Game review: Arcana famiglia - La storia della Arcana Famiglia -

 

Made by: Hune-X

Genre: Otome, Mafia, Romance, Adventure

Summary: Mondo, leader and "Papa" of The Arcana Famiglia, a big mafia organization, decides to retire. A tournament, The Arcana Duel, will take place and the winner not only get to take over the family, but also marry his beautiful daughter, Felicitá. The contestants are the 10 heads of the family (Felicitá included), whom all have special Tarot Arcana powers. Felicitá got 2 months until the tournament and during this time she must train hard unless she wants to be married against her will!

Felicitá
I usually don't write about the heroine in my reviews, but I felt that Felicitá needed her own introduction. Felicitá is a strong, kickass heroine who knows what she wants and ain't gonna let any dudes do as they please. Her infamous kick can beat the shit out of all the servants and all the guys in the game (except Papa, of course).  She got a good sense of humor and can sometimes be a bit sarcastic, but overall a very feisty girl who does what she believes in. Felicitá's Arcana "The Lovers" let her read other people's hearts, which both can be useful and hurtful. She can be seen around town with her pet owl, Fukurotan, by her side at all times. She grew up in a small hidden cottage with her mother and her personal butler Luca for unknown reasons.

Liberta 

 Liberta is a very happy-go-lucky character who always got a smile on his face. He often acts on instinct and luck and let the thinking come later.  His Arcana is "The Fool" but unfortunately Liberta can't handle his powers and wants to avoid using it. Liberta is very close to Dante and with his birthday coming up Liberta asks Felcitá for help and together they prepare everything.

Liberta thinks masks are fascinating and when he brings Dante a new one he found at the market, Dante snaps and tells him he needs to stop playing around and get serious. The Arcana Duel is coming up and since Liberta can't control his Arcana powers, he need to train even harder.

So later Felicitá and Liberta train in the garden and things get pretty intense. Liberta accidentally bumps into Nova who says Liberta will never be able to become strong and protect someone if he keeps doing things without thinking it through. The fight continue after Nova leaves but Liberta is so shaken by his words that he accidentally hurts both Felicitá and himself.

Some days later Liberta and Felicitá are shopping new masks at the market again and Liberta notice a very particular one. He asks the shopkeeper about it who tells him it used to belong to a famous man who rescued children from northern lands. When Liberta later shows it to Dante, his reaction was surprise and anger. Felicitá, feeling something was off, read Dante's heart and found out about the story between them.

Turns out Dante really was the pirate who saved children, and Liberta was one of them. The staff at the facility where he was raised used to provoke him in a attempt to bring out his Arcana powers. One day Liberta snapped and burned the whole place down, standing alone crying in the fire. It was then Dante came and took his hand. Dante put a "lock" on Liberta's power so he only could use very little of it and also sealed his memories of the event, hoping the child would one day be strong enough to control his Arcana. Dante always took care of Liberta as a kid, spending most time on the boat, SS Arcana.
There are two ways of releasing the Liberta's "lock", either by making Dante remove it or by Liberta remembering his past.

A fire breaks out a the market the next day and Liberta is too shocked to do anything. He grabs Felicitá's hand and asks her to read his heart, not being able to bear the feeling of confusion and fear for something he can't remember. Felicitá only says the words "fire", "Casa Bianca" (the island) and "mask" but it's enough for Liberta to remember everything.
Liberta runs off, hurt by how Dante treated him, but also afraid of his new powers.

Felicitá visit his room at the SS Arcana the next day, but Liberta asks her to leave, unsure about how he feels. Felicitá holds his hand and they both blush, Liberta realizing she was always there to believe in him. Right when things were getting good a storm hits the shore. Felicitá is thrown overboard while trying to save a man and Liberta doesn't hesitate to jump into the sea after her.
Liberta opens his eyes sometime later, washed up in a small cave on the beach with Felicitás cold body beside him. She doesn't respond and knowing she will die soon, Liberta hugs her and decides to believe in himself. He finally uses his power properly and starts a fire which warms the two of them. When Felicitá wakes up she thanks Liberta for rescuing her and tells him that his flames are "beautiful".

