My Top 10 Otome - Refresh for March 2023

The end of March seems a bit of an odd time of year to be doing a Top 10 list, but the last time I did one of these I kept it to a Top 5, and a lot of games have come out in the two and a half years since. While undoubtedly I'll get a few more otome under my belt before the end of the year, I figure this list isn't likely to change too much. And in any case, I tend to feel uneasy about listing something I played too recently, as my love of a game can fade with time, as we'll see one of the games that was previously in my Top 5 has actually fallen.

Moving the number up to ten also gives me space to add a few indie titles, which can't match the production values of a dedicated company willing to shell out for recognizable talent in voice, art, and music.

I'd also like to give honorable mentions to two titles: Hakuoki: Demon of the Fleeting Blossoms, for being my first otome and covering a part of history I find fascinating, and to Bad Apple Wars, for giving second chances to those most willing to fight for it. I thought maybe when I expanded to a Top 10 I might be able to fit them in, but couldn't.

10) Halloween Otome

Halloween Otome is a bit of a sentimental favorite in the English speaking otome community. It was made several years ago when indie projects were much fewer and less often complete. The artwork, while adequate for a free game released nine years ago, would not generate much enthusiasm in today's indie pool, but what I like about Halloween Otome is that it's just sincere fun. Emma Cee is fabulously lucky, and it's worked right into the story as she finds herself with a free ticket to a costume party for the rich and famous. There is no danger. Just people having fun and trying to win a contest put on by their host. The characters are entertaining and it's nice seeing them cameo in the Valentines Otome sequel/spin-off.

You can find this one on the popular indie site Itch.io, and it runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

9) My Vow to My Liege

My Vow to My Liege is probably the direct opposite of Halloween Otome, being full of war and betrayal. I wasn't sure exactly where I'd put in the bottom half of my Top 10, but settled on #9 because to be honest, I only really liked half of the love interests. What makes it for me personally is the attention to historical and folklorical detail (once past the part where King Fuchai is actually a younger sister crossdressing as her deceased older brother in order to maintain a hold on her kingdom's power). Fuchai is quite possibly one of my favorite otome protagonists ever. She is king in a time of war and the game lets her do everything a king in ancient times could do, from leading an army to torturing prisoners for information. If you need a more aggressive protagonist than most, Fuchai is your girl.

I believe this one is Windows only, and can be found on Steam.

8) Pre-Odyssey: Odysseus, Penelope, and Her Ducks

The most recent otome on this list in terms of release, I just adored this very sweet and funny story about the courtship of Penelope by Odysseus. It was entirely a one person dev team, so there are rough spots where it shows, but the ducks add a note of levity to what could otherwise be a very serious story, and the nods to the original Greek mythology are top notch. I don't usually talk about the ending credits to a game, or the bonus material, but they're genuinely worth it for this game, since anyone familiar with the mythology knows what happens to these two in the future and the extra material is entertaining commentary from the characters themselves.

The dev also has you covered when it comes to being able to play. Aside from supporting Windows, Mac, and Android, there is a web version that requires no download at all. The game can be found in Itch.io.

7) The Blind Griffin

Though not without its flaws, I think The Blind Griffin is still my sentimental favorite indie, for combining two things I have never see in a game before: 1) being set in the 1920s and 2) starring a Chinese American protagonist. Though the protagonist is player-named, she has her own identity as a Chinese American child from a large family in a time when the Chinese were not particularly welcome. Having come from earlier generations of Chinese immigrants, I knew what sort of history she likely had (for instance, she was more than likely Taishanese, like my own family) and being able to combine that with my general interest in early 20th century history, was pure catnip.

The Blind Griffin can be found for PC, Mac, and Linux on Itch.io.

