My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- is a visual novel based on the popular series of the same name. Read our review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Review Overview
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Faithful To Its Source Convenient Affection Management |
Format Ironically Doesn’t Fit Unfriendly To Newcomers Unbalanced Character Priorities |
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Overall - 76/100
The visual novel is a fun romp set in an original story based on the My Next Life as a Villainess light novel, manga, and anime series. As such, every scene is a breath of fresh air for folks wanting to experience more of the protagonist, Katarina Claes' shenanigans, and their hilarious and often charming consequences. However, though the visual novel has faithfully recreated every central character from the original work, including their love for the protagonist, one can't help but entertain the idea that its dating sim-like gameplay feels quite inappropriate for the kind of friends that surround her.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Story - 7/10
Even as an original story, it has retained the series' signature humor that centers around the protagonist's antics to avoid her exile or execution. There's also an abundance of fresh, entertaining scenarios for its readers to enjoy. However, it does suffer from a rushed pace, and many of its signature aspects, such as Katarina's mischief and the supporting cast's doting of the former, feel quite toned down.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Gameplay - 7/10
As a typical visual novel, its gameplay mainly consists of reading text and making decisions for the protagonist. However, nothing else is notable about its gameplay beyond the considerations you must make when you aim for specific romance routes. The plot itself doesn't change much, regardless of whose route you pursue, either. At the very least, your choices significantly affect the scenarios and endings you'll get.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Visuals - 8/10
The game proudly displays its amazing character artwork for the world to see. It's also littered with charming illustrations of memorable events, ensuring the risk of you getting bored of simply reading text is low. Additionally, its background images, though quite generic, are all well-drawn and fit the environments that each scenario demands. Unfortunately, all the above points only serve to make it a well-drawn visual novel. It uses none of the modern features other games employ, such as Live2D for their characters.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Audio - 9/10
As one would expect from a game developed by IDEA FACTORY, the voice work imparted to the characters by the numerous gifted talents behind them is impeccable. They have also managed to get the original voice actors together to work on the game, ensuring that players who come over from the anime series feel right at home.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Value for Money - 7/10
At a cent short of $50, the game is on the expensive side. However, it does make up for it with its numerous, distinct routes among the series' four core romanceables, as well as two not-so-hidden routes. Coupled with the game's respectable length, fans of the series will undoubtedly find it worth purchasing the game at its full price.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Review: A Great Romantic Fight Against Death Flags
As a fan of the villainess reincarnation subgenre of reincarnation stories, the My Next Life as a Villainess series naturally came under my radar. Although it's not as pressing as other works such as Tearmoon Empire or Falling In Love With The Villainess, it made up for it with its abundance of comedic scenes delivered by an honest and eccentric main protagonist. So, it was no surprise that its visual novel would also interest me. After all, I love visual novels quite a lot as well.
I was pleasantly happy that it delivered many of the things I liked about the series. Katarina, whom the fandom affectionately refers to as "Bakarina" due to her complete lack of awareness and baffling solutions to even the most minor issues, has returned as the same familiar, lovable glutton. Her best friends, who adore her to varying degrees, all come along for the ride with admittedly convenient excuses. With the entire gang present, the visual novel felt like home.
-At least to some extent.
Despite how faithful the game is to the original materials, it had to sacrifice some aspects that fans loved to deliver its dating sim experience. Chief among those is that Katarina's friends meddling with each other to prevent romantic encounters with her were heavily toned down. After all, considering that the developers must have intended for the game to emulate the series' canonical origin as an otome dating sim, these scenes are a must.
On top of that, the game's setting also severely limits the kind of shenanigans that Katarina could immerse herself in. For example, since they're on a ship, she can no longer escape the troubles of everyday life through farming, a canonical running gag that involves her committing all sorts of vegetable or fruit-related antics like wearing an eggplant pajama. And since her love for farming, a trait unbefitting that of a duke's daughter, is a significant part of Katarina's character, losing that here feels like a big chunk was bitten off of her.
Regardless, the game is still a fun read. It carries over the series' characters well despite its limitations. And even though its price is shockingly high, I feel it's worth every penny for someone invested in the series.
Pros of My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance-
| Things My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Got Right |
|---|
|
Faithful To Its Source Convenient Affection Management |
Faithful To Its Source
For many players (or readers), an adaptation, spin-off, or other derivative work of an existing franchise must be faithful to its original material, at least in most circumstances. After all, the reason for their interest in a franchise mainly lies in its signature or distinct characteristics.
Determining if My Next Life as a Villainess is faithful to its source is troublesome. After all, it uses an original scenario, allowing it to stand in a unique position compared to the manga, anime, and light novel series. In other words, the visual novel itself is a source material for any future manga, anime, or light novel adaptation of the story.
On the other hand, the visual novel could still be judged by how accurately it portrays the "spirit" of the series. In this case, are the characters still the same, lovable bunch from one of the prequel media? The answer is yes.
There are still plenty of the usual shenanigans between the characters. In fact, there's a wider variety of them now that they have found themselves in an unfamiliar environment. I mean, they're now on a cruise liner, of all things, instead of being stuck in school or at home all day.
They have also maintained their individual quirks. For example, the harmonious but semi-hostile relationship continues between the third prince, Geordo, Katarina's adopted brother Keith, and the marquis' daughter, Mary Hunt, where they all vie for Katarina's attention.
