Stories of Mara – Chapter One
Discover Summer in Mara
https://store.steampowered.com/app/962580/Summer_in_Mara/
About the GameChapters Two, Three and Four coming later this year, including a special extra Chapter created by Iria & Selene, renowned Spanish ya-authors. Check out their books here: https://twitter.com/iriayselene
Explore the everyday life in Mara through unique tales in this slice of life visual novel. Step into the shoes of a diverse cast and get to know the struggles and desires of the inhabitants of this modern-fantasy world set in a tropical archipelago.
Mara is the ocean that brings life to our shores. After the elits, an evil alien corporation, attacked our planet, life is healing and everything got back to normal. But in Qälis, the city island in Mara, normal is just a word.
In Chapter One, you will follow Akaji, a procrastinating blacksmith who has to ask for the help of all her neighbors to find Koa, who has disappeared, while dealing with her own struggles.
Stories of Mara describe the little tidbits of life happening in these islands. Embark in a personal journey to find yourself and discover how to bond with others.
Features
A bit-sized slice of life visual novel following a diverse cast from the calm and relaxing supernatural world of Summer in Mara. A soap opera featuring from trickster pirates to adventurer cat-childs.
Express yourself through making boat modelism to share with the rest of the community. This will impact how they see you and how you see them.
Visuals inspired by the Studio Ghibli films with a modern setting in a fantasy universe.
Steam User 28
Stories of Mara is a short free slice-of life visual novel. Only the first chapter is released for now. This episodic tale presents lots of diverse characters you could see before if you've played Summer in Mara. I haven't. And I'm sure I was missing something but this game may be played separately for sure. As I understood the main chars are missing and we just have the chance to know better some of the side characters. For such a short story the number of chars was really great and the way they looked was quite unique. In general, the game is very bright and kinda relaxing. I'm not a fan of dating sims or mini games. I prefer just to read and make choices, the more the better. But here making different boat models was surprisingly great fun. The very image of MC able to fix anything was rather appealing.
Unfortunately, the game doesn't have any settings: no skipping, no save and there're lots of choices in this game, which is always a wonderful feature but not when you can't save before that and replay later, especially in high replay value visual novels. Only autosave is available here. That was absolutely inconvenient.
There're 20 achs: 8 for finishing the chapters and others... I couldn't get xD Sadly, there's no steam guide for them. Actually there's one but only how to get 3 endings: good, middle and bad with no dialogs, so I have no idea which one I've reached and due to the lack of settings I don't want to replay the game. And it's a pity. For example, those boat models, they can be of different types and different colors for so many locals and... I can't save, I can't replay and if I decide to do it, I won't be able to skip. It always makes me sad when a nice story is technically not created in a convenient for players way.
Plus, the game has some typos, twice sentences were too long for the text box, so they were just cut. And there's a map, you are free to choose where to go. I mainly played the game in the evening, tired after work, so once I went to the place I wasn't supposed by the plot and had the conversation which was too early to have to make sense. Once, the 'girl' which was missing was actually standing behind my back, I doubt it was intentional. So, it feels like the game is not polished enough. Nothing too completely spoil the play-through but such imperfections weren't nice.
Welp, if I could I'd choose a neutral review. I'll come back to the story when other parts are released. And maybe I'll even replay the first chapter if a guide is published. Because in general even without playing the previous game I more liked then disliked this one. Sea adventures (only mentioned not actually presented but still), pirates, navy, boats...all that kinda made me recollect “One Piece” and I've watched 992 episodes of it XD So, despite all technical flaws I'd recommend to try it, it's free anyway.
More thoughts about the game in a Reading Nook
Steam User 6
This is a visual novel game following on from the game Summer in Mara. This takes place after Summer in Mara and Koa (the protagonist) is now missing, so you take the place of Akaji, the local blacksmith who is stressed and overwhelmed and now concerned about her little friend after finding her boat in pieces on the beach. I am too.
Being a visual novel, you do not walk around or explore, like in the prequel, but you do get to go to different locations via a map of the island in a way of exploring and interacting with the island residents. Sometimes there are paths unseen until you use different dialogue and / or "walk" elsewhere.
I adore the world that has been crafted from the main game, and the interactions and characters from everyone around, it is lovely to be transported back into this world once again.