6) Norn9: Var Commons

The reason I originally justified this in my previous Top 5 is that it emotionally moved me in a way that lower ranked games did not. Norn9 certainly isn't perfect, and the non-romance portion of the plot was a complete mess, but what it did, it did well, and chances are you will like someone in the cast, even if it's not who you originally thought it would be. It's like a bag of jelly beans. You might not like every single bean in the bag, but there are enough of the good ones (assuming you like jelly beans) that it's still worth buying the bag in the first place.

Also, Norn9: Var Commons has now been ported to Switch and in fact is coming out in English this week! So there's no longer a need to own a Vita to play it. The translation has been updated and the fan disk Lost Ark is coming out in English for the first time later this year, so now is a good time to get into the first game.

5) 7'scarlet

Despite being a little light on the romance, I was never not engaged in trying to figure out the mystery of Okunezato in 7'scarlet, and I love a good mystery, but when I looked at its competition I realized that there are a few flaws that really bothered me; mainly the half-baked brother route at the end, but also that there were inconsistencies between routes (such as Sosuke's level of knowledge about the town secrets) that didn't make any sense. I also don't like yandere romance options, though not badly enough that it affects my ranking.

Though this was originally a Vita release, it can be found on Steam where it's often on sale.

4) Collar x Malice

This is the game that probably dropped the most, having been previously at #2. While I did really enjoy the investigation and liked (slightly) over half the romance options, I still don't like the plot problems in Shiraishi's route and even though I bought the fan disk, the longer I go without playing it the more I realize that I'm not quite as in love with it as I originally thought. Still, I really love that Ichika has a social life outside of her interactions with love interests, and especially that she has other women to both hang out with and back her up. It's still a good blend of action and romance that other games don't quite hit.

It originally came out for Vita, but is also available on Switch.

3) Cafe Enchante

I had just gotten Cafe Enchante at the time of my last ranking, so I wasn't sure where it would fall, but after some time and distance I've decided that I really still like it. It's aided by an excellent cast, one of the few where I can say I genuinely liked every guy, including the one I thought I would be ambivalent about. Though it suffers from a lack of quality checking (names are sometimes translated differently, and the dubious translation of "hako oshi" introduced a whole new term to the English speaking fandom), I still like the directions the story was willing to go, making this a surprisingly poignant game by the time I finished.

Cafe Enchante is only available on Switch.

2) Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly

Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly was originally my #3, but was bumped up by the fall of Collar x Malice. It's still not a traditional otome in that the common route (with its own ending) is more or less the canon ending with everything else being either "in addition to" or "instead of," but I love the mystery and the shared story of the cast. The primary characters wake up in a mansion with no memories of how they got there, but the more they learn about their true circumstances, the more painful regaining their memories becomes. Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly gets its placement for having amazing plot twists and a non-linear method of storytelling to show how everything came to be. Romance is much weaker in this game than others due to the nature of it, but it's still a solid game.

Though it was initially released on Vita, it's also been ported to Steam!

1) Code:Realize (series)

And now for my favorite, which is unlikely to be toppled anytime soon, and that is Code:Realize. Spanning three games, Cardia's story of falling in love and finding a way to touch another person without harming them still resonates with me. She's fully capable of facing bad guys with or without her man and the men themselves form a formidable band of friends who work together, so the game is never just a one-on-one with Cardia and a pretty face. Many of the best moments are watching the guys interacting with each other, making them full fledged characters with lives outside the romance, and in turn, that makes the romance better, because when the chips are down it feels like the rest of the cast is 100% behind the couple. They're all friends. Why wouldn't they be? Add in a gorgeous steampunk London, hidden organizations, and the philosopher's stone and you've got quite a combination!

Code:Realize and its sequels were originally released on Vita, but have since come out on PS4 and Switch.

VN Talk: My Vow to My Liege - Part 5: Wu Zixu

This is the last installment of my My Vow to My Liege VN Talk series. As mentioned before, beware of spoilers since I will cover plot points up until the end of his route.

