History VisualNovel / FleuretBlanc

* PlayingThePlayer: A video game is an interesting choice of medium for discussing the CentralTheme of materialism, since most games condition players to [[GottaCatchEmAll collect]] [[HundredPercentCompletion everything]]. The gameplay elements play up this cognitive dissonance for all it's worth.

* ScoringPoints: Used as an instance of PlayingThePlayer. The points are worthless and you only even see them at the end of the day, yet upon seeing the obvious gameplay mechanic many players feel an irrational urge to make the numbers go up regardless. Combined with the CentralTheme of obsession and hoarding, [[YouBastard this can lead to some uncomfortable self-reflection.]]

** {{Deconstructed}} a little. Her father wanted a son, not a daughter, and named her "[[spoiler:Junior]]" before she was even born in the hopes she would continue the family line. When he discovered his offspring was a girl, he was livid. The resulting neglect and disappointment likely skewed her psychological development and perception of gender roles in an unhealthy way, and may have influenced her decision to enter such a male-coded field in the first place. However, this is also {{reconstructed}} in that her father learned to love her anyway.

* WomanInWhite: Amara.

'''Fleuret Blanc''' is a VisualNovel made in RPG Maker XP by Merlandese of [[http://www.twelvetiles.com/ Twelve Tiles]]. Originally made in 2012, it gained another surge of popularity when posted to rpgmaker.net two years later.

Notable for its discussion of many heavy themes such as materialism and obsession, ''Fleuret Blanc'' has gained popularity as as a literary and story-heavy experience, albeit not without some engaging gameplay elements. It can be downloaded [[http://rpgmaker.net/games/6686/ here.]]

* [[TownWithADarkSecret Castle with a Dark Secret]]: The Château de l'Hiver, FOIL's base of operations. From the bizarre decorations to the even more bizarre inhabitants, it quickly becomes clear that something's up, and Florentine endeavors to find out what.
* BringIt: Junior's battle pose features this.

* StealthPun / VisualPun: Grams' TrademarkFavoriteFood is ginger root. She also has a soft spot for redheads -- also known as "gingers".

'''Fleuret Blanc''' is a VisualNovel made in RPG Maker XP by Merlandese of [[http://www.twelvetiles.com/ Twelve Tiles.]] Originally made in 2012, it gained another surge of popularity when posted to rpgmaker.net two years later.

23-year-old Florentine Blanc is a college graduate who has dedicated her life to travel. Without having a career to fall back on, she takes up menial jobs whenever her pockets become empty. She seems to strike gold when she gets accepted into [[FunWithAcronyms FOIL]], a private fencing organization looking for members interested in a "new breed" of the sport.

The rules? Members of FOIL must [[AbsurdlyHighStakesGame wager their most prized possession in the world]]. [[GottaCatchEmAll This object acts as a trophy winnable by other members of the group]]. After seven days of bouts, the judges decide who Florentine replaces as the new member. In the meantime, Florentine decides to investigate FOIL's mysterious and secluded base of operations. As her experiences become more menacing, she encounters troubling questions and begins to discover what evolves into [[TownWithADarkSecret a mysterious and ugly truth]].

* [[TownWithADarkSecret Castle With A Dark Secret]]: The Château de l'Hiver, FOIL's base of operations. From the bizarre decorations to the even more bizarre inhabitants, it quickly becomes clear that something's up, and Florentine endeavors to find out what.

* NoSell: Parry is a guaranteed block against any attack -- except [[AlwaysAccurateAttack Feint]], which can still succeed depending on a QuickTimeEvent.

* QuickTimeEvent: Every action in bouts, particularly techniques, involves using one of these to get a bonus. They sometimes pop up in cutscenes as well.

