Kimi Ga Nozomu Eien LE Review

[EcchiOujisama]

I finally finished this mammoth beast a few days ago and have been letting it all sink in before sharing my thoughts on it. The first thing you need to understand is that you have no idea just how incredibly long it is. You think War and Peace is long? KimiNozo has almost twice as many LINES of text as War and Peace has WORDS. You think the 66 books that come together to make the Bible make a big book? KimiNozo wins again by a large margin - about 77,000 more lines than the Bible has words.

If you decide to challenge this beast and a half, know it's going to be a large investment of time. Whatever you're thinking for length based on that, it's going to be longer. It took me a solid month to get through this putting in several hours per day. 

But the real question is, is it worth it? Should you hold your breath that the English translation will one day be completed? tl;dr - it depends. If you want more specific information, you're going to have to keep reading.

I played the Latest Edition, which uses the AGES engine, and it definitely makes the gaming experience more enjoyable. Think going from Muv-Luv to Muv-Luv Alternative. It sounds like a small thing, but for something that will easily take 100+ hours the difference is substantial in the overall experience. Most of the game was redrawn for the new game and engine and the improvements are dramatic. Comparing (high school) Mitsuki in LE to the Mitsuki that showed up in the bonus scenes on the Special Fan Disk is like looking at two different people. Far more beautiful, far more detailed - in all ways she feels so much more real, vibrant and alive. Ordinarily I have limited tolerance for a game being released a million times with only minor improvements each time, but this difference is huge. YUGE even.

Amazingly, there wasn't even a route for Mitsuki until the FOURTH time the game was released (if VNDB is to be believed). Going through this I'm amazed that it made it to the PC and 2 home consoles without anyone thinking that people might want to end up with the hot girl on the cover. Mind blown.

The first thing I noticed right off the bat is that you really feel like you're in the same world as Muv-Luv Extra. Or to be more accurate, Muv-Luv Extra really feels like it takes place in the world of KimiNozo (which came first). It sounds small when I say it like this, but seeing the same backgrounds, hearing some of the same music in similar situations, the Hakuryou uniform and Sky Temple all come together to make you feel like you're in the same world in a way that the various KimiNozo and ML anime simply don't.    

Using the Japanese walkthrough I noticed there was virtually no overlap between Mitsuki and Haruka when it came to choices. Literally. Oh, you helped Haruka carry some papers in high school? You fucker! Mitsuki totally won't sex you three years later for that! When you think about it a little bit it doesn't seem like the things you do to get to Mitsuki's route should matter, given what happens to Haruka.

Spoiler

For those who don't know, Mitsuki makes our hetare hero late for a date by having him her buy a ring for her birthday (a total friend zone present if there ever was), causing Haruka to get wiped out by a car and put in a coma for three years. Mitsuki moves in for the kill during her coma time out, so none of the high school choices should matter when you think about it.

 Which brings me to one of the biggest problems I had with the game. Barely legal high school Mitsuki and short hair OL Mitsuki are two completely people. You see this a little bit in the anime, but given the (comparatively) short time you spend in the present in the anime when compared with the game, it's reasonable to think it's just dealing the triangle/guilt/stress/etc. Not so much with a larger sample size. Everything that made barely legal Mitsuki attractive from a personality standpoint is gone and replaced by a moody, brooding, depressing OL completely beaten down by life. She goes from being one of my favorite characters to someone I don't even want to be around.

It's made worse by the fact that she's the laziest lay in eroge history. CG recycling is taken to a level I would never be able to do with a straight face. I lost count of how many times I was amazed to see the same CG yet again. While you get the feeling that high school Mitsuki would be an absolute freak who would give you a western porn star experience every time, OL Mitsuki is every boring AV idol you're ever seen in the sack.

The situation is compounded by the three main "good" routes (OL Mitsuki, Haruka, Akane) being largely vacant of any happiness. It's one thing to overcome a horrible tragedy and have it lead to something good. That does not happen here. As soon as you think something is starting to go right, within five minutes all kinds of crap will break out and you'll be back to feeling bad for next few hours. The ending of Akane's route made it feel like they intentionally went out of their way to steal whatever happiness you have by being with Akane and ending it on a downer. The others didn't leave me feeling much better. To make matters worse, even when skipping the previously read messages the good/real/true/whatever routes aren't as different from each other as you'd think, or even all that different from the TV series. In retrospect, they did an incredible job of compressing about 50 hours of content down to 5. I was expecting added depth and character development that just doesn't happen.

