Long Live The Queen (sim, commercial)

[fleet]

Ok, how many words or screens?

That's kind of a weird way to quantify this game. It isn't a traditional VN, so that information isn't going to tell you much. I will back up Papillon and say that I played for days and days (and had time to create a map for the game) before I ever survived to see ONE ending. It is almost a - puzzle, stat-raising, VN? You don't just randomly pick stats to raise - you'll quickly learn you need to have a strategy to prepare for upcoming events.

All the ways you can die are fun to discover. Something kills you one game so you learn not to make that mistake again the next game, but in preparing differently you may set off a different chain of events than transpired the last time you played.

You can unlock different outfits that affect your stats in different ways, and choose to be a cruel or kind queen or anything in-between. It's the kind of game where I had fun even when I was dying over and over again and not reaching the end, so everyone should check it out! The list of ways Elodie can die IS hilariously long.

At the renai archive authors often state game play time or number of words/screens.
As a potential customer I think I have the right to ask questions before I spend my money or invest the time to download something (I have a slow internet connection). If you think that's weird, so be it.
"All the ways you can die are fun to discover" doesn't sound like fun to me, so I guess I am weird. I'll pass on this one, thank you very much.

[papillon]

I actually can't *give* you a wordcount because so much of the game text is wrapped up in separate code that doesn't lint.

You certainly have the right to ask questions, it's just that in this case the answers to the specific questions you've asked are not going to be accurate or helpful. If the information given doesn't sound like it's your thing then yeah, skip this one, I'll be doing a more traditional VN next.

[NatsukiDeath]

Oh Wow I'm surprised how much I am enjoying this game! >o< It is something genius really.

Having to think about what one action may do to you. (much as one consequence could be death or just failing one event.)

I'm glad I bought the game, so worthwhile if you want to have a witty adventure game with costume changes (they are cute~) and a mystery plot to follow on.

Already got a few things checked off the list, though working on getting to see the tentacle monster still.

[Anarchy]

I'm curious, papillon - were the three subskills thing inspired by the skill system in Academagia?

[papillon]

Not exactly. It was more that when I first started writing out piles of skills that I thought would be useful, enough of them naturally grouped into three kind-of-related-things that I thought I should just run with that.

[DerWille]

I picked up the demo and was impressed with what you put together. So I got the full thing.

It's the first time I've seen a game like this go without a stress/fatigue system and just let the opportunity cost of X or Y be the only price of an action. The mood system really helps accentuate that. It's basically inefficient to do anything without a 1.0 mood bonus but sometimes you're pressured to go against that. I also appreciate the crazy amount of ways this little girl can die. It makes her paranoid aunt completely justified.

After playing through a few times I was able to beat it and I sort of noticed a few things. The first is that royal demeanor, conversation, and luman magic seem to be the focus of the majority of events or handle them better than other skills. For example..

The poisoned chocolates event for example. Court manners is what lets her choose to not eat them and even gives a better hint that they're bad than the trade skill does.

Speaking of which, this is a pretty large spoiler so, back to the tags...

The invasion event seems to come across as know magic or die. I beat it the first time by nuking it with magic and the second time by winning the duel (I used the magic sword).

My first attempt at clearing the event, I had tried 100 logistics, 100 naval strategy, led the battle myself, and hired extra troops, but it was still a loss. Which is fine, but it makes me wonder what more does she need to clear the event without resorting to magic. I need to play around with options more, but it would be nice if there were some option to let them make landfall and fight them on the ground without losing your troops or waking the sleeper in the deep.

I realize there is the marriage alliance options (I've never picked it), but for me, that's as good as dying. Capitulating and losing your kingdom before you're even queen is right up there in the bad ends.

Still talking about skills, what mood gives a bonus to Economics? Also, is meditation used for anything? I've never seen something use it, but I need to explore the game more.

I think you have a good core to a game that could become much larger and much more interesting if you started to expand out the content. The two big ones would be a random event system that follows different "plots" and a high score system for endings. That would give players an objective way to look at how they did and try to get the "best" ending possible.

Also a smaller, quality of life thing, on the weekend activity select screen, would it be possible to have the option to bring up the mood menu? Sometimes I forget where it's at and pick the wrong thing.

[papillon]

There are plenty of other ways to get past the

poisoned chocolates

Most people go for the puppy solution, since it only requires you to raise one skill.

As for the big event at the end of the game...

... while you say 'know magic or die', the *easiest* way through is never to become a Lumen in the first place! Then you can just let the invasion happen and let someone else fight the final duel, while you only need to pass a composure check to stay alive.

Defeating the invasion solely on grounds of military force is intended to be ridiculously hard. You need to have the right skills to detect the fleet buildup EARLY so that you can build extra ships, as well as in general building up your military as much as possible and not wasting it on any other conflicts. This thread may help.

Trying to ally in marriage with Togami actually doesn't work anyway, he's already married. There IS another way to avoid the duel with truth and justice and love and music but it requires a lot of skills.