If there is any character that the title My Vow to My Liege applies to, it's Wu Zixu. Though all the love interests are loyal (or not) to Fuchai, Wu Zixu's vow is front and center from the common route on. He clearly states that his goal in life is to see his king and country prosper. Though he and Fuchai disagree a lot, particularly on the common route, it feels like constructive disagreement. He's there to point out the things she can't or won't see, and there's no doubt that he will never abandon her, no matter what decisions she makes. Zixu dies on half the routes, protecting her kingdom in her absence after getting her to safety.

It was really hard not to like the guy after that, and I was glad I saved his route for last as it let me end the game on a high note. Not only is his route the most unique out of the four (the march to Qi doesn't happen at all), but it's replaced with palace intrigue and more nods to history than any other route, including Goujian's. He even quotes the classic poem Young Reeds Before Flowering (蒹葭) that is used as the lyrics for the ending credits song.

My only disappointment was that his bad ending didn't include his historical line to Fuchai that his eyes be posthumously hung on the gates of Gusu so he could watch the capital's capture. I guess that wouldn't have made for a tragically romantic ending, and I did like his actual bad ending, which flips an earlier question Fuchai had about what the king would be without her prime minister, making it clear that neither of them are anything without the other.

I suppose that was a dismal note to start things off with, so let's get to the meat of his route.

Getting Zixu's route involves pissing off Goujian (by being willing to kill him as a scapegoat), which I was all for, and results in a much more contentious king of Yue for the rest of the story. I found I liked it when Fuchai stops backing him up so much. And the thing is, even though Zixu's warnings about Goujian seem overly much during the common route, he's absolutely right about him.

Once the naval battle happens, Fuchai returns to the capital after hearing about a possible coup, only to find out that Wu Zixu is being dunked on by the rest of the palace ministers, led by Bo Pi (who historically was bribed by Goujian). Because Gusu's granaries were damaged on his watch, Zixu temporarily exiles himself from court.

This eventually leads to Zixu being framed for treason once mind-controlled Chenfeng "confesses" to setting the city on fire on Zixu's orders. And Goujian, who is providing much needed food aid to Ng, lets Fuchai know that he was shot during the naval battle by Ng forces (which we know from Goujian's route was done on Zixu's orders).

Fuchai's ministers push for her to execute Zixu and she's furious that she seems to be the only one who trusts him. She demands to see the room in the palace where he's being held and her ministers are clearly afraid that allowing her a private conversation with him will convince her to spare him, but she's so upset that no one dares deny her.

What happens next is one of my favorite scenes. She wants to convince Zixu to become her husband (and even tries to undress before he stops her) because, she reasons, the father of the future king would be above reproach. But Zixu, being the guy that he is, tells her that she should execute him, even if the charges are false (mostly, he did give the order to kill Goujian). He tells her that she can't run a country without her ministers, and in aggregate she needs them. If his dying preserves the peace, so be it.

Fuchai does not take this very well. And to the player it looks like she angrily respects his wishes when she tosses a sword at him and tells him to stab himself, leaving her to fly solo for much of the remainder of his route. We even see his "corpse" hauled out after said stabbing.

While I was not surprised he would come back later in the story, since it was far too early to be either a good or bad ending, I wasn't sure how that would happen. And I definitely did not think that faking his death (by not quite stabbing himself lethally enough) would be the case.

Apparently "stab yourself to end things once and for all" is code for "fake your death and escape the city with a bunch of loyal followers" so Zixu can save the day when Goujian and the Kingdom of Qi try sacking Gusu. I am hoping something was just lost in translation (perhaps a reference to a historical event?) because I couldn't read into the exchange so Zixu's return came out of left field. I thought it would be more likely that the dream world (when Fuchai is trying to become master of the Ding of Virtue) would revive him somehow, since she's able to influence the past in it.

Still, Zixu's route ended up being my favorite of the bunch. I really liked how forward Fuchai was, from initially suggesting the marriage as an off the cuff method of getting Zixu back in court, to seriously trying to get him to marry her to save his life, to actually marrying him in the epilogue. Having all the palace intrigue didn't hurt either.

