Publisher: Hajime Doujin Circle
Developer: Hajime Doujin Circle
Single Player
PC (Steam)
This review contains plot spoilers for this game and Cinderella Escape R12 (2015).
I will preference this review admitting what this is, that it is as much a very low budget, independently made 3D beat 'em up made as much as a game with fetishes as its genre of choice. Created by Hajime Doujin Circle, a one person company by a Taiwanese figure Hajime who began this series with the prequel as a 3D puzzle game, imagining a world where Cinderella from the ancient wells of fairy tales is in fact imprisoned under false accusations of murdering a king. Dying as a result of the prequel's true ending, the sequel jumped genres into being a scrolling beat 'em up, resurrected by her (2D) fairy godmother and trying to prove her innocence.
It is a fetish game as, in mind to the fact Valve's Steam service allows porn games for sale on there, this had a free R18 patch from the developer you had to download from their Patreon account, which allowed topless nudity. You can literally kick people so hard in the pre-existing, non-patched version that their clothes explode down to their underwear and alongside the explicit BDSM slant with the clothes worn by enemies, and the costumes you acquire for Cinderella, you have in the outfit changing/buying menu a bar to toggle her breast size. What led to me wanting to play the game however was when, learning of this through video content by a videogame commentator Matt "McMuscles", a Canadian videogame enthusiast with an interest in documenting fighting games especially. I was enticed by the premise beyond the fetish content. That, even on a low budget, this is an adult fairy tale with an interesting central mechanic in the centre - that Cinderella, still stuck in a cursed arm restraint even after death and resurrection, has to rely entirely on kicks and flipping in the air to get through opponents. You can turn this aesthetic detail off, with the animation changed, but it ruins the littlest of things which could have the potential to be rewarding, even be expanded. That, whilst it would be a niche title to sell, is a beat 'em up entirely with a distinct fighting style of aerial flips and kicks, without punches, matched by an aesthetic style that is also of interest. I will go ahead and say despite the issues with the game, I would not mind a Cinderella Escape game where, toning some things down, would be an adult fairy tale beat em up with this mechanic explored further.
Here I also admit the fact, as a PlayStation One and Two player growing up, I have a thing for even the cheapest of beat em ups. Not one-on-one fighting games, but a genre which was coming back into popularity in the 2010s of levels you traverse with a fighting game arsenal of moves, with Matt McMuscles himself contributing to a throwback game called The TakeOver (2016)1, and in the midst of the first two Playstations was an era of smaller video game companies from Japan, and other regions, churning out lower budget games. The beat 'em up is one genre that came up a lot in that era, even if many did not get a Western release or I never got to from those released. One thing this genre has the potential to provide is that, alongside the fact you produce a few open levels, a character with a range of moves, and a few enemies, even if the time and resources are still needed, the efficiency of the mechanics means that you can add a variety of creative looks and styles to said genre mechanics. Cinderella Escape 2 Revenge is a low budget child of theirs from the era of Unity, the game engine which this was produced on. Even if these games have a potential of being repetitive, which will have to be addressed with Cinderella, they had an addictive quality for me and this was the same.
I say this not to insult Cinderella Escape 2 but warn that, due to its limited resources as a production self produced by Hajime Doujin Circle, and crowd funded, this game exists as a solidly made work in context but also very minimal in content due to the restrictions at hand. This could only expand beyond what we have here - more locations, more enemies, more moves beyond the few and the one special Cinderella has - if you had more resources, funding and time. Hajime Doujin Circle still tried with what they had here, which is the great note, as for a game which brazenly has a thing for dominatrix underwear on the female enemies, it invests in a tone and a narrative which is idiosyncratic for this type of production.
It has a serious narrative in the midst of itself in fact, in the Story Mode, of artificially made living dolls who, in this fairy tale world, are a lower class with incidents of them going on rampage causing further biases against them. The game is tackling a subject which is heavy handed, and comes with things in its attempt to be dealt with that could be read in really awkward ways, but it is ambitious even for this game to try this. Even if the game is meant as much for titillation, it is trying to tackle subjects like racism and persecution, as one of the side characters Snow White, here a Goth Lolita, is in love with a doll, which is pretty ambitious. Even the main villain Pinocchio, a doll who has found a way to become human, has a tragic back-story with the witch character that helps Cinderella out. Told in in-game cut scenes, only the knowledge that, as you can buy new clothes for Cinderella, she will be dressed in whatever she has, or can end up in just her underwear because of how the game's fighting works, adds an air of absurdity to a sincerely told tale.
