Choice of Rebels: Uprising 12+

Elegantly designed. Interesting setting. You have a lot of options for your character's origin, noble or slave, and that has a tremendous effect on the story going forward. Also you choose a specialization in brains, combat, or charisma and these too can uniquely color your play in legitimately intriguing ways. Much more thought and depth here than most choice of games, less emphasis on character statistics and much more thought put into the results of your style of leadership. I don't envy the author trying to follow this up. It's a planned first of five and with all the evident work that's gone into it, making the sequels won't be easy with all the ways you can end the first game. If you like gritty, smart, thoughtful fiction that makes you think about cruelty and compassion, idealism and belief, loyalty and betrayal, this one won't disappoint.

I never write reviews, but I have to rave. Choice of Rebels is one of the best titles Choice of Games has ever put out. An excellent storyline, a rich, immersive history and challenging, even agonizing, choices with both immediate and far reaching consequences all combine for an intense and satisfying story. You have chances to replay the last three of the four chapters, making changing your choices easier than most of their titles. I’ve also noticed an element of randomness to the results of certain choices which creates a more organic narration. Yet I never felt a single choice was meaningless nor taken without my character’s stats in mind. There is so much replay value and each replay feels fresh and engaging.

While this is one of my favorite Choice games, with characters you actually *care* about and meaningful choices, it's beginning is a large info-dump of exposition which was incredibly jarring and hard to follow. Finding what title meant what and what the social classes were shouldn't have taken a multiple paragraph pre-read in the built in lore book. Other than that, the book was an engaging read with multiple completely different endings and hidden choices. Unfortunately, during winter a few raids and events would repeat themselves. (Minor spoilers): The event where you raid the rich noble family with the guard on the top of the ladder you either fight or send others to fight I had occur twice in a playthrough. I'm pretty sure this is either a bug or an oversight, so I can forgive it more than the exposition.