C14 Dating Reviews

The writing in this game is extremely detailed. I was impressed by how thorough they were with all the archaeology knowledge that was in this. I, personally, am very into archaeology and geology, but I can see how someone might not be into this game if that's not their cup of tea (it's so detailed that it may drag down the gaming experience for you if you're not into that kind of thing). The mini games are pretty fun, one it picross and the other is math based, I guess? I romanced Hendrik for my first play through and he is perfect <3 But all the characters feel quite real and unique. It's a charming story and I look forward to playing through everyone else's route.

When I first started playing I was a bit bored but honestly this is such a sweet and cute little game and reminded me a lot of the feeling of first love and school worries during university. There's not a lot of romance until the end, but it's a great palette cleanser between darker games. This is also one of those rare otome games where a majority of the love interests could feasibly be considered datable irl. While there isn't a lot of a romance plot, the love interests are very sweet and great at communication, again a rare trait in otome games.

Writing is very well done and storyline is interesting. It's a long game, which I liked, however it's not as "easy" or "intuitive" as some other games I have played to get to the "romance" ending. My first playthrough was about 3 hours and I never got to romance, just became friends. But overall I enjoyed the game, mini games were a little hard but the good thing is you can turn them off if you want.

This game is so beautiful, for so many reasons. Yes, it's aesthetically beautiful - the art, the sprites, the CG's, everything is gorgeous. But, it's more than that. The story is equally beautiful. All of the characters are amazing, fleshed out, wonderful people. I enjoyed getting to know them all and being their friends. I've only done romance route so far (Hendrick) but plan to do them all (no duds here!). The depth of story is nice, as is the length, and the mini-games/scheduling is a bit different to other visual novels (though not all). But, for me, where this game truly touched my heart was all the disability representation. The PC is a diabetic, one character has a prosthetic arm, another has a cochlear implant... As someone disabled myself, I was overwhelmed by not only the representation, but how well it was done. It was handled with grace and dignity, and none of the characters were othered or stereotyped in any way. I can't thank the creators enough for this. You have truly made my day to have discovered such a charming and wonderful game. I can't wait to dive in and play more paths.

[i]C14 Dating[/i] is a very cute dating game with an archaeology theme, something that I have not yet seen before. It has some stat raising mechanics, mini games, and a very diverse cast of characters to befriend and romance. You are Melissa, 3rd year anthropology student on an archaeology summer course/internship in Belgium. Your fellow classmate couldn't make it on the trip, and so it's just you and your professor from California. That means you have to overcome language barriers, cultural differences & other boundaries to become friendly with the other students -- but at least there's camping, s'mores, and lots of cute guys and girls around! [h1][b]Pros[/b][/h1] + Its theme, centered around archaeology & geology + The characters' diversity (disabilities, different body types, etc) + Pretty artwork + The ability to turn off the mini games & change the font + Lots of save slots [h1][b]Cons[/b][/h1] - The mini games [i]can[/i] get tedious, but you can disable them - Some of the luck-based mechanics for the games & stat raising It's obvious that the writers of this game knew a lot about archaeology, and I learned a lot as well! It's an interesting theme to which the mini games add some extra fun. The games themselves are light (one sudoku-like game & one luck/guessing game), as is the stat raising (you create a weekly schedule with activities that raise certain stats). Its overall atmosphere is very summer camp-like: sleeping in tents, cooking together, partying & setting up a festival. Next to its archaeology-focus, the best part for me is the incredibly varied & diverse cast. You've got four guys and one gal on a "secret" route: [list] [*][b]Kyler[/b], aloof neighbourhood tsundere with a cochlear implant [*][b]Deandre[/b], friendly & easygoing rugby player [*][b]Hendrik[/b], pun-loving geologist with a prosthetic arm [*][b]Shoji[/b], shy & chubby gamer with an artistic talent [*][b]Joan[/b], French flutist struggling with communicating in English [/list] And I really loved all of them!! They are vibrant characters whose background is expanded upon in their own route, in other people's routes, and during location/random events (either when you're working in the lab or in the cave). Most of them are also from different countries & speak different languages. It's such a varied and cute bunch of people all connected to archaeology in some way, and all trying to help out Melissa, the protagonist. Would 100% recommend this if you're looking for a cute, diverse dating/otome game that doesn't have a standard story or theme. I thought it was a great experience :)