* RevealingCoverup: When [[spoiler:Junior]] tries to deflect an investigation into the anonymous text messages, she does so by pinning it on [[spoiler:Le Neuvieme]] -- but [[spoiler:the messages are in English, and [[SomethingTheyWouldNeverSay Le Neuvieme only speaks French]]]]. When Florentine figures out the fabrication, she realizes [[spoiler:Junior]] must have been the real culprit -- why frame someone else, otherwise?

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: It's [[ModularEpilogue modular]], though; you only see the snippets for individual characters if you've completed their subplot.

** DegradedBoss: After their trophy bout, you can duel members any time at half HitPoints.

* SchrodingersGun: There is one branch point (Tuesday afternoon) where both options have to merge afterwards, thus forcing both to be consistent with the overall storyline despite involving very different events. The result of this is that the two branches apparently occur in two slightly different universes, where prior events were different. If Florentine attends the meeting, the stated reason for [[spoiler:Kant's dismissal]] is that [[spoiler:Roland kept his prized possession for over a week]], which is corroborated by [[spoiler:Roland giving you said prized possession after the meeting]]. However, if she [[spoiler:follows Kant]], it will turn out that [[spoiler:he has his prized possession on him]], contradicting the historical events stated in the other branch.
* SchrodingersQuestion:
** There is one subplot (Nickel's) where answering the conclusion questions differently will still produce a correct answer but cause the nature of the mystery to change: it is possible for Nickel to be either [[spoiler:gambling]] or [[spoiler:investing]] depending on what you think [[spoiler:the number slips]] mean.
** Subverted in another conclusion. When Florentine confronts [[spoiler:Aunty]] about [[spoiler:the nature of FOIL]], she will say something different depending on the personality traits you picked in the initial questionnaire. [[spoiler:Aunty]] will confirm either, but [[spoiler:both are lies, and the true purpose of FOIL remains constant regardless of Florentine's assertion]].

'''Fleuret Blanc''' is a VisualNovel made in RPG Maker XP by Merlandese of [[http://www.twelvetiles.com/ Twelve Tiles.]] Originally made in 2012, it gained another surge of popularity when posted to RPGMaker.net two years later.

* CentralTheme: Materialism and collection; the role of objects in our lives and the meanings we attribute to them.
** PlayingThePlayer: A video game is, of course, an interesting medium to discuss this in, since most games condition players to [[GottaCatchEmAll collect]] [[HundredPercentCompletion everything]]. The gameplay elements play up this cognitive dissonance for all it's worth.
*** A particular example of this: gaining an item results in a cheerful ItemGet jingle, while losing one results in a dispiriting sound effect, even when it's part of a scripted sequence. This makes many players have a kneejerk negative reaction to losing items, even when it makes perfect sense and is in fact the smarter option.

** SchrodingersQuestion: Similarly, there is one subplot (Nickel's) where answering the conclusion questions differently will still produce a correct answer but cause the nature of the mystery to change: it is possible for Nickel to be either [[spoiler:gambling]] or [[spoiler:investing]] depending on what you think [[spoiler:the number slips]] mean.
*** Subverted in another conclusion. When Florentine confronts [[spoiler:Aunty]] about [[spoiler:the nature of FOIL]], she will say something different depending on the personality traits you picked in the initial questionnaire. [[spoiler:Aunty]] will confirm either, but [[spoiler:both are lies, and the true purpose of FOIL remains constant regardless of Florentine's assertion]].

** StealthPun / VisualPun: She also has a soft spot for "gingers" -- that is, redheads.

[[quoteright:320:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thoughtful_florentine_8589.png]][[caption-width-right:320:[[GottaCatchEmAll Everything is collectible.]]]]

* WakeUpCallBoss: Roland tends to give players a lot of grief due to his unpredictable nature and weird techniques. The developer also describes Le Neuvieme, the next boss, as "the bane of [his] existence".

* UncannyValley: Some of the {{Character Portrait}}s are in an awkward place between a cartoonish and realistic style, making them look off-putting. Roland's open-eyed grin is particularly freaky, as it's just a bit too wide and the eyes don't crinkle at all, making it look like a SlasherSmile.

