Moving Mountains - First Look

A new book has come out, and I’m excited to play it! This won’t be too spoiler heavy but just in case I’ll put stuff under a cut once I actually get into the story content. Also it’ll start getting long.

Moving Mountains is the 33rd book to be released. It is set in the fictional country of Yuanning, a feudal monarchy that takes inspiration from China. I’m not a historian and have received no details on the dynasty, so I can’t comment on historical accuracy, but it appears to be fairly grounded with no fantasy elements.

Listed under “Adventure,” “Romance,” and “Healing” in the bookstore, the summary indicates that our protagonist, Wen Rou, is struggling between the education given from her father and the expectations society has from her state as a noblewoman. I do think this is a rather simple premise, but it can still be a good story if the characters and writing are done well. Especially after the last story, Code Whalefall, being so incredibly confusing and hard to follow, a simple story can be a treat. But it could also risk becoming forgettable, especially since it’s working with an aesthetic easily compared to so many other books, like Gourmet’s Journey, Tang Hunter’s Dynasty, and Ancient Dreams, all of which I consider to be high quality stories; Moving Mountains has some work to do if it wants to distinguish itself.

Moving Mountains is two chapters long, with 33 stages and 43 stage events, making this story more linear than average with less stage events, which are the meaningful choices you can make throughout the story. With 46 new clothing items this also is on the low end, which is not necessarily a negative thing. All the outfits do appear to have thought and care put into them, with many details and subtle touches, and I quite enjoy them. This being said they are remarkably similar to the outfits in Gourmet’s Journey, so while they’re beautiful they’re not exactly anything new.

Displayed are three of my favourite outfits from the story; the middle one is a Jerry outfit while the other two are craftable, and while the Jerry outfits are more detailed the craftable ones are certainly not lacking in style. The first outfit I especially enjoy as it reminds me of Mulan with the red and the sword, which raises my hopes to dangerous heights for this story. I do hope we get to use a sword.

One thing that was rather interesting about the clothing in this book is that two of the six encounter items are only one star; usually one star items are rarer in the game, with many stories having no one star items at all. I haven’t graphed this but I believe this may make these the lowest stats for encounter items. While I haven’t unlocked enough blueprints to evaluate crafting costs it’s likely this will not be a cheap book. I do commend the restraint shown for Parvens shop, with only seven blueprints (especially when compared to Code Whalefall’s nineteen), and among those only one costing over 300 diamonds.

There are three companions in this book: Gu Yin, Luo Jiuhua, and Shen Jiaojiao.

Design wise the men are nothing remarkable, resembling the companions we saw in Tang Dynasty Hunter and Gourmet’s Journey. If anything they have even less to set them apart from each other than usual, seeming to share the same kind of stature with a different hairstyle and color robe. Shen Jiaojiao fares slightly better and it amuses me how similar her dress is to one of our craftable outfits, but just as before there really isn’t much to distinguish her design from the protagonist. Theoretically this is on purpose, to characterize her as a kindred soul, and I have no real complaints about this. I simply find it amusing how female companions usually get unique designs while male companions look alike so often that I have a difficult time telling them apart.

Personality wise, Gu Yin is set up to oppose you, telling you to mind your place and believing that you can’t accomplish all that you claim. Clearly he’ll be won over by your skill and charm throughout the story and admit the error of his ways. His backstory has him rising through the ranks of society from poverty, and claims that he’s more open minded than most.

Luo Jiuhua is your childhood friend who you’ve been reunited with; although you lost touch many years ago in the story you are reunited and rekindle the relationship. His family is rather wealthy, being merchants that have found some degree of success. I suspect he’s going to be somebody who might end up using his status to help you; I’d really like an arranged betrothal leading to real feelings stemming from your friendship, but I don’t know if we’ll get that arc.

I haven’t met Shen Jiaojiao yet, so I only have her bio to go off of; it would appear that she’s reserved and gentle, the perfect lady of society, and I guess that we’ll befriend her and help her open up and be braver about her desires. 

