Whisper of a Rose

I enjoed this one a while back. Was nice to replay it as summoner.

Dorothy: How can you talk if you don't have a brain?

Scarecrow: Oh some people without brains do an awful lot of talking don't you think?

Plot Spoilers ahead for Act one

Whisper of a Rose is a RPGmaker made up of three Acts (or Chapters) and the First Act is centred around Melrose who indulges in fantasy worlds of Princesses, Knights and other Fairy-tales as an escapism from her real unhappiness at school & her parents.
As a background introduction this character building of Melrose gives us a glimpse into the true person she is and attempts to add a hint of realism to a Fantasy based game by showing us the other side of the mirror of Melrose's World before thrusting us into her imaginary world.
As is often the case in fantasy imaginations, we get treated to a more stronger willed, more confrontational and headstrong version of Melrose that clearly she feels would counter her failings in the real world. The issue with this is that players can misunderstand this and interpret Fantasy Melrose as being a bully herself within her Fantasy world instead of seeing it as the Fantasy Melrose being a complete opposite in personality to how she is in reality. I guess it can be seen as a super-heroine scenario where, thinking on Superman, we see the personalities being a total opposite to their superhero persona.

The remainder of Act One focuses on the escapist world of Melrose and how she ends up there. It begins with Melrose being sent to her room for not coming home on time/not doing chores and it is here you do a construct of a Fairy-tale Castle for College whilst the game-play has you choose early on what Fantasy character Class Melrose will be whether it is a Paladin, Warrior or Summoner.
There is the start of many side-quests that lead you through the Main Story and it is when Melrose has learned of an experimental device called iDream within a Museum and, from this moment on, we see Melrose gradually revert to her Fantasy world in stages that begin at her Montas College then develops permanently as she finds herself in a Dreamworld in a place called Candy Mountain that, ironically, resembles a board-game called CandyLand.
By the end of Act One, we are introduced to the Fantasy persona of Melrose who is struggling to accept she is in this Dreamworld and verbally challenges anyone during this battle to accept her predicament.
For the remainder of Act One, Melrose ends up meeting two characters who accompany her on her quest to return 'home'. The first character is a scared spell-caster (Hellena) who seems a darker personality when using Spells but it is later revealed in Act Two the reason why. Melrose seems to be defensively harsh to Hellena which doesn't really reflect well on her considering her real-world treatments at College but, again, I put this down to Melrose still adjusting to this Dreamworld and also the super-heroine personality traits I mentioned above.
Eventually, Act One comes to a conclusion with Melrose having encountered a Ladybird character (Diamond) that seems nervous/anxious and has the ability of a Healer. Diamond wishes to stay with Melrose to avenge the kidnapping of her 'village' which becomes an ongoing side-quest.

By the time Act One is over, you should have learnt the basics of the characters and how to develop their skills which is in the form of a branching Skill Tree that have differing levels to each Skill ranging from MP cost, Attack strength and Casting Time and you earn (and can collect) Skill Points to unlock and advance through the Skill Tree. Rarer areas require Rose Petal Points that are harder to find in the World.
There is Crafting as a means to create items for health, magic use etc which are created from Recipes that are found in various locations; to craft within the Menu you have two lists - you can select items to go onto the left side and, when all Recipe items are selected, the Right side tells you to click the area to craft the item.
By Act Two, you can travel to a location called Kairo to accept side-quests called Trades that earn you rare items, weapons & armour that are not found in Dreamworld as pick-ups or drops.
The side-quests themselves are varied in that you can be seeking out items to unlock Dream Creatures (if Melrose is a Summoner) to performing requests for NPCs from different locations to earn rare items.

The battles are your typical RPGmaker ones that will also be familiar to early Final Fantasy games like FFV in that you have Attack, Skills, Items to use and Defend. There is also a choice to Fight or Escape at start of battle which is frustrating to use in Dungeon areas because of how narrow the areas are so even if you wanted to Escape a battle you will probably end up encountering the same enemy again within minutes! The Boss fights in each location area make use of status effects to weaken your party and can be long battles due to their HP but they are manageable once you know their tactics.
