tl;dr The developers behind this gem undoubtedly put a lot of effort into bringing the story, its characters and the part of world they wished to portray to life.
I wish the care, passion, and amount of details they had put into this work was the standard.
Do give it a read if the idea of returning into a small, tranquil village in early 20th century Scottish countryside as a young adult, after surviving the trenches of the western front of WW 1, only to slowly find love and discover magic & Fae are real piques your interest. Even if you're not big on furries.
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I've read my fair share of VNs from both sides of the globe.
While I don't consider that to mean much, it's my opinion that few VNs match Changeling Tale in its overall quality and especially the attention for detail.
I believe many people tend to overrate any given piece of medium. You can see them giving 9/10, 10/10, 5/5 or similarly high ratings to works that hardly deserve such without giving it much or any thought at all.
So while I can't be completely sure I'm not guilty of doing the same here, I also believe Changeling Tale deserves at least 4.5/5, but given I can't rate it as such I rounded it to 5/5.
Many other reviews already brought up many valid points, such as:
I wish the care, passion, and amount of details they had put into this work was the standard.
Do give it a read if the idea of returning into a small, tranquil village in early 20th century Scottish countryside as a young adult, after surviving the trenches of the western front of WW 1, only to slowly find love and discover magic & Fae are real piques your interest. Even if you're not big on furries.
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I've read my fair share of VNs from both sides of the globe.
While I don't consider that to mean much, it's my opinion that few VNs match Changeling Tale in its overall quality and especially the attention for detail.
I believe many people tend to overrate any given piece of medium. You can see them giving 9/10, 10/10, 5/5 or similarly high ratings to works that hardly deserve such without giving it much or any thought at all.
So while I can't be completely sure I'm not guilty of doing the same here, I also believe Changeling Tale deserves at least 4.5/5, but given I can't rate it as such I rounded it to 5/5.
Many other reviews already brought up many valid points, such as:
- the interesting, novel setting of early 20th century Scotland
- the focus on Fae, legends and folklore
- the overall art direction
- the intricate relationships between the colourful set of characters
- the music that accentuates everything from the serene loch, through the green, Scottish pastures, to the homely feel of the early 20th century farms
- the scenes where that passion runs high
- and many others
- the care and passion of the developers radiates clearly from their work
- the attention for detail is unusually high
- instead of having one or two endings per route, the developers went the extra mile and included several endings per route + quite a few small early/bonus endings which most VNs wouldn't bother with
- a lot of effort was put into making the setting of early 20th century Scottish countryside believable
- that's despite some small anachronisms here and there
- the game has many small, charming secrets
- I think it's an amazing idea that's rarely seen in VNs
- the routes don't drag on for too long, nor are they too short, which leaves the reader satisfied with the experience while leaving them just slightly hungry for more
- some which I'm probably forgetting right now
- a few scenes felt a bit too verbose, as in a few lines could have been cut from the script, but that's partially subjective
- Malcolm's attitude towards Alana was at times strangely antagonistic right from the get go and his behaviour around her differs considerably across routes without much reason
- depictions of individual characters is (occasionally) not fully consistent across all art (excluding sprites, obviously)
- such as their faces, heads, or body proportions might be a bit different when compared to their sprites, and vice versa
- that said, the tiny discrepancies were never distracting, so don't take it as a negative and merely as an area that could be possibly improved in the future