Like Mitsuki, Haruka also becomes a completely different person. In this case, they are changes for the better and consistent with the changes from the TV series. Suddenly she was able to speak without stuttering and getting too shy to complete a single sentence, her presence is warmer and the fact that no one bothered to cut her hair but did continue to braid it as it got longer is very becoming. It makes no sense, but it's for the better, so I'll fill in the blank with her subconscious mind working to improve her personality while it didn't have much else going on and Fumio giggling while playing with her hair instead of complaining.

While some of the bad endings take BAD to a whole new level (more on one in particular later), generally the "bad" routes are far more interesting, and many don't even feel bad when compared to everything that happens in the good routes. In some routes there is a fair amount of sexual domination and girls pleading just to be the mistress. OL Mitsuki in her old uniform is such a tease, so close yet so far from the girl I love. Given that we see all of the women are willing to share to some extent, it's really disappointing that there isn't a perfect harem route where you find a way to make Mitsuki, Haruka and Akane all happy by being with you at the same time. If there were such a route, I wouldn't complain about the heartache so much. By the time you're done there's a feeling of damned if you do and damned slightly differently if you don't. 

LE adds after stories for our three main heroines, and I don't have nice things to say about any of them. (Spoiler: no new H scenes either.) In Mitsuki's you meet her parents in what feels like the most boring scenario they could come up with, and the other two go back to the formula of making you feel as bad as possible and leaving you highly unsatisfied at the end. Again, after releasing this game what feels like 10 times and everything that's been added there's still no harem route where we can make chicken salad out of chicken shit just one time? Fuck you Age.

That's a lot of bad things - we need something to pick this back up. Fumio is AWESOME! The busty red haired nurse you might remember from the anime certainly delivers. There was always something about her, from her voice to exact body proportions from the neck down that just drove me nuts. In retrospect I can say they translated that from the game to the anime perfectly. Most importantly, this route doesn't waste your time and jerk you around before cock teasing and half delivering before taking it away at the end. There is a GLORIOUS H scene, what happens happens afterward and it ends. It tells its story, gets you off and gets out. Perfect. Not the ending I would have wanted, but as she's not one of the real heroines anyway I'll overlook it. Your mileage may vary if she doesn't get your motor running.

Kouzuki Motoko, Haruka's doctor, is the older sister of ML's Yuuko-sensei. You don't get a route with her, but it's not a big loss. Not only is she smoking 24/7 (ewww) but she just doesn't have the raw sex appeal that Yuuko-sensei and their other sister from KimiIta have. Nice tits, but you'll live without them. Trust me.

In talking about side characters that brings me to what may be the worst thing, not only in the game, but the worst route I've ever been down in any VN. I can't say enough about how much I hate this, so I won't even try. 

Spoiler

Manami is the green haired nurse. To make a long story short, she drugs you, kidnaps you, chains you to the bed, rapes you, then rapes you in the ass and etc. and etc. Eventually after making his escape, he calls Mitsuki for help, after she thinks he disappeared with no notice and started doing his best friend ala the TV anime. Takayuki explains the situation which starts to get awkward (as Mitsuki thought he abandoned her) and then...he tells them he's going back. Dafuq? Manami dresses him in girl's clothes and takes him to an amusement park, where even children know he's some kind of mentally deranged sex pervert with serious problems from the neck up. And he gets breast implants so he can really be her bitch. Fuck. This. Route. Fuck the asshole who wrote it, fuck Age for using it, fuck anyone who likes it, and fuck Manami for being such an indescribable piece of shit who would do this in the first place.

When I have words that strong for a woman with an amazing rack, it's bad. I just can't even with her normal routes or H scenes after that. This made me not complain that Fumio only had a short route and one H scene, because I'm pretty confident they would have found a way to take away everything I like about her and completely ruin my memories if given the opportunity.

Also part of the LE package is the main story from the Special Fan Disk, again updated to the AGES engine. There is a lot of crossover with the main routes and the skip previously read feature in LE will skip over the parts you've already read in SFD, another significant improvement. You FINALLY get an H scene withOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG soooooo hot mai waifu high school Mitsuki (although it comes in a bit below expectations), tooooootally 18 9th grader Akane, short haired Haruka and 2 with that green haired bitch who is dead to me. Seriously, out of all of the choices she's the one that gets 2 routes?!?! Someone at Age is clearly a Mitsukiphobe.

Unfortunately they didn't add more scenes with Mitsuki wearing this amazing kimono, which was one of the most beautiful expressions of feminine beauty I've ever seen. Again, your mileage may vary, but I sat here with my jaw hanging down at how incredible this was. In all fairness, high school Mitsuki tends to be incredible no matter what she wears, casual clothes, school uniform, swimsuit...but this was on another level.

