Escape from the Princess is a relatively short fantasy Yuri Visual Novel developed by Salamandra88 and published by 7DOTS. You can find this game on Steam.
Rosetta’s big dream is to become a strong magician, however, she gets kicked out of her magic academy because she seems to not have any talent for becoming a magician at all. One day when something seems clearly off, a powerful witch suddenly appears at her home, searching for help. The witch, Zara, is a wanted criminal, yet Rosetta helps her. So, I’m sure you all wonder, why she would help a criminal. Well, it’s an easy question: It’s because Rosetta would do anything for becoming a magician, even breaking the law. Though, what would happen if Rosetta starts to develop feelings for the witch Zara?
At first, I was a bit confused because Rosetta was willing to help her way too fast. Is she just naive? Very soon you notice magic is indeed everything to her. If I have to describe her, I’d say she is a dork. She is so unpredictable, not only in her actions but also the things she is saying. Of course, that means this game will contain a lot of fluffy and comedic moments. I chuckled a lot while playing this game and sometimes I was just speechless at how much of an air-head Rosetta can be. I also have to say if you have a thing for air-heads and unbelievable hilarious moments, by all means, this is the game you were looking for. Zara, on the other hand, seems very confused about Rosetta at first. I mean you definitely have to get used to her and I could definitely associate myself with Zara. Rosetta in contrast, just seems very weird in the beginning. Once she opens up, she is the most lovable girl though.
One thing I also have to mention is that I noticed that girls love, also known as yuri, wasn't a normal and accepted thing in this game. This means it was definitely unusual for girls to be in love with each other, if not even unthinkable. Some may disagree now, but I think this makes the game more realistic. Since I’m a sucker for forbidden love, I appreciate it, even if players may be torn on the idea of whether you should or should not love the same sex. Given Escape from the Princess is a historical game, more or less, it makes sense why lesbians were very rare and questioned. Though, the only thing that really counts is their love for each other of course!
I have to say the story is very predictable and sadly it probably won’t end up surprising you. I still enjoyed this game regardless and the girls are both very cute and very different. As I was playing Escape of the Princess I wasn’t even sure if it’d be real Yuri. Rosetta and Zara seem to have very different personalities and it seems like they will never truly get along. Oh boy, soon I was proven that I was totally wrong. Both girls were really made for each other and I started to root for them to be happy together eventually. We all know it’s not that easy and beware, this game does contain a lot of troubles and drama for their relationship!
Escape of the Princess contains a few different endings, however, the routes were basically the same except a few key scenes. I would suggest you to play the happy ending at least, as the other ones might leave a bitter aftertaste. On the other hand, some endings were so sudden, you can’t help but want to find out more about Rosetta and Zara. I noticed as I played through the different endings, the skip function is grayed out if you didn’t see the text yet. So you can immediately see if the text is skippable and won’t waste any time with trying out whether skipping works.
In case you’re worried about sexual content, there is an option to turn them off in the menu. I think it’s a very nice feature since there are situations where you don’t want other people to see you playing a game with sexual content, plus there is no need to download an additional patch! We definitely need more games where you can freely choose whether you want 18+ content to show up, as they may not be everyone’s cup of tea. I also have to add that the sexual content is very light erotic, even if you enable them in the menu, you can only see nipples and it’s definitely not the focus of this game.
I’m sure you’ve noticed as well that the artwork is simply gorgeous. I was surprised how well the CGs and backgrounds were animated, it really stood out and gave them a nice additional touch. Also, the characters have different positions and facial expressions, it will never get boring to watch the girls blushing!
I do have a few critiques. First, the CGs looked a bit unnatural with the proportions of the characters looking very off. Luckily, it only applies to a few ones. The text also really bothered me because they were too long sometimes and it would have been better to split them into small sentences. It didn’t happen too often, though it was clearly visible, since the text was even off the text bar a few times, which really ended up being confusing and made it hard to concentrate on the game. Although this game does not contain any Voice Overs it was still very entertaining to listen to the soundtracks while playing Escape from the Princess, they sound very comedic and cheerful.
So, in the end, I can definitely recommend Escape from the Princess if you appreciate unique humor and enjoy sweet love stories as well. If you’re looking for a game with a superb storyline, you should look elsewhere though. This game is definitely a nice way to spend your evening(s) with it.
Unicorn World
