itch.io

I'm happy that my comment actually did have an effect on how you view certain things. Although you didn't make any promises, that's already good enough.

Regardless of what you end up deciding on, thank you for creating 17th Astral :)

This game is really interesting in many ways both good and bad.

When I wanted to install the game, the itch client didn't give me that option at all. I had to download the game manually from the website, but that worked just fine then.

After starting to read, I quickly found out about the language issues that were mentioned in another comment already, so I don't want to say too much about it except that maybe the text was killed by a bad program that ran through it. You just don't mix up 'lower' with 'lover' several times throughout the game, already three times in HP Lira's lecture right at the beginning. The word 'surprise' got a good one as well. When something is suddenly supersizing or someone is supersized, then that's definitely suspiscious. I don't believe that all to be man-made mistakes. Just look for 'super' in the text and you should get some actual surprises out of it.

Something more useful to say is that except for Diane's wrong name header throughout the game, there's another case in Honoko's route where Honoko or Lumen suddenly speak as Nene although she's not even there, making the mistake obvious. Shortly after that, Lumen and Honoko get mixed up, that's a bit more confusing, but from what is said it's obvious who is supposed to say it.

But enough about that. Let's get to the good things.

The writing is actually pretty awesome and the routes are planned very well. The story or stories are beautifully written and deliver quite different romances, sometimes relying on the unique magic system, making the worldbuilding stand out even more. This. Is. Great!

Although I'm not sure about everything the story wants me to believe about the world, at this point I'm actually not trying to say that those aspects were poorly written, it's more like I feel I'd have to know more about life in other Astrals to be sure whether or not it could be because of poor worldbuilding. Again, this proves that something was done right here.

If you immerse yourself in this game, you definitely think a lot about different things, this is always a good point for every story and it's definitely a plus that shouldn't be underestimated.

Another plus is the music, I didn't get annoyed after all the hours I spent reading the different routes. That doesn't happen very often in my case.

And then there's the art. I really really miss a gallery in this game!

Although the art really is nothing that special, it's not that bad either. It's still definitely a great deal better than everything I could produce. And the CG's are actually quite interesting. Two of them made me laugh out loud and I really enjoyed that. Furthermore, the rather simple art makes one focus more on what the picture is all about and the CG's definitely serve their purpose.

But there are backgrounds as well. The proportions are off quite often, but the drawn backgrounds are actually really nice to look at. I like them very much. As I said before, I really miss a gallery for the CG's and the background arts.

One other thing to criticize would be that when deciding on a route, other characters obviously have to be a little bit neglected because of the route chosen. But sometimes, the relationship between Lumen and other characters isn't really made clear then. I'm not sure how to go into detail without spoilering too much, so I leave it at that.

This game is definitely one those that I won't forget, it's totally worth it despite the language (and art) issues.

I really hope that this game will be improved someday to make the reading experience better for everyone, so that the story can get the attention it clearly deserves. The potential is clearly there.

A second thing I obviously hope for would be a new story in this awesome setting, maybe in another Astral then. Again, the potential is clearly there.