Ok finally beat the first Utawarerumono.

I want to gather my thoughts some more and rewatch some scenes but it was good. I see why people hype the worldbuilding up, crazy in depth and engaging. The cast was fantastic and I was never bored when any of them were on the screen. Music was great too and really set the atmosphere.

Some negatives though, my GOD is the game long. Like idk if I'm slow at reading visual novels or what but goddamn bro almost 90 hours, because of this I feel like some sections dragged or were unnecessary but it is what it is. The ending was ok, I felt the beginning half was stronger but it wasn't bad. The final fight did have me crying though, the music and voice acting hit my soul!
All in all a pretty nice experience and I'm curious where it goes from here, a lot of set up happened for the future installments.

el mayor error de utawarerumono es no saber llevar una cohesión en el tono de la historia, una escena puede ser cruda y deprimente para que la siguiente escena sea comedia con escenas sacadas de anime ecchi genérico de temporada y puedo esperar esto de un moege, pero no de una historia con un peso dramático... es algo que se siente fuera de lugar, da pena ajena y es relleno puro el cual por lo que pude ver estás obligado a verlo ya que no hay manera de saltarse esas escenas.

otro problema con la obra es que cae en el cliché que más odio de una obra y es que todo es blanco y negro, no hay escalas de grises y aunque el grupo de "héroes" si tiene alguna escena que otra donde juega con el tema de la moralidad (el cual tampoco también fracasa ya que muchos de ellos terminan siendo hipócritas y contradiciéndose, pero el guion los hace ver como que ellos están en lo correcto...), el problema es más que nada de los villanos los cuales caen en el cliché de "malos muy malos porque si", el mismo cliché de villano genérico con monólogos, risas malvadas y sin ninguna razón real de porque hace lo que hace más que porque es malo.

estas cosas hubieran sido razón suficiente como para darle una calificación aún más baja y perder el interés por la saga, pero encontré la historia de Utawarerumono interesante con ganas de seguir saber que pasaría a continuación. seguire con la saga pero esta en una baja prioridad.

~ DIFFICULTY ~

🔲 My grandma could play it
🔲 Easy
☑️ Normal
☑️ Hard
🔲 Dark Souls

~ GRAPHICS ~

🔲 MS Paint
🔲 Bad
🔲 Meh
🔲 Graphics dont matter in this game
☑️ Good
🔲 Beautiful
🔲 Masterpiece

~ MUSIC ~

🔲 Bad
🔲 Not special
☑️ Good
🔲 Beautiful

~ STORY ~

🔲 This game has no story
🔲 It's there for the people who want it
🔲 Well written
☑️ Epic story
🔲 You choose your fate

~ PRICE ~

🔲 Free
🔲 Underpriced
🔲 Perfect Price
☑️ Could be cheaper
🔲 Overpriced
🔲 Complete waste of money

~ REQUIREMENTS ~

🔲 You can run it on a microwave
☑️ Average
🔲 High end
🔲 NASA computer

~ LENGTH ~

🔲 Very Short (0 - 3 hours)
🔲 Short (3 - 15 hours)
🔲 Average (15-50 hours)
☑️ Long (50-90 hours)
🔲 Extremely long (90-110 hours)
🔲 No ending

~ FUN ~

🔲 I'd rather watch paint dry
🔲 Hard to enjoy
🔲 Repetitive
☑️ Actually pretty amusing
🔲 Ride of your life

~ REPLAYABILITY~

🔲 It's a one-time experience
🔲 Only for achievements
☑️ If you wait a few months/years
🔲 Definitely
🔲 Infinitely replayable

~ WORTH BUYING ~

🔲 No
☑️ Wait for sale
☑️ Yes

I hadn’t heard of Utawarerumono until recently. This is a franchise that has been around for over two decades with multiple manga & anime adaptations as well as video games. I first heard of Utawareumono from a YouTuber I’ve been watching for the last few years talking about this series called The Kiseki Nut (https://youtube.com/@TheKisekiNut) & felt genuinely curious so decided to pick up Prelude to the Fallen first to see if I would enjoy this game as that seems to be the recommended entry point for the series.

