Are you sure you want to be reading this? Slay the Princess is one of those games where simply understanding what it actually is is part of the gameplay; of the entire experience. I'll do my best to avoid anything that could even hint towards spoiling, but...

Look. It's sexy in a cerebral and emotional way. Its kink is hidden in plain sight. It's absurd, yet coherent. Violent, yet intimate. Conceptual. Disembodied. Beautiful.

Is that enough to convince you? I'll try to expand a little, but I'll try to keep it as vague as possible. If the game is a meal, then let this review be the smell coming from the kitchen.

Oh, and I dedicate this piece to a certain horny horned witch.

If you think that quoting French philosophers is too pretentious, chances are this game's flavour might not be to your liking. Not just because it borrows ideas from some schools of philosophy, but also because the dialogue often is just arguing semantics; for humorous purposes, but also to establish stuff. Because yes, there's a lot to establish - and probably not for the reason you think.

No, I won't tell you the reason.

When you think about it, isn't the act of communication a dance of ideas of each other? In the end, we can only see other people through the lenses of our own understanding, limited or enhanced by our perception. Perhaps the same can be said of our own self-image; we can only define ourselves by what we are/are not, and others can - must - help us establish these things.

I swear, what I said is not a random tangent.

All that philosophical nonsense aside, the meat of the game is, well, deciding. Do you slay the princess? Do you save the princess? What do you say, when, and in what order? It is a visual novel, sure, but the sheer amount of agency you have is simply unreal.

I sometimes say that Disco Elysium is an impossible game; it couldn't have been made, but the devs missed the memo and made it anyway. This is very much the same thing. The paths branch and twist in so varied and incredible ways that it's surreal (and it's all voice acted!). This fact, combined by how surreal the rest of the game is, creates this bizarre reality-bending effect; it feels like the surface of your eye-mirrors has cracked and now you can see... beyond. And our brains aren't really made for that.

Ok, for real now. Imma cut the crap with the smart words. Is gud when u smart when playin this, but f*ck dat noise. Yknow what else is gud? The pictures. Like, they so fine u wanna slap yo momma. Yea, yea, words blah blah, but at the end of the day u gon be stabbin dat broad and watch her SQUIRT dat red juice all over ya.

SYKE BEYOTCH - nothin is simple. Get reddy to get yo ass HANDED to ya like it's ELDEN RING. U dont need book-learnin to shank a b*tch, but u gonna be needin some of those street smarts, yknow wat im sayin? A playa's gotta play. A slaya's gotta slay. And let me tell you brotha, theres plenty of slayin to be done. Gon need dat big PP energy.

Bottom F**KING line: if talkin sh*t bout random crap aint your thang, u can still get ur balls blown into the mfing shadow realm.

Let's be honest: reality is scary - especially when you pay closer attention. Existentialists definitely were on to something. Slay the Princess will trick you into doing actual philosophy without you even realising it. Many dialogue quips are taken almost verbatim from the writings of all the wordy bois I quoted here, but there's definitely more - I only dabble in philosophy a little bit, so I wouldn't know.

Earlier on, I mentioned sexiness and kink. And yes, they're there - probably not in the way you think, but they're absolutely there. The game very explicitly states that it's a love story whenever you launch it; and its quasi-sapiosexual horniness mixed with violence, bondage and power dynamics is the main vessel of expressing that love. Not the only vessel, mind, but don't expect a romance in the traditional sense. Or do. See if she cares.

You're on a path in the woods, and at the end of that path is a cabin. And in the basement of that cabin is a Princess. If you've made it this far, dear reader, I'm rather confident you know exactly what it is you should do.

More pretentious crap