Melancholy Republic Reviews

I loved the story to this game and the graphical style, the atmosphere was a good mix of fun scenes and sad scenes, with some rare actually good fourth wall/meta humour. its also nice to see some good British humour. however, it is rather janky, with semi functional controls and some spelling mistakes. also, it is basically a visual novel with a few adventure game elements, its fine as long as you understand that but don't expect an RPG.

Update: 'Life is about beginings and not endings', and this particular peice of story work has me enamoured. It may seem totally inpromrehncible but some moments have litterally left me in awe, and for good reason. There are a good amount of plot holes and sequences that do not marry up, also some grammatical and spelling errors, though let's remember there were plenty in FF7. One of these such examples is to do with the armoured princess (I guess minor spoliers here) Claires father makes it clear early on that she is rarely seen and that she is kept away from the public, yet claire has substantial meetings with her and she seems to have full reign of the city without the town guard going absolutley mad that she has departed. The clever and sutble reference and nods to other RPG's are most welcome and they are not overdone either, such as this one in relation to FF7. While I have yet to firmninatley comment on it, the obvious plus point is the soundtrack! absolutely sublime and as used by RPG's of yonder years this has a massive impact in the storytelling, it's up there with some of the best ever. Video Review: https://youtu.be/f8LJ98kdtpo ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Perhaps it's abit early to give a review on a game where I'm not even past the intro. But my very early opinion of this is very high. A beautifully put together game, it's obvious alot of time and effort has gone into making this as polished as it seems thus far. Naturally it's a very slow paced, narritive driven game and this should be at the fore of your mind when going into the game. The story aspects soo far are interesting and have me wanting to learn more about the world and the chararcters. So I'll leave this here for now and update when appropriate. If you want to see it running and how it looks in-game check out my video below. Youtube: https://youtu.be/NqjfVPVxBIU

The fact that as I write this, this game only has 16 reviews and is currently 'mixed' is heartbreaking to see. On one hand, I get it: you see RPGmaker art, you immediately assume grand JRPG-esque adventure with full combat system, customization, exp, etc. And yet, if you read the game's description, you'd know that that isn't what this is. This is ostensibly a kinetic visual novel, and an outstanding one at that. Excellent story and characters, emotional, well-written, and absolutely beautiful soundtrack. This game is the epitome of a hidden gem, and it pains me to see how poorly it reviewed and sold.

Well, this game really is what it says on the tin. It’s a melancholy RPGmaker game. Well… It’s more a visual novel than a game. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that, this is an experience I’d highly recommend, but don’t expect an RPG, because that is not what you’ll get here. There is hardly any agency. In fact, sometimes control is taken away from the player so much, that it can be a hassle to try to get to a menu to even save the game! There IS a lot to like here, though. Melancholy Republic’s maps and environments are stunning. All other RPGmaker games should really strive to match its quality in that department. The writing is a lot better than you’ll find in most RPGmaker games too, although it can be a bit on the nose at times, and a lot, though not all, of the characters are one dimensional. The music is good, and gets the job done. However, it could’ve been mixed better in areas and I didn’t find it particularly memorable overall. The real star of the show, in my eyes, was the world that the developers created here. I thought the backstory, the lore, the history and politics of the world were fantastic. This is definitely a world I’d love to learn more about and visit again.

As long as you're aware this is a visual novel going in, there should be no issues to be had. Controls are simple, but suffice for the VN environment. The soundtrack is beautiful and quite appropriate for the story. Perhaps during the ending credits when a particular piece is on repeat I wish there'd be more variety, but it's the only complaint about the soundtrack I can muster. The story itself for me was quite excellent and enjoyable, but depending on your tastes may not suit you. At times it feels like it could be flushed out a bit more, but doing so might make the game feel a bit long for some. I really have no regrets playing this game, and at full price I personally wouldn't feel like I overpaid, but any sale on it would lessen this possibility for others. I could see this becoming part of a VN Humble Bundle at some point.

