Cadybear's Reviews- The Haunting of Braidwood Manor
Welcome to the second official Cadybear's Reviews post! Today I'll be talking about The Haunting of Braidwood Manor, which I have ranked on the "Gold Tier" at 8 stars out of a possible 10.
I’ve played this about 4 times. Mainly because I needed the diamonds and this one is 6 chapters, so it’s easy mining. Nevertheless, I quite enjoyed this one.
The story was pretty linear, but it was interesting and compelling with memorable characters, and it works fairly well as creepy paranormal horror. And a few points do even make me want to cry. However, I do have two nitpicks. Like, how did MC make the connection between her brother’s death and Braidwood Manor? Unless I missed something even after playing the story 4 times, it felt very out-of-nowhere and unexplained. And how come Eleanor is the only one that can be brought back to life but not the rest of the Waverly siblings? That’s not fair at all. But for the most part, those are pretty minor issues.
It’s also kinda neat that we have a story where the main LI is female while the male LI is sidelined. Actually, I wouldn’t even say Victor is sidelined– he’s straight up a total non-character. I mean, I’m not a fan of sidelining LIs at all, but considering how so many books have treated female LIs now, this one is at least a rare change of pace. And I say this as someone who is very wlm. And I say “wlm” and not “straight” because quite simply, I don’t think I’m really straight. And Eleanor Waverly is one of many female Choices characters who I can thank for helping me realize that. Seriously, it’s super adorable how she’s supposed to be this cold stoic ghost, but then gets really blushy and flustered when you flirt with her.
Though, as much as I appreciate the sapphic ghost romance taking the full spotlight… this book is rather pointlessly genderlocked. And probably the first ever Choices book that I would deem as such*. I mean, all you’d really need to change is the dialogue in that one set of choice options when Clarissa asks for help writing her letter.
In the canon version, Clarissa assumes you know how to write letters to guys, and you get an option to say you’re actually into girls, and then she says how she’s cool with it and she considers sapphism very sophisticated if you choose said option. For a playthrough where you’ve chosen a male MC, she could maybe assume that you’d know what guys like to hear from girls, you could get an option to say you’re actually into guys, and she’d say it’s very sophisticated if you choose said option. Easy as that.
And as far as I’m concerned, Eleanor is only canon sapphic and not lesbian (but do correct me if I’m wrong). THOBM, I am sad that you are the start of the pointless genderlocking trend /jk
*Technically ROE is the first Choices book I could consider pointlessly genderlocked, but I’m a little more uncertain on that because there’s a handful of scenes that would need tricky coding changes such as the bachelorette party/girls night scenes. Or even before that is TFS, but I’m also a bit dubious about calling it pointlessly genderlocked because Kaitlyn is a lesbian and has a whole arc revolving around her coming out about it to her parents– but people have said that aside from Kaitlyn, the story and MC are very gender neutral, so do with that what you will. There’s also LH, but I’ll say my thoughts on its genderlocking in its own review.
So it didn’t have anything that really wowed me, but it’s still a great story that holds a very special place in my heart.
i kinda stopped engaging with the choices community a while ago for several reasons, but especially because I pretty much lost all of my interest in the app. but since it's spooktober, i really wanted to draw my favourite ghost gf. 🥺💖 i just love eleanor so much! and i wish that THOBM was longer... i need more of her. :'(