Talking of Dungeons/Caves, Whisper of a Rose has many of them in almost all the locations and they can be very disorientating so a lot of patience is needed! My earliest, and most annoying disorientation, was at the Butterfly Caves in Act One because at that point you are still new to the game and to be stuck going around in a vast complex cave system not knowing your butt from your elbow was challenging especially when enemies respawn after leaving areas then returning to them!

There is an ongoing Side-quest that you get early on at Annatta Woods where you can agree to find Frequencies that are basically the music themes to each Location/Battle. The Music itself is very typical of RPG games: melodramatic & catchy.
The graphics appealed to me for their bright, colourful, child fantasy-like themes and the Locations all fitted into these themes effectively such as: ValenTown and its contrasting HallowTown, the Desert regions contrasting the Jungles and many more. Thankfully, some regions allow using TelePortals that cost Recollection Orbs (battle drops) which saves time and aggro! Another important point is you can save at any time within the menu which is a huge relief saving on backtracking or replaying areas.
The game also features 50+ Achievements and Card drops which both have stunning artwork and there is a New Game+ that provides replayability for fully completing Achievements and Side-quests. It appears as Start Journey+ on the game-menu after a first playthrough. You can also play the alternative Classes for Melrose for replay factor too!

Of all the comparisons this game gets, one that stands out for me is The Wizard of Oz because I see similarities in the characters yet I also see variations of Melrose in the characters too in that they are weak traits of herself which explains why she is harsh towards them while the final character appears to be more how Melrose wishes to be.
My play-time is excessive for this game because of the issues I had with the disorientation in dungeons as well as pure exploring and figuring out the side-quests and I still need to complete Act 3!! I could hit 100+ hours but if you stick to the Main Quest and maybe use a Guide you can complete this in under 20-30hours!

Overall, while this game does have occasional Bugs (where my worst was being trapped in a narrow Dungeon and struggled to win against the enemies!) and it seems to adopt a mix of many previous classic RPGmaker games (even FF games!) I think its World and the Themes keep it unique while offering a wide range of things to do in the game as a diversion/break from the Main Quest.
~~~ Liked what you see? You can find more at Have a Word ~~~

Sigh. I should have read the reviews. The main character is a loathesome person with a victim mentality. She is played off as the "innocent girl surrounded by big meanies", yet she silently and coldly judges everyone she comes across, even people who are actually being nice to her. Her parents and the childhood bully are cartoonishly evil. In other words, her reality is a lala land of victimhood that doesn't really exist. The NPC dialogue is also noticeably bland. Did a high school fanfic writer from Tumbler write this? It's a shame because the art and spritework was very well done. This boat anchor of a story was a waste of good artistic talent. Next time, devs, find a better writer.

Honestly I don't know what kind of person, aside a 5 years old kid, would like this game. The story is interesting and the characters are cute, specially the gingerbread man who calls me daddy, but for that price the mechanics are too basic. Luckily I bought it on discount, otherwise I would be annoyed.

I recommend this game for anyone who has a taste for fantasy RPGs and various concepts that are interwoven into a single game to make something new and fresh.

This game has great music, I could honestly see myself just listening to it casually while working or going to sleep as it is also very soothing. Very nice melodies that bring the game to life.

The artwork is very nice. In fact, each design invokes emotion. The Portal Demon actually scared me when I first played the game off the creator's site and Candy Mountain is one of my favorite areas aside from the sadly memory wiped Fureta Jungle (it actually looks like it is falling apart and "shutting down", adding to the emotions embeded in the situation).

I honestly don't see anything to complain about in terms of the characters. Hellana is cute. Diamond is bravey. Christina is snarky. And Melrose is complex. I can actually relate a bit to Melrose as I have been severely bullied myself throughout my entire school career and I can easily sympathize with her on that note.

EDIT (AFTER FINISHING):

As for actual game play, this is very good. The ending was sad and funny at the sametime. Watching Melrose in the real world fall to her death on the left nearly made me cry and the happiness in the Dream World on the right was very uplifting. The two meshed well and kept me from bawling my eyes out for the whole house to hear.