Felicitá's mother and "Mama" of the Arcana Famiglia, invites her daughter together with Liberta and Nova to a secret teaparty. She reveled that Liberta is actually Mondo's grandson, born from Mondo's first wife's son. Liberta says he now knows who he is, and that he wants to win the Arcana Duel, become a strong and righteous man like Dante and be there for Felicitá like she have been there for him. He wants to fight for her and hopes their hearts will be even closer in the future~

Liberta, so cute! His story was really nice and had good pacing. It was sweet seeing how his confidence grew with time and how he wanted to win the Arcana Duel for Felicitá's sake. Still, it's pretty disturbing that Felicita is his aunt and that nobody seems to mind o_o

Nova
15 years old. Have a hard time depending and opening up to people. He and Liberta are always arguing, but the truth is that they are actually pretty close. Nova has a sweet tooth but is embarrassed to admit it because he thinks it makes him look childish.

Nova and Felicitá are cousins and were actually engaged in the past. Sumire even had a ring she promised to give Nova when he grew up but after an accident, the whole thing was called off.

One night Nova and Liberta rushes into Felicitás room, saying it's an emergency. Nova's parents, who both are in a coma, were kidnapped by pirates. Liberta, Nova and Felicitá sneaks off, planning to save them on their own.

Nova uses his Arcana, "The Death", which puts the pirates to sleep. Soon Nova himself collapses and explains it takes a lot of energy to use his powers, so he will stay behind searching for his parents while Liberta and Felicitá fights a masked man on the ship.

Some days later, Felicitá decides to go and talk to Nova. He opens up and tells her that even though his father is Mondo's brother, he wasn't chosen by the cards, meaning he wouldn't have a place in the family. The card ended up choosing Nova instead. His parents raised him very strict and said that it had to be like this if he wanted to become number one in the family. One night Nova overheard his parents plotting to kill both Mondo and Sumire in hope for Nova to become the new leader.

Angered by how desperate his parents were for power and the fact that they only used him as a tool to get the family, Nova's power went berserk and he put his parents in an eternal sleep.

A week later Liberta, Felicitá and Nova spends the day at the beach. Nova shortly tells Liberta about his parents and when asked why he didn't tell him sooner, Nova replies with "It's none of your business". Liberta then punches Nova in the face, screaming that they are all family and that they should carry the burden together. Nova smiles, realizing Liberta is right. Even if he wasn't loved by his parents, the Arcana family have always been there for him.

Nova talks to Mondo about finding a way to wake up his parents and Mondo is willing to help him with his own Arcana "The World". There is a big chance of not working though, and Nova could get hurt in the process. Knowing this, Nova still accepted Mondo's offer.

Just like Mondo had predicted, Nova started screaming in pain when trying to use his powers. Felicitá ran up to him and hugged him from behind, activating her own powers to help him make it through. Collapsing tired on the floor, both of them decide to wait there until morning to see if it worked or not. Felicitá cuddled up under a blanket with Nova and they soon fell asleep.
The next morning they both wake up by someone calling them, turns out it worked after all.
Nova smiles and hold Felicitá's hands, thanking her and saying that he would never have been able to wake them up without her help~

Nova was the first route I finished and after playing everyone else I felt that his was one of the weakest. His character felt a little flat sometimes and I his CGs were also the most boring/generic in the bunch. Nova also seemed very attached to Sumire and there are some jokes about how he like older ladies with big boobs (Poor Felicitá never stood a chance). The fact that he is also related to Felicitá bothers me.

Debito
Hates being tied down, love exciting things and flirting with beautiful ladies. He calls Felicitá "Bambina" which means "little girl", but the say he says it ends up being more like "babe". When playing Arcana Famiglia you'll notice Debito isn't just flirting with you in his route, he does it in almost everyone's. He loves making Felicitá blush and whispers sexy things in her ear. He also takes care of the financial in the family and spends time at the casino. He, Luca and Pace are childhood friends. His power is to become invisible.

