Saintess of the Golden Bow Demo Visual Novel Review

Saintess of the Golden Bow is a bit of a curveball for me. It represents a game genre that I’m out of touch with as well as a romance genre I’m not very familiar with. Still, that just made me excited to find out more. Could the game deliver on its successful Kickstarter? While what’s here in the demo is a rather lengthy sample, I couldn’t help feel it was lacking in some ways.

I don’t think what I played of Saintess is bad. There’s a lot to like here as well as the potential for interesting side stories. But by the end of the demo, I was confused and only mildly intrigued by the “twist” at the end.

Saintess starts with Celine, an American office worker in her early 20s with no affinity for this mortal coil. She hates her boss, she hates her job and she hates getting splashed by cars hitting rain puddles. Luckily her good friend Truck-kun is here to help.

After her epic battle with the grill of a semi-truck, Celine wakes up in the world of her favorite web novel: the Boy’s Love romantic tragedy Saint of the Golden Bow. Now Celeste, a character who was originally destined to die in the story, learns about the world and its inner machinations. Then she is deemed Saintess by the God of Light.

What follows is a series of moments loosely dictated by the player as they experience Celeste’s journey to defeat the Demon Queen and maybe hook up with one of the cute boys along the way. The demo speeds through the experience and can be beaten in a few hours, but let’s break down what the game brings to the table.

What I Liked

Given that Saintess of the Golden Bow is a demo of a game still in active development, my likes and dislikes come with an asterisk as things may be tweaked for any future demos or releases. One thing I expect to change throughout development is the voice acting. While I enjoyed it overall, a few actors (like N. Chang, who voiced Levi) were ill-fitting for the characters. In N. Chang and Levi’s case – I just think the delivery is a bit too soft spoken, which while somewhat fitting for the character, it felt more like he was whispering and less-so he was timid or soft spoken. The stand-out performance for me was X.M. Grant,, who gave George a properly deep and smooth voice without sounding corny.

I also enjoyed the character designs. Every character stands out with bright colors, decently drawn sprites, and unique clothing. Side characters like Mary have great designs and it’s a bummer she doesn’t get more than two or three lines of dialogue. The main character, Celeste, gets a lot of unique outfits, each with their own sprites.

The last thing that stuck out to me was the game’s twist. I chose to cover Saintess on a whim, as I love going into games with minimal spoilers if it’s completely new to me. Not knowing the twist going in made up for everything I didn’t enjoy throughout the game. I’d argue it wasn’t quite earned but I’m a sucker for left field twists a la Ace Attorney so I was all over it.

What I Disliked

Keeping in mind that this is a work in progress game, I still had quite a few issues. Most of these have to do with the pacing, the side characters, the world-building itself, and the weird vibe I get from Celeste being the romantic interest. I don’t think the writing is bad, but I found myself leaning back and questioning things several times.

I personally don’t enjoy isekai stories, as the protagonist’s outsider status often doesn’t feel like it adds much. The isekai element in Saintess is almost relevant, as Celine loves the world of Saintess and will comment on how the story has deviated thanks to her actions. It never adds up to more than Celeste saying, “Oh, this was different,” with some small flavor text for a story that we as the reader are unfamiliar with. It gets repetitive as I don’t think it adds anything other than reminding us that Celine’s story and the original are not the same.

Celeste is the central romantic figure in the Saintess story. In the version she’s a fan of, though, the romance happens between two of the male leads. There’s a brief mention of one of them being bisexual, it’s weird that Celeste being around removes any hint of romance between the guys. Perhaps I’m missing some additional context, given that the story is incomplete. But I couldn’t help but feel like this could have been handled differently, with Celeste acting as a facilitator and not the main romantic focus.

The Overall Vibes

I hope that my negativity about the writing doesn’t come across as trashing on the game. It’s a cozy little story that I experienced with a friend. We poked fun at Truck-kun, enjoyed some of the sillier moments, and discussed romance stories in other visual novels.

The demo of Saintess of the Golden Bow feels like a stretched out vertical slice more than a demo, but what’s here is promising. I’m excited to see what the team at Transparent Games adds over time. Congratulations to them on the successful Kickstarter!

Article Editor: Adam Wescott