I mentioned that I hadn’t met Jiaojiao yet; I am currently three stages in to this story, so will just be able to comment on the setup and speculate on where the story might go. The protagonist has a strong personality and feels trapped by her mother’s desire for her to get married; she loses her Nanny who tells her to be brave, and decides to chase her dreams. She’s characterized as quite intelligent, having taken lessons from her father and seeking rare books to buy, and even mentions having taken martial arts lessons in her youth. There is also a subplot about a terrible flood in the southern provinces of Yuanning, where her family is from, and her father has been sent to aid the situation, but refuses your request to accompany him and help where you can.

Three chapters is not enough to form a definitive statement on the entire book. I do think this could be quite a good story, but hope that the protagonist is allowed to take some major action to choose her own path. Disguising herself as a man to travel to the flooded areas and help, for example. Court intrigue and marriage arrangements have their place, but I enjoy it when protagonists get to do more active things, and a disguise would lead to some interesting situations. But since we’ve already met most of our companions at home I doubt this will come to pass.

One thing I enjoy is how the mother is being written so far. She’s stern and insists that her daughter must get married, but it’s clear that she’s doing so out of concern. I will say not too much depth is being given to this plotline at the moment, other than saying “I’m not like those other women who want to marry” and “Don’t be silly, you’re a woman. Of course you want a husband,” and I do hope that these perspectives can be fleshed out a little. I’m not arguing for every woman to embrace an arranged marriage, but I just think its interesting to consider what societal constraints might place a woman in a position where she feels that’s her best option, whether financial or social or political or a combination of all three. The protagonist’s assumption that a woman gives up her dreams when she marries is something I’d like to see challenged by a character in the narrative, maybe one who sought an advantageous marriage to gain enough wealth and power to pursue her dreams and interests. 

The reason why I am coming up with these ideas is simply because I’m looking for what this story can offer that would truly be unique. We already have several stories featuring a female protagonist escaping marriage and seeking her dreams, and while they’re of varying quality I tend to find that it’s better when she actually has a dream to pursue rather than just a desire to not be married. For example, in The Perfect Storm you escape your marriage to become a pirate, and while that past does come back most of the story is spent being a pirate, which I found highly enjoyable. Wen Rou has said that she wants to be free, but hasn’t expressed what she’ll do with that freedom; I’d enjoy it if she decided to masquerade as a man to save people, or if the story allowed her to be more of a scholar and seek out knowledge, or perhaps a shrewd businesswoman who’s skilled at running an estate. This could easily happen in the story, and I do hope it lives up to the potential I see in it.

I’ll be playing through Moving Mountains for the next few weeks and compiling more statistics on it, so I can do a full in depth analysis of the themes once I’ve completed this story. In summary my current stance is that this could be quite an enjoyable book, but it needs to go beyond the bare minimum to really set itself apart from the many books it resembles.

my main games right now be like:

what's up with dutp making the most lesbian-coded pairs sisters

A selection of my favorite outfits ever from Dress Up Time Princess (from stories, special events outfits, paying outfits…)

"Hey, his eyes...They're purple. By the gods, his eyes are purple!"

My Aesthetics (nº72): Time Princess - Magic Lamp

I am extremely normal about this

time princess players how do y'all picture the MCs of every story

like since every set and piece of official art has a different hair colour, length, and style with every picture of them, and sometimes there's descriptions that don't match the images, which one do you go with

and do you make half of them look like your avatar or have your own designs

what the fuck happened in shining nikki while i was gone. i stopped playing in late 2022 but even then i stopped paying attention at around the start of volume 2. so i've been trying to catch up a bit and every single thing i learn just makes me have to set my phone aside and just. think. like seriously what the fuck

I just finished Gotham Memoirs with the ending "Mafia Wife" and ???? That ending sucked????? 😭 They clearly ran out of chapter slots I guess because SO MUCH was just dumped on me via "and then this happened and then this happened" exposition. We should have been spending so much MORE time interacting with Vittorio??? Ough.

