Midnight's Blessing is a downloadable PC RPG developed by Aveyond Kingdom and created by the writer of Wind Child Black[1]
Sidni Miryam Larkhearst lives with her widowed mother in the sleepy town of Sembra's Post, delivering mail and goofing off, until three strangers arrive, burn down her house, and make her a pariah amongst her friends. She sets off to find out why her life has been turned upside down, and along the way learns quite a lot about herself.
Also, freaking Dracula is the villain.
A sequel, Midnight's Blessing 2, was released in 2017, and a third game, Midnight's Curse, was released in 2020.
Midnight's Blessing provides examples of:
- Affably Evil: Sidni actually befriends a bandit trying to mug her on her way across the Divide, giving him career advice and complimenting him on his hair. Doesn't stop him from trying to rob and eventually kill her, though.
- Axe-Crazy: Brenna fits this to a T, at first. Made especially clear when she brings the Sanctuary's terrarium to life in order to kill Sidni.
- Big Bad: Dracula, right from the beginning.
- Big Damn Heroes: Estradi's hat, it seems. In the first game, he appears out of nowhere to save Sidni, then later on mounts a rescue attempt that sees him interrupt a boss fight with one swift kick. In the second game, he saves Sidni, the party, Diana, and Brenna's newborn twins from the Corpse Horde, by bringing along an ogre and freaking DEATH as back-up!
- BFS: Estradi's weapon of choice is a large sword shaped like a gravestone. He's only able to lift the massive thing because he's a vampire.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Sidni knows she's in a game, makes references to other games, both by big-name developers and her own development team, and it's revealed that the Dev Team not only exist within her universe, but are worshipped as gods.
- The Cameo: Mel from Aveyond appears, as does the cast of Wind Child Black, as well as the cast of an earlier game by the same writer, Ashes Of Immortality, also about vampires.
- Character Development: An in-universe example; when Brenna is introduced, she's cool and aloof as well as an unrepentant murderer who eventually cracks when she feels insulted having to look after Sidni. Six months later, she and Sidni are roommates and friends, and Brenna is on her way back to being human again.
- Creator Cameo: As an Easter Egg, the writer, director, and distributor of the game can be encountered and spoken to. You can even sabotage the writer's pet project!
- Deal with the Devil: Dracula made one with Darkness, his soul in exchange for immortality. Darkness, being the Devil, only gave Dracula fame and renown, not eternal life. Being the most well-known vampire in the world is a form of immortality, after all.
- Denser and Wackier: Compared to the writer's previous game, Wind Child Black, which had genocide and a psychotic spree killer in its backstory, Midnight's Blessing is a very different animal, with its ditzy protagonist, action hero cats, dance instructor werewolves, and Take That Me Creator Cameo.
- Disappeared Dad: Sidni's father was in the Royal Rangers, and died during the Last Shadow War. Only, he didn't die, instead becoming the Governor of Milo, until he went insane and torched the entire city before taking his own life.
- The Ditz: Sidni, full stop. She befriends werewolf bandits, arranges for a cat to launch a Die Hard-style raid on some rats, and mixes up heart medication for sweatsocks on a regular basis.
- Don't Fear the Reaper: It helps that he's Terry Pratchett's Death.
- Doomed Hometown: Sidni's hometown of Sembra's Post is a subversion; although it gets hit pretty hard when Dracula's lackeys come looking for her, killing her friends and lighting some fires, the town itself is largely still intact after the attack. Milo, on the other hand, is rendered a monochrome ghost town after the Governor loses his mind.
- Fate Worse than Death: In the sequel, King Huen is spared by Sidni, but is turned into one of Frankenstein's Children and presumed dead.
- A rare version where we see the victim actually die, and he still suffers worse than death; the Governor wanders the afterlife, still mired in his delusion that his daughter died, still searching for her in vain, never realizing that not only is she alive, but he's talking to her at that precise moment!
- Fight Dracula: The Video Game!
- Funetik Aksent: The zombie expert in Miryam speaks with a distinct Jamaican patois that even Death calls "bulletproof". Luckily he's there to act as translator.
