Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets Reviews

This game is perfect for homosexuals<3 I might hate real men but at least fictional men are usually amazing!

Bought this for the romance options, fell in love with the duel scenes. They're so well done!

This is a pleasant little dive into a gay magical world with some interesting mystery hanging around, some interesting different magical paths, and plenty of romance options. At the moment of writing this, I've not finished my full first run through, but it's actually been decently erotic when those options are chosen.

I was in the mood for learning some magic and romancing cute guys, so I decided to play this game and I wasn't disappointed. I really liked magic lessons and battles and the whole college life was fun. I was afraid we won't have enough time to get to know all the characters, but that wasn't the case. I found all the romanceable characters quite different but interesting and charming in their own way, so it was hard not to flirt with all of them. I romanced Noel and Alistair so far (but I'll definitely try out other routes as well), and their romances were everything I wanted. There were funny and heartfelt moments and the spicy scenes were well-written. The main plot mystery is easy to figure out, but I feel like it's intentional. I kind of wish it was longer, but still it's a good story with lovable characters and I recommend it to everyone who likes m/m romance and magic.

*I played this game in the Heart's Choice omnibus app* When Raven de Hart's Freshman Magic: Spellbooks and Tangled Sheets was announced on the Choice of Games forum a few months ago, I was excited. The second-ever m/m romance title from Heart's Choice would be a magical school story - a subgenre I can't get enough of. There would be five potential love interests, representing a whole spectrum of romantic archetypes and promising plenty of replay value. There would be a subplot about students going missing, and I always enjoy a good mystery. For almost three months I waited for this game to hit the market. A last-minute delay on the original release date only heightened my anticipation. When I finally sat down last weekend to start playing Freshman Magic, it was with the excitement of a child on Christmas morning. This was going to be good. With that kind of buildup, there's really no way this game could have met my expectations. And it didn't, except maybe for a little while in the beginning. Then it hurdled over my expectations, vaulted beyond my wildest hopes, and landed somewhere in the stratosphere. It's that good. In Freshman Magic, you're a young man who has come to the prestigious magical college Briarthorn University on a dueling scholarship. Alongside your roommate and longtime best friend, Noel, you explore the campus, meet your professors, and maybe hit up a party or two. Your biggest challenge is balancing homework, dueling practice, and your social life - that is, until one of your fellow students goes missing. It turns out he's not the first - and he won't be the last. The mystery casts a pall over your first semester of college, but even that's not enough to put a damper on your burgeoning attraction to someone special. Is it a fellow duelist? Your nerdy study buddy? An aloof hottie? An upperclassman who works in the library? Maybe it's good old Noel. Freshman Magic goes farther than anything I've seen since "Harry Potter" in the specifics of what a magical education would look like. We get to see what classes are like, the approaches different professors take, the kind of homework they assign. There are opportunities to study with other students, and we actually get to see what they're talking about. Often, the player gets to decide what approach the PC should take to an assignment or exam question. It all feels authentically academic, but no less magical for that. And in between coffee-fueled magic-theory study sessions, there's plenty else going on. The dueling scenes bring action and excitement, the student disappearances bring suspense and dramatic weight, and there's certainly no shortage of romance. Like Heart's Choice's previous m/m offering, All-World Pro Wrestling, Freshman Magic is rated three out of three chili peppers for its explicitly erotic content. Unlike AWPW, which is pretty thoroughly marinated in homoeroticism even if you choose to focus more on your character's wrestling career, Freshman Magic leaves it entirely up to you what level of sexual content you prefer. Don't get me wrong, the PC's a red-blooded 18-year-old gay dude who's in no hurry to avert his eyes when he's walking behind a guy with a nice ass. And if you want to see how many guys you can blow in one semester, this game will let you do that. But if you'd rather read a sweet-ish romance where the PC and his prospective boyfriend bond by hanging out rather than hooking up, you can totally do that instead. I'm so happy to have this game in my life. I want to explore all the romances, all the different kinds of magic I can specialize in. I want to see if my character can uncover more clues to the mystery next time before the big reveal. I want to see him succeed at everything, and fail at everything too just so I can see as much as possible of the word de Hart has created. And nothing's been announced yet, but I do hope Raven de Hart is already working on another project for Heart's Choice. I'm sure I would enjoy whatever he did, but I can't help wishing for a taste of Sophomore Magic ... *originally posted on Reddit*

Really nice story. Solid main plot with some steamy scenes with all the (potential) boyfriends. 10/10, would recommend it to all my gay friends.