The storyline is still very good. Sure finding all of the ingredients for the good armor was tedious but well worth it. I still highly recomend this game. I am currently on the Plus Story now and still enjoying the music and art. Also, the Virginitphosbius (how ever you spell the third form of Farah that was once called Agraphobius) is easily the most distrubing, scary looking monster in the game. It beats the portal demon, hands down in design and representation.

That's another thing, all the phobius represent a specific fear. Arachinphobius represents the fear of spiders while Agraphobius represents the fear of sexual abuse. Very clever there Rose Portal Games. It definitely show that they know quite a bit about pshycology. This game gets more brownie points from me!

What I will say is that this game was playable enough for me to finish. I will give credit where it is due and say that there are some very nice things about this game. For a small developer (with this being their very first game), there are some things they did well... but they also definitely dropped the ball in some areas. For me personally, the features that I felt needed improvement and things that I found frustrating outweigh the few shining aspects that the game has to offer.

Pros

• Every area in the game is uniquely different. Each dungeon, town and sub area are all different in design, and each new area features its own unique music. Enemies are all unique, there are no "recycled" enemies that are recolored and stuck in various places. All boss enemies are also unique. In addition, all music is great to listen to and suiting. Monsters too, are all appropriate for the area that you are in. The artistic factor of this game is very high, and was well done.
  
  
• A good mix of RPG elements, such as: puzzle solving, dungeon crawling, grinding and completing side quests. There is also a crafting system and skill tree for each character in the game.
  
  
• You can save anywhere you want. This is very helpful in a game where enemies scale up in difficulty quickly. Being able to save before going into a new area or attempting a boss battle is huge. It also makes it easier to pick up and play, or finish without having to trek to a save point.
  

Cons

• What this game was trying to do with its story, I have no idea. Everything is completely all over the place. It starts by building a frame that this game is about a tortured young woman who has nothing to look forward to in reality, so she escapes into a dream world. Then, you spend the whole game trying to get back to the real world. Okay? You forget though about 10 hours in that there is a "real" world because the game throws so many other things in the mix. There's no pacing between the game play aspects and the story telling. A lot of the NPCs are barely in the story at all, hardly mentioned, and easily forgotten about/killed off.. or not seen or heard from again until WAY later. The story is clunky and disjointed, and instead feels like one long fetch quest. Go to point a, be told to go to point b. Go to point b. Great, now go to point c.. etc. There is no continuity here.
  
  
• The writing isn't anything to write home about. Melrose just isn't that likable of a character, so reading her dialogue makes it even more painful. Melrose is a 19 year old college student who hasn't matured past the mental age of about 12. She acts as a matyr to gain sympathy, but has not a kind bone in her body to offer in return. Being the subject of bullying herself, you'd think she'd be nice... right? No. She is immature, rude, and selfish. She expects everybody to push their own personal goals aside to help her return to the real world. Anything else is "whatever". She has a very poor attitude that doesn't much improve as the game goes on. Even when it's pointed out that she's rude, she refuses to believe this to be the case. The writing is very juvenile, and doesn't add to the already horribly planned out "story".
  
  
• The combat aspects of the game are off kilter. You have a choice of three classes for Melrose: Paladin, Warrior or Summoner. Regardless of what you pick, Melrose will mostly function as a physical attacker (slash damage) with some varying skills available depending on the class. Hellena is the ONLY character who can use consistent spell casting to cause magical damage. Diamond functions mostly as a healer, but deals piercing damage with a bow. Christina is the "tank" type of character who inflicts heavy blunt type damage. Why would they only give you ONE character who can cause magical damage when magic is so goddamn useful in this game? Hellena is by far the most useful and overpowered character in the game. Christina, Diamond and Melrose all attacking in one turn sometimes don't do enough damage as Hellena can do on her own with one spell in a single turn. This really irritates me, because you do A LOT of fighting in this game, and I feel like it drags at times. You don't even have access to make other characters learn physical magic spells through the skill tree. The enemies in this game seem to also LOVE to put up barriers or shields that block all physical attack damage. You might be able to remedy this if Melrose has the appropriate skill to break the shield, or if Christina can brute force through it.. but Diamond is useless in these cases. You depend so heavily on Hellena. But, what if she's silenced.. or runs out of MP? Well, then you're left burning through items or using Diamond's skill to restore MP (provided he has it, and isn't silenced/has enough MP). Three physical attackers and one magic user was not a fair balance. It doesn't really provide the game with much challenge (since it becomes easy with much grinding), but just frustrating. It's drawn out, and makes me feel like I'm wasting a lot of time and resources. Considering Melrose is your main character, I also found her to pretty useless as a Paladin when I played. Her attack power is trumped by Diamond and Christina, and a lot of her skills often miss or don't work as they should. She's also got low MP. For a class that's also supposed to be defensable.. she wasn't any more durable than my other party members.