I have all the other endings to get and I know I'm missing at least one more special image like this one -- with Juliano pointing a gun at the player character while Vittorio aims at him -- so hopefully getting that ending and setup will have a better payoff than, "and then I was a mafia wife and I lived happily ever after" 😭

I missed all the girls so much 😭😭

Moving Mountains Review

If I had to sum up my feelings about this book in one sentence, it would be “mixed”. There’s certainly a lot I enjoy, and with some minor adjustments I think this story could have been one of my favorites. But other aspects of this story really let it down, and change my perspective of this narrative to a more negative one.

Moving Mountains is two chapters, and the pacing is noticeably better than the last story, Code Whalefall. I also admire the clothing designs, but here we run into our first big problem.

Much to the frustration of many DUTP players, every single handheld in this book is a Jerry item. This means that you can only complete two outfits without Jerry spins, and a bunch of outfits that SHOULD be fully craftable are not. The in game statistics will allow you to get 100% without winning the items from Jerry, but this honestly just felt petty to me. There’s no reason why those items couldn’t have been blueprints we obtained in the story, and Jerry is an awful system to work with at the best of times given the element of randomness. Especially since many recent Jerry outfits have many four star items that don’t even look good, like plain white socks, and you’re much more likely to win multiples of those items than a single desirable item. I miss when exceptional items were the norm from Jerry, not the exception.

I mention this so close to the top because the outfits are the main appeal of this story. I’ll do a further breakdown of the characters and plot, but honestly if anything about this story appeals to you, there is a better story with those aspects. The premise of this one, that the MC Wen Rou does not want to get married, is something so simple that it can be seen in plenty of other stories as a subplot. I would recommend the Perfect Storm for an MC taking control of her fate and chasing her dreams. And if you’re here for the cultural aesthetic Ancient Dreams and Gourmets Journey have very similar styles and much better writing, along with grappling with themes of family responsibility and expectations. So I guess you can play this book if you want, but play those other books first. They’re much better, and don’t do this frustrating Jerry item stuff.

Now for the plot, which will be under the cut because of spoilers. I can’t decide if the spoilers will really affect the progression of the story, because it’s not set up as a mystery but the summary was so general I have to assume that to some degree they didn’t want you to know what you were getting into. But I honestly don’t think that spoilers will really change your perception of this story.

The main storyline has Wen Rou attempting to prevent an arranged marriage; unfortunately a powerful official attempts to blackmail her into marriage by tarnishing her father’s reputation. To repair it and save her family Wen Rou takes charge of the flooded region her father was working in to save both the people there and her own chances at freedom.

Starting off with the positives, I really enjoyed how much of this story was actually about flood management. I loved how you actually got to make decisions (in some paths) and change things for the better, and how project management was an actual skill that our MC was trained in and allowed to use.

I also cannot describe the delight I felt upon learning that we actually got to blow up a mountain. I would have loved to be more directly involved in that process, or at least have gotten a CG, but I do appreciate the fact that the title reveal was quite literal.

Character wise, I really enjoyed the MC’s relationship with her mother. Although you have opposing views it’s clear that she cares about you, and having that resolution at the end where she accepts your path and expresses her desire to see you happy was lovely. Too often I see these types of stories simply paint the parents as Evil, and it was nice to see it acknowledge that she wants you to get married because that’s the best way she knows to keep you safe.

Companion wise, Shen Jiaojiao was my favourite. The scene where she helps you out by funding your escape was one of the most impactful, and I adore how relying on her is what allows the story to continue rather than forcing you to seek the help of one of the love interests. I do wish that she’d been able to be more present in the second chapter and find it odd how one ending path doesn’t have you seeing her again at all, since her role as your friend and supporter was so vital to the first chapter. It’s also the best link to the theme of this story, the empowerment of women, since it has a character who does fulfill the traditional role she’s expected to, but she still shows spirit and courage and seeks to help you break out of those constraints.

