Thirsty Suitors Reviews

I don't feel it..

You play as Jala, a 20ish wayward daughter returning to her hometown after a messy breakup, only to be confronted with her six previous messy breakups she had left there. You must also contend with your Sri Lankan immigrant parents and your perfect sister who haunts you as your inner monologue. There is also a weird thing going on at a park, but it's just an excuse to do skateboarding games. This is a fully voiced VN with some terrific dialogue and deep character moments. Jala can approach her frenemies with one of three attitudes that will shape their relationships, but each suitor involves a wildly animated JRPG battle where you must tear down their emotional defenses before regaining their trust. Mechanically, you afflict status debuffs before you combo attack with a skill of the same color. It's bare bones and repetitive, but the battle animations and dialogue are fun and the timed button prompts keep things from getting stale. You battle with only a single character although allies can be summoned for various effects. Each in-game morning you can cook healing items with your parents. These sections are my favorite part. You get revelatory dialogue with your parents in between more quick time events that can impress them and buff your food stats. The cuisine sounds delicious and I wish they had included an actual recipe book. I loved the soundtrack too, just thought I should mention. My biggest issue with the game is the lack of face animations which can break immersion during heated and heartfelt moments. It might have been too difficult and I see ways the devs worked around it. This is a game for people who love stories about queer relationships, family drama, immigrant parent expectations, and cooking. There are some cute references to the PNW setting, and the way Jala gets everywhere on skateboard is fun as well. This is a very chill game that took me about 17 hours to get through with the side quests.

What’s not to love? This is such a refreshing game, completely unlike anything I’ve ever played before

This one was a lot of fun. Basically the queer version of Scott Pilgrim, with skating and cooking.

The characters are fun, some of the exes are a little too familiar lmao. It's a well-written, refreshingly empathetic story about generational trauma, growth from immaturity, and people being free to be themselves. The gameplay is a fun, interesting mashup of QTE and RPG mechanics. The fights can get a little repetitive after a while, but interestingly enough, my main complaint is that this game isn't long enough. I was just settling in and getting comfortable when it was suddenly over! I will grant that I did not 100% it, but it felt like I only got the 1st stage, and I wish there was a second/third/epilogue. I'll also say that I really wasn't a fan of the skateboarding. It was a fun way to get around, but sometimes I wanted to go somewhere and the board moved a little awkwardly. Maybe just a skill issue. Idk. Anyway, I really do recommend it, especially if you're buying as part of a bundle or if it's on sale, and especially if you want to see a story with queerness/immigrant backgrounds being centered. The gameplay is fun, the voice acting is great, the story is stellar, it's just a good time.