  
  
• Although they have put a skill tree system in the game, I feel as if it's poorly implemented. Navigating through this thing is a disaster. It's hard to put in to words unless you've actually played the game, but I imagine that some people who have played feel the same way. Rather than having a skill tree that you can easily see as a whole right in front of you, you have to tediously scroll around on a sort of "road" with varying forks to find the skills. I feel like I'm just blindly fumbling my way around in the dark. There's no way to zoom out, to see every skill so you know which ones you've already leveled. There's no color coating to showcase the kinds of skills on each different path.. no organization whatsoever. I think this is something they could have easily made more convienent. There are certain skills on the skill tree that are locked for the ENTIRE first play through for EVERY character. There's these "Rose Petal" locks that can only be unlocked with a special kind of skill point. But guess what? There are only 5 available in the entire game, scattered around on the world map.... and they are only accessible in New Game+. I found ONE at the end of the game by completing a side quest in my first play through.
  
  
[*] There's no map. This game is huge and the dungeons are also big and very complex. They've designed a lot of these dungeons with branching paths, caves, and a lot of random treasure strewn about. I honestly don't think I would have been able to finish this game without the use of a guide that had pictures of the area as a whole laid out. Even if the environments are nice to look at... everything does start to look the same after a while, and there are certain areas that are very easy to get lost in. You're guaranteed to miss chests or skill points because things are so easy to overlook while simply trying to navigate your way through the area. The other extremely frustrating thing is that enemies re spawn every time you leave that screen. So if you go into a cave that ends up having nothing in it, you'll have to encounter all the enemies you just fought again (most likely, most areas are pretty tight, with enemies that are hard to avoid). A mini-map featured in the corner of each map to show things like dead ends, opened chests, etc would have done this game wonders and made navigation much easier.

I love this game and has been playing it for 100+ hours.
I would like to recommend this game to those that love good RPG Maker games with an excellent storyline.

You can play this game as a Warrior, Paladin or Summoner. In this game the Summoner is the most interesting character which also enables you to unlock a lot more achievements. The combat mechanics is interesting as you play with different form of elemental damages (fire, water, air, earth) which are resisted by different degrees by different monsters. You also alternate between real and dream worlds.

Unlike most other RPGs, you do not gain skill points as you gain more experiences and levels. You need to explore every nook and cranny to look for skill upgrade points. You also need to talk to every character and do every quests to get skill upgrade and unlock points as well as better gears. As a summoner, you can also unlock different creatures to summon through various quests as well.

There is also an excellent crafting mechanism in this game as well. The best armors in this game, called Relic Armors cannot be bought or received as drops from monsters. They need to be crafted using various crafting items, as well as some very difficult to get monsters drop. Furthermore you need to keep your very first set of armor for all 4 characters as well, because you need to use them to craft Relic armors at the very end.

You can buy better weapons from differnet vendors in this game, but the very best weapons, called Ultimate Weapons can only be receive through quests too. Hence this elevate the importance of doing all quests.

To get all achievements, you will need to play this game twice, and hence giving it more replay value. This is because there is a New Journey+ mode which can only be unlocked when you finished the game. Furthermore there are quest that are started during your first game which can only be completed during the New Journey+ as well. So the achievements associated with these quests can only be received if you play the game twice.