Finally, on the list of things I like is actually the start of Chapter 2, where we have one stage mentioning the MC managing her period cramps. It’s so minor, but menstruation is such a taboo topic and I appreciate it being shown in such a natural light. It also serves the theme well, since this is something that could appear to make women “weaker” but the MC isn’t stopped by it, and more importantly we see Gu Yin offer sympathy and try to take care of her. His actions don’t come across as condescending but rather the assistance of a friend of equal status, and it was a good subtle moment for his characterization.

You might have noticed that I’ve barely mentioned the LIs until this point. This is because while I didn’t hate them, I also have some critiques of their writing. I cannot emphasize how strange it feels to me, having a story where the pitch is “the MC doesn't want to get married” and then barely having an ending without a romance path. The only one that could really qualify is the chapter one ending where you just straight up leave everything behind, which I did enjoy but clearly is not what the story is building towards since it’s so early on in the playthrough.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with having romance in a story, but I couldn’t help but feel that it was a strange choice in this case, especially since the LIs often felt extraneous to the plot. Admittedly Luo Jiuhua was treated the worst in this respect; while he’s supposed to be a childhood friend the writing fails to convince me that such a friendship was truly impactful or necessary, and his route actually involves doing so much less for yourself that it’s rather frustrating.

When Luo Jiuhua was first introduced I honestly thought there was going to be a plotline where we had a fake betrothal just to appease the MC’s family, and then you’d be working together and slowly fall in love and get engaged for real at the end, after being able to prove your worth and accept your family’s blessing to make your own path. It would have also given Luo Jiuhua some much needed personality, making him an interesting foil to Gu Yin by characterizing him as somebody willing to bend the rules and play around with tradition. Since this was clearly not the plan there were still things that could have been done to improve on him. Perhaps he’s the reason why the MC was able to begin learning from her father, and she’d been encouraged by him to pursue education. Perhaps he’d taught her martial arts, which as a fun bonus would open up the opportunity to have a sparring match with him and build some tension. 

I especially found his role towards the end of the story frustrating, as whenever the MC ran into difficulties he’d show up and throw his money around and instantly win the trust of the people. It’s always the MC failing and him succeeding, which removes her agency and creates distance between her and the final success. This is culminated in how in this route she doesn’t even think of the blowing up the mountain plan herself, instead overhearing it from somebody while distributing soup and stating the extremely obvious “well why don’t we try that?”. It would have been better to see the MC actually work with Luo Jiuhua, perhaps thinking of inviting him specifically because of his ability to soothe crowds and using that to her advantage, or asking him to look into previous flood mitigation efforts by talking with the citizens he knows so well. Letting her see these strengths and utilize them would reinforce her skill as a leader, instead of just passively letting her friend take care of the problems she faces.

Gu Yin was likely the author’s favourite, as that relationship gets far more time to develop and even starts off with quite the intriguing premise of being enemies. The support he gives you, especially in Chapter 2, is quite touching and well done, and I could realistically see their romantic ending as a fair culmination of their journey together through the narrative. Yet there are still weak spots that could have been improved, most notably the transition between Chapter 1 and Chapter 2.