First the good stuff, honestly this story rocks if your into Boys and Magic. From start to finish it held my attention, had me cursing in a few places and laughing and smiling in others. I found all of the RO options interesting, and really enjoyed the fact that there were plenty of opportunities to hang out with them and get to know them, before having to "choose." Also there were alot of flavor options as to how I wanted my MC to be behave / react to others and everything going on. The best thing I can think to say about a CYOA is that its really good when you cant think of a single place where you wish you had had a chance to choose something other than was written but no choice was offered. In this one you really do feel like you get a say on everything, and thats a very rewarding experience. Now on to the Less than good, the story brings up peoples skin color when introducing them,.... And i dont mean cream and ivory and ebony, but the racial references of "White" and "Black." While there is nothing intentional or implied in the use of the words in this story, lets just say Its a reminder to some of us, that some people still think in those terms, and its saddening. Its an ingrained way of looking at people, that really does seem harmless to many of the people who view the world and those around them through that lens. But honestly at best such a view is still silently divisive, needlessly sorting people into these, and those. And we all know where that kind of viewpoint can take a person when they knowingly use it as a weapon. I do not in anyway believe the writer used such terms to be divisive, but I would honestly encourage them to do a quick patch and replace such charged labels with descriptions that would still fit the characters. If you need some ideas on how to do that there are alot of IF games out there, that let players choose their features such as skin tone, hair color ect, all without using those two words as racial stand ins. (also missed opportunity not let us design / dress up our characters a little bit, thats always fun!) All in All i still highly recommend this story!

TLDR... Romance options are plain and forgettable with very little depth MC has a set personality which may or may not work for you, it did not for me Much of the story's potential is wasted, barely branches Writing style isn't all that, needs to be trimmed down 1. The Romance Options They're not that good. Perhaps only halfway through the game, around chapter six out of twelve, do you actually get to know a bit more than the surface-level details about the characters. But you've already been made into thinking some of them are hot before then, and for what? because of the color of their hair or their supposedly good ass? I guess that might just be what you have to choose from when these characters are so Nothing. I wrote above that you finally get to know a bit more on the ROs halfway through, and it really is only a bit more. Even with these scenes, these characters are still so Plain, indistinct, and underdeveloped. Pick the stereotype you're most into, that's it. Unexciting and dull romances happen in a lot of Heart's Choice games due to a low word count and focus on story branches instead of the characters, but most games with such problem have less than 180,000 words in them, so with over 250,000 words, I was expecting this game to be much better with that, and it's not, so... 2. The MC Trash. Garbage, even. (It's a joke, for the most part...) Yeah, if you couldn't tell, I'm not a fan of this MC we have. There's little opportunity to roleplay with this guy and you're mostly set as some sort of insecure dudebro who can hardly stand to be normal about who the guys he finds attractive. Much of the dialogue you're made to say is cringey as hell and makes you look like a total weirdo - I don't think you needed to say to him how you first jerked off at thirteen, MC. The author didn't have any other possible options in mind as to who you want to play as other than what he thinks MC should be. Maybe I'd be willing to look past a lot of my issues with the MC if something interesting came out of his dudebro archetype as the story and romances went along, but as I wrote above, these romances are so unfulfilling and forgettable, and the story... 3. The Story I was expecting the plotline of disappearances to be much deeper and more dramatic than it really is. It is not. There were a few moments throughout where it seemed the author actually did have an idea on what effect the disappearances could have on the characters behavior, and they were kind of neat. But they never get brought up again when you think they should, so the potential seems real wasted after that. As for the last two chapters, it 's glaringly obvious what the plot twist is, and the stakes aren't high enough, leading to a not-so satisfactory conclusion. It's also very on-rails throughout, the non-linearity is short-lived, everything will ultimately lead to the same one ending anyway no matter what you do. 4. The Writing I suppose it's been too long a time since I read something and wanted to go through it with a red pen and remove all the irrelevant sentences and paragraphs. [Figuratively...] So about that 263,000 word count with almost no actual branching in both the plot and the romance, where did so much of it go? Well, this book is written in a *very* boring and dull style. So many paragraphs with not enough intrigue or real valuable info. It doesn't flow well - has this writer heard of page breaks? Or paragraph breaks for that matter? I started skimming after a while, should probably stop wasting my time reading all that. 5. Redeeming Qualities (Or at least, the parts I did enjoy.) MC stands up to Noel being uselessly angsty over him at the end of chapter twelve. Raimundo's route is very much the best out of the five. With more romantic scenes, it could become something actually quite decent. The option to abandon Alistair at the motel out of fear for your safety and Noel's worry for you if you choose not to alert him about your hotel? Fun and interesting moments, wish there were more of them in the narrative to hammer in the theres-a-killer-on-campus plot. The sex scenes are... fine. They didn't exactly work for me since I'm not connected with the characters, but they're otherwise written competently. 6. Other Complaints It's so clear the author wants you to hook up with Caleb lmao There couldn't be all unique reactions for every RO while on the car trip with them? Sure, there are a few different dialogues and moments that you get to have depending on your RO, but only a few. Maybe I'm just being oversensitive or an "SJW" but I'm really not a fan of how the characters races are described. Oh, the guy standing next to you? He's White. The girl at the door? She's Indian. (Did that make you uncomfortable too? 'Cause it sure did to me...) Bit of a lonely game, I'd say. You don't get to make real friends in here, neither do the ROs interact much with each other either, so there are no dynamics to be seen with them. Conclusion? I'm not sure, maybe I just came in with much different standards than I should have with this, but either way, I'll still be on the lookout for a good m/m game from Heart's Choice. I see there are lots of positive reviews for the game. Frankly, I don't get it, but perhaps you will? If my review hasn't dissuaded you, maybe give it a try. You might enjoy it where I didn't. [Originally written Dec 22 2023, partially revised Jul 10 2024]