Nothing gives a bonus to Economics at the moment - no mood really seemed appropriate for making it easier to do math. You gotta go for the power of hard work there.

Meditation... There are a few places where Meditation can be used in place of Composure to pass a 'calm' check, and there's one important clue to a certain subplot that can only be found by getting your Meditation super-high. In general it's not the most useful of skills.

Considering that it's already very difficult to get through this game alive, I'm not sure how anyone would EVER manage it if it had random events. The game is all about learning and planning ahead and exploring options under tight constraints - if stuff happened at random you'd just die.

We're planning on adding a way to view your moods at the weekend activity screen, since several people have suggested it. Just not sure how best to fit it into the interface.

It makes her paranoid aunt completely justified.

Have you figured out what's actually going on with her aunt yet?

[Anarchy]

no mood really seemed appropriate for making it easier to do math

Then maybe having neutral mood boost economics might be fun!

...on second thoughts, maybe not. I'd spend way too much time trying to neutralize my mood. Eugh.

Considering that it's already very difficult to get through this game alive, I'm not sure how anyone would EVER manage it if it had random events. The game is all about learning and planning ahead and exploring options under tight constraints - if stuff happened at random you'd just die.

This is why I love this game

[DerWille]

I'd give the bonus to economics to either depressed, afraid, or cheerful because they're the weakest moods. I typically find depressed to be the worst because animal handling doesn't pop up much and only decoration of expression comes up with any regularity. Afraid has reflexes which is useful when she's attacked and faith for divination/lore. I remember cheerful was hooked up to athletics but the others escape me at the moment.

My compliant wasn't that there aren't other ways to do things outside of royal demeanor, conversation, and magic (outside of that one thing), but they're a dominant strategy. Those three skill sets seem to handle so much that not investing in them seems detrimental.

I read a little bit of the thread. I'm cool with not hitting all the flags for making a naval victory possible. I have tried runs with high divination which told me a war was coming, but despite preparing in the most logical way (increasing all military stats), it still failed. Speaking of warning events, the musician one is odd. I've hired her, but she never provided anything of value. I never passed the intrigue check though, but I did receive the message about musicians being good for spying. So I figure it has something to do with that.

A random event system would place greater importance on the skills that give you warning such as divination, lore, intrigue, and history. The early game would then be balanced against raising the skills that let do things vs the ones that warn her about what's coming. The reason I mention this is because random events would help keep the game from being "solvable". That keeps the game replayable and extend its shelf life.

The score idea was also to push people to take risks and try to irk by with as low of a skill in something as possible. Its a mechanical incentive to do more than stay at home in the castle (which is the best way to live).

Wouldn't the easiest way to add a mood screen to weekend activities is to put a textbutton on the bottom right handle screen that shows the mood screen from the gamemenu? You might need to make a separate one with a different tag and a back button to the weekend activity imagemap.

EDIT: I forgot to answer your question.

So far I know she's a luman. The first time I beat the game was with the nuke their navy event from power leveling sense magic before the ball.

[Arcanum]

I think I just met the first opportunity to get killed in game... I assumed I was reaching the end of the game, but apparently there's a lot to go o_o! So far it's very nice, but I think I'll need a guide very soon oops

[Elze]

Bought the game and totally adore it! Still haven't gotten a decent ending yet, and many many compliments to the artist. She made the queen effing adorable!

So far, the best I ever did was

fleeing away to the guy who gave me a necklace.

I'll try to nab at least one ending when the weekend comes.

[Anarchy]

I think that LLTQ has quite a lot of replayability what with all the different ways you can "solve" the game. Even if you run through the game once successfully, there are still going to be tons of other plot threads/scenes to get. Not to mention all the achievements.

[Elze]

Yesssss finally got an ending!

Trying to survive the attack from the Shanjia king was a nightmare! After several failed attempts, I eventually had to forgo 2 major events (the birthday party and taking part in the festival) so that I could raise my stats high enough to conquer him. I ended up marrying Adair and ruling a stable kingdom without any alliances, prevailing with a good business sense. Very satisfied with this ending! xD

Now that I've gotten my desired outcome, I've got to try for one of the more risky endings.
I personally think this game is worth every penny for it's replayable value. I think I've clocked somewhere between 5 and 10 hours just to achieve my first ending, which is already a longer playtime than some of the more expensive VNs that I've previously purchased. And the best part was that it wasn't a mechanical formula of simply 'replaying to raise the correct stats', since different stats and choices will branch out to different subplots.

I'd definitely recommend it for people who don't mind trying their hands at something more challenging that's not too frustrating <3
This is probably my favorite VN for this year!

[RVB]

This game looks absolutely beautiful. I will definitely be trying out the demo!

[Lumen_Astrum]

I played through once and I'm glad it wasn't a death ending. XD

Oh good lord, I dunno what makes Elodie losing her throne so sad.

I laugh everytime the word Lumen is mentioned, for some weird reason I am not sure of.

Will play through again XD