But first a bit of background. The original Utawarerumono was released back in 2002 for Microsoft Windows. This is a Japanese adult fantasy tactical role playing visual novel developed by Leaf. It was later ported to the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita & PlayStation 4. It is now more commonly known as Utawarerumono: Prelude to the Fallen which is a remastered version of the OG. The game follows Hakuowlo, an amnesiac man who one day wakes up in a village without any memories of who he is.

Now while this is indeed technically a strategy RPG, I feel like with this game you really should know exactly what you’re getting into beforehand. If you are expecting something akin to Fire Emblem or any other popular strategy role playing game, then I’m sorry to say you will be sorely disappointed. I’d say less than half of this game is filled with these sections as Utawarerumono is mostly a visual novel as mentioned before.

And while the gameplay is simple & not anything to write home about while definitely decent at doing its job, that’s not why you should play Utawarerumono. You experience it for the story & the characters. And man does this game deliver on that excellently. I was so enamoured in this world from the very start & grew incredibly attached to everything going on. I mean it had me in tears only five hours in so really that should say a lot about just how much I loved this game’s story & how impactful it was. Sure it’s not perfect & I will say it has its low points but ultimately I was so incredibly invested from start to finish that I can look past the not so great parts. I felt SO many emotions by the end of my 45+ hours, it’s truly something special. I also really really love the artstyle of this game & the soundtrack is just magnificent. I struggle to find things I genuinely hated about this game. It’s just a rollercoaster throughout.

So yeah I think it’s fair to say I absolutely adore Utawarerumono. This is one of the most magical tales I’ve experienced in quite some time & I cannot wait to get to the sequels whenever I’m able to.

Play this game. I cannot recommend Utawarerumono enough. Do not sleep on it. This is one experience you don’t want to miss out on.

It's excellent but not perfect, the problems start in the middle of the game and its final stretch, and I find it amazing that even though it was problematic, it still made me cry at the end. I loved it.

I love how Uta is always made up of small moments, that's why people have to learn to value SoL, nothing is possible without a good SoL to work things out.

Works that work everything with movement seem to be rushed and works that use a lot of the Sun tend to be slow and tiring, mainly because SoL moments are where nothing is changing in the value of the characters, so I think Uta balances these moments very well with all action that comes after.

Despite the mistakes...(Na Tunk's Rebellion and the final stretch), Utawaremono manages to remain in excellent writing, which ends up weighing much more than the problems.

This being the first of the three games is frightening for its quality, I don't even know what I can expect from the other two.

Ootoo san~~

pat pat


Mmmmmmh ^w^

It's hard for me to confidently recommend this game to everybody. It's a decent title, that occasionally can excel, but it really stumbled everywhere else throughout my playthrough.

Utaware wants to be both a grand visual novel title, but it also wants to present itself as a Tactical JRPG. In an attempt to do both, it exceeds in neither. The gameplay is tolerable at its best, and boring/bland at its worst. It feels like more of a tacked-on decision by Aquaplus to try to promote this game to a broader audience than it does in the pursuit of something actually inspired. Never really felt like I was having to play smart in order to win battles. By the end, I was desperately begging to not have to do any more of this stuff. It doesn't help that the game has no way to skip a lot of battle animations because, believe me, you'll be tired of seeing them over and over after the halfway point (Edit: Apparently, there's a speed-up function in battle so this point I make is invalid now. Still It's not exactly clarified at all that you can do this.). Sure would have at least improved the pacing of this game, which is kind of awful to begin with, to not have to sit through so much meandering combat.

But that's not the reason people love Utaware, right? It's the story. So I figured I would enjoy this game more for that reason. Unfortunately, that's not so much the case. Utaware is not a bad story by any means but, once again, the pacing is bad and it really dips between being actually interesting and engaging, and just being the most cliche vanilla storytelling you've ever seen. The first act is great, I think. It sets up the story well, and there's enough mystique to everything that I wanted to learn more of the world-building and characters. Never really paid off though. After that good first act, it's a lot of mediocre stuff one after the other and it continues to do nothing special for a great chunk afterwards.

The final act somewhat comes together nicely, with a conflict that is at least kind of interesting. There's some neat twists that recontextualize the whole experience, and it wraps itself up on a pretty high note for the most part. Besides the narrative, you got a sleuth of supporting characters. I don't think any of them are super interesting or complex, but they're likable at least so I can't complain much.