Fuchai remains king in Zixu's good ending and they have a daughter, who will inherit the throne since Fuchai has since made amendments to the law to allow a woman to become king. The implication is that Fuchai herself still presents as male at court though (likely to make sure that the law has teeth) and her marriage to Zixu is a secret.

I'm not surprised by that, since it's likely something he would have been in favor of, but I'm a wee bit disappointed that we find out he's stepped down as prime minister in his good ending, since it's not clear what he's doing with his time anymore. Their daughter is recognized as the legitimate heir, so she's probably being taken care of by palace nursemaids (if not Chenfeng, who is babysitting in this ending), so Zixu probably has lots of time on his hands now.

VN Talk: My Vow to My Liege - Part 4: Yiguang

I was probably the most ambivalent going into Yiguang's route because there isn't much to his story aside from being a mage. Though Wu Zixu distrusts both him and Goujian, Yiguang is in less precarious a position. The only black mark against him is that he faked his death five years ago when the rest of the Shi clan sacrificed itself instead of continuing his family's service to the king. Unlike Goujian, he never raised arms against the kingdom.

We meet Yiguang living as a simple village doctor, with the respect of the people around him, and given the flashbacks we have through Fuchai, there's no reason to doubt that he's anything other than the kind-hearted soul he appears to be. The question really is why he never came back after the sacrifice, and it turns out to be a very mundane but relatable reason. He was afraid that Fuchai would have changed over the years and she'd no longer be the childhood friend he remembered.

Considering that was the one element of the unknown going into his route, it was harder to get excited about it. Yiguang is continually himself, with few ups and downs, and we don't end up seeing any new sides of him.

What makes his route markedly different from the others though, is that we get to visit two places that he otherwise visits alone in other routes. So we get to be with him when retrieves the Azure Dragon Sword from the hidden palace of the Shi family and when he goes to Haojing to find the Body of the Ding of Virtue. Both trips make for a nice change of pace from the march to attack Qi, though they don't sync up with the rest of the story very well.

For instance, Yiguang and Fuchai leave the army after the naval battle to go to the hidden palace, with an agreement to meet up with everyone else at Han City afterward, but when they come back, they apparently don't meet up with the army after all and head back to the capital of Gusu where they find out that the army has been sent north to attack Qi by a fake Fuchai (actually the Dragon God, though apparently without needing her blood to maintain the disguise as he did on Chenfeng's route). This sends the two of them right back out of the city to catch up with the army so everyone can head south again.

Though this happens to some degree on most routes, since there's usually a march to Qi, and sometimes a GuSu visit between the naval battle and the march, it feels particularly needless given how quickly they turn around. Yiguang is already tied for the shortest route in the game despite being the poster boy since his route skips having a chapter in Linzi, the capital of Qi.

As a love interest, Yiguang does all right as the unwavering childhood friend, and I suspect the reason Chenfeng ends up mind controlled is to mark a clearer difference between the two. There's little romantic angst on Yiguang's route save that Fuchai is aware she is likely to die before achieving any kind of happy ending with him, and unlike Chenfeng, Yiguang is not shy about letting her know his feelings.

Despite that, I felt a little let down. His Jade Fish talisman saves Fuchai many times over, and it's something he gave her years ago even though (or perhaps because) it's intended only for his soulmate. But I just felt the romance wasn't earned. They've been apart for most of their teenage years, but there's very little sorting out their feelings and getting reacquainted before they suddenly exchange marriage vows before the final battle.

I did like the climax of his route better than the others though, because the Dragon God is actually active around the ritual site where they prepare to kill him, and because Fuchai ends up doing it on her own without the ritual while Goujian is completely freaking out because she's discovered the Dragon God's hidden weakness. (She really hates Goujian for his betrayal on this route, which I'm all for.)

I'm less keen on the death fake-out though, because it's fairly obvious on Yiguang's route which are the good vs the bad choices, so the fact that it looks like Fuchai's dying in the good ending is pretty cheap. Much like in Chenfeng's ending she ends up faking her death, leaving the kingdom to her cousin, and this time leaves on a journey to see the world with Yiguang.

