Pale Spectrum - Part Two of the Book of Gray Magic

I discovered this after playing through "Brilliant Shadows", having looked to see if a second part had come out. Unfortunately, I would not recommend this game as a sequel. While it maintains some of the positive themes of the previous instalment, it quickly becomes a choppy experience where we switch between characters quickly and without reason throughout the chapters. The story has no focus and no true driving conflict - any antagonist is quickly dealt with and seems to be an afterthought. The introduction of the magical spectrum also creates confusion, as we are bombarded with new magic with no explanation or focus. This creates logical dissonance with the previous game - we had two forms of magic, well thought-out and explained to us. That there are more forms of magic is not the issue, it is the lack of explanation that makes it feel like the characters are now overpowered but still in the dark about their abilities. I intend to see this game through, despite my disappointment. I hope that Ithaqua Labs have learned from this experience and create more streamlined story experiences in the future.

An excellent sequel to Brilliant Shadows. Good stuff: [list] [*] Great writing and character development. [*] Unique and interesting lore. [*] Racial diversity, given that several dark-skinned characters have their own goals and ambitions that don't revolve around white people. [*] Queer representation, three different queer couples and a trans character. [*] Choices greatly matter, with several different consequences and endings. [*] Lovely artwork. [/list] Bad stuff: [list] [*] Several typos. [*] Despite the presence of a trans character, there were some instances of ciscentric language and cissexism. [*] Incomplete gallery? (Some CGs aren't available in the gallery) [*] Lack of compiled information for reference. With a story like this that has so many unique terms and variables to keep track of, it'd be nice to have an option in the menu for people to refresh their memory if they've forgotten what something means. [/list] It's definitely an excellent visual novel despite its flaws. If you've read Brilliant Shadows, definitely follow up with this!

Unfinished, underdeveloped, unsatisfying, and seemingly come undone since it appears the devs have dropped this series. This is a real shame since the first book, Brilliant Shadows, was so enjoyable. Plotlines go seemingly nowhere, characters are brought back to do essentially nothing, there's an unjustifiable surplus of new characters who do not add anything to the story, and the pacing is jumpier than an anxiety-riddled frog during an earthquake. Even the justified new characters who DO serve to drive the narrative are one dimensional, or just unexplained and fleshed out poorly. There's simply too many ideas here that are delivered to you at a breakneck pace with inadequate time to digest them. I fell in love with the world I was slowly discovering in the first book, the second just unravelled any interest I had in seeing where it all leads. I struggle to think of how long it would take to wrap up all the ideas and plotlines that have been set in motion here, and in a clean way. Narrowing of scope would have helped here. I wanted to like this, I really did.

This is easily one of my most favorite games ever and I really truly hope that there is a third game in the future! I had so much fun with the story and making decisions for the different characters.

I love this game. You can tell they spent a great deal of time world building to develop their complex magic system and the how the relationship between the characters. there are quite a few endings, though i the ingame chart of all of the endings and options were more explict in letting you know how many other paths can still be taken. I'm still not 100% sure that I have taken every ending. As for the ending themselves one ending path feels more like a true ending than most of then the others. I really would love to see the next part of this game and see how it all resolves itself.

A truly unique visual story that continues on the story elements that were built up from the previous installment.