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mirorbdangamachine · 4 months ago

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Games that I finished in 2024

One of my favorite things every year is when everyone posts their top ten favorite games that came out lists and the typical end-of-year awards discussions. It’s exciting watching everyone have these analytical talks and detailing why they’ve enjoyed what that year had to offer. Something I don’t see as commonly though are people reflecting on games they’ve played that hadn’t come out that year, which I think is an incredible disservice. There are tons of gems hidden away in yesteryear that are just waiting to be discovered, and I think they deserve the time to shine.

It will be January 31 when this post goes out, so I’m running out of time for this topic to still be relevant, but I wanted to go over every game I finished in 2024, be it on my own or with my friends. To clarify, this won’t be about every game that I played, else I would be here forever, but rather ones that I had completed the main stories of. This is going to be written mostly in the order of how I completed them, at least as best as I can remember. I’ll be keeping better track of that in 2025, but for now, let’s get this show on the road.

Nancy Drew: Message in a Haunted Mansion

So this game will hold a special place in my heart as being the first game my now girlfriend and I played together after first speaking to each other two weeks prior. The Nancy Drew games were ones I hadn’t really played when I was younger, and so it was fun getting to experience some of them last year with him as he took me on a trip through memory lane. This one had a very good sense of atmosphere in its short runtime, feeling very genuinely spooky at times. The puzzles were all solid, we had a blast messing around in the maze segment, and aside from one touchy tile puzzle, the game held up pretty well. Out of all the Nancy Drews we played last year, this one is probably my favorite of the bunch. I even surprised my girlfriend with a tapestry of the poem in the game when we met, so it will be near and dear to me.

Famicom Detective: The Girl Who Stands Behind

I am almost ashamed as to how long it took me to actually finish this game. I’m fairly certain it took me… Two years, roughly. As a murder mystery lover, I always felt guilty about having never picked it back up again, but now that I have finished it, I am so glad I finally did. The reason I put it down the first time was because of the command prompt system that the game utilizes to do actions. It was simple enough, but there were some points in the early and mid game that made me frustrated due to not understanding the typical workings of this style of ADV gameplay which would require me to have to repeat options or do them in particular sequences to trigger. I was much more used to how the Ace Attorney games handle it where your options are more free flowing and clearly labeled on what you hadn’t done yet, so to go to a game where that wasn’t the case, I became frustrated and took time away from it. Once I finally let myself give it another chance, I remembered why I kept trying to throw myself at a wall to try and get through it in the first place, and that was because this game was a very solid mystery, but more importantly, had an excellent grasp on making you feel for the characters within it. With this being the prequel between the original two games, this one centered on the backstory of Ayumi, and I cannot express to you enough how seeing her try and do everything she can to solve the mystery of her best friend’s death made me feel so many things for her. I didn’t want to stop because I would have felt bad about not seeing her story through, and once we finally got to the end, it was all well worth it. This game doesn’t lean that far into the horror elements that you might think it would based on the premise of everyone thinking a ghost haunting the school killed a student, but when it does choose to go that route? Oh buddy, it hits. While I prefer The Missing Heir’s actual overarching mystery more, I think this one handles its character development better. If you have the chance to play this game, please do give it a shot, and don’t feel bad about having to pull up a guide at times if you feel lost.

Return to Mysterious Island

Another one of the old computer games that my girlfriend has shown me this year, I can confidently say that upon starting Return to Mysterious Island, I couldn't have have guessed where it was going to lead. I don’t want to elaborate because it is definitely best experienced going in blind. Exploring every nook and cranny of Mysterious Island was a joy, and it definitely puts your brain to the test in trying to think of ways to use your inventory. If you’re looking for a short and fun adventure game, this would be a good one to have a romp through with some friends.