VN Talk: My Vow to My Liege - Part 3: Goujian

Even though Yiguang is the poster boy of My Vow to My Liege, I feel like the game may have been created with Goujian in mind as his route is the longest out of all of them.

I had a difficult time with Goujian's route, not because of the being on opposite sides thing (star-crossed lovers from feuding nations is all right with me), but because both he and Fuchai keep running hot and cold throughout the entire run. In the beginning of Goujian's route, when he's trying to figure out whether Fuchai actually trusts him, it was understandable, but as it wore on, I kept wanting them to make up their minds whether they loved or hated each other, and one or the other or both would keep bouncing between love, hate, and more rarely ambivalence (that wouldn't last).

I suppose, being a romance game, the answer is ultimately yes, even in the bad ending, but it's a long conflicting road with a fair bit of mood whiplash. The changing feelings are more understandable when prompted by something, but sometimes they aren't, so it's frustrating when they won't commit.

Like other routes, Goujian's story diverges following the naval battle with the Kingdom of Qi, during which Ng's supply ships were attacked. Given that the ships were traveling through a hidden route through the river tributaries that few knew about, there had to be a mole on the Ng side of the battle. If the player has gone through any other route first, it's pretty obvious that the mole is Goujian, but Fuchai at this point in time is still fully trusting of him. She and Goujian just swore a hundred years of friendship between their kingdoms and she released him to go back to his people.

Following the battle Goujian is prickly with her because it's obvious there was a mole, and he's the most glaring suspect. She says she trusts him, but he finds that difficult to believe given the circumstances, and when he pushes her to swear that she does not suspect him, she refuses on account of him acting so defensive.

What can be difficult to see, particularly in the early chapters of his route, is that Goujian has been getting mixed signals from Fuchai for a long time and his anger is nothing recent. We know they met before he realized that she was actually the king of Ng, which is why they use the affectionate nicknames Ahyu and Ahjiu, but we don't get the circumstances until his route when Fuchai enters the Spiritual Realm and lives out a mirror version of his circumstances, where Ng is defeated and Fuchai is the one enslaved.

This lets us see how Goujian came to care about the one person in Ng who was kind to him, while also feeling betrayed upon learning that his "friend" was also the king holding him prisoner and demanding his people pay tribute. While Goujian did not know who Fuchai was at first, it was impossible for Fuchai to not have known Goujian's identity, making the sincerity of her friendship suspect. Unfortunately for Goujian, he'd already started crushing on her by then, which made him extremely conflicted and understandably upset, leading him to forging an alliance with the Dragon God and his followers.

This revelation comes very late in his route though, leaving his behavior bewildering for most of it. He betrays Fuchai at the naval battle, but then he's mushy with her on the road to war with the Kingdom of Qi. A short while later he betrays her again at the conference with the Kingdom of Jin by ripping open her clothes to expose her chest and gender to the other kings, and then he's… sorry about it (or not, depending on choices made).

From Goujian's point of view I understand why he backstabbed Fuchai at the conference. He swore his revenge would not come without Fuchai suffering the ultimate humiliation, and his action, aside from being devastatingly personal, theoretically put the entire Kingdom of Ng on the backfoot. Being her lover at the time probably helped wedge the knife in, and I'm fine with that if Goujian's decided that his commitment is to his revenge, but being apologetic while exposing her didn't work for me. He can't have it both ways.

I'm less surprised that Fuchai's feelings bounce around after his second betrayal, but she seems surprisingly forgiving of it. Even in the bad ending when she's reconciled herself to the fact that they're enemies, it feels more like she's lamenting that their relationship can never be because they're the kings of two nations at war rather than because he placed his desire for revenge over her.

