A Spooky Cute Romp Through The Woods: "The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince" Review

Player(s): 1
Platforms: Playstation 4, Nintendo Switch

“Oh. Oh they’re cute. They’re so cute. They’d fit right into my Halloween aesthetic.” That’s all I could think as I started up The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince. The game gave me a charming and slightly grim fairy tale, with gorgeous visuals, wonderful music, and fun puzzle mechanics. Too bad it was over almost as soon as I got into the groove of it.

​(Mild spoilers for the game follow)

​Liar Princess presents itself as a literal storybook, set in a fantasy world where monstrous creatures and humans coexist with high tensions between the groups. The liar princess is actually a wolf, who accidentally attacks a prince who enjoyed her singing, and made a deal with a witch to transform into a human to help lead the prince to her to fix his eyes. What follows is an easy to follow puzzle platformer, utilizing the princess’s wolf and human forms as she gets the prince from point A to point B with a lot of literal handholding. 

Handholding? Yup. That’s a MAJOR mechanic in the game: the prince is blind. The princess in human form has to hold his hand and lead him through the forest. The thing is, the handholding button in human form is also the attack button in wolf form, making your carelessness your downfall.

The game wasn’t particularly hard. It’s is very generous in explaining how things work in the forest, and how to get the prince to help you on your journey. Puzzles were, for the most part, easy to figure out, and only rarely did I have issues getting through them quickly. Monsters can kill the prince and the princess in human form in one hit, but wolf form is invincible and the only way to attack. Honestly, the hardest parts of this game were not accidentally attacking the prince, and not losing the prince when holding hands and jumping to the next ledge (a surprisingly short fall will also kill him). I’m willing to say the latter issue is more a weird mix of physics issues combined with awkward button holding, but it caused me more problems than just about anything else. There’s collectables scattered throughout the levels, unlocking fun extras for those hunting them.

​The visuals were light on color, but so expressive and wonderful. The game kept the spooky cute aesthetic, and little touches such as the prince and princess smiling when they hold hands only added to the overall charm. The music added to the atmosphere, with each setting having its own track. The additional sound effects were minimal, with the only voice being the narration of the story scenes. All of this helped build a great atmosphere of mild terror and loneliness, with the princess and prince cutting through it all. NIS took a bit of a risk with this game (it was entirely designed by a female web designer) and I feel it paid off in spades.

​Honestly, the biggest issue I had with this game was that it was over much too soon. A story playthrough might take 5-7 hours, with a couple extra if you’re going for all the collectables. But even so, I enjoyed my time with it immensely. Knowing this, it’s hard to say for most people it’s worth the asking price, but I can say you won’t be disappointed in plunking down the cash.

-Janette G

Second Opinion (Nintendo Switch Version)
My first thoughts when booting this game up was that it reminded me a lot of "Dokuro", a similar puzzle-platformer from a few years back on the PS Vita (though ported to other consoles, including the Nintendo Switch) from Game Arts and that's not a bad thing. Similar to that game, I have to say that I think the experience lends better to someone on the go. Someone playing this in small bursts might be able to look past some of its drawbacks. However, all the problems mentioned in the above section plagued my playthrough too.

Far too often I felt that the deaths came out of nowhere and weren't any real fault of my own. A relatively small screen view meant that far too often enemies I didn't realize were there would take out the Prince before I had a chance to do anything about it. Other times I found myself making leaps of faith only to immediately meet my end. I know this game doesn't really penalize repeated deaths, and some of them were actually humorous, but I couldn't help but feel frustrated more than once. Also, some of the hand-holding jumps, and other multi-button pressing sections, had my hand twisted into the most awkward of positions and far too often it was these sections that would have to be done at least a minimum of twice to pass. While "The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince" definitely wins out on aesthetics and overall presentation, I'm not sure if this package also contains a great game. Also, similar to above, once the story was completed I felt there was very little reason to go back to this game and I wonder if anyone but the most staunch of completionists would bother either.

While I feel that if you are inclined to pick this one up you should probably look into picking it up for the Switch (I imagine this would've been a PS Vita release several years ago) as it feels far better handheld than on a console. That said it's kinda hard to recommend this one due to its relatively high retail price considering how long the experience actually is.

-Manuel (alavic_222)

For More Information on The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince:
https://nisamerica.com/games/the-liar-princess/

Gameplay: B
Graphics: B+
Sound: A
Value: C+

OVERALL: B

Pros:
+ Charming story with easy learning curve to puzzles
+ Visuals and music meld perfectly to present the story
+ Replayability for completionists 

Cons:
- So very short compared to the price
- It's easy to lose hold of the prince, causing many area restarts
- Puzzles are too easy at times, with little driving you forward

Note: This game was provided to us for the purpose of this review. The PS4 version was played for this review