Overall, SFD is much more enjoyable than the main game. It doesn't go out of its way to make everything go wrong at every possible moment, and lets you have your little moments of fun. It's extremely short, comparatively speaking. It took maybe 7 or 8 hours skipping the messages displayed in the main game to finish it. I think the best way to describe it is that it captures the essence of everything enjoyable about Muv-Luv Extra with none of what dragged it down. 

There are 10 additional short segments on SFD not included in LE (or I managed not to find/unlock them if they are there).  This was when the difference in the engine and the redrawn art really stood out. As mentioned Mitsuki had the most dramatic improvements, but others clearly benefited from the higher resolutions and redraws. The first 9 are very short but last one was a good hour or so.  It's a pretty epic and worthwhile what if story outside of the story's canon worth your time. As long as you've been through Muv-Luv Unlimited, Akane Maniax and Daikuuji Kiki Ippatsu that is. It's assuming you're familiar with all these characters and stories, which left me a bit lost with the Daikuuji stuff.

Pedophiles will be disappointed that Daikuuji looks like a short adult with her clothes off, but Mayu and Amakawa could easily pass for 8. From a storyline and fapping standpoint I thought all of these wasted my time, although Daikuuji's may set up some wacky fun in Daikuuji Kiki Ippatsu. 

Bla bla bla text wall. Yes or no? 

Overall, it's a very mixed bag. The good is really good, the bad is really bad to really REEEEEEEAALLLY bad. Ordinarily once I step away from a game for a few days I tend to remember far more of the good than the bad. That wasn't the case here. Everything that dragged it down in the moment has stayed with me and I really don't have any desire to return.  The amount of time when it's simply not enjoyable compared to the amount of time it is enjoyable is quite large. I rated it a 5 on VNDB, but that was primarily due to technical aspects  and inclusion of the main story of SFD bringing up the all around score. When it's good it's among my favorites, unfortunately that only covers 15ish hours of the 100+ hour experience.

The only way to know if you will like it enough for it be worth the time investment is to actually go through it. I could have gone off on several other profanity-laden rants on creative decisions I didn't like, but I think there is enough here for you to get the idea. Everything that was good has been discussed. If the things I dislike resonate with you as things you dislike, you'll probably have the same sense of disappointment I do now. If you're looking for something to fuck with you, make sure you're never happy for long and come up with constant bullshit to pull the rug out from under you just to make sure you don't accidentally start enjoying yourself, you have definitely found the game you've been looking for.      

[Vorathiel]

Although I didn't read it all, because I want to read 'main story' being as fresh as possible so I'm dodging even peoples opinions, the Green Haired Nurse route from you description made me suffer. I'm terrified that I will (I know I will, I'm a completionist) read this route one day. Jesus Christ. This might be The Worst route ever. 


Also - you sure about first pharagraph? That Bible comparissions seems to be.... a little off.

[Toranth]

Mitsuki had a route in the original game, although later editions added more for her and other characters (mostly bad ends).  Mitsuki had one, Haruka had one, Akane had one, and then there were the other routes - the fetish routes.  Ayumayu and the nurses all are specific niche fetishes that for some reason age felt necessary to throw in there.  Honestly, I would have preferred for the game to have only the three main routes.

 

While I agree with most of what you said in your review, I think that if you look closer, you'll see the OL Mitsuki and JK Mitsuki were pretty similar,

Spoiler

at least until Haruka wakes up.  At that point, she deserves to be moody and anxious.  After all, in her mind, she caused the guy to be late for his date, which led directly to Haruka's accident and coma.  On top of that, while she was down, Mitsuki seduced him.  Even if it was to save his life, as he was suicidal and self-destructive at that point, she stole her best friend's boyfriend.  Then, to top it off, after two years of being his lover and getting pretty serious about it, suddenly Haruka's back and Mitsuki thinks she's going to lose him to her again.

So, to me, I wouldn't want to see happy and cheerful Mitsuki there.  It'd seem pretty wrong and out of place.

At the same time, a harem route would also seem very wrong.  Haruka and Mitsuki are both very possessive, and Akane would never try for it.  Just look at how Haruka reacts in the Mitsuki ending -

Spoiler

refusing to ever see them again?  Compare that to how Mitsuki acts in the Haruka end, and you'll see which one is the better person... but also why they could never have a 3P or 4P relationship there.

 

All things considered, I'd almost recommend that people watch the anime instead.  The game is good, and it sounds like the LE rerelease fixed up the graphics to mostly modern standards... but it's still basically a simple soap-opera love triangle, and the anime covers that story, and those characters, pretty well.

