Charming Blood Preview (Days 1-4)

I guess I have that newly turned vampire rizz (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

I’m at the point where I wait for early access games to fully release into their 1.0 version. Especially if the game is story-driven like visual novels. Though, I do make exceptions. Charming Blood was one such exception. I’m not sure exactly why aside from this being vampire media and the story summary being interesting to me. Anyway, I’m a bit rusting on early access previews and this is the first time I’m writing one for a visual novel. So, let’s see how this turned out. Both this preview and the game itself.

Charming Blood has you play as a young man who you name in the beginning of the game. He doesn’t have a canon name though, so I’ll just refer to him as the protagonist. The protagonist’s life hasn’t exactly been going the way he has hoped (or planned). We don’t know much about his life before we jump into his life, but we know that he expected his life to change for the better when he moved out to a new city so he can go to art school to pursue his passion for photography. However, it has not. He just lives where it’s gloomier now, lives in an apartment located in a not-so-great neighborhood where something is always broken, and working in a competitive studio where he’s mainly doing some boring editing jobs with a boss that won’t hesitate to fire him if caught in the wrong mood. Though, it isn’t all that bad as there are some silver linings. Like the apartment building being pretty quiet and his across-the-hall neighbor is really nice and sweet.

Little did our protagonist know that the change he wanted is going to come very soon. It may not have been what he wanted, but it’s definitely a drastic turn. After his nap turned into a sleep (I know the pain buddy) and having to take on a terrible night gig so he could keep his job, he returns to a dark apartment complex due to the lights being out. That day was clearly not his day and it was only solidified as a series of events causes him to meet an early, embarrassing, death. Except, he doesn’t die. He wakes up. Not in his apartment, but in Victoria’s (his across-the-hall neighbor). He soon learns he was turned into a vampire, after a lot of convincing, and now he has to get used to his new life and everything that comes with being a part of the vampire community. While also trying to not panic about what he’s going to do now since he can’t just easily slide back into his old life. Luckily, he does have and make some good vampire friends who helps him out with adapting to his new life as a vampire, helps him make sense of the supernatural world he’s now suddenly a part of, and may even develop feelings for as they interact throughout the whole game. The protagonist even gets roped into a whole disappearance mystery and a war between vampire clans that luckily, or unluckily, grants him some distraction.

Every so often, you do get choices. It depends on the situation, but you’ll get the choice on how you want to react in a conversation or what you want to do. The former is mainly what response you want the protagonist to have; like telling the truth or lying, or staying silent or butting in. While the latter determines what scene you’ll get; like for example you can meet Mina early on if you pick a certain choice. It’s hard to really tell the long term affect choices have right now, but you can see the short term affects. The romance may just be due to if you get enough scenes with them, but right now I like to assume there’s some kind of hidden affection meter since you can tell when a love interest (LI) likes or don’t like a response you picked. Funnily enough, I wasn’t doing too well with Victoria starting out, but once the protagonist turned into a vampire I knew her enough to know what responses she liked.

Only three of the four LIs are in the game right now. Like with my otome reviews, I’ll do a quick rundown of them!

Victoria

The first LI you meet is Victoria, or Vi as the protagonist likes to call her. She’s your local goth who likes to be mysterious and is the protagonist’s across-the-hall neighbor. She’s pretty distant and reserved, but she is nice and sweet once you get to know her. At the beginning, you can tell how much distance she’s putting between her and the protagonist, but at the same time you can tell that she does enjoy talking with and hanging out with him. I’m sure it also helps that her chunky orange cat, Sheri, seemed to instantly like him. Victoria is also the one that turns the protagonist after finding him on the verge of death. She’s not one to show her emotions much, but when she does she is pretty expressive. It’s obvious that Victoria cares about the protagonist a lot and is quite upset that it’s more than how much he cares about himself even. It isn’t until he’s turned that Victoria starts to get closer and really open up since, well, she doesn’t have to worry about keeping her secret a secret anymore. Due to being the one who changed him, she takes up the responsibility of helping him adjust to his new life and introducing him to this new world. Though, while she wants to do it slowly, circumstances doesn’t let her and it can blow up in her face. You also learn that she trusts the protagonist to an extent (like, she knows he’s going to do something stupid and he’s too stubborn for her to stop), has a dark sense of humor that pairs well with his, doesn’t like lies, finds others being concerned about her overhearing, and is an optimist. You also learn that she’s neutral, though she does have ties to one of the waring clans, and she can be pretty terrifying when she wants to be.