So Felicitá finds herself pretty interested in Debito and when Pace invites her to help the children at church together with Debito and Luca, she agrees. When choosing activity Felicitá picks soccer and everyone is having fun playing around until Felicitá starts bringing out her A game, daring Debito to challenge her. Luca later tells Felicitá about how the three of them used to play in this church when they were kids and how Pace and Debito always got him into trouble.
A child starts talking to Felicitá, describing weird and warm feeling inside. She reads his heart and realizes the kid is in love with her. Felicitá says some kind words and promises to met him again, but on the way home Debito stops her and says she should never say something like that.
Sure, he likes to flirt with women, but he make sure never ever to promise anything more than that. Giving hope of love to the other person is just cruel.

A girl named Milena causes trouble at Debito's casino and when they later get to know her she reveals herself to be the daughter of another famous mafia family. She and Debito flirts and he is amused to see how jealous Felicitá gets.

Debito is actually a pretty bi-polar guy and his mood can go from extremely angry some days to happy-go-lucky. Felicitá is worried about him and asks Luca to tell her more about his past.
Debito's family died when he was really young so he was raised at the church, befriending Pace and Luca. Then Jolly knocked on the church door. And the experiments began.
Jolly wanted to find out more about how the cards chose their owner, and did all kinds of tests on Pace and him. In the end Debito was forced to make a deal with "The Hermit".

Luca is suddenly stopped by Debito, who's been standing there all along, using his powers to conceal himself. Debito announces that he will kill Jolly at the Arcana Duel and leaves the church angry.

Some week later, the friend trio + Felicitá goes to visit the children again. Everything is fun and going great until Jolly shows up, scaring the children away. Debito starts fighting with him and when things are about to get out of hand, Pace punches Jolly in the face, sending him through a window and eventually destroys the whole church. After reminding Debito how weak he is, Jolly leaves.


Days later after having a date together, Debito is feeling tired and Felicitá walks him to his bed. He invites her to sleep beside him and she hugs him tight, saying Sumire used to hug her like this when she was a kid.

Debito pulls her down in his lap and says her name for the first time. Blushing, she hugs him back and hears him whispering "You're warm. This kind of thing...might not be so bad either"

Debito tells Felicitá more about his past and the trauma behind his lost eye. One of the reasons he can't sleep is the immense pain from "The Hemit", mixing together with the memories of Jolly putting his artificial eye in. Debito admits he can't handle his powers properly, and Felicitá reads his heart, noticing he is actually unsure if he wants to kill Jolly or not.

After that day, Debito disappears for a pretty long time. Felicitá feels helpless trying to search for him, knowing his powers.

One night re-appear in her room with beautiful purple flowers, asking for forgiveness. She wants to know where he have been, but Debito just says he doesn't want to see a pretty lady sad, and asks her to forget the whole thing about revenge.

Unfortunately, the nightmares become so intense that Debito decides he can't wait until the Duel to kill Jolly. Worried, Felicitá talks to Jolly, and knowing that Debito is listening from somewhere, Jolly makes a plan to have a showdown in the garden later at midnight.

I love Debito for being the sexy and teasing guy that he is. That being said, he was pretty hard to understand sometimes and required reading his heart to know what he really meant. I think he and Felicitá makes a pretty good match though, since they always got a kind of competition going on. Good chemistry to be short. And what is love about if not finding a good match?

Pace
Very care-free type of guy who loves lasagna more than anything.
He is actually a pretty smart and very caring guy underneath the silly first impression.
When spending time with Felicitá almost all they do is eat, until she finds out he haven't been paying for the food lol.
And we're not just talking about some meals here, for dinner Pace can eat about 30 lasagna, 10 pasta dishes and some pies as dessert.
His Arcana power gives him super strength.

So one day Felicitá notice Pace is always nervous and keep looking around town as if searching for something. He says it's nothing and tells her to forget about it. When the two of them later receives a mission to go to a ball, Pace pretends to have a stomach ache
and makes Felicitá go on while he will catch up later. Not fitting in very well, people start whispering about her at the ball. A blonde man with an attitude walks up to her and starts talking to her while looking at her pitifully.
Just when Felicitá had enough a handsome man with well-groomed hair asks her to stop. Everyone at the party starts talking and the blonde man shockingly says "Brother!?"
Felicitá didn't recognize him first, but the handsome man is actually Pace.