Excuse me... Where exactly is this college located in Tennessee? Not one, not even two, but ALL FIVE GUYS have the hots for you?! AND this is all happening WHILE you just started college?! (Yeah okay I know the real answer... Potion of magnetism. XD. It just... Had to be!) Since this game had a murder mystery: I obviously went for COMBAT mastery. It was unnecessary... V.V Because that... I am going to call it weird... CHOICE messed everything up! "Low-key hedonism" isn't flirting apparently! Good to know! Restarting did wonders and I couldn't choose a guy so I went/did all four of them. Sorry BEST FRIEND, but all you guys do is swear and flip one another off. You two don't give me ANY chemistry together. PAH! Four guys in... And I only liked two. One because he was mysterious... And a certain someone FORGOT to ask him about said "mystery"... COUGH... And the other one was Halim. I knew a Halim as a courtesan in another game, so this game reminded me of him. Halim is a sweetie. Yes. The answer is yes. It's fine to "sample all" and pick just one. :> Remember when I said that it isn't really a major thing to do Combat? It really isn't... I picked Enchantment on my next play through... You know... To Enchant people's clothing off faster? And I did 2x better than my first time. Why? Because in this game focusing on ONE SKILL is a bad idea. So let's be a crazy, studious ass and focus on them all! No one could compete! Let's talk bads now. I COULDN'T for the life of me read ALL THE TEXT. Mind you it wasn't anything horror-like or so sad that you would lose your heart through your nose... It's just... WALLS OF TEXT!!! Especially for exams and teachings and f me! CAN YOU PLEASE separate those paragraphs?! My eyes start to wonder/glaze over and I can't focus! I am already out of school! Stop putting me back in there! Without a proper motivation that is... Heh heh. What else? You will learn JACK SHEET about your love interests. Yes. I can only tell you their stereotypes. That's it. See game? If you just put MORE INFORMATION into developing THOSE GUYS and less into studies... Which I didn't read and still got accepted into the top university AND dueling academy...! Then you would have a more interesting story! The mystery...! Okay, would it be shallow to say I was chasing "dat ass" instead of caring who was killing people? I mean... There is an option to "go back to sleep" or "help with search party"... I can't function if I don't sleep. Sleep it is. Now now... While THAT may sound insensitive... Please ask yourself this... Whose fault was it that I chose those options? Mine? The game itself or perhaps the knowledge that even if you DON'T get into the center of it all... You will still end up solving the mystery? Eh? EH?! Without going further in depth and becoming a freaking snore of a lesson, I will tell you this: I liked it. Minuses aside... I did enjoy the parts I did read. The lewd parts and romance parts and some of the school parts. Yep. It also offered me a guy's perspective. Although... I didn't learn much of anything that I didn't already know... Apart from everyone had a "fine ass"... What's considered a "fine ass" anyway? The details on that were absent and- Kidding. Fine, simple (if you don't read certain parts) book to pass time and get you that BL magic school "semi-fix". OOH YEAH. Thank you!!! :D >:3

I enjoyed this games and finished it roughly under 9 hours. The story was well done and kept me on my toes. I choose Alstair because I'm into mysterious men but Caleb or Halim wouldve been my second choice. I was a goody two shoes my first round and I plan to play a bad boy in the next round.