Nancy Drew: The Haunted Carousel

Nancy Drew winds up at an amusement park to investigate a haunted carousel and somehow causes massive property damage along the way. Sounds like an average Tuesday for Nancy! When it comes to the Nancy Drew games, the actual gameplay is the same for all these ones that came out in the 2000s, so nothing is different there. I feel like this one didn’t hit the atmosphere quite like Message in a Haunted Mansion, though there’s were some fun set pieces to go throughout it. It was another cute one to play through with my girlfriend while we were with each other in person, so grab a friend or a loved one and just have a laugh at some Nancy shenanigans.

Murders on the Yangtze River

If you were to ask any of my friends how I was when I talked about this game, they would probably say I was extremely annoying because I constantly kept recommending it to them all every chance I had. Murders on the Yangtze River is easily in my top three games I finished last year, all of which I am still juggling as to where they sit in that said ranking. As previously mentioned, being an Ace Attorney fan, any game that has a similar feeling in its investigation system is probably going to get a thumbs up from me. Playing as the very well traveled detective Shen alongside his silly yet ingenious inventor sidekick Afu made every investigation a joy to experience. The two have very fun back and forths reminiscent of the Edgeworth and Kay from the Investigations games, with Shen being more socially adjusted than Edgeworth. When it comes to any mystery story that is from the perspective of a detective who is stated to be known in-universe as extremely competent and knowledgable, you always run the risk of not meeting those expectations due to trying to stop the player from trying to get ahead of the character’s current logic, and thus making the detective seem dumber than intended. Thankfully this is not the case here, as each chapter is handled with diligent care to ensure that the player feels right next to Shen each step of the way, with neither you nor him having their intelligence downplayed. All of the crimes were very well thought out, and the cast of characters in each were all thoroughly enjoyable form beginning to end. The game also has one of the most unique systems to solving one of the overarching mysteries near the end of the game that I have seen, and for that alone I think this game would be worth experiencing. There is only one part of the game that I could mark as a negative, that being a very small horror detour that we take in the latter third, but it is not big enough of a section to make me lose any overall enjoyment. Going throughout the story, you wouldn’t think the experience of each chapter could ramp up as much as it does when all of them are as solid as they are. And if you were curious, I’ll even say that this game doesn’t suffer from “Case 3 Syndrome”, so that’s all the more reason to play it. All in all, I absolutely think this is worth every penny, and hopefully you will enjoy it as much as I did if you try it! There is going to be a DLC case released for it sometime this year, so when that drops, you will find me right there playing immediately.

Unicorn Overlord

Something very funny occurred as I was writing this out. Before I began on the entries, I had written down all the games in as close to chronological order as I could remember, so I could go about them in the same order and try and remember details of each one better. The only game I I had forgotten to put down was Unicorn Overlord. This was not because of it being a forgettable experience, far from it. In fact, this is another one of my top three games of the year as I had mentioned in the previous entry. The reason I hadn’t listed it is because I had somehow convinced myself that this was Fire Emblem Awakening, my favorite game of all time, which I had once again replayed this year as well. The reason I confused it for that game is not just because it features a blue haired swordsman as the protagonist in a medieval fantasy setting, but rather because just as I had done with Awakening, I 100% completed Unicorn Overlord. I played every level, I recruited every character, I saw all the endings, I had unlocked every single rapport conversation available between all units, and I had even gone and watched every Rite of the Covenant scene at the end of the game with every character on my save file. For those who have played this game, you know that there are over 60 playable characters to unlock, and all but roughly five of them have rapports to view (this game’s version of Fire Emblem’s supports). Once I had started this game, I had become obsessed with it, not putting it down until I saw literally everything that there was on offer. All of this is being said before I even have mentioned the gameplay! A lovable cast will get you very far in my books, but this game also backs it up with a modern version of the Ogre Battle team combat system mixed with real time strategy in the overworld. You get to comprise multiple units for your band of merrymen to go ride into combat together, and with a bevvy of classes that all have unique properties, there are seemingly infinite combinations you can make. Sure, there will be those layouts you can create that will just utterly run through the game, but if you are someone who loves experimentation, then you are going to fall in love with this combat system. The game incentives you to watch battles play out so you can make adjustments between each one on the map so you can better tackle it and try to retain your members. This game does does have varying degrees of difficulty available, all of which have since been fine tuned by the developers in patches to make it as fitting and fair as possible, and while there is no permadeath mode to begin with, you unlock one to play on after you finish your first playthrough of the game. There is so much to love about Unicorn Overlord that it even made me log into my old Tumblr to go reblog fanart of it and actually make posts in the subreddit for the game, which I have never done on Reddit before. If you are a strategy RPG fan of any sort, or you are wanting to try and jump into the genre, then I would say this is a wonderful game to do that with if you were wanting to look beyond the usual recommendations of the Fire Emblem series.