- Given Name Reveal: Even though she only ever goes by 'Sidni,' towards the end of the sequel, she (and the player) learn that her first name is actually Baraxidni, after her grandmother. Her reaction to this makes it an Embarrassing First Name.
- Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Of the four main characters, Sidni is the only one without a melee weapon, preferring to use a bow. However, Brenna, other female party member, uses a scythe in battle. So...Guys Smash, Girls Shoot...except when they Slash?
- Mad God: Of a sort. The game's creators are worshipped as gods, and although Amanda and Delmashio are reasonable, rational sorts, Love Guru tends to conjure up monsters he can't control, complain about not being able to make an office with windows, and convinces the other two to turn evil for the money. Although he reveals that he's always been evil, if incompetently so.
- No Fourth Wall: The characters make mention of the fact that they're in a game, talk about past games from the same developers, and even encounter their creators.
- Noodle Incident: Quoth Sidni: "...So I says to him, "I don't care if she is your Grandma, she lips off to me again, and I'm roofing the other one, prosthetic leg or not!" Naturally I had to run for my life — turns out fat people can really book it if you get them angry enough. So...that was my ninth birthday. Now on my tenth —"
- Mood Whiplash: Welcome to Milo, Sidni! Walk around and talk to the people! Enjoy the majestic, regal music, watch an actor recite a scene from a play, watch the children play in a park, help unite a couple on a blind date, or talk to the artist in the town square. Then...go talk to the Govenor. Yeah...
- Meaningful Name: Both in- and out- of universe examples. In-universe, Estadi's first name means "Blue-Eyed". Out-universe, Brenna's last name, MacBav, is Gaelic for "of hunters"
- Not Even Bothering with the Accent: A rare non-verbal version; Elsabet' spoke with a Cockney accent when she burned Sidni's house, but this is never heard of again when she later appears.
- Offing the Offspring: Of a sort. Dracula needs his soul in a mortal body to fulfill his promise to Darkness. He figures the best way to do that is to reincarnate it into a child. So while the baby isn't genetically his, spiritually, it's HIM.
- Our Souls Are Different: They can be reincarnated, transferred into other people, delivered to the Devil, absorbed by magical medallions, and used to heal dying infants.
- Retired Badass: Sidni's mother Diana was once a Tracker, like Brenna.
- Running Gag: "My name is Sidni Miryam Larkhearst, I'm seventeen, I'm a Reed, and I wanna join the Royal Rangers!" Now, repeat this everytime Sidni meets someone new.
- Dips into
Tear Jerker territory when she tries to use it to talk down her insane father. It fails, and she's forced to watch him take his own life.
- Dips into
- Sanity Slippage: Milo's Governor seems normal enough, if a bit strict. Then he learns that Sidni is the daughter he considers dead, accuses her of being an abomination who killed his child, and purges Milo of all life before killing himself in front of the daughter he's never met. He didn't just slip into insanity, he zoomed into madness on rocket boots.
- Shout-Out: So very many.
- The ratcatcher sidequest references Terminator, Robocop, Die Hard, and Rambo, and the mice are all named after famous cartoon rodents.
- The ghost in Sembra's Post has porn-parody books of The Legend of Zelda and Dragonriders of Pern.
- The actor in Milo recites a rewritten Act 2, Scene 2 of Hamlet.
- The Archeological Society in Milo is actually the SCP Foundation, and even mentions SCP-2000.
- And Society is staffed entirely by the Sinister Six!
- Death would like to remind you that he is not evil, merely very efficient.
- He'd also like to mention that Albert is in mourning over the death of his favorite author.
- Dracula mocks The Twilight Saga, but then, so does everyone else.
- During the final battle, the party mocks Dracula with references to Castlevania and Sesame Street. Darkness finds this hilarious.
- Dracula also mentions that he has already beaten Blade, Buffy Summers, and Simon Belmont.
- From the sequel, there's an Easter Egg where you can find the list of baby names Sidni's father was considering before she was born. She was very nearly named Lara, Zelda, or Cloud. Or Squall. Or Buffy. Or...
- We Used to Be Friends: Estradi and the Blood Poet were friends, blood brothers, and comrades-in-arms, before the Poet became an unhinged necromancer.