It's an alright game but, if it wasn't for people praising later titles in the series, I probably would have dropped this.

8/10
28 horas de leitura, Li/joguei bem rápido mesmo.
Vou apenas fazer um comentário breve e arbitrário de minha experiência pessoal, como o habitual.

Utawarerumono foi uma grata surpresa, em pleno 2022, me deparei com uma visual novel jrpg ( 60% visual novel e 40% gameplay de jrpg tático) e meu Deus, é bom para um caramba.

Os diálogos são muito bem dosados, o background das palavras são bons, a gameplay apesar de simples da uma gás bacana em situações de narrativa e um incentivo legal para não ficar só lendo texto.
A dinâmica dos personagens e a convivência entre eles é o crème de la crème, me senti muito confortável lendo do começo ao fim, não enjoei de ler, não perdi o ritmo, foi genuinamente a 3° melhor experiência de leitura em uma visual novel.

A forma como o jogo vai explorando o mundo e os personagens através de suas simples mecânicas é fascinante, o engajamento foi muito alto depois de 7 horas de prólogo, ficava animado a cada momento que se passava.

Dito isso, se você procura uma boa história, você vai encontrar eu acho.... apesar de que tem um pequeno problema, o primeiro game dessa trilogia, os antagonistas são péssimos, tipo so existe um que é funcional para o andamento da história, o resto é só artifício de roteiro bem qualquer coisa, um elo fraco infelizmente.
A gameplay é bem simples, não irei comentar, afinal jogando você vai entender perfeitamente como você deve ser portar as batalhas, sério ela é tão simples que não tem mistério, mas posso comentar uma coisa:
Ela é um estilo tático similar de leve a fire emblem, aumentando ainda meu engajamento em aprender as mecânicas e as estratégias, que cá entre nós é um jogo bem fácil no normal....já no difícil, de fato é um desafio.
As osts são boas, mas a inserção delas em momentos chaves só começam a sincronizar em total harmonia com o texto na metade em diante, moldando muito melhor as cenas e os diálogos a um tom crescente muito bom.
A cara quando tocar kimi ga tame...lágrimas masculinas escorreram.

Ponderando, é um boa visual novel/jogo.
Amei os personagens, amei a dublagem, amei os cenários, amei os diálogos e por fim gostei da gameplay.
Recomendo para pessoas que buscam bons diálogos e curtem momentos slice of life, mas sobretudo uma boa história, com bons personagens.
Tenho grandes expectativas para as sequências visto que ouço falar que são superiores, então talvez eu tenha achado uma trilogia a agradecer pela existência.

Wound up loving this one. The beginning's very strong, the cast is wonderful, and the episodic stories throughout the middle are lovely (excepting the one with the inn owner/princess, it was apparently added to the console ports and you can feel it). But it's the climax/ending that really brought this one home for me. The lore bombs are honestly pretty ridiculous, but they still worked for me because they're grounded in Hakuowlo's journey, in the journies of the cast. Cried a whole lot multiple times through the concluding episodes.

I think where most folks will struggle is that there's very little urgency to most of the story; you really have to trust that it's taking you somewhere. It's a lot like Trails in that sense. But if you can give it that trust, if you're willing to luxuriate in the cast and world without real plot progression for long stretches, I think the game ultimately rewards you for your investment.

É um ótimo jogo, mas que eu tenho umas ressalvas pra fazer. Gostei bastante de como a história se desenrola (mas confesso que achei no começo um pouco do nada a mudança de storytelling), mas pelo formato do jogo o pacing me cansou bastante. Ficar mudando de momentos mais slice-of-life e combate alguma hora fica bem chato, mas pelo menos a história me cativou o suficiente pra continuar até o fim, só que às vezes essa mudança parece meio abrupta. O combate é bem simples, mas é funcional e no começo é divertido, só que mais pro final eu já tava meio desgastado dele pela simplicidade, mas ele é bem bom. Os personagens pra mim foram o ponto mais de destaque do jogo inteiro, junto da OST que é uma maravilha. No final das contas por tentar ser uma VN e um SRPG a experiência se torna bem dicotômica, senti que ele nunca soube dosar exatamente esses dois aspectos, mas é um puta jogo! Os pontos altos dele se destacam mais do que os baixos, então no geral eu sai bem satisfeito, e eu tô bem ansioso pra jogar o resto, principalmente o terceiro jogo. Recomendo demais.