Death Come True

This is an FMV mystery game that was the first released project by Too Kyo Games, the studio that Kazutaka Kodaka and Kotaro Uchikoshi, the creators of Danganronpa and Zero Escape respectively, founded. Centered around our protagonist waking up in a strange hotel with an unconscious woman tied up in the bathroom with no memory of how he got there, this is a wonderful and short game that you can finish in a day. The portrayal of the main character by Kanata Hongo was the highlight of the game, he really made this story come to life. As it becomes evident that this is a timeloop story, he does a great job at showing off the growing agony of the perpetual infinity. Due to this game being so short, I don’t want to go much further beyond that so as to avoid spoilers. It is well worth checking out, and I am sure if you got some friends together to go through it, you all would have a fun time. The game also comes with behind the scenes commentary and interviews, so if seeing the production of an FMV game is something that interests you, it is all there to see as well.

Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical

Stray Gods was crafted in a basement by a Professor Plutonium-like figure who was searching for the best form of addiction possible to hook either queer folk who were theater kids in high school, Percy Jackson fans, or the most likely scenario: Both. As you can imagine, I fall into the “both” category. The songs all were wonderful, and the fact that they change depending on how you choose to behave leading up to that point makes for a great way to encourage replayability. I do think that maybe the games leaned a bit too hard into its dating sim aspects, but then again, it never really tried to act like it wasn’t going to also be that on top of the story being told. Surprise surprise that it is rooted in another murder mystery, so if the idea of using magic and fantasy elements in mysteries is something that excites you, I think you would have a fun time with this. The worldbuilding is very solid, the idea of the gods now living among us out of sight is one you can see being real and they take some fun liberties with the concept. The cast, while not feeling particularly faithful to their original mythological counterparts, is still fun to see go about the world they find themselves in. It goes on sale on Steam somewhat often, so if you find it for 20% off or more, then I would recommend getting ahold of it yourself to go through it.

Famicom Detective: The Missing Heir

In the last Famicom Detective section I had mentioned that it was the prequel, so now we are onto the original title that spawned the series. You can definitely tell as much as this story is more focused on the protagonist rather than Ayumi, to the point that she barely features in it for the most part. You will be conducting an investigation into the Ayashiro family, whose matriarch has just passed away, though her butler seems to think that there was foul play afoot. As you look further into each member of the Ayashiros, you will come to find that all of these people are thoroughly unpleasant people to be around with the ownership of the family business at the core of the story. It is a very classic setup that finds ways to surprise the player, even if they have experienced something like this before. Like I said before, I enjoy the actual mystery that was occurring in The Missing Heir more than I did in The Girl Who Stands Behind, it is a good and meaty taler to read through with twists and turns you wouldn’t expect. If you are going to play these remakes, then I highly suggest to play them in the order of The Girl Who Stands Behind and then move into The Missing Heir, as it is going to provide some more characterization to the main character that makes this story more enjoyable to consume. I am very happy that I finally got through these, and I am currently in the middle of the new entry in the series that just came out last year, Emio: The Smiling Man. If this series continues beyond this third game, then I think these two games have established two very solid leads in the main character and Ayumi to guide us through.

