Welcome to the world of Princess Maker 2! A child-rearing simulator with some fantastical flourishes, Princess Maker 2 has a relatively simple goal: Raise a daughter into a grown woman. This task can be as easy or as complicated as you care to make it, though your daughter's later years will be much more rewarding if you put in some effort.
This guide will help you get started in Princess Maker 2. You'll always reach an ending, whether you know how to play the game or not, though your daughter will fare better if you know a few things right from the get-go.
Character Creation
Your first step in starting a new game of Princess Maker 2 is generating a daughter for yourself. There are a few steps to this:
- Enter your family's last name. Your own character (the father) will go by this name.
- Enter your daughter's name. Choose whatever you like. (Her default name is Olive, but we'll just call her 'your daughter' in this guide to avoid confusion.)
- Choose your daughter's birthday. This determines your daughter's starting stats, her patron diety, and when her birthday falls during the year. We'll get into the stats in another section of the guide. If you want to maximize your playtime you should choose a birthday during the Harvest Festival (entire month of October, the 10th month), as the game ends on your daughter's 18th birthday - but if the festival is active, the game will see it through first.
- Choose your age. Enter whatever value you like.
- Choose your birthday. This determines the father's birthday. If your relationship with your daughter is high enough she'll bake a cake to celebrate the day. Otherwise, this entry doesn't matter.
- Choose your daughter's blood type. There are four different blood types, and they determine some minor statistical changes to your daughter each month. If you don't want to worry about this, then choose Type O.
- A: +3 Morality, +2 Stress
- B: -2 Stress
- O: No stat changes
- AB: +2 Sensitivity
Daily Gameplay
The majority of Princess Maker 2's gameplay takes place on the scheduling screen. Here you determine your daughter's schedule for the month. Click the big Schedule button on the bottom of the right menu and a calendar of the month will pop up, with four options for your daughter to pursue:
- Study. Your daughter can take classes and boost her stats. Classes cost gold, indicated on the class button that pops up. The amount here indicates how much that class costs to take per day, not the total amount. Your daughter will move up class levels if you study a particular subject over and over, granting her higher bonuses but also increasing the cost of the classes.
- Work. Your daughter heads to a job and earns money. Jobs raise and lower stats, depending on the nature of the work, and earn you variable amounts of gold. Perform a job enough times and your daughter will receive raises. As your daughter gets older you'll unlock additional jobs.
- Errantry. Your daughter heads into one of four outdoor areas and explores. You can run into monsters and get into battles, meet NPCs, and collect items while exploring. Your daughter will need to take some combat classes (Fencing or Kung-fu), as well as equip a weapon and armor, to survive these areas.
- Time-Off. You give your daughter some time to rest and relax. If you choose to Vacation your character will travel with the daughter, improving your relationship with her - though unlike Free Time, Vacationing costs money.
You can allot up to three activities per month. For the most part your daughter will do as bidden, though depending on her upbringing and / or Stress level she may not do well with each activity. We'll get into these issues a bit further down.
In order to successfully perform several of these activities you'll need gold. Your daughter will earn the lion's share of gold from jobs and adventuring. If you find yourself struggling with gold, keep in mind that you'll receive a pension of 500 gold once per year. It's not much, but it's something.
- Stats. Displays your daughter's statistics. More on this below.
- Talk. Can speak to your daughter. Having a chat or giving your daughter some pocket money will make her happier. Lecture is largely reserved for delinquent daughters, to put them back on the straight and narrow. Look below for more.
- Diet. Change how much your daughter eats over the course of the month. Your daughter's Weight and Stamina will change, depending on the diet you've chosen. The more robust the diet, the more gold you'll pay per month to feed your daughter.
- Profile. A general overview of your daughter's name, age, bloody type, star sign, and vital stats. Also includes a breakdown of her current health and disposition.
- City. Pay a trip to various shops in the city. They have the following functions:
- Armoury - Buy weapons and armour for expeditions into the wild
- Tailor - Buy dresses with a variety of non-combat functions
- Restaurant - Buy dishes that have various beneficial effects for your daughter
- Item Shop - Buy items for use in and out of combat
- Church - Donate gold to lower your daughter's Sin score
- Clinic - Will heal your daughter if she comes down with an illness
- Palace. Pay a visit to the seat of power in the kingdom. Your daughter can speak to a variety of high-ranking officials, though she'll need to raise her stats before the conversations amount to anything. Your daughter's social standing rises the more she converses with people at the palace. You can only visit the palace once per month.