The first episode is free, but I would strongly recommend playing the game first as it follows on from it. This is from a small Spanish studio and I've come to love the world they've crafted, you can feel the love they have put into their games and this. I can't wait to see future episodes of this story.
Steam User 4
Stories of Mara does currently consist of the 1st chapter’s 1h long prologue that entices you to await eagerly the continuation of the story!
Game's premise:
You play as Akaji, a strong young woman inhabitating the island of Mara.
While performing your daily routine at the workshop, you become aware of an unhandy situation involving the sudden arrival of a boat grasping too much attention of the local beach bar’s customers.
It happens to be the crashed boat of Koa, your friend who is nowhere to be seen.
In search of a friend:
Worriedly, you begin questioning fellow inhabitants about Koa’s whereabouts. However, no one results to be taking the issue at heart, while casually brushing the topic away stating that nothing may have happened to the lively Koa.
To add more burden onto your shoulders, everyone seems to be in need of more work or repairments to ask of you causing you to be stuck at the workshop once again. You manage to find a compromise while offering exchanges coming to the work requests, in order to achieve useful information coming to what may have happened to your friend.
The workshop laborer:
Akaji is a very caring and hardworking character, which causes her to accept way too many work from her neighborhood’s side. She seems to be unable to say “no”, which clearly destabilizes her emotionally, which can be noticed by her constant change of facial expressions, as well as the dialogue choices the game does offer which tends to be among the motivated hard worker type of mindset and a genuinely worn-out emotional state.
Personal considerations:
This game got me absolutely excited while viewing the amount of variety of traits coming to so many different non-human fantasy characters. Each character does display a really detailed and originally fabricated designs, as well as overall concepts.
Noticeable differentiated ways of speech are also a huge bonus.
Featurings:
This is the 1st chapter of the game (which will bring us a total of 5 chapters) that recounts the prologue of the story. The length is of 1h and while the story pacing is very casual and laid-back, it does offer interesting narration and features, such as quality art, partial voice acting, sound effect noises and a neat assortment of background music.
Being a Visual Novel, the game will display choices which may or may not influence the outcome (that cannot be said, as the full game is yet to be released).
To proceed with the story you’ll have to visit a variety of places displayed on the island’s map, an appreciated feature creating more immersion in the world Stories of Mara portrays.
Overall:
A relaxing little adventure introducing us to the plot and the views the island of Mara has to offer.
Recommended to public seeking for a colourful and laid-back gameplay. Be wary of the fact you can only play through the first chapter at the moment.
To find out and discover interesting VNs, indie games and more navigate through my Curator Page!
🩷 Gyepi Types 🩷
Steam User 2
This Visual Novel continues the story in Summer in Mara, except the main character in it is missing and you play as the blacksmith from the original game. The characters are well fleshed out and lovable, and very believable in their interactions. It's almost as if some of the story is taken from real life scenarios.
Pros:
The art is fantastic and well done.
The dialog is in-depth and involved.
Your choices definitely matter.
Characters are very well developed.
Cons:
Autosave system rather than multisave is awkward
A few more notes:
I have yet to complete a single play through, but so far, every single choice I've made in game seems to have changed the path of the game in some way, whether it's a dialog choice or a map choice. Many VNs, even with choices, have very few paths and if this sticks to what I'm thinking, this could be one of the few true 'choose your own adventure' type VNs.
Being used to Renpy's multiple save system, it's a bit awkward playing a VN with an autosave feature. It's hard remembering if the game saved recently or not.
The map system is not really explained, though for the most part it's pretty self explanatory. It would be nice if there was a journal or log system with a list of what you need to do and where they're done, but maybe those can be added in the future.
Conversations with Noho are a bit too realistic... My compliments to the writers.
For some streamed gameplay, please visit
Steam User 2
Summer in Mara was already such a beautiful story with amazing characters, but now with Stories of Mara, that just got so much better! The characters are as lovable as before (if not more so!) and the story is absolutely wonderful and even more heart-driven than before! An absolute gem. <3 I will be waiting with excitement for more to come!
Steam User 2
Haven't even played for an hour yet and I can see this is amazing game, much like Summer in Mara the game has a nice story, charm, banging music and great visuals. I'm looking forward to the new chapters that are to come and would recommend anyone to play this as well as Summer in Mara.
Steam User 2
Not a real game just clicking for the stories. If you are a lover of the Chibig universe like me you will enjoy reading the story.
If youre interested you can take a look at some gamplay: