At PAX East 2023, there’s a a game that had everyone buzzing: Black Tabby Games’ Slay the Princess. The horror visual novel is based on the simple premise of committing regicide, but it’s the execution that really sets it apart.
The demo begins with the narrator informing you that there is a princess locked in a remote cabin and that she poses a threat to the safety of the entire world. The objective? To kill her before she can escape. However, I quickly realized that the narrator and the princess were both being extremely cryptic and untrustworthy. In the first playthrough, players can hesitate to use the knife and leave the princess alone, but in the end, she broke free from her shackles and killed me. The player wakes up and finds themself in the same scenario, but things were different this time. The boards were floating in a black void, and the princess appeared as a demonic creature called The Nightmare.
What sets Slay the Princess apart is that the experience varies based on the choices you make. Some players will encounter a sympathetic princess, while others will face different monstrous variations of her. The game puts you in a time loop, and as you play through it multiple times, you begin to question the narrator’s motives and the true nature of the conflict.
It’s fascinating to read about the experience of playing Slay the Princess at PAX East 2023. The author seems to have been deeply affected by the game, unable to stop thinking about it even after leaving the convention. The horror visual novel sounds like a unique and thrilling experience, where the player is tasked with killing a princess who is apparently a threat to the safety of the world. However, the author notes that they were never given a clear reason why the princess is considered a threat, and this lack of information makes them skeptical.
The demo appears to be a time loop, where the player wakes up in the same scenario each time they die, but with subtle differences. Depending on the choices the player makes, the appearance and behavior of the princess can vary greatly. Some players may encounter a sympathetic young woman, while others may face monstrous variations of her. This variability makes Slay the Princess an interesting game to discuss and compare experiences with other players.
The author is left with many unanswered questions after playing the demo, such as why the narrator is being cagey with information and why certain objects disappear or behave strangely. It’s clear that Slay the Princess is a game that will challenge players to think critically and question everything they are told. The author is already looking forward to playing the full version of the game when it launches on Steam later this year, eager to uncover the truth behind the princess and the strange world she inhabits.
The writer was impressed by the game’s ability to offer different experiences to different players based on their dialogue choices and actions, even though they all start with the same basic premise of killing the princess. The game’s ability to create an insurmountable feeling of tension and conflict while providing little information about the situation at hand was also highlighted.
The writer also expressed their curiosity about the game’s overarching story and why the narrator is being cagey with the players. They speculated that the different variations of the princess and the disappearing mirror could be clues that will eventually coalesce into some universal truth about what is happening and why.
The writer found Black Tabby Games’ Slay The Princess to be an incredibly haunting and terrifying game that left them with numerous questions about the story and characters. They recommended that other players should try the game for themselves to experience the different variations of the princess and uncover the mysteries that lie within.
