Getting Started With Alice In The Country Of Clovers
Alice In The Country Of Clovers is a Japanese visual novel by OshareMame, originally released in 2017 and later translated by the fan group Moonphase Project. It follows a protagonist who enters a distorted fairy-tale world and navigates multiple romantic routes with various characters. The game is structured around choice-driven branching paths, and each route has its own set of endings ranging from standard conclusions to more intimate scenes. The original Japanese release runs on RGSS2, which means you need either a translation patch or a fan patch to play it without reading Japanese. The Moonphase Project English patch is the main one people use. Here's how I got it working on my machine, because the official instructions are not exactly thorough. First, you need the base game. If you have a legitimate copy of the Japanese version, place the game folder somewhere you'll remember. Then download the English patch from the Moonphase Project website. Extract the patch files into your game directory, making sure the structure matches what the patch expects. Usually this means dropping files directly into the root folder alongside System.exe.
The tricky part I ran into was that the patch doesn't always overwrite configuration files cleanly. On my first attempt, the game launched but displayed the wrong character names across the board, and several CGs were stuck on placeholder images. The workaround was running the patch's setup tool first before launching the game, and verifying that the lang.txt file in the root directory had the correct language flag set. Without that, the patch silently falls back to partial localization. If you're dealing with compatibility issues on Windows 10 or later, run the game in compatibility mode for Windows 7 and enable the 64-bit patch if one is available. The original build has known issues with newer DirectX runtimes. Installing the legacy DirectX End-User Runtimes package usually resolves the graphical glitches without affecting gameplay performance.
How the Route System Actually Works
Most people think visual novels work like a tree where you pick a path and follow it. Clovers is more complicated than that. The game tracks hidden affinity values for each character, and these values are influenced by choices you make early on, often choices that don't seem related to romance at all. I spent about eight hours on my first playthrough thinking I was doing fine, then got dumped into a bad ending on what I thought was a solid route. The problem was I had been accumulating negative affinity points without realizing it. Certain dialogue options during non-romantic scenes actually carry weight. There's a scene early in the game where you respond to a random encounter, and the option that seems most polite actually reduces your chances on the character you care about. The game doesn't tell you this anywhere. The affection system has thresholds. Each character has multiple thresholds, and crossing them unlocks different scenes. If you miss a threshold entirely, you can't reach certain endings regardless of how many correct choices you pick later. This is where a walkthrough becomes useful, but even walkthroughs don't always cover the edge cases.
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Common Pitfalls That Trip People Up
The biggest issue I see repeatedly is people trying to replay routes without understanding save scumming limitations. The game has autosave points, but they don't always trigger where you expect them. I've lost progress more than once by assuming a save point existed after a long dialogue sequence when it actually appeared two hours earlier. My fix was to manually create save files before any major decision point, not just at the obvious checkpoint moments. Another problem is the pacing. The early game moves slowly through exposition-heavy scenes that some players skip, but those scenes contain crucial affinity flags. Skipping them means you might completely miss route-locked content. I learned to read through everything at least once, even if you want to speed-run later runs. The game also has a specific CG lock mechanic where certain images only appear after you complete a full route. This means your first playthrough won't show you everything, and there's no in-game gallery that reveals locked content. You need to track your progress manually or use external resources that catalog what you've already unlocked.
Is It Worth Your Time
The game has genuine strengths. The route structure is ambitious for a fan translation, the voice acting in the original is solid, and the art direction has a consistent gothic aesthetic that holds together well. The writing is straightforward but effective for what it is. However, the pacing drags significantly in the middle sections, and some route transitions feel abrupt. The fan translation does a competent job, but there are occasional lines where the English phrasing is clunky enough to break immersion. If you're playing for the story, be prepared to push through slow spots. For people coming from mainstream visual novels, the route system here requires more upfront planning than typical entries in the genre. You're better off using a walkthrough from the beginning rather than figuring everything out solo. The game doesn't give you enough internal feedback about where your choices are heading.
If you enjoy dark fairy-tale aesthetics and don't mind investing multiple hours across different routes, this is a solid entry. If you're looking for something with faster pacing or tighter narrative structure, there are better options in the same space.