Turns out Pace is actually son of the mayor, but only half-related to his brother.
After his mother got pregnant she was sent away to live in a cabin while Pace's younger brother was raised in the fancy mansion. Pace says he doesn't regret being raised poor, because they still had love. His most fond memory is when his mother made lasagna, the two of them eating it together with Debito and Luca.

Felicitá wants Pace to make up with his brother, but they put it on hold for now. After eating another huge dinner, they run into some bad guys at the street. Pace runs up to them, punching them in the stomach, only to be shocked when nothing happens. Debito and Luca passes by and help out, and Pace explains it must be because he is feeling tired.

A week later Pace is eating less than normal and his energy seems drained.
Worried about him, Felicitá tries to talk to him but the only reply she gets is that "It's no big deal". Some time later Pace takes Felicitá to the garden and tell her the truth. Because of the tests Jolly did on him, and his own Arcana power, he is destined to die when he turn 30. Being 25 now, he only got a few years left and tries not to do anything that would leave people sad when he dies.

Felicitá promises not to tell anyone, but Luca soon notice the ojou-sama is indeed hiding something. With Felicitá on the verge of tears, Pace finally tells Debito and Luca as well. With everyone feeling down, Pace takes Felicitá to his mothers grave, where they met his brother. They talk and Pace realize how sad he was when his mother suddenly died, and that he doesn't want to do the same to his friends.
He also confesses to Felicitá for a second time, apologizing for falling in love when he got his curse.

Pace and Felicitá goes to fix the broken church the next day, but an accident occur and the heroine is trapped under massive logs with the children. Pace tries to open up a path and tells himself "If I can't even protect the people of love..." Screaming Felicitá's name, Pace uses his power and finally removes the wood. Felicitá runs up to him and says she always believed he could do it. They hug and Pace starts crying out of relief that she is alive.

Just as handsome without glasses

After the accident Pace is starting to go back to normal. After spending the day together, he reveals he got a gift for Felicitá. On one of their earlier dates, he gave her a beautiful broach, and this time it turns out to be a necklace. She happily puts it on and Pace winks, saying that next time(after the Arcana Duel) it will be a ring~

If I were to sum up Pace's route it would probably be "The power of love". Pace is just such a awesome character. He always does silly impressions of the other characters which made me laugh way too much, and I would give Sugita 10/10 for doing a splendid work on the voice.

In the ending where Pace wins Arcana Duel, he says he needs to start making some babies with Felicitá right away, since he wants to see them grow up before he passes away. Luca then interrupts by brining a letter, written by Pace at the age of 8, declaring that his only love in the world is Lasagna and that he is forever married to it, therefor his marriage with Felicitá isn't real. Poor Pace lol~

Luca

Felicitás assistant since an early age who would go through anything for his dear ojou-sama. He always gets trolled and bullied through the game (which is hilarious) but tries his best everyday.
He can sometime start babbling to much when nervous or over-think it, and his somewhat perfect butler facade is broken down through the game, and we get to see the real Luca.

 It's obvious from the beginning of the game that Luca have been in love with Felicitá since forever. The other characters are also aware of it and Felicitá knows it somewhere deep down too.

Luca was the one who taught Felicitá to fight with knives and one day when practicing for the Duel, Felicitá challenge him.
Things are looking even up until Felicitá makes a rush for it. She runs up to Luca, grabs his cheeks, whispers his name and gently blow in his ear!
(God, you should hear the sound he made here)

So they continue to spend more time together and everything is going great until some of the subordinates starts pointing out that Luca can't always come and save ojou-sama. She is all grown up now and might even be better at fighting than him. Felicitá replies that she indeed does want more distance and do things her way. Luca is of course sad but when talking to her later in the garden he admits that he agrees, even if it hurts a little bit.

Luca is interested in alchemy, just like Jolly. One day when Felicitá stops by his room Luca shows off some magic that looks just like firework in small bottles. Just like magic - as Felicitá says.

After the incident with Jolly at the church, Luca starts taking a distance from Felicitá and locks himself in his study room. With help from the chef, Felicitá bakes a pie and makes tea, as a thank you for always doing the same to her. Luca smiles and somewhat cheer up, explaining that he was just reminded of a trauma. He continues and tells her about how he, Pace and Debito were Jolly's lab rats and begs Felicitá never to get close to Jolly.