The second time you play this game, you get a lot of benefits, including new skill sets which can only be unlocked in New Journey+ You can also get better creatures to summon and start of with certain crafting recipes which are not present in the first game. I have started on my New Journey+ and this game is still sustaining my interests even though I am playing it a second time.

This is a great game. The only shortcoming I can think of is that the graphics are OK, but not top-notched. However, considering that I got the game on sale at about $10, this game is defintely worth its weight in gold, in terms of the enjoyment value and the time played.

-------------------Review Update after Finishing New Journey+ ---------------------------
I am finally done with this game, after 156 hours
I played the game twice, and finished New Journey+ with allthe steam achievements.

In the end, all my characters were at level 47, and I had 31 DRAGON TEETH.
I just love grinding that green dragon for lots of XP and orbs.
That dragon also got me a lot of levels too!!!!

All my characters were equipped with Relic Armors and Ultimate Weapons.
I also made 4 of those awesome Tanzanite Rings with game my characters +9 magic attack and +3 magic defense. In the end, Helenna's Tornado was so overpowering that she can wiped out all the enemies in a single turn (equipped with Relic Armor, Ultimate Weapon and Tanzanite Ring).

I simply fell in love with this game, and that is why I spend 156 hours on it.

I put the prequel, "Sweet Lily Dreams" on my wishlist and will buy it when it is on sale. I am sure I will enjoy the prequel very much too.

Once again, thank you for the wonderful game, developer Lucia Silvermoon !!

Well, that was a waste of money. This game will not display properly on a 1920x1200 (24inch) monitor. You have the option to play in window mode, but you won't be able to read anything unless you're 6 inches from the screen. sigh.

Also attempted to steam stream this to my MAC, it also does not display properly. What a waste.

Don't buy, unless your machine is a 486 MX with 2MB graphics card. I think thats the MAX this game will allow.

I had streamed this game with only a few viewers. We didn't get some of the early game. There was a lot unexplained, we felt. Like the bouncing around time, the awkward bathroom humor. The abuse was very mature, we didn't mind it but it was rough. I got to a point where I couldn't defeat the worm. I know the game prompted to train, kind of, but didn't really seem to offer a hell of a chance for it.

Not sure how to rate game. At all. I'm going to go with a thumbs down, but maybe in the future it will improve or the next game the company puts out will be better.

Whisper of a Rose is a very well done RPG Maker game about a girl named Melrose who has a pretty awful life and very much wants to find some way to escape it. She finds a device called the iDream and uses that to escape into her Dream World.

But she ends up finding out that the Dream World isn't as nice as she thinks it is. After all, not all our dreams are nice and happy, there are plenty of nightmares as well.

Whisper of a Rose takes us on Melrose's trip through the Dream World. Everything in the game is based on things that happened to Melrose and her own fears and wishes. Even her own repressed memories show up at times. The settings range from rolling hills to unpleasant forests and swamps. And all Melrose wants to do is find a way home.

Overall pros:
+Lengthy game, it took me just under 30 hours to beat it, though that included having to redo some stuff when I was defeated.
+Gorgeous settings, you can barely even tell it's RPG Maker
+Wonderful soundtrack. All the music fits great with the scenes and the battle themes are just amazing. You can get the soundtrack for free at the dev's website too.
+Very responsive dev which is always a good thing.

Overall cons:
-Never thought I'd say I wanted random encounters in a game, but this game really would have been better off with them. Visible encounters just don't work here with how difficult it is to avoid enemies and how they immediately respawn with no chance for immunity to avoid the encounter. Monsters also don't stop while you grab treasure which leads to encounters you may not want. (Edit: This has been improved upon as well with a short delay between respawn and an item to avoid encounters. New Game+ mode gets an important item to allow unlimited avoiding of encounters)
-Regular battles can get lengthy and tedious. (Edit: This has been improved upon and they are much shorter as long as you aren't avoiding everything and not upgrading equipment)
-While there is a quick means of travel, it only covers limited areas and you'll be backtracking a bit for sidequests, which makes the encounter annoyances even greater because you'll get stuck fighting some monsters when you just wanted to make a quick run to grab an item.

