I have no memory of how Queen Beast got into my game library, but I’m grateful it’s there. Studio Envelope’s debut game is a nostalgia-driven kinetic novel that celebrates the Japanese pulp sword & sorcery genre of the 1980s & 1990s, with heavier emphasis on ‘90s OVA. If you think fondly of Go Nagai’s Devilman Lady, you’ll like Queen Beast.
The plot is so familiar you can sing along: a lil miller boy goes on a big adventure, joins up with a woman warrior in bikini armor, saves the princess, and decides what kind of adult he wants to be. There’s high adventure, fantastical fantasy, gruesome horror, and bright, bright hope. While there is an attempt to overcome the patriarchal pitfalls of the genre, especially with the sister, villainess, and kidnapped women characters, the overall feminism does a face plant. There are SPOILER multiple rapes of female characters (one on screen) END SPOILER and an “ironic” dismissal of hentai (which I found especially ludicrous with how entwined the erotic and fantasy pulp genres are). There is also an inequality in which gendered bodies are put on display for the audience. With an exception of children and elders, female characters are pretty much full frontal nudity—maybe there will be a proverbial fig leaf. The male characters, however, are modestly covered in shadows and angles. Delving into this artistic choice leads down some distinctly un-feminist rabbit holes. What could be a shallow thought process of “I prefer drawing women” leads into how patriarchal societies are okay with the objectification and use of women as sexual objects, while only men are nuanced people, worth the dignity of clothes and bodily privacy.
All that being said, I avidly played the game. As if to temper the horrors, the cast is majority women, and sapphic sexuality is embraced and celebrated on its own terms. The sprite, background, CGs, and chapter card art are drop-dead gorgeous—I took a lot of screenshots and shared them with friends. The music is lovely. The game is free, which is bananas given how much work it must have been to create.
Despite some unsettling drawbacks, I’m still giving Queen Beast a thumbs up, but the approval is tilted slightly more towards the artwork than the narrative.