
Magical Diary: Horse Hall is an
Otome Game released by
Hanako Games
in 2011.
Part
Life Sim, part
Dating Sim, part
Adventure Game - it follows the
Wild Seed born
Player Character through her first year of the
Wizarding School - Iris Academy.
A
Wolf Hall spin-off is currently being planned.
Magical Diary contains the following tropes:
- Accidental Marriage: More like accidental engagement, but due to the power of a promise the people involved have to go through with it.
- Animal Motifs: Deliberately invoked by the faculty of Iris Academy. All students are assigned a house when they enroll;
- "Adventurous" Horses, "charming" Butterflies or "mysterious" Snakes for the girls
- "Daring" wolves, "elegant" falcons or "eldritch" toads for the boys.
- Anything That Moves: Pastel.
- Audio Erotica: Professor Grabiner, according to the PC.
- Big Eater: Virginia. She sure can pack it in.
- Boarding School
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer / Eccentric Mentor: Professor Potsdam. Despite being the powerful headmistress at a prestigious Wizarding School she comes across more of a mature Granola Girl. Most of the time, anyway.
- Captain Ersatz: Professor Grabiner is very obviously fanon Snape.
- Cloudcuckoolander:
- Big Steve.
- Suki.
- Snake/Toad Hall students in general.
- Cool Big Bro: William to Virginia. And she adores him for it.
- Crazy Jealous Guy: Kyo towards Minnie.
- Mr. Fanservice:
- Everyone is Bi: Gender appears to be completely irrelevant when it comes to romance here; not only can characters be romanced either way but no one comments on this to indicate that it's at all unusual, and other NPCs date both genders as well. Most obvious with William, Damien, or Ellen if you pursue her.
- Gay Option: No Hanako Games title would be complete without this. In this case both Ellen and Virginia fulfill the role officially.
- Magically-Binding Contract: The sworn promise of a witch or wizard is completely binding, with dire consequences if broken.
- Manipulative Bastard: Damien!
- Masquerade
- Middle Child Syndrome: Donald's problem.
- Obfuscating Stupidity : Professor Potsdam is a lot more devious than she first appears.
- Odd Couple: You have two roommates. Virginia is a Book Dumb junk-food-addict slob. Ellen is a quiet, studious neat freak who loves vegetables.
- This isn't quite Tomboy and Girly Girl since as Horses they're both somewhat tomboyish. Ellen is more girly, but not drastically. However, Pastel is extremely girly, and she and Virginia are apparently friends.
- Parody Sue: The default character name is Mary Sue. The creator was having a bit of fun there.
- Pastiche: Of Harry Potter Fan Fic. For example, Professor Grabiner is Severus Snape through fangirly eyes, while Damien is a Malfoy (in leather pants) Expy. And, of course, the PC's default name is Mary Sue.
- Save Scumming: Given the multiple dialogue options, multiple game paths, and random nature of magic skill gains, this is pretty much required. Given that you can literally save everywhere, to 80 slots, this is also practically a game feature.
- Secret Character: As of the latest patch, Big Steve now has a partial romance path. Reaching it is much more difficult than any of the other characters.
- Shout Out: The school play is The Small Place of Purchase of Frightening Things.
- Spirit World: The Other World.
- The Talk: Something of a Running Gag. Professor Potsdam will sometimes open a class sounding like she's about to lead into the talk, only for it to turn out to be something unrelated. She does eventually get round to it, kinda.
- Troubled, but Cute: Damien. Donald to a lesser extent.
- Two-Teacher School: The only instructors we ever see are Professor Grabiner and Professor Potsdam.
- Two Timer Date: Possible if you were on Virginia's path and then accepted a date with Damien.
- Urban Fantasy
- Wizarding School
- You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Many of the characters have unusual hair colors.