Nancy Drew: Ghost Dogs of Moon Lake

Fun fact, this is the only Nancy Drew game that I played a part of when I was a child. I didn’t finish it back then, and frankly after going through it last year, I am not surprised that I didn’t as there were some puzzles that even as an adult had me a bit stumped. You know when you and your friends have to bust out a guide for a Nancy Drew game that this game maybe was a bit above the mental capabilities of a five year old, hahaha. Nancy has once again found herself at the behest of a friend calling in a favor, this time investigating a seemingly haunted house on a park lake that gets attacked by - you guessed it - ghost dogs at night. Winding through the history of a gangster who once lived there and the untold riches left behind, it comes as no surprise that someone wants their grubby mitts on a piece of the pie. This was another fun adventure with Nancy, and it had a very unsettling atmosphere to it that had me freaked out as the night approached each day. I would recommend giving this one a shot, but do not feel bad by any means if you have to bust out a walkthrough.

No Case Should Remain Unsolved

This might be one of the most emotional two hours I have ever spent playing something. This is such a beautiful short story in game form that I truly think everyone should go and play. It is centered around unraveling the timeline surrounding a missing girl and her family to figure out what must have happened. The gameplay itself is relatively simple in connecting keywords across the bits of conversation with each family member to unlock new pieces of information, with the occasional question asking if you know enough to unlock a new answer. With that said, please, go take the time to experience this.

Dokapon Kingdom Connect

Have you ever seen those videos talking about “the most rare/expensive Wii games”? If you have, then you have probably Dokapon Kingdom included in a few of those. Thankfully, the game has since been rereleased on Steam as Dokapon Kingdom Connect, meaning you and your friends can all… Suffer. Suffer, forever… Okay, that’s an exaggeration. The game is genuinely an extremely fun time, as if you made a Dungeons and Dragons campaign into a board game featuring rock-paper-scissors combat. The game is heavily luck based, to the point that even if you try and plan accordingly for maximum profit in gaining the most money and towns, you can still very lose everything at the drop of a hat. Over the five months it took us to play through this game, all four of us at various points were either vastly far ahead of the rest or way behind everybody on the weekly scoreboard, and then after one chapter event, everything would be scrambled. If you go into it with no expectations and just are wanting to have a good time, you will enjoy yourself. You can sabotage the other players and steal the lead from them, constantly threatening your friendship as if this was Mario Party cranked up to eleven. The problems arise however when you get to the final three chapters of the game, where the enemies become exceedingly difficult, and the game begins to cheat against all of you. This is not an exaggeration either, as the final four boss fighters of the game do actively read what inputs you are doing to try and counter them, and it caused my friends and I to have to grind seemingly forever to stand a chance, only to then still lose all of our progress. When we finally got to the end it was pure catharsis, however, I would never want to wish going through all that nonsense on my worst enemy. Thankfully, we have since discovered that you can just have a set umber of turns to play through, so you can have much more fun and take far less time to get through it all. For anyone wishing to go through a full campaign, I wish thee luck, and may you have either the greatest friends in the world, or not mind having a bunch of computers to just try and zip through it as fast as possible.

Find Love or Die Trying

This was a tale of two halves if I have ever seen one. The first half of the game is akin to The Bachelor, where you take on the role of the lead love interest, except the twist here is if you aren’t entertaining enough and the show ratings go down, you get killed by the production crew. I thought that was a very unique premise as it is what the game is sold upon, and while it has its moments, the week that you play through is almost excruciatingly unbearable when it comes to cliche and over the top writing. The executive producer is comically evil to the point of annoyance, and outside of the outlandish date events you get, the only really interesting part is the underlying plot with the director after each day of filming. However, once you get through the week, that is when the real game truly begins, as you realize you have found yourself in a timeloop story, forced to repeat this cycle again. Normally I wouldn’t spoil that, though I found the first part of the game to potentially be painful enough for some people to put it down. Once the pretenses of the situation are dropped, the writing actually becomes very good as you and the girls you are taking go on a thriller adventure trying to uncover what is going on behind this show, all while trying to act like you are none the wiser. Beyond the first week, I thought the whole cast was really fleshed out and I found myself attached to each of them and wanting the best for them, and I am happy that I pushed myself to continue after that initial hurdle. I know everyone hates the whole “I promise it gets good after a certain amount of hours” argument, but thsi is a case where I think it is warranted. It also helps that the initial week isn’t that long to play through, perhaps two to three hours at most depending on how fast you read, so everything beyond that point is smoothing sailing.