I liked this mainly for the setting, which was pretty extensive with its world-building and lore. There’s a lot of interesting places, people, and terms to learn about and opened up some intriguing plot threads throughout. And the SRPG gameplay was fun enough, if really simplistic.

But the characters aren’t really memorable, especially the villains who weren’t fleshed out much at all despite how lengthy their segments can be. And a lot of the game was bogged down by pretty dull scenes that felt more like filler, making it a bit of a drag to get through. It picks up a bit in its final hours and has a good ending, but the game isn’t paced very well overall.

This is a pretty decent visual novel with some fairly mid gameplay intertwined. There are some neat animations in the gameplay with final strikes and co-op attacks. I found most of the characters likable, if not a little lacking in depth. The game drags in the middle but I think it ends really strong. If you like VNs and want to play this series I would recommend this since it sets up the sequels which are really good, but if you don't already like the genre or just want to play a standalone game I don't think this is for you. On its own it's a fine experience but if the other games didn't exist I don't think I would recommend this to anyone when so many other amazing VNs exist.

If you wanted to be mean you could call it a poor man's Fire Emblem, but aside from the fact that it's a tactical RPG I don't think it's very similar. This game is a lot more focused on the story and FE is generally more focused on the combat. The combat is honestly not great and the maps are really quite boring and samey. One or two of the maps are just like fuck you move your 10 units 40 tiles away with no real challenge in between you and your goal. Just an exercise in tedium!

There are some absolute nuclear bombs of cringe here and I don't consider myself someone who is usually sensitive to that kind of stuff. Like I've played many VNs before and have never really felt that way. Thankfully the ones that really got me were limited to the first 25% of the game or so. I would really prefer if Aruru's VA would refrain from like putting the mic in her mouth on some lines. Lord forgive me idk if the Uta community really likes her or not, but Aruru in general I didn't like.

While its turn-based tactics ruleset will likely leave a tactics aficionado disappointed, Prelude to the Fallen’s decision to stick close to its original 2002 design is also one of its greatest strengths as a narrative focused title. Its early history inspired setting is charming, its characters both fun and robust, and its plot is sufficiently weighty for the war drama it tells without indulging in unsufferable pessimism.

(I ended up binging the three Utwarerumono games back to back, so this review is effectively a "Part 1" of a review of the series as a whole.)

As a beginning to the series, Utawarerumono serves as a solid foundation. It has the markers of inexperience natural to a developer's first forray into a genre, but Leaf played it safe to positive effect by staying 60% in the realm of the Visual Novels they had built their reputation on. And, at least in Aquaplus's remake, the combat system’s safety means it’s also never frustrating and maintains the flow of the story even when their encounter design is at its weakest.

Combat is fairly archetypal FF Tactics style, and the most complex it gets is in managing the facing/flanking, unit element matchups, and a mana-like Zeal resource which effects what abilities your units have available. There’s a fun mechanic around timing button presses to the attack animations to get “criticals” and juice a little extra effect out of your units abilities. But, with how minor of a role Zeal makes in the moment-to-moment in this title, the timing game doesn’t reach the impact it has in the next two titles.

The combat system might have been quite fun as it is, but unfortunately its weakest link is simply encounter design. Arenas are sparse on environmental hurdles and if you have any basic grasp on positioning and target priority, the game will rarely give you any higher challenges. Despite this, I appreciate Leaf/Aquaplus’s decision in context. These days I personally favor more cutthroat turn-based combat, but I remember when early RPGs would derail my ability to experience the story with their random difficulty spikes. Leaf wanted to tell a tale first and foremost, and the combat was an experiment to enhance that. If the combat had stayed this way in the following titles, I would be more critical, but thankfully it did not.