Later, returning home from work, Felicitá open the door to Luca's room only to find Jolly standing there. On guard, she starts asking questions, but Jolly chuckles and says that maybe Luca is the on she should ask instead? 

Just then Luca opens the door and shields Felicitá, yelling at Jolly to get out. Jolly smiles and continues to mock Luca, up until he gets really pissed.
Before Jolly leaves, he asks Felicitá to read his heart. She is shocked at what it says; Luca is Jolly's son. But instead of fighting, she says that the bond between her and Luca can not be broken that easily. Bored, Jolly leaves, returning the book he originally came for.
Luca apologizes, and admits that what she read in Luca's heart is true. Jolly is Luca's father. Luca says he can never forgive Jolly for experimenting on him and his friends and being such a cruel person, but he thinks that one day they might come to an understanding.

A week from that, Pace's brother stops by, asking for Felicitá to use her powers to help someone. Since it's against the Arcana Famiglia rules to use your powers outside the family, she refuse. Just before she leaves, he suddenly says "But you saved Sumire when she was in a coma!". Luca, standing beside her, is shocked to hear this and quickly pulls Felicitá out of the room, saying it's time to leave. Realizing Luca knows something, Felicitá feels betrayed. When meeting Luca at the market the next day, Felicitá asks why she was locked away in the cottage as a child? What was the coma Pace's brother was speaking about? Will Felicitá still love Luca after knowing he hid so many secrets?

Man, being Luca is suffering.
Joke aside, Luca is my favorite character in the bunch. He is so gentle and only one of his endings had a confession scene (because the rest didn't even need it) and I was just moved by how much he loved Felicitá (Both in his own route and in others too).  His Drama CD tracks and they were really sweet too, everything is from his point of view. He says "It doesn't matter what she think of me or what happens. As long as I can see her beautiful smile, and be here by her side, I'm happy. My beloved ojou-sama."  (*´・ｖ・) Naaw. I loved how at first he tries so hard to always be the calm perfect butler, but you later get to see his different emotions and sad/angry/happy sides too.
I recommend playing him last of the osananajimi-trio, just to understand their relationship more.

Jolly

Gondo's right hand man. Jolly is a guy who likes to work alone and rarely spends time with the other members of the family. The town people are scared of him and he is known for his cool attitude.

Jolly's story starts out with Felicitá meeting him at the market. He is staring at an octopus for sale. While talking to Felicitá, another guy walks by and asks to buy it instead. Jolly is of course pissed off and is about to beat the shit out of the guy for buying the octopus HE was about to get, but the guy runs off in fear and the shopkeeper is so scared she says she'll give him anything he wants for free. Jolly walks away and Luca pays the old lady because he felt so sorry for her. Lol, I don't know if this was supposed to be funny scene or not, but I laughed!

After that Felicita becomes a bit stalker-ish and sneak around after Jolly all the time. She does some jobs for him but on her spare time she tries to follow him everywhere he goes. He eventually let her in his secret lab (why did that sound dirty to me?), where he show she her his alchemy work.
When first stepping in, Felicitá curiously asks about the large tank in the middle of the room. Jolly explains that he is creating human clones, a homunculus. Felicitá leaves the room, somewhat unsettled, but interested.

Remember the boy at the church who fell in love with Felicitá? That boy was actually Jolly's experiment, Elmo. He was only completed a few days ago, but is picking up things very fast. Elmo is also a Arcana user, and his card "The Tower", gives him power to cast invisible shields. Jolly is very impressed with Elmo using his powers every day without getting tired or losing control.

 Some days later Felicitá is having trouble sleeping, so she and Liberta spies on Jolly and Mondo, whom are drinking in the garden and talking about their past. It's the first time both of them have seen Jolly without his shades, and Liberta teases Felicitá for staring at Jolly's face for too long xD

Jolly one days comes to Felicitá asking for help. He explains that it's important for her to listen and that it's actually a matter of life or death.