* NightmareFace: Roland's grin.

* GadgeteerGenius: Junior.

* CrossDressingVoices: Grams is voiced by the developer, who is male.

* EarlyBirdBoss: Averted with Roland. Unlike every other member, he starts with only one technique, and [[MirrorMatch it's the exact same one as yours]]. This doesn't prevent him from being a WakeUpCallBoss for a lot of people, though.

* GottaCatchEmAll: Played with. The gameplay mechanics encourage this behavior, even while the story points out its pitfalls and creepy facets.

* GratuitousForeignLanguage: French. Justified as the game is set in France and many of the characters are bilingual.

** Lampshaded by Le Neuvieme -- to him, ''English'' is the gratuitous foreign language.
--->"I could not understand a word of that meeting. Why wouldn't they speak in French? We are in France, for God's sake!"

* ProductionForeshadowing: Squeaker's tale about a stone that confers the power to kill someone with a word will sound eerily familiar to anyone who has played Merlandese's later game ''Last Word''.

* TheQuietOne: Masque, who communicates mostly in grunts and {{Visible Silence}}s. [[spoiler:Subverted in that he can be quite the chatterbox when talking about a subject that interests him. The problem is, there is only one subject that fits that description: masks.]]
* RedHerring: [[spoiler:Anastasia's bus accident]] is suspicious as all get-out and Florentine spends most of the story assuming it has a connection to the central mystery, a paranoia that only gets more justified when she finds evidence that [[spoiler:FOIL kills its former members]]. In the ending, however, the event is revealed to have been a legitimate coincidence, with no relation to the conspiracy.

* SmarterThanYouLook: Masque at first appears to be taciturn DumbMuscle , but his text messages reveal that he is actually quite well-spoken when he has to be, and he is also skilled at investigation. [[spoiler:He also has an academic interest in masks and cultural history, probably enough to catapult him into full GeniusBruiser territory.]]

* TalkingToHimself: As can be expected from a low-budget indie game, many of the voice actors have to play multiple roles. Amusingly, Roland and Grams both have the same actor.

* SmarterThanYouLook: Masque at first appears to be taciturn DumbMuscle (with a side helping of racial UnfortunateImplications), but his text messages reveal that he is actually quite well-spoken when he has to be, and he is also skilled at investigation. [[spoiler:He also has an academic interest in masks and cultural history, probably enough to catapult him into full GeniusBruiser territory.]]

* RedHerring: [[spoiler:Anastasia's bus accident]] is suspicious as all get-out and Florentine spends most of the story assuming it has a connection to central mystery, a paranoia that only gets more justified when she finds evidence that [[spoiler:FOIL kills its former members]]. In the ending, however, the event is revealed to have been a legitimate coincidence, with no relation to the conspiracy.

[[quoteright:320:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thoughtful_florentine_8589.png]]

->''"[[GottaCatchEmAll Everything is collectible.]]"''

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: It's [[ModuarEpilogue modular]], though; you only see the snippets for individual characters if you've completed their subplot.

* NewGamePlus: Techniques, items, and character information is preserved. Points of interest are ''not'', but the game will sometimes fudge things in your favor, allowing you to access pertinent events and conclusions sooner than you're supposed to. It also gives you the opportunity to fight the FinalBoss as a normal member if you like.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: Florentine making an absurd leap of racist logic to conclude that [[spoiler:Masque is ''mind-controlling the judges with a magic Tahitian spice'']]. She is quickly revealed to be hilariously off-track, but she never apologizes or reveals where her reasoning came from.

* NewGamePlus: Techniques, items, and character information is preserved. Points of interest are ''not'', but the game will sometimes fudge things in your favor, allowing you to access pertinent events and conclusions sooner than you're supposed to.

%%Title screen or "thoughtful Florentine" for picture? Title screen too busy, other may not be relevant enough.