Even the light hearted aspects - the fourth wall breaking joke of the Fairy Godmother being 2D, that Cinderella is a ditz, one who when everyone presumes her to be a mythical fighter whose bound arms allow her to train to become more powerful, and goes along with it - feels like a premise that, on one side selling sex, is however on the other stretching against its restrictions, that contrast actually leading this to be a compelling premise to expand on. This game will still put people off, from the toggle to expand the lead's breasts to BDSM traps you occasionally encounter against the bosses. It is, due to how much was possible, still stuck with repetitious content too. What was created is solid in context, but Cinderella herself only has a few (if very flashy) moves, the one special thankfully insanely elaborate, spinning on one leg in pirouettes which would make a ballerina blanche, whilst the flips in the air with the basic moves are appropriately over-the-top. The limitations mean, alongside the locations per level being only a couple, you have limited enemies too.
Baring the camera, which is potentially fiddly, the game is fluid, Cinderella practically homing on opponents especially with the slide button. Challenge is found in enemies with long range or special attacks, which in a choice I praise the creators for, have visual prompts onscreen to help warn of ahead of time. In one case, when you are beating up the Seven Dwarves in a bar, because Snow White refuses to come back to her Queen mother, I legitimately had something memorable here early on which emphasised why I find this premise has more potential in it, something you could have elaborated on in a larger scale game, in this small tavern room brawl as their do charge rolls and fire projectiles. Even the whole idea of kicking a villain so hard their clothes explode off is a mechanic as, alongside being equal opportunity with males in their tighty whities, it is designed to leave something vulnerable to more damage. It is a mechanic that gets lost as Cinderella gets more powerful, but it is interesting to see even a fetishishtic aspect become part of the game, especially as Cinderella herself is in danger of this too. (Even the clothes and accessories, which you earn coins to buy, increase stats as you buy them in bulk).
Even the kinkiness of the game is less an issue than in terms of interpretation. Even as a heterosexual cis-male wary to not just presume a defence for such content, I have however become more wary of the concept of the "male gaze" because the notion of the gaze is more complex nowadays. More female gamers are recognised, as are more non-heterosexual gamers and more awareness of sexual desires being more complex, which really forces one to re-think the image of Cinderella here in leather fetish gear beyond just presuming it is objectifying, knowing full well that depending on the viewer, they themselves as a non cis-male gamer may be offended, may roll their eyes, may actually enjoy the game, or may even cosplay and/or draw illustrations of this character. Even if this is obscure choice for the later examples, we cannot presume everyone equates the same opinion, and I think more an issue here was the linking of violence is a bigger issue, if only because, whilst still very tame here, this does not have the major aspect of BDSM that you have the pre- and post- interactions with those involved in the role-play.
If this game got rebooted, than you could find a way to keep its BDSM content, and tone some content down and increase others, especially if you brought in non-heterosexual male voices. This is the kind of game, just imagining if you ran with the kinkiness, you could still have as lewd in a crowd pleasing way, for many, even if you have a limited audience. Here as well some of it is in-game would have to be worked with mechanically, the traps here especially whilst eyebrow raising in the boss battles, from "Spanish horses" to chain jungles, they are, escaped through button mashing, annoying at times when the bosses will just spam them with shields up. If you find tuned everything the potential is rife for a lot of playfulness with fairy tales as a form if the aesthetic can be all inclusive and emphasised the humour more. Be it Three Buff Pigs, to a Snow Queen boss with Snow Bunnies and Frost Gimps, a humour and playful sexuality could be run with if you had more resources.
The story mode is slight, able to be played under two hours, and there are "Quests", challenges to increase your levels and earn coins for coins, though the later raising the potential issue of repetition with the resources the game has. Nonetheless, I found this game entertaining, and whilst it may seem ridiculous, honestly, to come to a game like this which is about the "fan service", the content which is meant to be erotic, and be far more interested in the skeleton of the premise and mechanics, that was what happened and what left a lasting impression. The optimist in me, if this ever got a reboot where anything was possible in ambition, would be interesting as we have had many adult fairy tales in a variety of medium and suitable audiences, including videogames, and one based on the fight mechanics and tone here with some content rearranged could work. Something like this which has some of this erotic content but is also more interested in other content feels like it could become something really memorable.
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1) As referred HERE.
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