Mindcop

By now you should expect this list to continue with the trend of mystery games. Adorably drawn and animated with a charming detective duo, Mindcop is what I would call the puzzler’s murder mystery. Combining match three and detective gameplay together worked much better than I really thought it would, with the mind surfing mechanic giving us detailed mental examinations of those we are interviewing. The set up has a Twin Peaks feeling to it, where an extremely small town faces its biggest challenge yet in one of their own having been murdered, just replace Twin Peaks with Merrilyn Crater Camp and Laura Palmer with Rebecca Goodman. Not to say that this story will eventually devolve into the paranormal, though it does share the idea of the further you, the titular Mindcop and your partner Linda, go, the more of the dark secrets of this town will be uncovered. Coupling this with the fact that the game features a time mechanic where each action takes a certain amount of time and you only have five days to catch the killer, I felt like I was racing against the clock all the way until the end to try and confirm whether my suspicions were correct. You can end the game whenever you like by arresting who you think the culprit is, but I think the fact that I got down to the final two in game hours left before I was able to make my decision with enough confidence to feel good about it is a testament to how well done this game handled its core mystery. The fact that this is a nonlinear investigation game as well greatly serves this purpose, so one playthrough is very unlikely to be like another. Even when I had finished my first run, I wanted to go back and explore so much more that I didn’t have a chance to before. Thankfully there was a free play mode after that gave me the chance to do so. While it isn’t in my top three games I played this year, I would recommend this to anyone who is a fan of either match three or mystery games.

Loco Motive

Speaking of my top three, Loco Motive is the last of those titles. As someone who hadn’t ever played point and click adventure games growing up, this to me felt like I was watching a Hanna-Barbera cartoon play out on a Saturday morning, except it was based around a murder mystery on a train. Once again another very classical scenario to the mystery genre, you are playing as Arthur A. Ackerman, the estate attorney to Lady Unterwald, the head of a major railway company. With her not getting any younger, she keeps making adjustments to her will, but tonight, on the Reuss Express, she is going to finally announce who she will be granting the business to once she retires. Right when the moment of truth comes however, after passing through a dark tunnel, tragedy strikes, and Lady Unterwald is found dead! Now it is up to you and your extreme lack of qualifications to try and figure out who did it! With a very beautiful pixel art style and fully voiced dialogue, this game oozes with charm. To those who are more familiar with point and click games than me, I am sure you will find some similarities between it and popular ones of the genre like the Monkey Island series. For anyone who hasn’t experienced games like that and have wanted to try it out, then I say look no further than Loco Motive. I found myself laughing about the whole way through this title, and I wouldn’t have traded that experience for anything.

Queer Man Peering Into A Rock Pool.jpg

One of my friends who I had played through Dokapon with gifted this to me for Christmas and I decided to play it that evening after he had told me it was a good short game, to which he was correct! This falls into the “walking sim” genre, and is a very metaphysical expression of living as a gay man and trying to navigate how the world acts around you while you try to make the best of your situation. That is just one potential explanation of many, as the creators intentionally left it ambiguous as to what it was all supposed to mean. If you want a game where you walk through what looks like a synthwave music video and then eventually starts pulling out The End of Evangelion references, then this is a game for you. It is another game that can be done in just under two hours, so it a fun think piece to sit with.

