Oblivious Garden ~Carmina Burana

Here're my preliminary observations: [u]Graphics:[/u] Very pretty. The graphics are watercolor-esque style. 4:3 aspect ratio (Not widescreen). Full-screen is achieved by hitting the windows maximize button. [u]Story:[/u] The game summary mentions 7 princesses. Only 3 are romanceable. A 4th girl, the head maid, is romanceable with the addition of the DLC. The news states that the DLC is included with each copy, however I'm not sure if this will apply in the future. While the story flows for the most part, there are moments where the transition is abrupt and the flow is broken. I'm not sure if it's deliberate. [spoiler] For instance, there was a scene where you're teaching Finn and she falls asleep. Then, when you try to wake her she's terrified. For all of 2-3 clicks. Then suddenly she's calm and apologetic. You get the feeling she's either schizophrenic or there's a step missing. Then, there is another scene where you're at the training hall on the first day, and you f...

This game is really a mixed bag. In one hand, the art style of the characters and backgrounds are gorgeous, the music beautiful and relaxing. The romanceable characters are very unique and deep, and I found myself genuinely interested in finding out more about them and they're well being. (Be warned though, if you're planning on choosing Leira as a romance option, you will need A LOT of patience. Her rudeness can be really hard to take, and at some points your perspective will switch to her's, and the game neglects to state this, leading to some confusion.) On the other hand, the translation is absolutely awful, and english-speaking players will need to read a lot of the lines over and over again to understand what's going on, and there are not that many different music tracks in the game, making long playthrough's a little tiring. Oh, and a little advice; even though there are multiple paths to take in the game, you can only choose one path and stick to it. I completed Lin's route, ...

The story and the characters are interesting, personally i like it but the translation is bad, very bad. Many of the conversations are very unclear and it feels like a 6 year old child wrote it. Unless it's properly translated i would not recommend this.

First of all this game is very beautiful and it pleases the eye. I have not finished the game yet and am not sure that I will just because the English is horrible. It ruins an otherwise enjoyable game. I will update this if I do end up finishing it.

I was able to clear one route for Dyanna, Lin, and Finn; three routes for Leira. From this, I do think that a lot of things are lost in translation because of cultural barriers, and to make matters worse the translation is quite terrible; as I read in the forums the translation is now being reviewed. Oblivious Garden ~Carmina Burana is pretty much similar to other VN's, you move around the garden and go to places where you can interact with its characters. Your decisions will direct which storyline you will go through. In some stages of the game you will be asked to prepare a tea, this will lead you to a minigame. You'll decide which ingridients to use, set the temperature and time for brewing. The game may end early if you somehow suddenly got kicked out of the garden (This was how my first game ended). If you were able to do you job well you may be able to proceed to one of the heroine routes. I had a hard time understanding it but the story is really good and interesting. The prot...

Amazing game with an incredible story! Just absolutely fell in love with the characters. Definitely great to break away from the typical VN, no school girls, no stereotypical protagionist, nice break from the usual japanese voice overs with the chinese voice overs. I really love how in depth the story is, more of a book than most VNs. Irell is a great protagionist, how haunted he is by his sins and past. I never cared for the protagionists of other VNs, he really stood out from the bunch. The voice overs were great, especially Leira's. She really sold the taunting, cruel speaking character, but was also able to sound cheerful when needed. The music was superb, recommend buying the soundtrack. The girls are easy to fall in love with. I really wanted and wondered why Marian wasn't a choice to fall in love with but after doing Leira's story, I saw why (You'll see why). I really liked how the world had religion, magic, and other things but didn't feel the need to go in to depth wi...

Apart from the glaring translation shortfalls, Oblivious Garden ~Carmina Burana is one of the better visual novel style games to ported to Steam. This is a CHINESE made and voiced game and buyers should be aware of that before they consider anything else. While it isn't too big of a deal for me, some people on the forums are quite upset about it. Graphics/Art - 5/10 The backgrounds looks horrendous; it's almost like they went into paint and brushed some pictures together. The character models on the other hand look relatively crisp and workable. Some characters have a couple awkward postures and the sprites aren't overly polished compared to something like If My Heart Can Fly, but it's passable. Sound/Music - 9/10 The soundtrack is phenomenal and I'm going to give them props for voicing most if not all of the female lines. That being said, the Chinese voice actors sound quasi-amateurish but compared to most of the VN's on steam that lack any form of voice-acting, it's still a welcom...

Of the visual novels I've played, this is probably my favorite so far. The artwork is lovely and the character design well done. The music works well with the setting. The character voices sound fine to me. As with all translated VNs, there are some occasional clunks in the text, but I didn't feel it was bad. I can't comment on the translation like I might with a Japanese VN as I don't speak any dialect of Chinese, but nothing in the text seemed overly hinky that would hint at a poor translation. These are just basic good points you can find in a lot of VNs. What really made this one stand out, in my opinion, is the vast difference in the stories for each path. Most of the VNs I've read have had pretty much the same plot regardless of what path you're trying to follow, with unique scenes and dialogues inserted in based on your choices. In this case, without spoiling anything, the entire progression of the plot is different. Each girl's path is written individually so that i...

I love VNs (Visual Novels). This one in particular is pretty awesome. Without spoiling to much of the VN, the artwork and background music is fabulous. The story for the most part is pretty good and each Princess is unique to their own peers, especially with their history/background story. There are 7 Princesses and 2 Maids that stand out. Only 3 Princesses and 1 Maid are options for an ending, maybe more in the future updates? (The staff has stated that it is not 100% done and Finn's chapter will not be a free DLC in future dates, as it stated "Price glitch indeed, we'll fix it asap") The Mini-game Finn's Tea Time I thought was good but is also kind of pointless. It does not really affect the story besides the Princesses/Maids giving their opinion on how good/bad your tea tasted. Would of loved it if making the best Tea/crafting a S rank Tea gives you a unique art with each of the Princesses or something of that nature. A little more information on how to craft a Tea would be helpf...

Pretty presentation, and a premise with potential, but doesn't hold up as a text-based experience. The English is barely localized, and riddled with obvious errors, visible from the very first scene. All in favor of more VNs on Steam, but ideally they'd have a little more effort shown in the localization than in this case.