Achievement wise, it's not an easy 100%. You'll need two full playthroughs to 100% the game and there are a few missables. It's about 30 hours per playthrough from the looks of things if you want to be sure to miss nothing. There is some replay value though since you get some new stuff on a second run and there's one sidequest that can only be finished on the second playthrough and it nets you the best summon in the game.

Still, it's a very good game and I do recommend it. It's not exactly short and sweet, but it's worth playing all the way through.

Also a little tip for anyone playing it: don't sell your initial armor for any characters. You'll need that later if you want to get the best stuff in the game. It's doable to beat the game without it, but more difficult.

Whisper of the Rose is a slightly more mature version of Sweet Lily Dreams (also done by Rose Portal Games). The story revolves around Melrose who is in a harsh relationship with her (supposed) parents and rough school life. She thrives in happiness through her dreams and imagination. This ends up leading her to steal a device that allows one person to enter a dream world that may or may not be better for them.

The story is common among many people and may even connect with those who might be in a similar state (or were). The game play is a little different than SLD, but is still an RPG Maker Game with simple RPG elements. The game has some great music and you can even get through it with little grinding if you are decent with these kinds of games. The variety of sidequests also help to make the game a little more interesting when you start getting tired of the main story events.

Some of the game's plot can be a little too dull and may lead some people to give up early, but it ramps up the further you get into the game, making most people wanting to continue. The Skill Tree almost seems like a real tree. It has giant branches and is not the easiest to navigate, but once you get use to it, it is not that problematic. There is not a large variety of enemies, but each enemy has different weaknesses no matter what type it is.

There are other good ideas and bad moments in this game, but I will not spoil too much to give anyone interested in the game a chance to experience the game for themselves. There is a free guide online if you ever get lost or need some kind of help and exploration is always recommended. You may find things that you didn't know you could get early on that will help with your game play. All in All, the game is decent for an RPG Maker game and is definetly worth trying.

7.2/10

Got to the Love Engine Dungeon... Did a puzzle requiring stepping on some star shaped tile on the ground and then pressed 1 to 5 to make a path for myself to a switch and a skill point. Once i got the skill point i leveled a skill and saved without realising that saving there would reset the puzzle trapping me forever with the switch on the other side. Since i saved with the puzzle reseted when i load i still am trapped since the puzzle reset without bringing me back to the puzzle entrance and there is no way to teleport out of a dungeon...
This is a great game and i came across no other bug. I'll have to restart it from the beggining now but i do hope they will fix puzzle reseting when you save for no reason and often trapping you forever unless you made many save file and are able to reload before you got to the said puzzle. Also would appreciate more information on the stats difference between the class.

I truly wanted to like this game, (because, lets face it, I had already spent my money on it) but I just couldn't be drawn into it. I played for awhile, but no matter what happened no matter how close I felt I was getting to actual gameplay, the long, drawn out, and poorly written interactive novel that this game begins with was too much for me. maybe one rainy day i'll try to keep playing, but for now I cannot reccommend this game to anyone. well, besides maybve someone with too much time on their hands, who wants to wasted it harmlessly, but without any fun being had. This game is just short of being a chore to play.

Controls

Soundtrack

Story

Gameplay

I actually like this game, because it seems to have a neat story and well-conceived characters. Storyline and character's actions don't seem too stupid and unlikely.

The mapping looks nice and not too dull, but its tedious to run around. Blocking items like plants and too long dungeons, where it's easy to get lost. While you are getting lost several times, you at least get to know every enemygroup. I even met some often enough to exchange names and phonenumbers.. but I'd appreciate if they won't show up ever again.

When you finish a fight you can't move for about 2 seconds and/or the loot blocks you. In the meanwhile all the enemies around you CAN move and get near enough to attack you right after the last fight. That makes it almost impossible to avoid fights. Running around gets pesky.


But at least it feels like it's made with some love. Probably because it has potential. Those fights just ruin it ..