- Equipment. Equip weapons, armor, and / or dresses on your daughter.
- Save / Lord. Allows you to save your game, load an old save file, or close the program.
Stats
Your daughter's character consists of a series of stats. You can view them by clicking the top-left icon on the left menu. Stats fluctuate whenever your daughter does a job, takes a class, or receives an item, among other methods. Stats get complicated enough that we'll discuss them in greater detail in another section of the guide. That said, we can break them down into some general categories:
- The upper-left stats - Stamina, Strength, Intelligence, etc. - are general stats. These outline your daughter's general aptitude, as well as some aspects of her personality.
- The lower-left stats - Combat Skill, Attack, Defense - outline your daughter's combat finesse. Taking classes and equipping items will raise these stats.
- The upper-right stats are all related to your daughter's reputation. As she gains more achievements her fame will grow, unlocking new opportunities. Improving other stats will also improve your daughter's reputation.
- The lower-right stats are all related to your daughter's non-combat skills. You'll boost these stats by doing jobs and taking classes.
In most cases your daughter's stats will rise when taking a class or performing a job. That said, it's also possible for stats to drop, and they'll often to it in tandem with stat increases. You'll need to balance these stat changes so your daughter doesn't become too unbalanced. (Unless, of course, you have a particular extreme path in mind.)
Harvest Festival
Each October you'll have the chance to participate in the Harvest Festival. A celebratory competition, the Harvest Festival covers the entirety of the month, preventing you from undertaking any other activities. The Harvest Festival features four competitions, each geared towards a different specialty:
- The Combat Tournament, which pits your daughter against a series of opponents in one-on-one matches
- The Art Festival, which allows your daughter to display something she created in Painting class for the kingdom to enjoy
- The Dance Party, which compares your daughter's dance skills with those of other dancers
- The Cooking Contest, which tasks your daughter with preparing a dish for a panel of judges
Status Ailments
For the most part your daughter will behave herself, completing classes and jobs without trouble. Depending on the fluctuation of her stats, however, your daughter may wind up with a status ailment. These affect her performance in tasks, and may prevent her from completing those tasks altogether. There are six status ailments in all:
- Delinquent - Occurs when your daughter's Stress outweighs her Faith or Morality (whichever one is higher). When your daughter is Delinquent she'll sometimes goof off while doing jobs or taking classes, leading to a wasted day. She may also waste your money when sent off on Free Time. Scolding your daughter while she's Delinquent can lower her Stress and end the ailment.
- Sick - Occurs when your daughter's Stress outweighs her Constitution. When your daughter is Sick she becomes less efficient in her jobs and education, and can no longer engage in Free Time. If your daughter is Sick for too long she can become bedridden, and if you don't lower her Stress after this she can die, ending the game prematurely. Letting her rest at home or visiting the Clinic will restore her health.
- Runaway - Randomly occurs when your daughter's Sensitivity is her highest stat. This results in a wasted month, and all of your daughter's reputation stats will go down. You can lower your daughter's Sensitivity by making her do Housework.
- Overweight - Occurs when your daughter gains too much weight. This restricts the dresses that she can wear. You can cut down on her weight by changing her diet, or by sending her on Ocean Vacations. Giving your daughter Ancient Milk will also lower her weight.
- In Love - Randomly occurs when your daughter's Charisma is her highest stat, and when she reaches fourteen years of age. This tends to happen more often if your daughter has a low Morality stat. Your daughter will get over the 'ailment' on her own within a few months, though during this time her work and school life will suffer.
- Mistress - Randomly occurs when your daughter's Charisma is her highest stat, and when she reaches fourteen years of age. Your daughter agrees to be the consort of an older man, and she'll earn some money on the side - though her Refinement and Morality drop quite a bit whenever they spend time together. You can Scold your daughter to force her to end the arrangement, though your relationship with her needs to be high for it to work.