The Case of the Golden Idol

This was the last game I had managed to squeeze in right before New Years as the player alongside my friends. Upon opening this game up, you have a very minimalistic tutorial given to you on how to open menus and then you are off to the races and have to piece together how to proceed on your own. Normally, I would say that is a horrendous approach to the beginning of a game, however, this time the developers made it work. The Case of the Golden Idol felt like what an advanced version of an ISpy book, where you are given a scene of a tragedy and from there you are meant to fill in the blanks as to what is actually happening. You get to examine the people and environment to add keywords to your bank, where from there you try to slot them into the spaces they are meant to go in and see whether or not you were right. This process with each scene was always very entertaining and felt like a good puzzle to try and solve each time. Watching the overarching narrative unfold all centered around the aforementioned golden idol was fascinating, and my friends and I always felt like we deserved pats on the back for being able to get through some levels with how minimal the information you are given is. There is a sequel to this called The Rise of the Golden Idol, alongside two DLC stories, and us three have already said that we will definitely be checking them out sometime this year. If you are looking for a fun puzzle game to play with friends, then this is definitely the one I would recommend to you!

Games that I have watched to completion

This is going to be a much smaller section, but I wanted to still shout out these games that I watched my friends play all the way through. Seeing as I wasn’t the one holding the controller I can’t really speak for how these feel to manuver, but still experienced the entire story.

First off is a slice of life visual novel called Twofold, but to call it just that would be doing the game a huge disservice. You play as Olive Penn, a college student on the verge of failing out, who is looking for a club to join in hopes of trying to get study partners before they get given the boot. They eventually find themselves stuck between the Literature Club and the Art Club, ran by our two main love interests in Millie and Caprice respectively. Depending on whose club you choose to join will determine which path you will be on, but the two are much more intertwined than just being a route split. Navigating through Olive’s life and seeing them try to connect with the various members of the club and seeing how they are all going through their own struggles, it is a game that really pulls at your heart strings. I very rarely cry when it comes to games, but learning more and more about both Millie and Caprice really did bring me to tears on numerous occasions. For a game to be able to do that to me makes it very special in my book, and I think this is a story that you should seek out and experience all the way through on both sides. I don’t want to say too much, so please go and play it yourself, or watch a playthrough of it. You can find my friend Don’s stream VODs of it on YouTube, linked here!

Next up is a game you have probably seen floating around by now due to the explosion of popularity it receieved in Mouthwashing. It is a psychological horror game that while being light on the jumpscares, makes up for it in rich storytelling and making you reconcile with everything that you are witnessing on screen. This is truthfully a game that I would not watch a content creator go through, as the topics within it are very serious, dark, and deserve to be treated with sincerity, rather than being played through with someone trying to be entertaining. My friends and I were aware of this when we went through and it was a harrowing experience, though one that I would say is more than worth experiencing. This is another game I would try to go into as spoiler-free as you can, though again with the popularity and level of fandom it has achieved, I understand that it can be hard to avoid. I normally am someone who is not a fan of horror games due to being easily scared and not finding the adrenaline rush enjoyable, but this is a game where you will not have to worry about that. There is a segment in it that does behave like a traditional horror game that I think overstays its welcome in the maze section, but beyond that, I think this is a fantastic game.

Finally, another horror game, albeit one that doesn’t quite feel like it due to its aesthetics: MiSide. I think the premise is a fun one, where the trope of the yandere girl is subverted in how Mita doesn’t actually care about you romantically, but rather she just wants to keep you trapped for her own amusement. Going through and meeting the various Mitas was a fun concept too, and you could feel the looming presence of Crazy Mita and how she has affected all of them. Perhaps calling this a horror game isn’t quite right, as it is more of a thriller with the occasional jumpscare and spooky setdressing. All in all, it was a fun thing to go through with friends, but it wasn’t something I would have personally found interesting had I been on my own. At the time of writing, the development team is still working on the “Peaceful Mode”, which I assume will just be the continuation of the romance slice of life activities at the beginning of the game. However, with the team currently leaning into the posts that go “Oh I can fix her”, I don’t foresee it coming out and being in the spirit of the rest of the game. Maybe I will be proven wrong, time will tell.