The good ending also felt a little… easy, considering what Goujian has done. Despite what happened at the conference, Ng having an openly female king turns out to be a non-issue and Fuchai gets to marry Goujian. I don't know exactly how that leaves things in his home nation of Yue, but Wu Zixu makes it clear that Goujian is marrying into Fuchai's family, and not the other way around. Goujian is a little put out, but that didn't bother me. If nothing else, I'm glad Fuchai didn't step down and/or run off with him.

But this made the conference chapter very irritating to me. Literally the only reason it exists is for that scene where Goujian humiliates Fuchai, because it doesn't appear on other routes, and has no bearing on the remaining story beats, not even the Goujian specific endings. It doesn't even bother to show the reactions of the other kings before putting Fuchai back on a boat for her capital, further cementing the fact everything about the conference was irrelevant except for Goujian.

I think if not for the conference scene, and if Fuchai had just been a little more suspicious of him, I would have liked Goujian's route better, but I just can't forgive him.

VN Talk: My Vow to My Liege - Part 2: Chenfeng

Chenfeng was my first route in My Vow to My Liege and he was initially a character design pick. Not too ostentatious, not too stern. He looks like a nice guy and one of the kinder characters in the cast. And when I saw how close he was with Fuchai in the opening that sealed the deal. As the king's bodyguard, attendant, and childhood friend, Chenfeng is in on her secret, and since she obviously can't have female servants helping her in and out of her royal clothes, he's the one who does it. There's no blushing, no sexual tension. When he's combing her hair you can see that this is just daily life for the two of them.

Out of the four love interests, Chenfeng is the least "special" with no magic powers or titles (former or present). He was a battlefield orphan who the king took in out of pity (possibly on a whim) and brought into the palace to be his daughter's playmate. While growing up he was constantly aware of his lower status and even though Fuchai called him her friend, he knew that other people might not necessarily see it that way.

Fuchai wasn't completely braindead about his concerns, and tried to raise his standing. Though it's only a background note and does not impact the story, she arranged for no less than Sun Tzu to mentor him. (Sun Tzu was one of the ministers of her father's kingdom in history, so this is not as large a stretch as it seems.) Chenfeng is commented on as being talented enough to be a general, though he refuses to take such a position.

Because, as is obvious to us if not to our protagonist, Chenfeng is in love with Fuchai and would rather spend his life at her side. As her bodyguard and commander of the Royal Guards he goes almost everywhere with her, at least until he's badly injured in the common route. Though the poor guy wants to do nothing but keep carrying out his duties, Fuchai keeps pushing him off to rest. That's not to say he doesn't continue to show up, because he does, and frequently, but it prevents him from being omni-present, which I think is a good thing. (With a side bonus of showing how much he wants to be with her because he keeps getting out of bed.)

I didn't initially like the start of his route because Chenfeng starts acting out of character, becoming brusque and possessive. Fuchai is taking greater and greater risks that are likely to get her killed, and Chenfeng, who is already doing his damnedest to keep her safe, feels like she doesn't respect how hard he's working for her. Worse, he knows that with mages and the Dragon God around, he can't fight that kind of power because no matter how good a swordsman he is, he's helpless against the supernatural.

His reasons are sympathetic, but his actions aren't. It might start with him becoming overly vengeful towards Fuchai's enemies, but he ends up imprisoning her in her room of the palace so she can't leave. He even suggests, quite forcefully, that she should give up being king so she can live as Tengyu again.

What saves this (from me punting his route as a surprise yandere ruining what I thought was a sweet love interest) is that it turns out Chenfeng is being corrupted by the Dragon God's magic from when he was injured and sent in to the human sacrificial array earlier in the story. His route gets even more dismal when it becomes clear just how little of his own self-control remains and how his devotion to Fuchai has been twisted.

Probably the best part, which will sound strange because I talked about his devotion being twisted, is that when Fuchai enters the Spiritual Realm to save him, she realizes that what she saw is a part of him. It's just it's not the only part. She comes across two dueling Chenfengs espousing conflicting views over how best to care for Fuchai (both of them make good and bad points), and when they demand she choose between them, the best choice is to acknowledge that both of them are a part of Chenfeng.