 

PS - Manami can die.  In one of the card game side discs, there's a route where she captures an alternate reality Takayuki, and has TWO of them to play with   She can ruin anything.

[EcchiOujisama]

@VorathielI appreciate wanting to go in as blind as possible, but if you've already seen the TV anime you've already had 90% of the main routes spoiled. Whoever went through the game and compressed it down to 14 episodes did one hell of a job. The more I think about it the more impressive it is.

If you want to avoid/get the Manami Worst Route of All Time over with, I used this walkthrough. http://gamerssquare.fc2web.com/kimiganozomueienlatestedition.htm The route in question is the one that ends on 8/14 with やっぱりダメだ. You have to clear Haruka, Mitsuki and Akane before you can do it (or other side character routes). Not sure if you need to do all of their routes first or only the "good" routes since I did them all before the side characters.

The Bible comparison comes from different lists of longest books which all claim it is "about 1 million" words. I would assume the "about" is due to different translations having different word counts, but I can neither confirm nor deny beyond that.

@Toranth

Spoiler

I can somewhat agree with your point on Mitsuki. I have no problem with her feeling responsible, since, you know, SHE IS, especially for someone who doesn't even care about her birthday anyway per SFD. I interpret the whole present deal as Mitsuki having already made the decision to ovary up and steal him, consequences be damned. Bitches be crazy and all that. 

My issue is more than that - as soon as Chapter 2 starts the voice acting portrays a person that doesn't remotely resemble the person I knew.  The difference was even more jarring going through SFD after the main stories. It's like the same seiyuu doing different characters in different games. I don't even need to look at the screen to know which one is which.

I would expect Mitsuki to be a mess when Haruka wakes up, she should be.  But at some point that same fire needs to come back, in her voice, her words, her actions. The line must be drawn here, this far, and no farther, and all that. We never get that, she just keeps getting more and more depressed and more and more depressing to be around. The Mitsuki I knew would have picked herself up, dusted herself off, figured out what made the guy like her in the first place and made a fight of it before it was too late - everything else be damned.  

For the harem route possibility - I would argue that Mitsuki totally submitting and being a good little whore masturbating in the closet and being put on a leash just so she doesn't lose him completely shows she's open to sharing under the perfect circumstances, and Haruka fucking him in the hospital to make him late for a date with Akane (resulting the accident repeating and another profanity-laden rant I decided not to write) and even promising not to tell Akane as long as she gets some shows Haruka is open to sharing.  If Onee-chan is already sharing, and notices her cute little sister wants to share too, I don't see this being insurmountable. I see a way I could get there if I were handed this scenario and think one route where things continually improve after the accident isn't too much to ask. I would even argue it's more believable than that Manami shit. After that, just about anything is fair game. I wouldn't be surprised if they added another "bonus" scenario where Manami brings the BETA to this world, makes you watch as she brutally kills all of the girls in the game, then has the BETA kill Takayuki, ending in an H scene of Manami and the BETA raping his corpse. They'll call it KimiNozo Days and say you should have known it would be bullshit from the School Days reference in the title. 

I agree with recommending the anime and I'd also strongly recommend SFD to anyone who enjoys the anime. The ratings for the game have always been quite high on VNDB, enough that I wonder how many of those people only watched the TV anime and voted based on that. I just can't see how such a strong majority of people would view this as an 8 or 9/10 experience overall. 

[Vorathiel]

4 minutes ago, EcchiOujisama said:

@VorathielI appreciate wanting to go in as blind as possible, but if you've already seen the TV anime you've already had 90% of the main routes spoiled. 

I did not.  

[Toranth]

1 hour ago, EcchiOujisama said:

@Toranth

[snipped for harem only]

  Hide contents

For the harem route possibility - I would argue that Mitsuki totally submitting and being a good little whore masturbating in the closet and being put on a leash just so she doesn't lose him completely shows she's open to sharing under the perfect circumstances, and Haruka fucking him in the hospital to make him late for a date with Akane (resulting the accident repeating and another profanity-laden rant I decided not to write) and even promising not to tell Akane as long as she gets some shows Haruka is open to sharing.

 

Yeah... those.  Those ends were added in the first rerelease, and in my opinion were distinctly unnecessary.   Probably the same producer that though the fandisks need more green-haired she-monster was responsible.  I still think of those as 'non-canon', and like to pretend only the main three endings exist.  The fandisk stuff could (should!) have been worked into the high-school part, I think.  Similarly, following up the main game by unlocking Akane Maniax would help shed a lot of light on her character, and how she coped with everything.

