Frog & Blade

Frog & Blade is a multi-ending visual novel with battle elements, set in a near-future city where impossible phenomena grant people their deepest desires or supernatural powers. After Miyoshi Yatsushiro is killed in a dream by a man wearing a frog mask, he wakes in his own bed as if nothing happened. As incidents spread around the wish-granting Monolith and a mysterious liquid called Soma, Miyoshi investigates and uncovers secrets about his world and himself. The story takes around 10 hours to complete across all routes.

Story and characters

Miyoshi is the heir to a kendo dojo. He gains the ability to seal supernatural powers into objects and is drawn into a conflict with mysterious villains. Frogman, who spreads Soma around the city and takes pleasure in the resulting chaos, seems to know Miyoshi and calls him “my hero.”

Miyoshi’s junior disciple, Reiri Tachibana, lives with him after her mother falls into a coma following a street slasher attack. Cheerful despite her circumstances, Reiri hates the slasher Kuro-Oni and is determined to uncover the truth. Invisible, a stalker who can turn invisible, worships Reiri and targets Miyoshi for assassination, mistakenly believing he is Kuro-Oni.

Cupio is a chimera girl who escaped from a research lab as an experimental animal. Soma gave her powers and a human form, and she grows close to Miyoshi. Public Security Bureau officer Masatoshi Shinohara, who lost both arms in a terrorist attack, uses powers granted by Soma to pursue criminals with deep hatred. Mimi is a physically formless, amnesiac self-proclaimed deity, visible only to Miyoshi; she enjoys people-watching and likes mizuyokan, a sweet bean jelly.

Choices and routes

Your choices affect your attributes, which influence how each case concludes. The story has three main ending routes, with branches determined by your choices; after completing one route, the others become selectable. You do not need to restart from the beginning to play them. Map progression also lets you advance main events, play sub-events unlocked by raising your stats, visit shops, train and edit your deck. Completing all routes requires clearing all sub-events, and you can change the difficulty between Normal and Easy at the start or later from the map.

Battles and cards

Combat uses simple click-based shooting mini-games with roguelite elements. You equip and manage up to 10 Ability Cards obtained through the story or shops, combining cards or upgrading abilities with shop items to gain an advantage. Battles cycle through Attack Phase, Enemy Boost Phase, Card Phase and Dialogue Phase. If you lose, you can choose a “cheat” option to win, and you can skip battles in the settings to focus on the story. The overall difficulty is low, and strong card combinations can easily overpower enemies.

Events and presentation

Shop points come from clearing events or activating certain cards. The game has no voice acting, but includes background music, sound effects, screen shakes and flash effects. Almost all female characters and some male characters have sprite variations.