Having played Piofiore, Café Enchanté, and Code: Realize consecutively before Ozmafia, I was surprised at how short the sections of the game were. It made a little sense, given that there are 17 sections and then some for the Oz bachelors alone (who, by the way, each have eight endings and are only three of the ten romanceable options), but it was also a bit of a surprise as well.
Between actual sections and breaks between scenes, the gameplay felt choppy. Some scenes were literally a short conversation, which made them incredibly weak for stand alone scenes. The transitions weren’t exactly smooth, and there were times the scenes ended so abruptly that it caught me off guard. It was like literally flipping through a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book where each transition screen was like the process of flipping to a different page (which took away from the immersion). It also kind of felt like going through a bullet list outline of the route rather than a fleshed out finished piece or presentation.
A comparison I would make is that the episodes in the three Aksys games I mentioned actually felt like cohesive chapters to a story, while Ozmafia felt like it was made up of several somewhat disconnected vignettes. On top of that, scenes alluded to events that would- no doubt- have been intriguing and engaging, but were never realized. We never get to see those climatic moments, and it’s honestly very disappointing.
Missing out on those scenes was definitely a contributing factor to this game feeling a lot more childish than most of what I’ve played so far. The characters themselves felt childish, and that’s largely because any serious scenes we would have witnessed maturity, gravity, and growth in were left to our imaginations (not just because they are actually young). Most of them also seem very shallowly developed- including the heroine. My opinion of her may change after I complete more routes, but no promises.
I think one of the most disappointing things about this game is that I was genuinely excited to play it. It was at the top of my wishlist on Steam and one of the games I absolutely wanted to get during the end of year/new year sale. With it costing ~$35.00 USD at full price, having so many love interests and possible endings, pleasant art, and the fun fairytale mafia multiverse, it seemed like it was going to be amazing and a game that I would enjoy playing at least all the happy routes of. But after the first route I finished (Caramia’s True Love vs. Axel Happy Ending), it felt like a chore- like I was only playing this game to review it. There was a small part of me that wanted to keep going with the hopes that there would be better character development in other routes and a special curiosity for Pashet’s route, but I had much more dread than excitement after that first route.
And I think it’s worth noting that I do actually enjoy some of the more problematic, arguably bad, and straight up cringy otome games- but I know that they’re going to be that way when I start them. I consider them my less serious and more indulgent games because I know the characters are going to be fairly generic and poorly written, and I know the plot is going to be weak and cringy. But since I didn’t anticipate that with Ozmafia, it was hard for me to look past its faults and enjoy it.
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