The series' fans will definitely appreciate the familiarity.
Convenient Affection Management
In the past, most dating sim visual novels suffered from either a lack of an intuitive method of viewing the affection they have collected between each character or forced players to play in a specific way to access the routes they intended to conquer. Nowadays, dating sim games have many ways to ease their players into the hearts of the heroes or heroines they seek. In the visual novel of My Next Life as a Villainess' case, that also rings true.
The game has made it a point to make getting into the route you want to be in as easy as possible. These include giving visual feedback on which hero's affection you raised after making any choice, providing a chart where you can check how much affection you have already collected for every character, and marking choices you had already made when you reload a save file. That way, you won't get lost in your efforts to woo a bachelor.
On top of that, if you seek a more challenging experience, you can turn the visual cues off in the game's options and then opt not to check their affection gauges within the pause menu.
Cons of My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance-
| Things That My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Can Improve |
|---|
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Format Ironically Doesn’t Fit Unfriendly To Newcomers Unbalanced Character Priorities |
Format Ironically Doesn't Fit
My Next Life as a Villainess is a story about a young girl from Earth being reincarnated as the antagonist of an otome dating sim game. To prepare for the scenarios that would lead to her being exiled or executed at the conclusion of the game, she invests much of her time into learning new skills that will allow her to fend for herself in case the former happens or support the other characters in their respective romances to avoid the latter. In her desperate attempts to do so, she ends up charming the entire cast with her unpredictable, honest, and straightforward nature.
Unfortunately, as someone with no experience with romantic relationships in her previous life, she is far too dense to realize what they feel about her, at least up until a certain point.
The game is set somewhere between the conclusion of the otome game scenario where she managed to avoid the bad endings during the 2nd year students' graduation ceremony and before her awareness of the other characters' feelings toward her started manifesting. This means she's still at the point where her lack of awareness maintains a status quo between every character that desires her affection.
That is why a dating sim, a genre that typically seeks to break these sorts of stalemates, feels so out of place for this series.
A significant amount of the anime, manga, and light novel's content revolves around the many interactions between each character that serve to keep each other in check. While that is still found aplenty in the visual novel, much of the usual meddling or misunderstandings have been toned down or removed entirely to give way for actual romantic encounters.
That means it's less entertaining than the anime, manga, and light novels unless you're specifically looking for romance.
Unfriendly To Newcomers
As mentioned above, the visual novel picks up from somewhere between the conclusion of the 2nd year students' graduation ceremony and the point where Katarina has become aware of some of her companions' feelings. In other words, many of the game's scenarios are predicated on the assumption that its readers are already familiar with at least the former.
Otherwise, you'll be left without any idea about what's happening.
Of course, the game attempts to ease those new to the franchise into it. This is done by spreading recap sections throughout the game that reference events before the game's timeline. However, since its audience is primarily those already familiar with the series, the flashbacks often lack enough context for newbies to make appropriate connections.
These recap sections might even raise more questions than answers in certain circumstances.
Unbalanced Character Priorities
Due to the protagonist's personality, she has attracted both men and women almost equally. Unsurprisingly, for these kinds of stories, nearly all of them, including the ladies, are romantically infatuated with her, even if some are already engaged with somebody else. In a way, you could call this an indiscriminate harem scenario where Katarina could have a choice to swing either way.
However, the only romanceable options presented to you are the four of your main companions and two not-so-un-obvious mystery characters.
Although it fits the main series' initial focus on Katarina having to befriend the men to prepare for or prevent her bad end, Maria and Mary, who are both infatuated with Katarina, should have also been options considering the original scenario's events.
It's only fair that way, even if I don't like large harem-type shows.
Is My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Worth It?
Only If You're Already A Fan
Because of the game's staggering $50 price and general unfriendliness to new readers, the visual novel is obviously aimed toward the currently-existing fans. For those interested in the series, I recommend checking the anime or reading the manga or light novel before buying the game. Because if you like these kinds of stories, its visual novel is worth the money.
Otherwise, you'll do yourself a solid to skip this for a more entry-friendly title.
| Platform | Price |
|---|---|
 Nintendo Store |
$49.99 |
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Overview & Premise
After getting past her doom scenarios and achieving the "Friendship Ending," Katarina Claes, the supposed villainess of the otome game "Fortune Lover," has found herself in a massive crew ship along with her friends. There, she must fight a new set of doom flags with far less preparation and insight than she's used to. Will she achieve victory over the otome game's developers and achieve happiness? Or will she end up getting exiled to a remote island or possibly executed as intended?
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- FAQ
How Many Routes Are There in My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance-?
There are four main routes, plus two hidden routes available.
Is My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Available On Steam?
The game is currently only available for the Nintendo Switch.
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My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Product Information
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| Title | MY NEXT LIFE AS A VILLAINESS: ALL ROUTES LEAD TO DOOM! -PIRATES OF THE DISTURBANCE- |
|---|---|
| Release Date | November 28, 2023 |
| Developer | IDEA FACTORY |
| Publisher | Reef Entertainment |
| Supported Platforms | Nintendo Switch |
| Genre | Visual Novel |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| ESRB Rating | Teen |
| Official Website | My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! -Pirates of the Disturbance- Website |