As for that narrative, it follows a sort of episodic/historical structure covering the establishment of a small nation after a rebellion and the series of conflicts that shape its place in the world. Yet it’s equally a character focused tale following the tight knit circle leading the young nation. The regular breaks from the war drama to take time on low-stakes character and world building scenes will likely make it feel a bit slower paced at first. Yet, I was consistently surprised by how much of plot threads which seemed rather trivial at first unfolded into much more intricate events that weaved into the central narrative quite nicely.

I think what makes it work so well is that it is a story which rarely makes empty promises. When there’s fighting, people get hurt and die; when there’s political maneuvering, reputations are harmed and enemies are made; when times are tough, people make decisions they can’t take back; when there’s love, the population number goes up.

It may be that I’ve simply spent too much time in the orbit of modern fantasy anime, but there’s a very refreshing early-00s VN feeling to this story with its writing and subject matter. With the minor edits made in the 2006 iteration to bevel out the egregiously explicit early-00s VN elements, it comes off as a solid balance of fun and mature (and definitely not always both at once).

Once the ride gets going in earnest—and it does start a bit slowly—Utawarerumono offers an engaging series of twists and turns with many organic layers to its characters and intrigue. It’s not a flawless story, but it’s an effective one and I found myself well attached to the world by the end of the first act.

I imagine one element that many people will get hung up on is the more… harem-y setups, which is most prominent in this title of the three. And…

Fair

But a wise man once said that you can know the true virtue of a Harem Anime’s soul by the strength of its male supporting cast. And Utawarerumono does right by its men. The bonds of fraternity get their due development. Even apart from that, they also somehow manage to fit some real meaningful character development into most of the romantic scenes, well beyond the surface level appeal.

I have to dance around spoilers for my examples here, but there were a few subplots in particular that start out like setups to a rom-com gag, only to then closeline you in the gut with the sincerity or seriousness of them. One that got me was a “baby in the basket” setup that gets into boundaries one must put on their parental instincts. Then there’s another where a character’s drunken plea to the main character could have been ripped right out of a comedy as a setup—and it is quite light spirited in the moment—but in context it leaves a melancholy aftertaste, and that subplot ultimately blooms into the story’s most bittersweet tragedy and a major setup for the rest of the series.

So, yes, it’s harem-y, but it’s not a power fantasy. (How the sweaty otaku’s it originally preyed upon for sales in 2002 reacted to it, I can’t say)

In regard to the art and sound of the game: it was one of the main factors to me starting the series and it delivered throughout. I adore the character art. They hit such a fun balance between fantastical and period appropriate in the designs and the range of unique-yet-cohesive feeling characters is impressive. The illustrations, including the backgrounds, are soft and natural, yet clean and precise. Every inch of the screen adds to the warmth of its atmosphere, and the music carries you into it.

I do have to admit I’m not a huge fan of the 3D art used for the tactics gameplay sections. It was a Vita game at launch, however, so there’s little to do about that. It’s a practical and efficient style for a tactics game on a small screen and it’s done well enough to be inoffensive. This sentiment stays the same through all three of the modern ports of the games. The rest of the presentation, however, is wonderful. And that is also true for the whole trilogy.

So, would I recommend this to Turn-Based Tactics fans? Not on the merit of its combat alone. If you’re casual fan then you’ll probably have fun enough with it, but regardless, this is a game you’d realistically be picking up for the story. I can say the gameplay gets better in the next two, and it certainly does, but really this title is a good test for whether or not you want to continue. The amount of writing per game only goes up from here as well (though not dramatically).

Who this game is really for is anyone looking for a good war drama with lots of fun character development and is appreciative of the fantasized Kofun-era-Japan-esque setting (I’m not an expert so feel free to correct me there). The fact that it also then becomes an engaging tactics JRPG in the next two titles is just an added bonus for sticking with it.

---

Part 2 - Mask of Deception
Part 3 - Mask of Truth

I am never one to think a slow burn is a bad thing, so the sleepy startup leading to the eventual, constant conflict and twists later on is supremely what I am here for. There are bits that are very much of its era and genre, but the remake is never immensely gross and I still think it holds up immensely well, with the characters especially being an absolute standout. The world, admittedly, isn't very well fleshed out or explained, with the sense of scale being particularly nebulous, but it's a solid consolation that the sequels benefit from years of consideration over the setting, resulting in a much more satisfying picture of things once you get there.