I really fell in love with this game. The characters are all unique and likeable. The story is not deep, but to be honest I think that's a nice change from visual novels/dating sims that spend too much time with overdone drama. It's also so much more realistic that way. Love the diversity and the humor. At times I got a little frustrated with the lab minigame, but I think it's nice to have them in the game istead of "only" having choice options. (And you can turn the minigames off!) If you're looking for a light-hearted, sweet dating game that's just a little different, this might just be the game for you!

C14 dating is probably one of Winterwolves' best dating sims. And I've enjoyed all their games. You are Melissa, a university archaeology student, on a dig site in Belgium. You get to meet a selection of interesting people, and potentially fall in love with them. It's gratifying to see greater diversity, in so many ways: you have a saphic love interest, as well as an ace love interest. The protagonist is Hispanic. There are three disabled characters (protagonist is diabetic, one love interest is deaf, another has a prosthetic arm). Game play is fairly standard for this sort of game, with skill building and socialising with love interests till they're either friends or lovers etc... the game contains two mini games, which are skippable if you don't like puzzles or just want to speed up a second/third/fourth playthrough. Unlike in some earlier games, an effort seems to have been made with each love interest to make them at least somewhat compatible with our protagonist. You have some common ground with everyone and the relationships feel plausible. I'm also impressed at the level of detail and research that went into this game. Speaking as someone who's trained in both geology and archaeology, I can say that I saw no glaring errors. It's also nice to see such effort put into friendship paths, though there are occasions where it feels like you only got onto the friendship path because you failed at the romance path. It's also gratifying that there is an 'alone' ending which is positive (rather than being a lose condition as it is in many dating sims). All in all I can thoroughly recommend this game to anyone who enjoys dating sims. As I said at the start, this is one of Witnerwolves' best games so far.

Note: Disregard play time as I bought this game much earlier during it's beta phase and finished it then. I just wanted to review this game as soon as possible, so here we are. This is a cute little visual novel with puzzle mini-games and stat-raising as the gameplay. Puzzles were definitely fun for a time, but I admit it got a bit repetitive down the line. If puzzles aren't your thing, I remember the option for disabling it during the beta, so plus points to this game for catering to the varying tastes of the audience. The writing was well done as well (I can't say anything more specific as I don't want to spoil any detail of the story) and I ended up liking all the characters shown on screen, which is always a good thing. As for the routes, I really can't say as frankly I bought this game for full price, twice (once during the beta, and then here on steam), solely for the yuri route. That particular route is very adorable in my opinion, so I left the game pretty satisfied with my overall experience. Tl;dr : Spent $40 for this game solely for the yuri. No regrets.

