Seers Isle is a French Visual Novel released in 2018 by the indie developer Soft-box. It follows a group of would-be shamans who have traveled together to an island inhabited by mysterious non-human "Seers" who can grant healing powers and the second sight to humans who pass the tests that they impose.
This visual novel provides examples of:
- Anyone Can Die: Most of the party WILL die, and they're well aware from the beginning that they won't all make it. Even the player character can die.
- Chekhov's Volcano: Weirdly played with. There's a volcano on the island which is seen erupting at the climax of the story, but this is in a time loop/flashback to the island's distant past.
- Creepy Child: The Seers, who are eerie, silent, antlered children in wooden masks.
- Death of a Child: Jennyver's backstory; her daughter and husband both died of a plague that killed most of her village. Also features in Rowan's backstory; as a child, Rowan accidentally got her clan chief's son of similar age killed by a bear, which is why she spent years on the run and was eventually exiled to the island to face the Seers' judgment.
- Dwindling Party: Hoo boy. Party members turn back, disappear with the Seers, or die steadily throughout. However, which ones die depends on your choices.
- Empathy Doll Shot: In-universe. When Jennyver disappears with the Seers the other characters find a doll among her belongings and deduce that she had a child who died.
- The Fair Folk: The eponymous Seers of the isle.
- Game Over: Unusually, averted. Seers Isle has multiple endings, but no actual fail state.
- Gay Option: On Arlyn's path, Rowan can romance her, they can have an Optional Sexual Encounter, and they can end the game as a couple.
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: Potentially part of the endgame, on Duncan's path.
- Horned Humanoid: The deer-antlered Seers, and also Rowan in her cursed form.
- He-Man Woman Hater: Erik, who especially hates having women tell him what to do.
- Island of Mystery: The title makes it pretty clear. It's got eerie possibly supernatural storms, a graveyard of whale bones, megaliths galore covered in mysterious glyphs, creepy silent antlered children with potentially godlike power over the island, hallucination-inducing caverns, time loops, even a (dormant) volcano...
- I Will Only Slow You Down: Brandon offers to stay behind because of his injured leg. It's up to the player whether the others take him up on it.
- The Marvelous Deer: The Seers have a magnificent white stag, which appears when they come to carry off Erik's body. Their own antlered appearance alludes to this as well, as does Rowan's.
- Medieval European Fantasy: Largely a Celtic and Norse-inspired setting.
- Multiple Endings: With achievements for each.
- Optional Sexual Encounter: Between Rowan and Arlyn or Rowan and Duncan. Complete with Nipple and Dimed, even.
- Player Character: Played with. This game is a strange case where we don't see the player character — or even know who the player character is — until partway through the game. (It's Rowan.)
- Peggy Sue: Potentially part of the ending on Arlyn and Duncan's routes.
- Promoted to Parent: Arlyn, whose mother is dead and whose father is a traveling musician who's rarely home, is the oldest of her numerous siblings.
- Psychic-Assisted Suicide: Played with; psychic-assisted homicide is definitely a possibility, though it's hardly unjustified under the circumstances.
- Psycho Party Member: Erik, whom the others flag as potentially such pretty early on. Eventually also Jennyver, though she's more of a case of Not Herself at that point.
- Sadistic Choice: The choices during play determine which party members live and which ones die.
- Scenery Porn: The gorgeous handpainted island.
- Team Mom: Jennyver, who's the oldest member of the group, a kind and gentle healer, and was in fact a mother, although her child died. It makes her eventual Face–Heel Turn more shocking.
- Tribal Face Paint: Erik with his numerous woad tattoos. Freya, to a lesser extent.
- Video Games and Fate: The characters lampshade that they have a sense of deja vu, as if they've experienced everything on the island before. They also discuss whether they can change their destiny. There's also the matter that the Player Character Rowan is invisible and incorporeal for most of the game and spends much of the story only able to watch and psychically suggest choices to the other characters, as if she's playing a game herself. The ending can also involve Rowan "replaying" the plot of the game with foreknowledge of what's going to happen.