Mina

Next up is Mina and I’m just going to come out and say she has some big boobs. I don’t like beating around the bush like other reviewers like to. She works at Club Tears, which is a supernatural themed club to regular humans, but a sanctuary for vampires from the council. Though, you don’t learn that it’s a part of The Wild Ones/Society of Freedoms which are basically seen as radicals in the vampire world and have enough members to challenge the clan that serves as their ruling authority. Mina is actually pretty cool, upbeat, straightforward, and kind. She instantly can tell that the protagonist is newly turned, upset for him when she thinks his patron (the one that turned someone) doesn’t care for him, shares the sentiment that people should be responsible for themselves, notices when the protagonist gets all gloomy and goes to cheer him up, and has a great and unique sense of humor. I love how she runs with Cinderella jokes, especially how she jokily calls herself protagonist’s succubus-fairy godmother. She also gives you some more information on the vampire world, directly and indirectly. Like how she starts calling the protagonist her “little brother”, introduces him to the taste of fresh blood (while also hinting that blood can come in different forms which alter its taste). Though, you can catch a hint of jealousy, a hint that she’s not a woman you can get rid of easily, and she’s pretty sneaky.

Alex

Lastly, in terms of the LIs currently implemented, there’s Alex. You meet Alex right when the plot starts to kick in as she’s here to get Victoria’s help on behalf of The Mistress. I think it’s only implied right now, but she’s a part of the Children of Darkness clan who is the ruling authority in the vampire world. It also seems that vampire hunters can also be vampires as she is one. Anyway, Alex is friends with Victoria and she’s the short one of the group. She gives off some tsundere vibes as she’s quick bare her fangs, quick to show that she’s upset or irritated, is pretty dismissive of the protagonist as he’s an outsider, dresses like a rebellious teen, and how she knows what buttons to press to irritate someone. However, you can see through that tough exterior as she’s also quick to calm herself down (almost like maybe she wasn’t as upset as she let on), you can tell how much she respects and cares about Victoria, you can tell that she was hurt that Victoria didn’t tell her what she did until she had to, and she seems to unknowingly wear her emotions on her sleeve. She also doesn’t really like the protagonist’s jokes and a bit cocky, but she does start warming up to the protagonist.

Overall, I liked the story and characters so far. I do like how the first couple of chapters acted as a way for you to get to know the protagonist and Victoria before the turn. Especially seeing how their relationship was. Even though you’re going in knowing all of the LIs are vampires, I do think the writing does a good job at Victoria being weird and secretive enough to where you suspect it, but then also enough to where it’s like maybe she’s just being mysterious and is a night owl cause she as a night job. You can also tell that Victoria does like the protagonist and it’s believable that she was panicking and turned him because she didn’t want to watch him die. Basically, it’s understandable that the protagonist didn’t take the whole vampire business seriously and that Victoria would turn him. Also, I audibly gasped when the reality of the protagonist’s fall became apparent and the CG came in. And how relieved I was when it was obvious someone came for him and he was being turned. It was also interesting learning about this world’s lore, how you learn different pieces of it from the different LIs, and I loved how they all take different stances and positions in the vampire world. The plot that started coming in from this recent content update was also interesting and I think it came in at a good time. The mystery is good, it puts Victoria and the protagonist in a hard position (especially needed for Victoria as it gives her a reason to have to explain things to the protagonist), and introduces you more to the vampire world. Not to mention that along with the mystery of what the texts with Nick are about (who’s Nick, S.R. and Lily?), it does bring in the question of whether the protagonist has a gift too and what it could be. I kind of feel he does…or maybe I was catching hints that aren’t there.