Really enjoying this SNES-style grindfest. Challenging little puzzles. 25 hours in. I will see this one through to completion.

This game is a standard turn-based RPG. It looks like an old SNES RPG. Story wise its pretty average and alot of the dialog is awkward at times. The music is great, there are alot of stand out tunes that feel like they came from the glory days of RPG gaming. The battle system utilizes the same mechanics as the Final Fantasy ATB. Nothing groundbreaking here, but if you enjoy RPGs, this game wont let you down.

Okay, the game gets a few mixed reviews, but Whisper of a Rose is definitely a good addition to one's library of games. The in game art style is beautiful and shows a lot of consideration has been put into designing area's, characters, etc. There are a few rough spots though in gameplay, such as scripted scenes involving sprites getting stuck if char x moves in front of y by interference from char z. For example, in the museum's scene it is possible for Melrose to arrive at the door before the curator and thus blocking the trigger for the event's continuation.

Similarly, if you escape a battle, enemy sprites will be reset to their original spawn points. If you happen to stand next to one you'll either have to fight and win or face game-over since Melrose's sprite is immobile immediately after a fight (probably because of the item drops needing to be calculated). Sounds bad? I can be. But! Even with those flaws the game is fun to play. The battle system feels reminiscent of Lunar SSSC, with animated battlers and variable music, the three selectable classes are balanced well thus far and your first summon is cute.

I won't touch too much upon the story, as others have done that already, but like To the Moon this game has a unique appeal. I'd recommend it even to those sceptical of RM games in general.

Whipser of a Rose is great, until you actually start playing it.

In the opening scenes, I was immediately drawn into the game. Whisper of a Rose has an immersive narrative pulling from the real world into a fantasy one with a played out but fitting transition. Everything in the game is quite symbolic of the paralells between the real world and the dream world you enter. Melrose is a unique character to follow around as far as RPG worlds go, and the cast that was starting to form as I played through seemed at least not totally cheesy (but if the super powerful person who can't control their powers! trope bothers you, red flag). Unfortunately, once the opening scenes end and you actually start existing in the game world, the reality sets in that this not an exciting adventure, it's a typical JPRG grindquest without the tension relievers most of them typically throw in.

I have to state before I get too far into this review, that I only played 5 hours of the gameplay. Maybe after the 5 hours I played, the game would magically become 200% better, but I find it doubtful. It's obvious from the get-go that the game was not very well play tested early on in the development process. If it was, the obvious feedback would have been that The areas within the game are far too large. How often do you hear people complaining about that in an RPG game? Typically when RPGs have large areas, when you go well off the beaten path, you are rewarded. This is something WoaR attempts to do, but fails miserably at.

Let me paint the picture. You are going through the dungeons with your party, spamming the attack button on small groups of enemies because it literally takes less time to do that than to cast a spell that would kill the enemies in one hit (in addition to your turns refilling, your spells have their own cast bar. You also have to wait for every other characters turn to end before your spells go off). So you're going through the area, killing off the exact same enemies over and over and over and over and over again, trying to see if the path you're traveling on is the main one or a little detour. When you get to a dead end, you see a chest. "Ah, this isn't the right way, but maybe I'll get something cool!" you may think. But no, what you'll get is a weapon or armor piece that literally increases a stat by one, or memory orbs. Memory orbs are the currency of the game. So imagine spending literally 30 minutes going through a dead end path (I'm not exaggerating, the game is that poorly planned) only to end up at a chest that gives you more of the same money that you're already frustrated of seeing... and that's it. YOu have to backtrack all the way back to the beginning of that path and find a new one.

This is all the game is in the first 4 real hours of playing it. A mindless treck through bats to find very small upgrades or useless money. That's it. I didn't even encounter a TOWN in the first 4 hours of gameplay. The game is a constant motion forward through dungeons. There was one point where I found an inn, but there was nothing to do or explore there, and there were no NPCs worth talking to (about 3 total anyways). Typically in JRPGs, towns offer a kind of tension relief their repetitive nature can sometimes cause. It gives the player a chance to relax, plan, and become immersed in the world they are exploring. Whisper of a rose ingnoring this convention in an otherwise convetional game becomes one of its greatest flaws.

