You can please some of the people all of the time, and you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.
Never has that been truer for me than during my time playing the empire management sim, My Lovely Empress. It’s the third entry in the ‘My Lovely’ series by developers GameChanger Studio, who worked alongside Neon Doctrine for this particular offering.
Don’t worry if you haven’t played the others, for it doesn’t matter, but let’s find out whether you should prepare for a glorious reign in My Lovely Empress, or instead pass the responsibilities on to someone else!
The Crimson Empire is under the rule of Emperor Hong, whose ascension to the throne has come about due to unfortunate circumstances. The former Emperor Khan, his father, died years ago after a betrayal by powerful mythical creatures known as the Yaoguai. Empress Dowager took over the role until Hong became old enough to step up, and continued to mentor him before dying of a mysterious illness. This ill fated family then suffered another loss as the Emperor’s wife Xiang also got afflicted by illness and died. Distraught and inconsolable, Hong vowed to resurrect Xiang, no matter the cost – even if it meant striking a deal with the Yaoguai.
That’s the essence of what’s going on in the utterly depressing start to My Lovely Empress, but it’s necessary to set such a tone as the darkest days are yet to come in the Crimson Empire. There’s a lot of politics at the forefront of the narrative too, with advisors and neighbouring monarchs reacting to Hong’s action, which is fine. The infusion of the Yaoguai, though, results in far more interesting encounters because the creatures are all very unique in personality. Getting to know them through a visual novel style setup is a welcome break from the seriously taxing gameplay.
The ultimate aim is to keep Xiang’s soul alive long enough to figure out a way to bring her back from the dead. The soul needs essence to survive and if its total amount reaches zero at any stage, it’s ‘game over’. Everything you do is in seasonal cycles, which is split into turn phases, and it’s at the climax of each cycle where the soul’s vitality perishes further. In order to have a hope of satisfying this need, you’re going to require a thriving empire, which requires your focus on a number of aspects.
As the ruler of the kingdom, a key factor is that you’re in charge of the purse strings and must keep the peace with the people of the land. For the latter, it’s important to maintain a decent level of trust with commoners, traders, nobles, and soldiers. This helps boost the economy, sees a natural increase in the population, and reaps rewards. Unfortunately it’s easier said than done.
During a cycle, various problems pop up and you must spend a limited amount of action points to solve them. It could be something as simple as a dispute between two of the aforementioned groups of people over land ownership or a complicated matter involving numerous parties. While you can roughly figure out what outcome suits each party, the amount of trust gained or lost is unknown. Your decision could also trigger passive effects, both positive and negative, including a higher percentage of currency rewarded for so many turns and a bigger trust deficit towards one party.
Much like those in actual positions of power, you’ll feel the impact of every single choice and regularly ponder what’s best for everyone. It’s also good to see objectives popping up to keep you working towards the right things and drawing your attention to new areas at times. The rather crucial matter of your dead wife takes precedence over everything though, and that means summoning the Yaoguai.
The Yaoguai are ten Asian mythology inspired creatures that breathe extra life into My Lovely Empress, ironically by bringing about death. Should you acquire the necessary items to summon each one, expect to meet Gumiho, the seductive fox; the snake-like Lady Emei; the cute mermaid Picsis; Shabah, the unconventional genie; and more. They all have different attributes, possess useful traits, and can be ‘awakened’ into an improved form.
Their purpose depends on your approach, with one option being their ability to cause disasters and cull the population. It’s a bold, but worthwhile exercise if you want to harness human essence for the dwindling soul. On the contrary, a creature can be sacrificed in return for essence and a special boost, however in doing so, you’ll not have the capacity to use them for other activities. Activities such as exploring for items, resolving issues available only to Yaoguai, giving them investigation duties on everyday problems, and meditating to recover stamina – mythological creatures get tired too you know.
Another aspect to bear in mind is your relationship with other rulers residing nearby, as this opens up additional opportunities that are beneficial to your empire. Romance is even on the cards, but juggling all the different elements outlined above and trying to please everyone is not easy. You see, there are a fair few reasons that prevent you breezing through the campaign.
Given the amount of issues that arise, problems sometimes timeout before solving them, simply due to a lack of action points. Some of the Yaoguai-specific tasks also required more stamina than their maximum limit, which meant you had to awaken them and you likely won’t have the means to achieve such a feat. Before long, everyone who’s still alive hates you and there’s a metaphorical empty pot where the money used to be. That was certainly the case for me and the Crimson Empire had a worse outlook than the UK post-Brexit.
Even with a clear tutorial that explains every new feature, the difficulty curve is incredibly steep, and chances are that your first run is likely to be a disaster. Smart decisions in regards to unleashing disasters, sacrificing Yaoguai, taking note of seasonal exclusive activities, and making the most of the neighbouring rulers, can prove useful for future attempts. Still, it’s tough to actually reach the multiple endings in place. It’s possibly due to the dwindling soul essence forcing drastic decisions to be made hastily, destabilising everything built up prior. Perhaps there are too many temptations as well, and it seems impossible to get involved with all the different facets.
Moving on, the visuals, which are certainly impressive, are presented in a Chinese ink-brush style. As such, the characters are intricately designed with the humans oozing elegance and the creatures looking fascinating. The overworld maps for each empire really provide a personality to the environments and the cutscenes, although irregular, are decent enough to convey the key plot points. In terms of audio, and while the BGM is nicely fitting, the sound effects during conversations are beyond annoying. There are only so many grunts, shrieks, groans and such that one can handle before it begins to great. I get that it’s instead of a voiceover, but it would be better without these sounds.
Ultimately, My Lovely Empress is an engaging management sim that emulates the tremendously hard job of ruling an empire almost too well. That’s not to say you shouldn’t try your hand at it, because the storytelling is good and the burdensome decisions are greatly implemented so that even the smallest success is rewarding. Furthermore, the Asian inspiration for the setting, the Yaoguai, and the elegant artwork come together to create a well-crafted world. It’s unfortunate how the difficulty is quite off-putting, with too many fires to put out and the constant weight of resurrection looming over proceedings.
As long as you’re prepared to fail though, you should pay the fee and take the throne in My Lovely Empress.
