Recent reviews by Ravel

Seabed grants you pleasure from piecing the bits together, as well as noticing clever red herrings and foreshadowing. It has a decent amount of artwork for the medium-length doujin work. A lot of people find it pacing slow, but it's not that bad in my opinion, the last 4 chapters are extremely engaging and you read them eagerly in one breath. The game, however, has some descriptions which are a bit too thorough for my personal taste. The 'yuri' part of the story is almost non-existant, as the game explores the themes of memory and human psyche, rather than the theme of homosexuality. If you are experienced in the visual novel field or you feel like the game resonates with you on an entirely different level, go for it.

An amazing experiment in the visual novel genre from the standpoint of interwoven storytelling. Midway through gets a bit too dark despite its seemingly colorful presentation and cheerful beginning hours. Includes several hard puzzles to rack one's brain about, and, perhaps, too many characters to count for my own taste (I prefer less but more memorable/fleshed out characters). All in all, a great game with some unique plot bits.

The game is purchased on DLSite for 15$.
Steam key provided by the developer.

In this Garden of Judgement you are going to bare your sins.

Vanilla: Garden of Judgement is a short but sweet visual novel from the circle Charon, creators of many decent visual novel hybrids. Vanilla is definitely one of the best Charon stories yet, even though it uses a lot of the same themes, with madness being their forte. This visual novel manages to remain both gloomy and heartwarming at the same time, which is a merit in itself. Very well translated, but, unfortunately, with a considerable downgrade to it. For some unknown reason the developers removed the Japanese voices from the english release which had been present in the original version. We can only hope that voices are coming back in the future patch, but no news so far. Other than that one issue, I highly recommend Vanilla to all who can appreciate a good doujin work.

Whilst not perfect, MYTH is an extremely ambitious visual novel which tackles an assortment of light & dark themes. It's a great read for anyone who falsely deems they have exhausted the genre and there're no greater heights to strife for. MYTH is a kind of game that, if only it had a bit more polish, could be at the very top of must-reads.

If you're looking to play an old school FPS with pure gameplay, but you don't want it to be outdated like some of the classics are, then this is definitely the game for you. Amid Evil can easily brag about its beautiful visual aesthetics and interconnected level design. My one gripe is that I wish there were more weapons to play around with, but at least every new episode introduces all-new enemies. The game is still in early access, and as we all know there's no say if the final product maintains this level of quality and promise, but from what I've seen so far, every new episode just gets better and better.

For the crazy price Activision's asking you'd expect to see a fully working product. I've bought the game, foolishly thinking people overstate the game's problems in their reviews. But everything they say is true and relevant. The game's not just bugged, it has broken menus and dialogues, and controller support is absent. Even though there are community fixes and patches for MUA, I'm not buying the game to tinker with it. They should drop the standard price by 75% permanently if they don't want to commit to fixing these problems officially. Considering it's 2018 already and nothing is done, I doubt it ever happens.

Black Widow's face perfectly describes how I see this abomination of a port: https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/933806673712402733/863D883F293BD315743D345857236738603DC741/

Unlike many other reviewers on Steam say, Yomawari 2 doesn't fix all the problems introduced in the predecessor. The game still has enough cheap deaths (middle finger to the Manor chapter), and you still barely use its mechanics like an ability to bait enemies, preferring to run away from them in 99.9% of the times. Yet again the developers focus way too much on a chase aspect of the game, instead of coming up with clever puzzles. But even then... the game is definitely a major improvement over the first one. In the first Yomawari its story was nothing but a garnish for the exploration. In the sequel I found myself way more invested in the story events, even if they are laconic and basic as ever. The town is filled to the brim with urban legends and collectibles waiting to be uncovered, some of which are basically full-fledged side-quests. If Yomawari becomes a series it has a bright future ahead of it for sure.

Mediocre as a mystery game and ABSOLUTELY AMAZING as a character-driven game.

A cruel fairytale of Weisse Hexe protecting her kingdom of Eylstadt for the one she loves. One of the most underrated anime (and, in my opinion, best) shows of 2016 that unfortunately suffered from being overshadowed by community favorite fall runs such as Yuri on Ice and Sound Euphonium 2. Izetta: The Last Witch follows young princess Fine and her loyal companion Izetta, who both are willing to sacrifice everything in order to protect what they cherish. It's a war story of uncompromised desicions, painful sacrifices, nation's loyalty and unwavering leadership. And of course, loving someone unconditionally more than life itself. Both gritty realistic and sweetly dreamlike, Izetta is a show that sincerely tries to reach hearts of militaristic and shoujo ai addicts alike. With memorable designs from Bunbun, one of the creators of Yuuki Yuuna mahou shoujo series, and well-animated dynamic battle sequences.

In a way, even if it's not intended, this game is a spiritual successor to Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, another glorious metroidvania game where the player takes control of a upgradable vessel to explore outlandish environment and solve ecological problems. Aquatic Adventure discards expendable enemies, turning every single encounter with hostile wildlife into unique boss battles; basically, that's the main attraction of this game, besides the picturesque seabeds. In further comparison of the two titles, the current subject matter severely lacks puzzles based around the unlocks you get, but makes up to it with backstory insight diaries scattered throughout the game. All in all, I recommend The Aquatic Adventure of the Last Human, because it has a sense of style and interesting 50/50 focus.