I'm sad that I quit the game so soon into it. The environments are gorgeous and inventive, the story, while a bit cliche, is rather interesting and makes sense with the surroundings you find yourself in... but the gameplay is just... boring. That's all there is to it. Perhaps at some point, the game does a complete 180 and the paths becomes more linear and the combat becomes more complex, but I personally couldn't force myself to sit through any more of it after the sidequest boss I spent an hour and a half trying to find died in about three turns.... and then I realized I would have to backtrack all the way back to a teleporter just to get back into the story (would probably take at least 20 minutes to do). I didn't want to hate this game, but unfortunately Whisper of a Rose stands as a perfect example of how a great story and world can be hindered by the actual gameplay of a poorly planned JRPG.

Immensely game-deprived at a certain point in time, I found Whisper of a Rose on Steam. My first thought was "It looks very pretty. Immensely pretty, in fact. Whoever made the art for this game was very good." Honestly, the trailer and blurb sounded so mundane and cliché ridden that I considered not giving this the time of day but I thought, maybe advertising the game was just harder than writing it? So I sat down and started playing it.

Four hours later, I regret this decision. The writing the bland and cliché as it gets with only the slightest hint of self-awareness (which, I will not be afraid to admit, shows promise but I don't care enough to pursue it), the combat never gets anywhere, and it takes about three hours just to get the ability to upgrade your skills.

But the WORST of it comes when you're going through Butterfly Forest. At one point, you're impeded by a group of butterflies that you're not allowed to touch else you get cursed. So what you have to do? BACKTRACK TO THE LAST LEVEL to get an item that will let you pass! Uggggggggggh... Fine, whatever. So I go back but the game misdirects me; I get dragonfly eggs instead of dragonfly droppings. Or maybe those WERE the dragonfly droppings but I'm not using them right. Either way, I don't know how to proceed.

I can tell you now that, even if your JRPG well is so dry that your tears are literally the only things that allow it to hold any sort of liquid, Whisper of a Rose is not worth it. The art is pretty, though. Whoever made the art assets for this game, if you're reading this, you are fantastic. Sadly, good aesthetics does not a good game make and thus this game has effectively stolen $7.50 of mine that I'm never getting back.

Nice art but quite frustrating. Not in difficulty sense, the game is rather easy. It’s just boring. I thought I was in for a treat as the game went through in beginning phases but it fell flat pretty quickly once it starting moving. Many of the environments are beyond annoying to navigate. Between world objects blocking you such as plants, rocks and the tiresome enemies chasing you endlessly to make you engage in a snooze fest of a battle it really starts to become a chore. Whisper of a Rose attempts at bringing in a skill tree to the genre which works but not as well as it could. You collect skill upgrades in random places or talking to random npcs, many which can be easily missed. You do not earn any skills from just leveling up so It’s nice that they did something different and encourage exploration but this game simple isn’t worth exploring. Its pointless to escape from battles because the enemies simply spawn right next to you only to engage the battle again. If you try running far away hoping you can lose them don’t bother. They can often navigate the annoying terrain better than you. If you do successfully get away you’ll only be met by another horde immediately after or during your escape. Want to find a way to that chest you see on that ledge? Well then be prepared to put 30 minutes at least trying to painstakingly get to it. First JRPG I’ve ever desperately tried not to get into any battles. Not just because they are pointless and boring but because it will cause you to level way to quickly, obliterating any challenges. 5/10

As far as classic rpg's go, this is like a classic that never happened, almost like a dream (pun completely intended) the story is fresh and interesting like the true twisted face of "wonderland". The art style is impressive and the music is amazing, the gameplay is reminiscent of old school final fantasy with some current day practices. My only problem is not being able to select the resolution, my screen seems to cut off a little, but beside that little fact, I wish modern rpg's would take a step back and see what an indie can do with a little passion and a whole lot of style. I give Whisper of the Rose a 9.5.