quest journal, it would make things so much more convenient and result in less hunting through walkthroughs for completists. It's worth exploring everything, though, and returning to places you've been before when you have new fun gear. ;)
I liked this game a lot. For 95% of the game. While some have complained it is tedious, I found the levels interesting and the monsters satisfying to kill. There is a lot to research and having to keep track of the various resources you have during the game was interesting for me. The text is sparse, there is some reading to do, but not a lot of it. I spent the better part of two weeks on this, but I did indeed explore every level (and some of them even twice!) However, why I rated this 4 is the ending. I will try not to spoil, but if you are gamer like me who prefers to play on the easiest setting to explore the world and the story, you will be stuck in the end. At least there are youtubers who have played it through so you can check out the ending. Even if you are someone who likes heavier difficulties, the final fight will be quite tedious and you will need to prepare for it. And the section before that feels a little useless, but maybe that is just me. So, if you don't like a sudden difficulty creep no matter the difficulty in the last part of the game, don't buy this unless you are fine with not actually finishing. However, if this sounds like a challenge you would like to accept, go for it.
A sparkly turd. The nice art lures you in, and then you are treated to inane puzzles, an extremely unpleasant and mean main character, and an idiot plot relying on keeping the main female character either unconscious or confused. What a mess. I'll be glad I'll never have to babysit stupid mean Rufus ever again. I am glad I got it on discount. Paying the full price would have been an utter disgrace, especially as you are clearly left hanging waiting for more. As to the reviewers saying that Rufus being a shitty unlikeable jerk is the point, I recommend you play Book of Unwritten Tales: Critter Chronicles. The main character Nate is also an unlikeable jerk, but his progression into less of a jerk actually makes sense and does not involve a shitty storyline where he wants to possess a girl he's just seen five seconds ago and is responsible for putting out cold in the first place. So, in the end you will actually feel for him. As for Rufus, all I felt was relief for finally not having to play with him anymore. Juvenile crap.
I am glad I ended up quitting halfway through, considering how inane the plot is apparently going to get. Worst QTEs ever. What's the point of forcing me to constantly mash buttons while I could simply be allowed to watch the somewhat interesting cutscene? The appalling way most of this was built makes me wonder if the game designers were high when making this game. And so many unnecessary sequences. No one cares about QTE basketball, and here we are forced to go through an entire chapter. The story which was interesting in the beginning, devolves into pretty much nothing quickly enough and you are left wondering what it is that you are supposed to enjoy. Also the supposedly immersive mouse controls? Give me a break. Life is too short to waste your time on this. Just watch a LP or something, you can at least do something else while doing that.
While I did end up using a walkthrough due to having a rather low patience threshold, that is likely a personal failing of mine. The game itself was sweet, the creatures bewildering and yet cute, the story lovely, though I think it would have been better with at least a few paragraphs summarizing exactly where the characters were and why they were doing what they were doing. The music was also very nice. 4.5 stars, as I would have preferred some story spelled out. I do recommend if you like colorful and weird games, and don't mind not being told what to do.
