NobleGamer The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante Review

I recommend Sir Brante to anyone who enjoys dark fantasy in a narrative-driven visual novel format where choices matter and basic role playing is provided. Here is what you need to know - Spoiler free: +The look and sound of the game in the style of a grayscale visual novel with just a bit of flair has an epic feel to it all. -Audio is just music and some SFX. So no voices, except for the brief cinematics that show every couple of in-game years. -I have played to the character's adulthood when they start to live on their own, and there are only a handful of literal roles that can be chosen, though... +There are plenty of attributes, "sides" to take that aren't always black & white, and prior choices can influence what happens to you and the story. +For choices, the prerequisites and immediate impacts to attributes & relationships are available, and can even be hidden if you choose. +Stats get more elaborate with character's age, but are intuitive so far. +5 chapters can be rewound/replayed at anytime, which correspond to 5 phases of the character's life, starting with birth. Peacetime in adulthood for Chapter 4 is by far the longest. ?Evidently the only way to skip text/dialog is page by page, clicking arrows or using left/right keys which is easy, so whole already watched sections between choices cannot be skipped as a whole. +It works well using Steam Link and thus Steam Deck, though it would be nice to have an option for the fonts to be a bit larger, and I wish Steam Link allowed for specifying right/left arrow controls to advance/rewind the text. +After true death, you do have an opportunity to rewind to a prior chapter to make different choices. Even when I opted not to do this and end the life/playthrough in a seemingly very final way, the save was retained so that I could rewind to a prior chapter if I chose. Multiple saves can exist and a new game can be started anytime. -As for the end of the 4th chapter: I played through all the major roles, and it seems easiest to unlock things that require extreme (highest or lowest) occupation attributes. If you try to achieve something that requires values that are not extreme, it will be very difficult because choices near the end of that chapter tend to push you to one extreme or another. ?Its hard to know whether that can be mitigated through a series of choices or not, because those choices can be difficult as well. That's how intricate the attributes and choices are, which I highly respect, but can frustrate anyone who really wants to accomplish very specific things. ?Having played through the final chapter multiple times per major role, and covering most of the end-game "sides" I could take, I found that my ability to influence the bigger picture was slightly proportional to my relevant attributes in my role. ?I don't believe there is an achievable "happy ending" for the city & empire, but there are non-horrific endings. If there is a happy ending, it would be extremely difficult requiring a very specific set of choices.