Since its debut in 2016, Noel The Mortal Fate has culminated in seven seasons, and this new release collects them all into one package, as well as a bonus season 3.5. Updates for consoles in mind have also been added, with an upgraded UI, new story and dialogue content, and Full HD support.

Conceived by the independent Japanese developer known as Kanawo, Noel The Mortal Fate borrows heavily from classic JRPGs and adventure games in style and gameplay, offering a story full of intrigue and deception to get your teeth into.

Story

After losing a prestigious piano contest in the town of Lhaplus, Noel Cerquetti enters into a Faustian pact with a devil named Caron. However, upon learning that they have both been deceived by a third party, they team up to take revenge and put things right. As one would expect from a mystery adventure such as this, there are plenty of twists and turns along the way and many characters who enter the fray.

The character of Noel is well handled and developed. She is immediately introduced as an arrogant and impetuous child, who will stop short of nothing to be the best - not even a deal with a devil. But gradually we see glimpses of her inner turmoil come through in various monologues, expressing her guilt and anxieties that reveal another side, morphing her from a spoilt brat to a compassionate and sympathetic protagonist.

The relationship that develops between Caron and Noel is also quite charming. They begin as a bickering pair and slowly start to warm towards one another, a la your typical buddy narrative. Caron begins to care for her well-being, beyond what is necessary for his own interests, as his character develops from an uncaring antagonist to a devil with a heart of gold. Much of the game's absurd and deliberately incongruous humor mainly derives from their relationship too.

The writing is sharp and elegant for the most part. On occasion, it also offers up the sorts of quirky phrases that you would expect of a game like this. For instance, the characters are introduced with a title card, and some of these are quite striking: Noel herself is described as a “Promising Pianist of Prestige”, which sounds like a boss from a Souls game, whilst Noel’s best friend, Julian Littner, is described as “Diligent Cinderella”.

There is no voice acting in the game, so all we get are subtitles. Thankfully, they appear to be free of any glaring typos or grammatical errors, so it’s clear that proper care and attention have been paid in this respect.

Gameplay

Noel The Mortal Fate sits firmly within the top-down adventure camp, strongly reminiscent of the Japanese classics of the genre with no real surprises thrown in. Aside from the dialogue and story to experience, there are some very basic mechanics, with standard movement controls and a single button to perform various actions.

There are your typical platforming puzzle sections, which mainly involve looking for red arrows for Caron to jump up to, and he can use a chain to ascend various walls and such. But there is nothing to do except move in that direction and he will climb for you. In the main, the puzzles you have to solve are not taxing at all, and the game usually explains what you have to do quite clearly.

When you enter combat mode, you simply walk into enemies to attack them, with no dedicated attack button. There are minor elements of strategy involved, such as getting critical hits if you attack from behind, and deciding whether to attack enemies when they glow red in their ‘desperation’ mode: doing so will fell them in one hit, but they will cause you considerable damage if they get a hit on you; otherwise, you can just wait until they stop glowing and engage them as normal. More weapons are unlocked as you progress, but again nothing that radically alters the playing experience.

There is also a little bit of sneaking on occasion, which is mainly avoiding vision cones. There are also the obligatory boss fights, which again are very simple tactical challenges. More characters and mechanics are introduced as you progress through the seasons, but essentially they don’t offer anything drastically different from before.

Throughout the game does a very good job of explaining what is going on and all of its systems. There are logs in the pause menu for story beats, characters, and gameplay mechanics, as well as a glossary of terms. Expositional dialogue between characters also occurs quite frequently to recap your current situation. All of this ensures that you are never really in doubt as to what is going on at any given point.

The game is also very generous with save points, offering them to you after every little event or once you reach a new area, which happens frequently. This isn’t a game that wants to challenge your gaming skills in any real capacity; its focus is firmly rooted in the narrative experience.

Occasionally there are dialogue options, but these are mostly inconsequential and many are there to elicit some sort of humorous response, or simply tell you almost explicitly to pick the other option.

Audio and Visuals

Stylistically the game borrows heavily from the usual suspects of Japanese pop culture. The menus and fonts are almost entirely ripped-off from the Persona series, and being made in RPG Maker, it features the typical subtle pixel art style but without the bit reduction.

The character designs of the dialogue sprites are your typical anime fare: Noel has the long black dress that we’ve all seen countless times before, whilst Caron has an indistinct crow-like head and predictable formal attire. There really isn’t anything that’s striking or original at all in these designs. The same can be said about the environments, although there is a touch more detail in these.

The music is littered with the typical JRPG piano and string ballads, combined with twitchy and frantic EDM and techno during the tenser moments. There are some real catchy tunes in here, but unfortunately, no credit can be given to Kanawo on this count as all the music has been pulled from royalty-free sources; at best you can say that they have chosen well. This also means that not all of the tracks loop quite so seamlessly; there are occasions when songs stop and restart abruptly.

On PC, the graphics options are as sparse as they come, allowing you only to change the resolution. This is fair enough for a game of this type, but I did encounter minor screen tearing throughout, and with no V-sync option I could not remedy this, at least not in-game. There is also no option for different fullscreen modes, so alt-tabbers might be annoyed by this.

Replayability

The entire saga of Noel The Mortal Fate features a fairly linear narrative with no real different paths to take, and it will likely set you back 15+ hours or so. There’s not much reason to play through the game again unless you really want to pick different dialogue options than before, but as aforementioned, they have very little impact on the story at all, so this would be for hardcore completionists only.

What It Could Have Done Better

Everything is fairly well put together and presented, although there are a few issues. When starting the game, it goes straight into a cutscene introduction, before you can even get to an options menu to adjust the settings - an annoyance that many titles seem to be in the habit of doing now. The music in that cutscene was somewhat distorted too, whereas the rest of the game’s music seemed unaffected.

The game’s humor can also get wearisome after a while. For instance, there is a running joke about Caron looking like a crow, to which he protests whenever Noel mentions it. It is milked for all its worth but the joke runs dry by the second season.

Gameplay-wise, the lack of combat controls can also be frustrating. You can quite often find yourself just rubbing up against enemies instead of attacking them, so you have to be quite precise, which is hard with the floaty, ice-rink movements.

One of the most frustrating aspects of Noel The Mortal Fate is that the pacing of the game is killed by the constant interruptions. Whether it be mission complete screens, saving prompts, or tutorial instructions, any flow that you might get from the actual gameplay is severely constricted. This, combined with the aforementioned sparsity of the gameplay, makes me think that they’d be better off going all in with a visual novel instead. The story and writing are by far the most substantial aspects of Noel The Mortal Fate and are the most accomplished, so why not ditch the gameplay entirely considering it is bereft of any real satisfaction?

Verdict

Noel The Mortal Fate is standard fare for a game of this kind. Its story is intriguing enough to keep you hooked, the character development keeps things interesting, and the central relationship between Noel and Caron is dynamic and rewarding to follow. The writing is competent and funny, with the morbid subject matter juxtaposing nicely with the absurd humor for the most part.

However, the gameplay is so devoid of any meaningful interactions that it calls into question the whole point of its inclusion. The constant interruptions are irksome and break the flow of the game, and the art style is fairly basic and derivative. One can certainly tell that this is a game made by a solo developer on a budget. You’re in it for the story with this one, and not much else.

Noel The Moral Fate is out now on PC via Steam and the Microsoft Store, as well as Xbox One and PlayStation 4 for $24.99. It is published by PLAYISM.