Ah, I'm sorry that his summary turned so short, but telling any more would spoil the whole game, which I really didn't want to do :I Jolly is...kind of hard to place. Even after finishing his three endings I felt that I was a still unsure of what I thought about his character. But hey, maybe that's his charm as well? And he loves to troll Luca and the rest of the cast, which is always a plus XD

Dante
Surprise, surprise, even the big bald guy gets a route!
Dante to me is almost a side-character, so it felt really weird reading his route. He and Felicitá never really goes to the romantic-aspect, but close enough.

Dante's route is almost 50/50 of Liberta's route. Focusing on Libertas and Dante's past. As I mentioned earlier, Dante used to be a pirate who saved children and did all kind of heroic deeds.
The masked man on the ship, fighting with Felicitá and Liberta was also Dante. His power is to remove/manipulate memories.

Felicitá remember how he used to visit her at the cottage, and that he was the one who gave her Fukurotan.

Dante acts like a mentor through the game, helping Felicitá realize and use her powers. He also helps her train for the Duel, happy that she decided to go her own path.

Sorry that his summary is so short but honestly...I just don't care OTL
Dante is a pretty generic guy who doesn't really have anything going for him (or against him!) but his route was so slow that I almost fell alseep when reading.

Gameplay:

Arcana Famiglia uses a map-selection when choosing guy and as you play the game you unlock the characters secrets (in form of hearts) which you later can go and hear after finishing the route. They are divided into different categories such as "Date secret nr.1" and "Food secret nr.2" and it's really fun to know different little things about them. The main gameplay in the game are two things:
The Kokoro-function. Felicitá can read people's hearts by using the analog controller. There is a limit to how many times you can use it per day, but it refills at night. Be aware that some endings require you never to read their hearts (expect in situations forced to), so check with a walkthrough before you play. You will sometimes see a small grey heart beat once on the other character, indicating that their thoughts/mood has changed.

The second selling point of Arcana is the real time button pressing system. During the fighting scenes, buttons will pop up and you actually got to be pretty quick not to miss it. I pressed the wrong one several times when playing and it can change the outcome of the game.

The game also had a bunch of extras to unlock, which I'm always think is a plus. Don't forget their website for the secret passwords and more goodies~

Final Score:
Story 10/10
You guys should know, even though this ended up so long, I left out a lot of story, which just shows how much potential Arcana Famiglia has. Not only did I not want to spoil all the major events/secrets/backgrounds, but because it's just too many. You can tell they worked really hard at making all the characters believable, with stories and character interactions shining through (osananajimi-trio especially). The humor is great, all the character tease each other really often, even if Sumire turns out to be the real troll of the game.

The Arcana members also play a sort of punishment game at the end of certain events. Picture above is when Debito and Luca eats Lasagna in front or Pace, which makes him go totally crazy.

Being Luca is suffering

Music 8/10
Game music was pretty nice. The battle-theme fitted well and made you alert and ready for those buttons to pop up. All the characters sang their ending song (CD will be on sale in December) and I found most of them cute. Debito's "Amore Bambina" is the one I liked the most.

Art 10/10
Love! No weird proportions, no mistakes that I could see, simply flawless! I love the super heavy black shading which really brings out the comic-style. Did I mention the boxes appears/moves around? Just like a comic, but better!

Voices 9/10 
 First off, Sugita needs a special mention for his work as Pace. Just awesome. I actually didn't realize how good the voices were until I unlocked the seiyuu commentary. Debito and Nova' for one, sounds really different in their normal voices. Honestly, all of the crew put a lot of effort in this game, and you can tell. Listening to Nakamura Yuuichi (Luca) was pretty funny, at the end he says Pace's catchphrase "Yosh! Everybody together now! LAASAGNAAA!". Yonaga Tsubasa (Nova) on the other hand talks about how he thought Nova looked really cute being tsundere and all when first seeing the character. Lol I guess being in the voice acting businesses makes you like that XD

Total: 10/10 
I seriously love Arcana Famiglia to bits. The game is unique with it's comic-style and heavy shading, none of the characters feels flat or dislikable and the story is well-planned. It also got a nice pacing that makes it easy to read and makes you want to play even more. I really hope people give this a try, because I seriously couldn't put it down for a second, it's just that good.

Until next time!