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Heileen 3: Sea maidens
Apr. 5th, 2013 12:41 pmI've been deciding whether or not to try this game for ages, but it was on sale and "silly pirate f/f dating sim" sounded like just the thing to get me through a cold.
The Heileen series is about a young woman, Heileen, who sails to the New World from Liverpool with her friends and family in the first game, has to survive on a desert island in the second, and spends this third game on a pirate ship finding her friends, forming relationships and trying to figure out what she wants to do with her life. The way it works is you download the demo (Heileen 3: New Horizons), then pay to unlock the f/f or m/f romances (or both) I just paid for the f/f romances (sold as "Heileen 3: Sea Maidens"). I started on game 3 and wasn't too confused, and apparently it's the best of the series.
Overall I enjoyed it, but was bored or irritated for a lot of it. It's got a very conventional outlook: slavery is bad but colonialism is good, and "natives" are simplistic and often scary. It's very heteronormative, it's origins as a m/f dating sim are pretty obvious especially at the start when the main character keeps swooning over all the guys (especially Morgan, who she unambiguously crushes on all game regardless of who you romance), and since the romances are structured to allow you to switch to friendship at the last minute some felt a bit out of left field. Also some of the unavoidable "flirtation" from LIs felt like sexual harassment to me.
nb: If you are easily triggered by not-quite-incest don't read my summary and don't play the game!
( More specific thoughts )
And now, because I found it confusing for a while and to steal ideas for Copper Rose (if only in a "DON'T DO THIS" way), a more in depth discussion of the game mechanics. Some general plot spoilers but nothing specific about the endings, and personally I would have wanted to know all this going in.
( More details than you can poke a cutlass at )
The Heileen series is about a young woman, Heileen, who sails to the New World from Liverpool with her friends and family in the first game, has to survive on a desert island in the second, and spends this third game on a pirate ship finding her friends, forming relationships and trying to figure out what she wants to do with her life. The way it works is you download the demo (Heileen 3: New Horizons), then pay to unlock the f/f or m/f romances (or both) I just paid for the f/f romances (sold as "Heileen 3: Sea Maidens"). I started on game 3 and wasn't too confused, and apparently it's the best of the series.
Overall I enjoyed it, but was bored or irritated for a lot of it. It's got a very conventional outlook: slavery is bad but colonialism is good, and "natives" are simplistic and often scary. It's very heteronormative, it's origins as a m/f dating sim are pretty obvious especially at the start when the main character keeps swooning over all the guys (especially Morgan, who she unambiguously crushes on all game regardless of who you romance), and since the romances are structured to allow you to switch to friendship at the last minute some felt a bit out of left field. Also some of the unavoidable "flirtation" from LIs felt like sexual harassment to me.
nb: If you are easily triggered by not-quite-incest don't read my summary and don't play the game!
( More specific thoughts )
And now, because I found it confusing for a while and to steal ideas for Copper Rose (if only in a "DON'T DO THIS" way), a more in depth discussion of the game mechanics. Some general plot spoilers but nothing specific about the endings, and personally I would have wanted to know all this going in.
( More details than you can poke a cutlass at )