Upon initial confrontation with his regressive ideas about the role of women, I fully believed we were going to be disguising ourselves as a man to join him on the trip and then have a dramatic reveal. Alas, such a plotline was not to be, and you instead convince him to bring you along. Which reveals an interesting bit of nuance to his character, as it’s clear through the way that he treats you that he doesn’t actually see women as lesser. Yet the story never addresses this discrepancy; it would have been interesting to see him speak about conforming to the ideals of society even if they’re not sincerely held, and the compromises he makes to secure his position of power because he believes he can do more good by making less waves. It would set him up in contrast to the MC, who refuses to adhere to standards she doesn’t believe in, and their relationship could allow them both to grow, with Gu Yin admiring Wen Rou’s bravery, and her learning from his temperance to be less reckless and choose her battles wisely. It would have also gone well with his backstory of growing up in a poor family and obtaining power, and he could have discussed the prejudices he himself faced and how that has impacted his worldview. Instead that backstory appears to not matter whatsoever, as he never even connects with common people or shows any knowledge from said background, nor allows it to motivate his actions. He doesn’t aim to prove himself or earn his place, nor does he try to advocate for those who were born in similar circumstances as he was. In my opinion the element of growing up poor could have actually been entirely given to Luo Jiuhua, since he’s the one who ends up connecting to the commoners far more often and is more sympathetic to them, and it would really make no difference to Gu Yin’s character.

It also would have made their partnership more impactful, if we saw him overcoming ingrained prejudice or fear, or if he represented the system that was holding back Wen Rou. If they’d let Gu Yin be from a rich family and kept his prejudice, he could have grown through the story and come to realize the error of his ways, and his arc would have represented the larger change that Wen Rou comes to have on the world around her. This is where the “dress up as a man” plot would have worked particularly well, since he would have been treating her as an equal and respecting her opinion before realizing she was a women, and then could reevaluate his own internal prejudice. Although he might not have been as nice during the story, I think it would have been fascinating and a good way to connect their relationship between the two chapters.

This brings me to my main problem with this story: what’s up with all the poor people? Chapter one sets up a theme about those in power being abusive and dismissive to those without official positions; we constantly see examples of corrupt officials and are meant to empathize with the citizens living under their governance. But whenever we actually interact with these citizens they’re portrayed fairly unsympathetically. Most of them do not have names and form simply a faceless mob; the MC is unable to appeal to reason in most cases, and must resort to lying to them to get their cooperation. The story struggles with this part of the narrative, with the MC being frustrated over being unheard, and while some of the dialogue and writing attempts to address this by pointing out how they have valid reasons to be distrustful of authority, this is never really resolved in the course of the story. The citizens trust Luo Jiuhua, despite him also being a wealthy noble and present in the area during this abuse, while seemingly arbitrarily disliking the MC for the exact same reasons. It could be a fumbled plot about disliking outsiders, but this doesn’t mesh with the MC’s stated past of knowing the area from having grown up there. If Luo Jiuhua was the character who’d grown up poor and then risen to prominence through the luck of fortune this would make much more sense, as he’d then be viewed as one of the citizens despite his new power and explain why they’re so receptive to him.

It would have also been nice to see the MC actually overcome this difficulty in communication. Perhaps by appointing Luo Jiuhua to be the intermediary, or setting up an internal council run by the village to petition for their needs; some way she could have listened to their concerns and allowed their voices to be heard. The most baffling parts of this plotline are how one of the bad endings literally has the MC being killed by a senseless mob when they believe she is trying to run away, especially when in the other ending she is STILL appearing to leave the town with little explanation but somehow the people trust her this time; also the plot point where you can choose to whip the mother who stole from you to feed her starving child, and it appears to have no affect on the story. I honestly thought that was going to come back at the end, perhaps with the commoners now distrusting her at a crucial moment (perhaps when she’s leaving to go find the delayed delivery of explosives), but encountered no such thing in my playthrough. Perhaps it was there and I just didn’t unlock that path, in which case it’s still strange that something like that could happen and have so little effect on the story.

Built into this is the ongoing conflict of education for women. The MC mentions how she’s been fortunate to learn from her father, and its implied that most other women are restricted to flower arranging, with Wen Rou’s interest in the book festival being something her mother disapproves of. At a pivotal point in the story Wen Rou gains support by promising a mother that her daughter will receive an education (although I do wish the dialogue in that scene made me feel less like she was threatening the future of this child if the mother failed to comply, and she would be separating them permanently for the benefit of the daughter’s education; I suppose schools in this world don’t allow you to go home to see your parents). In of the main endings Wen Rou opens a school specifically for women, to try and educate others and give them the opportunity to change their society as she has. Yet once again the theme is muddled and unclear, resulting in this school becoming kind of a weird note to end on, at least in my reading experience.