If Fuchai does everything right, Chenfeng is able to break free from the Dragon God's magic and will join her in the final battle to retake the capital of Gisu from the Dragon God. If she doesn't, Chenfeng remains controlled. She manages to kill the Dragon God in both the good and bad endings of Chenfeng''s route with rather surprising ease for a final confrontation (not even famous last words from the Dragon God himself), with the difference being that both Chenfeng and Fuchai die in the bad end, having inflicted mortal wounds on each other.

While I expected some sort of tragedy for his bad end, I hadn't expected it would run all the way up to the end of the storyline, or to hit me emotionally, but there was just something poetic about Fuchai turning into water to join the waters of the lake and for Chenfeng (after coming to his senses) to become the wind so he can continue to be beside her. (Bonus: "Wind" is one of the characters in Chenfeng's name.)

I particularly liked his good ending though, which sees Fuchai give up the throne (now that the Dragon God is gone and the Sacred Vow broken) to her cousin while pretending that she fell in battle against the Dragon God. This frees her to live a nondescript life with Chenfeng away from all her previous duties where she can be Tengyu again. And I have to admit I like the fact she ships her cousin with Princess Shaojiang. Maybe that marriage alliance between Ng and Qi can still happen.

VN Talk: My Vow to My Liege - Part 1: Overview

In which I talk (write) about visual novels from a storytelling perspective...

Platform: Windows
Release: 2020

I picked up My Vow to My Liege for a few reasons. One was that it's set in ancient China, which is unusual for an otome game, but also because it's by a Chinese developer (no chance of being exoticized by outsiders) and I heard that it has a good translation.

This title is less than a year old as of this writing, so be aware there will be spoilers as I get further into my discussion.

My Vow to My Liege is set during the Spring and Autumn period of Chinese history, probably during 492 BC given that Fuchai has been king for three years. Five years prior to the story, Fuchai's father tried breaking the Sacred Vow that bound their family and their kingdom to the deceitful Dragon God, but rather than killing it, they were only able to seal it away, at the cost of the entire Shi clan (the head priest and priestess's family) and all of King Helü's sons, including the real Fuchai.

The game's Fuchai is actually Tengyu, Helü's daughter. Since a woman cannot rule, and the Sacred Seal binding the royal family to the Dragon God can only appear on the bodies of those of the bloodline, Tengyu took on the name of her youngest brother in order to become her father's heir. When he died, she became king, and only those closest to her are aware that she is a woman.

Naturally this introduces complications, as the Spring and Autumn period is a fractured time in Chinese history with multiple smaller kingdoms rather than a single empire. Fuchai wants to keep her kingdom safe while also researching ways to sever her kingdom's connection to the Dragon God, and one of the traditional ways is to form a political alliance through marriage.

It's not surprising that Fuchai wonders about the point of it all when she would never be able to produce a child with a wife, but she still proceeds with the marriage proposal because it's too important not to. As for how getting a blood-related heir would be conceived, her prime minister advises her at one point to pick a random guy, get pregnant, and he will handle disposing of her partner to keep it secret. She's not keen on the idea.

Fuchai is a complicated character. She wears her royal mask well and is capable of thinking like the man she pretends to be both in terms of romantic interest (she admits that if she really was a man, she would love to marry Princess Shaojiang) and as a king with too much to lose. There aren't too many otome heroines who will unhesitantly cut off an enemy's hand during an interrogation. No one prompts her to do it. She does it on her own without any dramatic build-up because she's out of time and needs answers from enemy agents who are willing to kill themselves, but might speak up to avoid being maimed. (She gets the info from the maimed prisoner's partner after making an example out of the first one.)

That isn't to say that Fuchai is all about being a ruthless king. She has moments of vulnerability, and she wants to live as a woman instead of being trapped by her filial and national obligations, but she's also capable with a sword and will go to hell and back for those she calls "friend."