It's obvious a lot of love has gone into this game. Though on the short side, the story, character depth, music, sprites and map design all work together very well. The writing could definitely expand on quite a few areas and use some proofreading, but overall, doesn't detract from the experience and is worth looking past. Would recommend for someone looking to experience an indie story-based thriller.

God, if ever hitting no felt painful on a review. Melancholy Republic was basically made for me, a period tragedy set during the corrupt early days of a new Republic, following a noble looking to see her father's killer brought to justice and falling in love with a princess. Its not at all shy with its politics or its heart. It even basically shits on historical English dictator Oliver Cromwell with its somehow even more cartoonily evil counterpart Kromwell. I should love this, problem is, it fails in most every aspect of its execution. Technically, it's an absolute mess. RPG maker is basically held together with spit and hope. I wouldn't wish it as your development software. Still I expect basic functionality. It lacks even a menu, I lucked out on a forum post to learn f5 can make it not full screen because god the visual tearing on full screen. Worse than that the audio is scuffed to hell. Which is a shame as the tracks, when they aren't skipping and screaming, are beautiful. Visually its very lovely for an rpg maker game, and even has moments of shining. Like damn the god rays look great. But also I hope you like walk speeds that range from drying paint to a brisk walk at random. Now some suggested it was just like a shitty asset flip to run away with the kickstarter funding, and I firmly disagree. This game has soooo much heart. It's heart is twice the size of its head and four times too big for the skill of the writing and pacing. Like god the game really got heart. Often the writing is so full of feeling that it fails to capture nuance at all. The villians are so cartoony in their evil, like how the hell does their Kromwell make Cromwell look not all that bad. The romance never gets time to sorta settle? The mystery gets abandoned within like a day of story, the ending twist so key to tragedy never bothers to explain how Kromwell predicted their plan? It spends so much time doing in scene back stories for its lovingly considered cast and all of them are so shallow and obvious. Yet somehow I did feel something at the end, which clearly shows they cared enough to make the emotions work even if it feels so... frustrating. Also the comedy is all awful, just a bunch of bad references with no real meaning. Arna, in her entirety was a mistake. I think what bothers me most about this game, is I don't think I'll ever find something with this concept ever again, and that more than anything, more than the tragedy at the heart of this story, leaves me heartbroken.

Melancholy republic... it's the state the game leaves you in afterwards. I found it very well written and distinctly different from other visual novels. Every character was endearing in their own way and just worked well together. The game has no options menu (April 2018, maybe the dev will add it later) but you can change some keybinds using F1. Press F5 to toggle fullscreen. Don't press F12 (screenshot) as it exits gameplay. Press esc to save when you're not in dialog.

An interactive game that isn't all about swords magic and potions ! It gives an interesting new view to games as such. But the sad part is I can't get myself into playing it with the slow movement, long text box as well as the fact that this game isn't running with steam. Steam overlay can't be used while this game is open, no way of customizing ur key binds, no way of customizing resolution and no way of customizing game screen. So if ur trying to take a screenshot of the game it will put u back to the main menu, well if u forgot to save... Ur going to have to RESTART ur entire game. I bought it when it first got released, I thought their dev would do something to fix that but I guess I was wrong... Wouldn't recomend this game until there's more game options for users to use !

Ok first let me start off that this games will have some big Pros and Cons depending on what youre looking for. Myself, i was looking for a rpg type game that didnt rely on combat, exactly this game. hoewever if your looking for something more than the story (like myself) this is NOT the game for you. the music was absolutely gorgeous i can not get enough of that up tempo string opening it's beautiful. the story its self was a compelling story and somewhat unexpected. Romea and Julliette type romance and ending, with a political and social story plot. Being that the story was great the game itself left me wanting more, It was more of visual novel than a game, which to me are not appeasing. theres is nothing you can do to dictate or change the story, and thats what i relish in a video game carving my own path making decisions and seeing how the choice affected the people around me. that being said this game has a great story, great music, but very little actual gaming. REPLAY VALUE- non-existent STORY- captivating CHOICES- minimal MUSIC- like who made it cause it's awesome balls OVERALL RATING- 3/5