Opening a school for women to follow the same path is hardly something new to DUTP books; most recently we’ve seen this in The Perfect Storm. But in that book the lack of education of women is a theme that is commonly built on; the protagonist comes into conflict with her parents over learning, and repeatedly laments the fate of women who are forced to marry and give up their dreams. She’s fully aware that she’s a symbol of female liberation and embraces it. Here Wen Rou seems only vaguely aware of her role, acting dismissive towards other women and taking her own education for granted. It’s not mentioned why her father taught her, especially since it appears he did not expect her to follow in his footsteps; was teaching his daughter just a hobby? Luo Jiuhua’s past with her could have been used very well in this situation; perhaps her father was originally teaching Luo Jiuhua and mourning the lack of a son to educate, and Wen Rou was allowed to sit in and quickly excelled at the classes, surpassing Luo Jiuhua and gaining a lifelong thirst for knowledge. 

This is especially stark in Wen Rou’s interactions with other women. On one hand we have those in high society, who she refuses to mingle with and enjoys frustrating by pretending stupidity. The exception to this being Shen Jiaojiao, who you do empathize with and who does help you, but it would have been nice to see an acknowledgement that even those who you disagree with aren’t just vapid drones, happy to blindly follow the societal constraints you chafe against. It portrays the MC as very “not like other girls,” which then only is amplified in the second chapter as your education is what sets you apart from all the poor commoners who can’t understand policy and must be lied to, lest they form an unreasoning mob.

Wen Rou has a very interesting position, as she is currently fighting against a system that does oppress her, but also has a degree of privilege many do not. This book fails to address these systemic influences on the world; it’s never discussed what the norms are for education for women and those in poverty, nor how that correlates to positions of power. We aren’t explicitly told of rules that are in place preventing women from being officials or going to school, at least until the very end when Wen Rou can choose to ask for one of these rules to be dissolved. Others seem mostly unaware of these influences; perhaps one of the poor people in the second chapter could have been a women with great influence in her community, and Wen Rou could propose giving her an official position of leadership, and we could learn that this has been withheld from her due to her gender. It would connect the damage of the floods and the negligence of the officials to the conflict about the oppression of women, and deliver the narrative that everybody benefits when barriers are removed and people can use their talents despite not meeting traditional gender expectations. Even the widower we met could be grieving the death of his wife, and we could learn she was an important member of the community who advocated for better living conditions, and her death negatively impacted everyone. If you wanted to be especially brave you could include a subplot of her dying of an easily treatable illness, but she couldn’t afford such treatment due to her poverty, which was because her work was going uncredited and unpaid for.

At the heart of Wen Rou’s story must be the acknowledgement that she is not special. She has a position where she can make a difference and she does deserve that, and she does have talent and has worked hard to reach this point. None of that is taken away by pointing out that there are other equally skilled women, women who can also be leaders, women who also search for innovative solutions and long for more, and women who are simply not given the same opportunities as Wen Rou. This is how real oppression works in real life, perpetuated by people who mean well but cannot understand the barriers that others face, especially when they themselves have overcome barriers. And here we could tie this conflict into the story title and flood management; people have tried to stop the floods before, the same way that people have advocated for social change in areas of injustice. And they’ve been stopped, or change has been insufficient, or new problems have arisen. Then the conclusion shows that it’s important to keep trying, to let new people come up with new solutions, to push onwards and seek new ways of understanding and reaching those who have been ignored and left behind. Moving mountains takes more than one day, but it can eventually be done, and the fact that its hard doesn’t make it any less worthwhile.

I forgot this (ex)companion existed

ummm....

did wen rou go to spiderman 101 on heroing or..?

first time princess to curse caught on camera

Mother