This makes it unfortunate that part of her backstory deals with attempted rape (and attempted suicide following the attempted rape) because it really doesn't do anything to advance her character. She's already compelling without it and barring one romance route, her experience in the past has no impact on her present. It's just there like it's part of the atmosphere.

Since Fuchai is (sort of) a historical character, one of the more interesting things about the game are the other historical characters around her. This is an otome, so that means there are love interests. The game gives us four, three of whom are historical; Wu Zixu, her prime minister, Goujian, an enemy king currently held by her kingdom as a slave, and Shi Yiguang, historically one of Fuchai's concubines but in this case a male mage and childhood friend. Chenfeng, Fuchai's attendant/bodyguard/childhood playmate, rounds out the group as the fourth option.

Because of this history, savvy players are likely to have expectations on how things will go and who to trust, which can run counter to what Fuchai believes. Given that Goujian is historically famous for nursing his revenge (there's even a proverb about his dedication to doing do) it's quite likely that a Chinese player wouldn't be surprised that Goujian betrays Fuchai on most routes, even if Fuchai herself is. Goujian does a pretty good job of pretending to be cooperative, even saving Fuchai's life at one point, all in the name of obtaining the freedom he needs to do the real damage.

For an otome, My Vow to My Liege leans heavily into dense military action sequences, which is an unusual choice for the genre. Due to Fuchai's duties and the eventual escape of the Dragon God from his imprisonment, she and her love interest have to deal with finding sacred artifacts and threats from other nations. There are land battles, sea battles, operations in another kingdom, filling the middle to late parts of the game with a lot of warfare. And for those liking proactive heroines, Fuchai is in the thick of it, from participating in planning stages (where as king she is the final word) to charging in with her escort herself.

Fuchai also doesn't spend much time wondering about what love is or baffled about the feelings she's having. She acknowledges the affection she has for the men in her life fairly easily, but she does not know what her future will be or if she'll even have one, which is probably the most mood-dampening aspect of her romances. When the Dragon God's plans begin in earnest, the Sacred Seal on Fuchai's chest keeps acting up and it's clear that it's slowly killing her. One of the reasons she tells Wu Zixu that she cannot agree to his secret pregnancy plans is that she doesn't know if she's going to be around long enough with a rogue Dragon God running around.

Fortunately, on most routes the romance and the Dragon God plot move hand in hand, so confronting her feelings about her love is woven in a naturalistic fashion. Between events like Chenfeng being brainwashed by the Dragon God and Wu Zixu being framed by the Dragon God's followers, it makes it understandable why Fuchai would devote time to her affections even though she's simultaneously trying to take down a god.

And no matter what happens, Fuchai will always take down the Dragon God, even in her bad endings. I really appreciated the game's fidelity in sticking to her main quest since some otome will drop the heroine's story in favor of focusing on the love interest's goals in certain routes. Before anything else, it's Fuchai's mission, which only makes sense when she's the liege of the title.

I'd also like to talk about Shaojiang, who plays a major role in the story. She's introduced as Fuchai's fiancée for the arranged marriage, but she's a determinator herself and a powerful mage. When she gets kidnapped by the Dragon God's followers and trapped in the Human Sacrificial Array, she ends up fighting them from inside of it.

After her initial surprise at learning Fuchai's gender, she doesn't freak out or complain about wanting to break the marriage because her husband-to-be is actually a woman. It's just another fact and she doesn't treat Fuchai any differently for it. One ending even suggests she's still sweet on Fuchai and that's the reason she's refusing another marriage proposal. Though, she is a bit of a shipper herself and happily arranges for Fuchai to get some alone time with her chosen man, providing that Shaojiang approves of the match.

As with many otome, there is a common route, a fairly substantial one, that establishes the setting and the characters before branching, and the routes are long enough that I'll be breaking the game up into a series of posts like I do for most of the longer otome I play. So next week will start with Chenfeng!