Heartspell: Horizon Academy

A neat story, lots of cute characters to befriend or smooch, and a fun lil match 3 game. I think I need to be a bit more bolder and pick the flirt options more consistently, I missed out on Typhon even though I had wanted to romance him. D:

This game was such a pleasant surprise. I went in expecting a cute visual novel, but ended up really enjoying how much more interactive and connected everything felt. One of my favorite things about the game is how well the story connects everything together. A spell you learn from one character might end up being useful in a conversation with someone else, or something you discover in one part of the story can come back later in a completely different situation. It makes the academy feel like an actual living little magical world rather than a collection of separate character routes. I also really loved how many choices there are. Some visual novels can feel like you're just reading a book with the occasional pick A or B thrown in, but this game actually made me feel like my choices were shaping the story. I was paying attention to what I said and what abilities I had because I knew they could matter later. The puzzle system was another thing I really enjoyed. Each student has their own puzzle mechanic, which kept things from feeling repetitive. There were also situations where I had to change my equipped abilities to interact with something, and I also thought that it was a really clever to add progression. Skills and abilities aren't something you usually get much of in a visual novel, so having that extra layer made the game feel much more dynamic. And the game is fully voiced. Let me say that again. 100% Voiced. WTF? Seriously, what a treat. Fully voiced visual novels are pretty uncommon and the voice acting here is really well done. Everyone sounds great and fits their characters perfectly. The artwork is beautiful too, but the voice acting really helped bring all of the characters to life. The romance was also very nicely done. The spice level isn't explicit, but I definitely found myself kicking my feet more than once during every storyline. The spicy pictures at the end of each chapter were a particularly nice touch. Very tasteful. Very appreciated. No notes. My biggest complaint is the achievement system. You can't get all of the achievements in a single playthrough, and you'll need to play through the game three times to get them all. I really don't like that. Visual novels don't have a ton of replayability for me once I've experienced the story, so I probably won't be doing three full playthroughs just to clean up the last few achievements. It's especially painful when you're only missing a handful and know the solution is basically, well, guess you're playing the whole game again. No Sir, I won't be. Other than that, though, I had a fantastic time with this one. It's charming, whimsical, beautifully made, and has a lot more interactivity than I expected going in. Between the choices, puzzles, skills, connected storylines, great art, and fully voiced characters, there is a lot here to enjoy. If you like visual novels with romance, magic, meaningful choices, and characters you can actually get attached to, I'd definitely recommend giving it a try. And yes, I will absolutely be kicking my feet about romancing a necromancer in the schools forbidden forest for the forseeable future, IDGAF.

Very charming game. Fully voiced (and voiced well), great art, great music, great gameplay. Stands far above other dating sims I've played (which isn't many, admittedly) in the narrative. The game has many choices (outside of just who you're dating) that matter, from choices that affect dating specifically (like how serious you want the relationship to be, what role you take in the relationship, if characters get involved in other relationships, etc.) to choices that don't, from super minor things (like whether or not you're a vegetarian) to more major things (spoiler things). The game is also very nonlinear and the order you do things in matters, but instead of in a way that makes it feel like you need to read a guide about the "right" order to do things, it's in a way that feels very rewarding on a second playthrough when a scene plays out differently because the state of the locations/characters. The only criticism I'd have is that finishing the game's overall story requires that you finish all of the dateables' base storylines (to be clear, you don't have to date them, but you do have to interact with them maybe more than you'd want to), although narratively there is a reason for that.

Speaking as someone who likes match-3 games and is a little luke-warm on visual novels, this was really well put together. A lot of thought went into the characters, world, and magic. There were interesting plot or character turns for pretty much every character without ever feeling forced, and the voice acting does a lot to make up for the limited animation. Bonus points for standardizing polyamory and the respectful low level of kink exploration (nothing explicit, but when it broaches the ideas it does it well). As for the match-3 gameplay, it's not the most elaborate I've encountered but it's varied enough thanks to the little quirks of each character's spells and customizable enough to never feel too overwhelming. It's not exactly hard (even on the more difficult setting) but it never became tedious or boring in the main story. About the only complaint that I have is how every day basically randomly shuffles what characters appear where so who you progress with first or fastest is basically a dice roll. That's not such an issue until you get toward the end and you're trying to get your last few interactions and it keeps rolling you ones you've already done. It took me forever to get my last scene with Heron to spawn as an option. That's a late game nitpick, so if you've gotten that far you probably care enough to power through.

Heartspell : Horizon Academy is a really well-made game I really enjoyed Story wise, I wish I had more. Gameplay-wise, it was long enought to be good, and not too long to start to be boring. Gameplaywise, it's okay. A good match-3 type game, with new powers and combos to unlock. Some fights are harder than others based on each character's power, but it's manageable once you understand how everything works. What was really good was the story. The world-building was great, the story was really interesting, the characters designs are cute, and each character is well written, even though I did not really clicked with all of them (Morgan and Dawn, mostly). And by the way, the fact that the game was fully voiced is really great and the voice actors really did a stellar job. If I had to nitpick, it was tedious to unlock all the optional dates once the stories are done, and not all of them were really interesting. Thanks for a great game !

(ES) Me gustó la variedad de personajes que tiene el juego, las distintas personalidades que tienes e incluso las múltiples elecciones que tiene. Este juego te permite incluso emparejar gente y puedes estar con diferentes personajes a la vez y puedes ver como tus elecciones afectan a la historia. Me alegra que aunque la mecánica sea de match-3 tienes la opción de quitar ese minijuego y simplemente centrarte en la historia cosa que sinceramente aprecio porque soy bastante manca para esas mecánica. A lo largo de la historia vas conociendo más sobre los personajes y vas comprendiendo sobre cómo funcionan y te vas encariñando con ello, tanto las mini historias como la historia principal me han gustado mucho. El lore de este juego es muy interesante y espero poder conocer si se puede en un futuro más sobre el lore del mundo y sus personajes. (EN)I really enjoyed the game's diverse cast of characters, their distinct personalities, and the wide variety of choices available. It even lets you match people up or date multiple characters at once, and it’s great to see how your decisions truly impact the story. Since match-3 mechanics are definitely not my strongest suit, I deeply appreciated the option to skip the minigames and just focus on the narrative. As the story progresses, you learn more about the characters, understand their motivations, and genuinely grow attached to them. Both the main storyline and the side stories are fantastic. The lore of this world is incredibly interesting, and I truly hope to discover more about the world and its characters in the future

I really like this game! Great voice acting, amazing art, and super chill gameplay (except Amara's lol I was sweating a few times). I love how unapologetically queer it is. A truly comfy game with cute romanceable characters. You can date whoever you like or date them all! Even some NPCs! Can't recommend it enough, more games like these pls~!