With that, those are all the games that I had experienced last year! Looking back on it, I really didn’t imagine that my top three games of the year would actually be from 2024, let alone the fact that I would say they all rank amongst my top ten favorite games of all time. Last year was a wonderful year of gaming for me, and I hope 2025 gets to be the same! I am going to be smart about this for next time and write these entries as I actually complete them instead of all at once. At the very least, I accomplished my goal of getting this out before February, though in the spirit of me, it was at the last minute. Hopefully this article will have given you some good suggestions for games to check out, and if you do, tell me what you thought of them!

#2024 #Games I played #Games I played in 2024

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mirorbdangamachine · 10 months ago

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So I saw a Reddit post discussing who everyone picked to perform the Rite of the Covenant with in Unicorn Overlord, where someone in the comments talked about how he made the choice based on what would have given Alain the biggest political advantage. They listed some examples, and that then got me thinking “What is EVERYONE’S advantages to Alain were he to pick them?”.

So I wrote all of those out for each and every character recruitable in the main portion of the story, alongside some potential downsides too.

Spoilers below the cut up until the final battle of the main game!

Without further ado, I shall now present all of these in sections based upon where the in game library says the character counts as being from:

Cornia:

Scarlett: Not only secures peace with Albion, but also means Alain has direct influence onto the control of Palevian Orthodoxy, enabling religious backing, and the country of Albion itself.

Lex: Nothing politically gained beyond increased public morale.

Josef: This is his dad, the king’s guard are already secured with Alain because of this, same with all Liberation leaders. Don’t marry dad.

Chloe: Nothing politically gained beyond increased public morale.

Hodrick: This is kind of his uncle figure, probably shouldn’t do that. The king’s guard is already secured anyways.

Clive: Strengthens ties to the Ashen Blue Knights, potentially making the Ashen Blue region swear fealty to Alain directly instead of his grandfather Gerard.

Rolf: Nothing politically gained beyond increased public morale.

Sharon: Strengthens ties with the Palevian Orthodoxy, garnering support from religious entities.

Mordon: Seemingly much older than Alain, perhaps not appropriate. Would strengthen support with mercenary groups, may face criticism of perpetual drunkenness.

Yahna: Unsure whether her power will enable her to continue to live forever or not. Served Alain’s mother as court sorceress, morally gray on whether this is appropriate. Would secure support from the southern swamp region of Cornia, and strengthen ties with Elheim.

Berenice: May garner support from mercenary groups and potentially the Ashen Blue Knights.

Selvie: Nothing politically gained beyond increased public morale.

Auch: Will secure allegiance with House Aubrey of Cornia. May potentially face criticism as a former commander of Zenoira.

Adel: Strengthens ties to the Ashen Blue Knights, potentially making the Ashen Blue region swear fealty to Alain directly instead of his grandfather Gerard.

Fran: Secures support from the Knights of the Rose, potentially able to rebuild the squadron and increase public morale as a result.

Nina: Secures support with a Cornian noble house, potentially may face criticism for former banditry work.

Miriam: Secures support from the Knights of the Rose, potentially able to rebuild the squadron and increase public morale as a result.

Kitra: Secures support from the Knights of the Rose, potentially able to rebuild the squadron and increase public morale as a result.

Melisandre: Secures allegiance of House Meillet of Cornia. May face criticism for swearing fealty to Zenoira during their invasion.

Colm: Significantly older than Alain, perhaps not appropriate. Would secure support of House Meillet.

Monica: Secures allegiance of House Nordheim of Cornia. May face criticism for swearing fealty to Zenoira during their invasion.

Renault: Nothing politically gained, will most likely face criticism as a former high ranking general of Zenoira.

Tatiana: Nothing politically gained, will most likely face criticism for engaging in inhumane experimentation.

Virginia: This is Alain’s cousin, he realistically shouldn’t marry her. Not like that’s stopped royalty before though. Would ensure that the Cornian royal bloodline is not split and thus cannot have a dispute of royal succession. Also ensures allegiance of the Knights of the Rose.

Gammel: Nothing politically gained. May garner support from some in Elheim, though most likely will face criticism for banditry.

Mandrin: Nothing politically gained. May garner support from some in Elheim, though most likely will face criticism for banditry.