I also like the characters. The protagonist walks the fine line of having his own personality and history, but also being easy to self insert and adjust his personality. I really appreciate how he doesn’t have any pervy thoughts. He’s quite the pessimist and a complainer, but he’s not annoying. He’s likable and jokes around and is a good guy to be in the head of and hang out with. I can definitely see why Victoria was fond of him and how he made fast friends with Mina and Alex. I also really liked the LIs. I can’t decide whether Victoria or Mina is my favorite as I like them both a lot. I can tell why they’re both the poster girls for the game. And while Alex isn’t in the running, I do like her, the dynamic she has with Victoria, and how she brings in a different vibe. It’ll be interesting to see how the romance plays out. Also, I didn’t notice it until after I finished my playthrough, but the fourth LI is Erika. The Erika. It will certainly be interesting to see how that happens, as well as the reaction that the other LIs have haha.

I don’t really have many negatives concerning the game itself. The only thing I noticed is that there was some inconsistency. I noticed a name being spelled two different ways (Lillush and Lilush) and switching from calling those that watch Knowing Ones a Watcher to Observer. The game also switches from calling the powers vampires have as talents to gifts, but that can easily be excused as characters having different terminology for it (especially since Alex is the one to call them talents while Victoria and you call them gifts). The skip is also a bit annoying as it does stop, rather than keep going, which it seems to be whenever the game loads something in or when the scene changes. It’s not much of an annoyance right now, since there’s only four days/chapters. The skip also goes by whether you saw that specific scene variation, even if there is some shared dialogue lines, but the scenes aren’t that long so I didn’t really find it annoying.

Aside from that, this game just really needed to be marked as an Early Access release. I do understand that the developers aren’t able to change it though and the description for this game starts with explaining that it’s actually an Early Access title (though, the current progress needs to be updated). I’m also surprised that content updates weren’t an announcement, but rather posted on the discussion board. I waited to do my preview since I saw that Day 4 was coming soon through social media and I know I was waiting for it to pop up in the News section saying it’s been added in. I’m not sure if the known issues with the Save/Load system and the backlog is fixed yet or not, but it should also get a News update when it does as I was also waiting for that to be fixed too. There was a patch before I started playing and the backlog was available and the only problem I had with Save/Load was saves made from a previous session didn’t let me progress to the next line (luckily it was easily remedied by just quick saving and then quick loading). Granted, though, you won’t have a problem if you’re like me and make the majority of your saves on choice selection screens (which serve as a way to progress to the next line).

To wrap this all up, the music and sound effects are pretty nice (though some are short loops) and I did enjoy the writing style. The visuals were great as well. I love the art style that was chosen for the game. The backgrounds look great and does a good job at giving off the vibe of the place you’re at and, if you’re at a personal room, you can get an impression on their personality. I especially love how the characters look. Victoria, Mina, and Alex look beautiful and I love how each of them has different unique styles (which also ends up going with their personality). This is probably not what was intended, but I also felt like it was also to show the fashion trends in the vampire world and how different they are to the human world. Personally, Victoria is my favorite visually.

I also looked at old demo playthroughs and updates to the visuals are already being applied. The text box is a bit more stylized and cleaner, Victoria and Mina got updated looks (both in their art style and their outfits), they also got added poses (I’m very glad Victoria got a pose where she’s holding her chunky fluffy cat), updated visuals for objects, the protagonist checking his text is stylized so it’s more immersive (aka looking at a phone with the texts in them), added background art, and added CGs. I did also notice some small script tweaks.

Verdict (So Far)

I enjoyed Charming Blood so far. The premise is interesting and the game does a good job at executing it. The characters are well written, as well as the dynamics that they have between one another, and the protagonist perfectly walks the line that allows him to be a good player character. The visuals are also great and does a good job at visually sending you information about the environment or the characters. The choices so far are also done well so far. I ended up focusing on Victoria on my first playthrough and I enjoyed all the scenes that I got. I even replayed to pick different choices (including different series of choices like starting Mina’s romance route) to see the scenes I didn’t get and different versions of other scenes to see what happened. It was quite interesting to see what was different, the different lore information, realizing what Victoria was hiding from the protagonist (which I feel is so he wouldn’t feel guilty), and how the dynamic changed between the protagonist and the LIs. It’ll certainly be interesting to see how the choices will affect future events and how the romances will play out.

So yeah, I’d say Charming Blood is worth picking up. Even now, with only four days available and especially if you’re thirsty for some vampire media like I am. I can already tell that if the quality is kept up throughout development (which is going to become important as Days/Chapters will inevitably become more complex) Charming Blood is going to turn out to be a great dating sim visual novel. I can’t wait to see what future holds for these characters.