Choice of Rebels: Uprising

Reviewing (mostly) every game (or DLC) in my library, part 604: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (9/10) Can you like, or even love, something without understanding it? I’m honestly super impressed by [i]Choice of Rebels: Uprising (“Rebels”)[/i] because I went in not expecting much. I heard it had a high-fantasy world and a stat-heavy narrative, but I struggle with high fantasy. I like magic, gods, and swords and all that, but I find that such high stakes ironically makes me uninterested in the story. Additionally, fantasy works often coin jargon, requiring a reader to flip through the glossary once. I like stats, especially if they matter—but only if I win. Which was definitely not the case in [i]Rebels. Rebels[/i] is not beginner-friendly and has a confusing jargon problem. It’s also weak characterization-wise, and the romance is either poor, confusing, or not very LGBT-friendly. The complexities of the politics are lost on me, quite frankly. With all that said … there is something so singularly fascinating about Joel Havenstone’s world. You play as the noble or peasant class in a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up world. Maybe America’s darkest timeline before the Industrial Revolution and the advent of machinery.…

[h1]CHOICE OF MULES[/h1] Choice of Rebels: Uprising is an Interactive Fiction game set in a mature, low-fantasy world where your choices truly matter. I was able to finish it in around 7 hours, but if you want to explore different routes, you can easily spend 15 hours or more. Honestly, I'm a little bit torn about Uprising. On one hand, it features a compelling story with various meaningful choices, but on the other hand, it can be very stats-heavy and repetitive. While this wasn't a major issue for me, fans of "traditional" interactive fiction may find Uprising a bit too gamey. Overall, I found the experience entertaining and definitely [b]can recommend it[/b]. It’s certainly not for everyone, but if you're fine with resource management, you'll probably like it. [b]World[/b] There's a lot of worldbuilding throughout the game. At first, this can be slightly overwhelming due to the constant introduction of new names and titles, but it doesn't take long to get used to it. One small nitpick of mine: some names try a bit too hard to sound "fantasy" for no reason. Starting a name with the letter X doesn't automatically make it more unique. Initially, you only learn what you absolutel…

Very enjoyable game. It seems to have a lot of different paths through it! There are quite a few unfamiliar terms to learn at the start, but you get the hang of them pretty quickly, and I actually found that they made the world feel more immersive. I especially enjoyed how much you can engage with questions of religion, politics, class, and what kind of society you actually want to build. Mature and very well written. Highly recommended if you enjoy CYOA/interactive fiction games! One thing to note: the story is not finished and will continue in a sequel.

Echoing what the other reviews are saying about the worldbuilding and premise, it's excellent. But as for the actual CYOA gameplay, I found it to be unsatisfying.

PEAK! Can't wait for the sequels so I can build my commie utopia

Very good lore and storyline can be a bit confusing at least for me. I still really enjoyed it though.