Drakenhold:

Aubin: Garners support from the desert region of Drakenhold, strengthening ties between the two countries. May increase support from mercenary groups, but may face criticism for former banditry

Travis: Secures allegiance with House Zechshelm of Drakenhold, strengthening ties between it and Cornia. Also may garner support from mercenary groups.

Bruno: May increase support from mercenary groups. May face criticism as a former Zenoiran general.

Berengaria: Secures allegiance with House Zechshelm of Drakenhold, strengthens ties between the countries. May increase support from mercenary group, but may face criticism as a former general of Zenoira.

Leah: Strengthens ties with Drakenhold.

Primm: Strengthens ties with Drakenhold and the Palevian Orthodoxy.

Aramis: Secures peace with Drakenhold in secret.

Magellan: Garners support from the desert region of Drakenhold, strengthening ties between the two countries. May face criticism for former banditry and being a former commander of Zenoira.

Liza: Garners support from the desert region of Drakenhold, strengthening ties between the two countries. May face criticism for former banditry.

Gloucester: Strengthens ties with Drakenhold, though may face criticism as a former Zenoiran commander.

Hilda: Nothing politically gained, will most likely face criticism as a former Zenoiran commander and inhumane treatment of citizens.

Jeremy: Nothing politically gained. May increase support from mercenary groups.

Gilbert: Secures peace with Drakenhold, granting Alain direct influence on the country.

Bryce: Nothing politically gained. May face criticism for banditry.

Amalia: Nothing politically gained.

Elheim:

Rosalinde: Secures peace with Elheim, potentially giving Alain influence on the country.

Lhinalagos: Strengthens ties with Elheim.

Celeste: Strengths ties with Elheim.

Ithilion: Strengthens ties with Elheim.

Eltolinde: Secures peace with Elheim, giving Alain direct influence on the country.

Ridiel: Strengthens ties with Elheim.

Railanor: Strengthens ties with Elheim. May face criticism as a former Zenorian general.

Galadmir: Strengths ties with Elheim.

Bastorias:

Morard: Strengthens ties with Bastorias. While no one singular ruler has been selected yet for the country, he is one of the most likely candidates to take the position, which grants Alain direct influence on the country.

Yunifi: Strengthens ties with Bastorias. While no one singular ruler has been selected yet for the country, she is one of the most likely candidates to take the position, which grants Alain direct influence on the country.

Ramona: Strengthens ties with Bastorias. While no one singular ruler has been selected yet for the country, she is one of the most likely candidates to take the position, which grants Alain direct influence on the country. However, she is implied to be much older than Alain, so this may be questioned on whether it’s appropriate.

Dinah: Strengthens ties with Bastorias.

Bertrand: Strengthens ties with Bastorias. Questionable whether this is appropriate given his implied age due to having had a son.

Govil: Strengthens ties with Bastorias.

Albion:

Ochlys: Secures support from the Palevian Orthodoxy, strengthening ties with Albion.

Raenys: Strengthens ties with the Palveian Orthodoxy and Albion. Implied to be older based on her having been a lady-in-waiting for Scarlett as a child, so this may be questioned for whether it’s appropriate or not.

Jerome: Secures allegiance of the Largion region of Albion, strengthening ties with Albion. Seemingly much older than Alain, this may not be appropriate.

Umerus: Strengthens ties with the Palevian Orthodoxy, Albion, and the Heavenswing Knights.

Fodoquia: Strengthens ties with the Palevian Orthodoxy, Albion, and the Heavenswing Knights. Questionable whether this is appropriate given his implied age due to having had a son.

Sanatio: May strengthen support from the Palevian Orthodoxy, Albion, and the Heavenswing Knights. Will most likely face criticism due to his part in covering up the murder of Pontifex Arant and following Zenoiran command.

If you happen to think of any other benefits or downsides to the characters, it would be neat to see what you think!

#unicorn overlord #I may have gone just a wee bit insane with this one #I am sorry if some of teh copy and pasting was a bit annoying #there are just a lot of characters in this game #cross posted on reddit

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