Disclaimer
I was sent a free copy of Island of Hearts to review for my blog. While I am very grateful for the opportunity, I won’t let it sway my opinions. This will be my honest review.
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Table of Contents
What is Island of Hearts?
Island of Hearts is a dating sim FMV out now on Steam. There is a demo available for you to check out. The game deals with some adult themes like alcohol use, sexual innuendos, and girls in revealing clothes. This is your content warning.
Hook
You are at what feels the lowest point in your life. You’ve lost your job and your long time girlfriend has broken up with you. In an effort to cheer you up, your friends teleport you to the Island of Hearts where you will get a renewed chance of love. Suddenly, you find yourself at a beautiful island resort surrounded by beautiful women who are also looking for love. Explore the island, get to know the girls, and try to get all of the endings. Will you find love during your stay, or are you truly destined to be alone?
Gameplay
Island of Hearts is a piece of interactive fiction. You watch scenes play out and occasionally make choices that affects the ending you get. Each choice you make raises the affection level with each girl. There are also a few minigames sprinkled throughout to change up the gameplay, but those are just cookie clicker mechanics. You are playing this game to look at pretty girls doing cute things and to collect all of the endings. The game makes it easy to collect endings by allowing players to redo choices after completing a chapter.
Review
Island of Hearts is fine for what it is. If you are looking for a good FMV, you are better off playing something like Love too Easily or The Fame Game.This game is fun, but the quality is a little too inconsistent. If the goal is to look at pretty girls and enjoy the fan service, fine, but if you’re looking for a good story, you will be disappointed.
Story
There is a story to this game, but it isn’t always good. There are some very poorly acted and produced scenes, and some very boring ones that feel like they drag on for ever. The first part of this game before getting to the island was so boring, I almost gave up on this game. Luckily, it does pick up and not just because of the fan service. There are some legitamately fun scenes where the actors and writers are having fun with the ridiculousness of the game. There are also scenes designed specifically for the fan service which are fine, but there isn’t much plot to it. The endings is where it gets hard to recommend. There are some very fun endings, but there are also some extremely disappointing ones. I collected most of them, but I’ve lost interest in perusing the rest. Once I got the ones I wanted, I saw little interest in going back to try for more.
Quality
The quality of this game is inconstant. Some scenes have good sound, decent acting (for a group of untrained influencers speaking a second language), and are well shot. Others feel out of place because the sound is bad or the acting isn’t great. Most people won’t forgive the bad acting. There are some poorly acted scenes, but there are some very fun moments that saved the experience (and no, not the fan service ones). Are there enough good scenes to make up for the bad ones? Only if you enjoy cheesy bad movies. Also, the transitions are terrible. This isn’t a deal breaker, but it is distracting.
Gameplay
You’re playing this game to look at pretty girls in bikinis and clicking around to get the ending with your favorite girl. There are mini games, but they feel pointless. I failed a couple because the directions aren’t clear and they don’t always work great. Some of the games affect the outcomes, but the impact isn’t very clear. I like that you can go back and change your choices. This makes getting multiple endings fast and easy, but the game does a poor job at letting players know how to achieve certain endings. This is only important if you want to 100 % the whole game, but there really isn’t a reason to. Some of the endings and scenes are just too boring. I do like that collecting endings is easier than Ladies Don’t Tempt my Immortality (a game that really makes you work for all of the unlocks), but I rather be playing that because its a better story.
Conclusion
I enjoyed playing this game more than I thought I would. Although the acting isn’t great and the story is all over the place, there are some fun moments that made the game worth a couple playthroughs. Unfortunately, I don’t think the game is fun enough to recomend. There were enough scenes were I would just zone out and lose interest because nothing happens. I can’t recommend this game, especially when you have games like Love Too Easily. But, if you like the cast of girls and don’t care too much about the plot, there is a good amount of fan service to enjoy. This isn’t a porn game, but there are scenes specifically designed to show off how hot these girls really are. The game isn’t terrible, there are just better examples.
You can pick up Island of Hearts on Steam.