I enjoyed this game and that is enough to give it a thumbs up, although for every little thing this game does right, there is a thing it does wrong. [b]Song in the Main Menu is great[/b]. Whenever I opened the game, I stopped for a little bit to listen to it, but [b]music in the game is super generic and annoying[/b]. [b]I like the way that romancable characters look[/b]. They aren't just your standard otome pretty boys. They have different body types and they have their limitations. On the other hand, [b]their personalities are super cliche[/b]. You have your intelligent, cold and distant boy, that turns out to have a golden heart, you have easygoing sportsman and shy but kind nerd. Cliches aren't necessary a bad thing, as long as you can do something new and original with them or around them, but sadly, it's not the case. I like the fact that [b]it's all about friendship[/b]. I hate when otome games, especially those sets in modern times, force you to focus on one particular character and, from the very beginning makes you know that romance is your main goal. Even if there are friendship endings, they usually feel like bad ends. Not here. I really liked how Melissa is getting along with people around her and how she gets to know them better. On the other hand, [b]romance is poorly done[/b]. This is a problem with many Winter Wolves games - it just came out of nowhere. Yes, I've made Melissa and Kyler getting along, yes, they have few cute scenes, that could point to to the fact, that they are developing crush on each other, but they spent so little time together (lack of scenes), that it doesn't feel emotional when she screams "I love you!" at the end. Like... when? How that happened? [b]Mini games seems like a step in the right direction[/b]. There are way too many of them (it felt like there were more lengthy minigames that actual meetings with characters that are interesting to you), sure. The lab one is partially based on luck, which seems pointless, but the cave one is challenging and pretty fun (if you want to play something like that and not, you know, focus on plot). Still, you have option to skip them and despite all the negative stuff I've just said, I can imagine it being a nice addition, if it will be done better in the future. [b] Stat raising, though, is annoying and pointless[/b]. Really. There is absolutely no reason why there need to be stats at all, especially, since you don't need to keep tracks of two stats, like in "Nicole" for example, but only one. Want to date Kyler? Spam "study". Prefer Shoji? Spam "play games". What's the point of doing that, when you could chose particular paths or scores points with characters just by making choices within the plot? And there are choices like that here, so... Once again, why are we raising stats? For some extra endings, that also could be acquired my making right decisions?

C14 Dating is a nice, laid-back visual novel about romance and archaeology. (Like, seriously, lots of archaeology.) There isn't much of a plot: you are an American college student going abroad for a 2-month elective at an archaeological site in Belgium. There is little to no conflict, no "true route", etc. It's really all about interacting with the people you can date/become friends with, which is why I say it is a laid-back game. Despite the lack of a plot, I would say that most of the game's strengths lie in its writing. The cast, which is pretty diverse--some characters have disabilities, as well as different sexualities and body types--is very loveable, and though some of them could be linked to certain dating sim tropes, they are well-rounded and not restricted to cliches. Interactions between characters and the MC are cute, and rather than a 'good end' and a 'bad end', each character has a 'romance end' and a 'friendship end' [strike]both of which made me smile like an idiot[/strike]. Even if you fail to befriend anyone, nothing bad happens. It's just a game that exhales niceness all around. On another positive note, the music is fairly nice and the art is usually well-done, although some CGs look a little awkward (Deandre, particularly, looks smaller and thinner in his CGs than in his sprites; and there are some issues with facial angles). On the other hand... I was somewhat disappointed in the stat-raising system. I've played very few VNs based on stats, but they would usually require some balance (you would eventually need all stats to be at a certain level, which requires a strategy to juggle all possible activities in order to keep that balance). This doesn't happen in C14. If you want to get into a character's route, you just need to spam the hell out of one option and follow them to the cave or lab whenever you can, save for a few exceptions (the game never tells you where Joan is and there is one event of Shoji's that takes place when he was supposed to be at the cave, yet he turns out to be at the lab for... some reason). While this may make the game easier for those who don't like stats to begin with, it makes the whole system feel dispensable. It really only plays a significant part (in which you need to somewhat balance your stats and choices) to get the Group Photo CG and the Best Alone End. The minigames are entertaining at first, but quickly become tedious. Last but not least, this is the VN with the least intuitive choices I've ever played since Amnesia. There are occasions in which all choices available feel "neutral", and others in which a choice causes an effect opposite to what you would've imagined (this happened a lot in Kyler's route, particularly). All in all, I still enjoyed the game due to its characters and to how well some themes were handled (long-distance relationships, language barriers, friendship ends, and ESPECIALLY the asexual character route). I recommend it if you want a wholesome slice-of-life dating sim experience with little to no negativity and decent diversity. I do not recommend it if you're into dark, complex themes and/or very averse to stat-raising... or to using a guide. Because trust me, you'll probably need one.