As for scoring, well.  Back when the game was originally released in 2001 (dear God, 15 years ago) there wasn't a whole lot of "good story" options.  Air, KimiNozo, YU-NO, Memories Off, uh... man, even Kazoku Keikaku wasn't out quite yet.  Anyway, there weren't a lot of options, and for the time it was a high quality product in every way - music, art, voice acting, story, engine.  I have a lot of nostalgia about the game, I'll admit.  If I were to encounter it these days, I wouldn't rate it an 8 or 9, for sure.  But back then, it really was one of the top games out there.

[EcchiOujisama]

I'll freely admit I have a ton of nostalgia for the story, albeit from the anime (which "only" has 12 years of nostalgia cache for me). I would be completely willing to accept the idea that it was looked at more favorably in its time than I'm seeing it now for the first time with 2016 eyes. This was definitely blazing new territory in 2001, no argument at all. The issue I take with that hypothesis is the most recent ratings displayed on VNDB. Take mine out and 4 of 7 of the most recent votes are 9 or higher, all from this June or later. Two more are higher than mine. My 5 rating is in the bottom 5% of all votes. If there are people here who who feel this is a 9+/10 game despite the things we've been talking about I'd love to hear the reasoning for it.

You mentioned Akane Maniax, and implied something good about it, which is interesting to me. I've seen the OVA and was not impressed to the point that it made the game a low priority. Is the game more worthwhile? Haruko Maniax not being particularly good and being especially creepy in its delivery of H content has made me further wary of anything with Maniax in the title.

[wyldstrykr]

it is long? can you compare that to clannad, grisaia no kajitsu and da capo 3? also is that the version that is still translated to english? thanks

[EcchiOujisama]

Is it long?  If the Bible and War and Peace aren't good reference points for Filipinos, I'd estimate twice as long as Grisaia no Kajitsu. I got bored with it and never finished it so I can't say for sure. Definitely longer than Clannad.

There is no English version now. There is an English version in progress. The last update at alternativeprojects.wordpress.com was almost 5 months ago. It does not sound like it will come out anytime soon. 

[wyldstrykr]

ill wait, unless im not alive 

[Lucius]

Personally, the main draw, and the main reason why I bothered to read the Chinese version of this game, was because of its very nonlinear nature resembling the likes of Clannad. Its branches are still not as massive as School Days, but for what it is, it's a very attractive game to play just to see which ending or route I would end up with. It's not like one of those multiple-route VNs with very few choices either (Grisaia comes to mind), so the conversations felt more natural to me, and I like that kind of VNs.

I heard about all kinds of bad things about the VN and the h-scenes, but to be honest, I've seen a lot of bad stuff among VNs. I mean, I'm playing euphoria right now, and its h-scenes can go to absolutely disgusting level, and I'm fine with it because it's so common now that nothing surprises me. I have a lot of time to kill, so killing time on a mediocre trash of a storyline isn't something that would bother me that much as long as I get a good balance of fun in return, and from your review, it seems that it's not all 'bad' with this VN, and there's some good in it.

I personally love tragedies, actually, so that's another draw for me. Even if this goes to melodramatic level, I'll take a melodramatic tragedy over a well-written but saccharine slice-of-life comedy (Majikoi) any day. The tension and drama can be quite engaging, and I just love the shock factors that come with stories like this... even though I've already seen the 'twist' happening in the anime.

That being said, with the kind of quality you've told me about in your review, I think this won't be on my priority list any time soon. With the other stuff I've got going on right now, maybe I'll just wait for the English edition to come out.

[Toranth]

19 hours ago, EcchiOujisama said:

You mentioned Akane Maniax, and implied something good about it, which is interesting to me. I've seen the OVA and was not impressed to the point that it made the game a low priority. Is the game more worthwhile? Haruko Maniax not being particularly good and being especially creepy in its delivery of H content has made me further wary of anything with Maniax in the title.

Akane Maniax takes place shortly after KimiNozo resolves, and is about how Akane deals with it all.  It's interesting in that a) it is a bit of an epilogue, and b) it finally gives Akane some depth.  But it's still a comedy fandisk, so I wouldn't expect much from it.  The game is better than the OVA, but hardly worth going out of your way to acquire.

But better than any of the Ayumayu stuff, which is all garbage and worth going out of your way to avoid.

[Bolverk]

17 hours ago, wyldstrykr said:

it is long? can you compare that to clannad, grisaia no kajitsu and da capo 3? also is that the version that is still translated to english? thanks

If you want to count on TLwiki the sizes of text scripts and I think you can.

• Grisaia no kajitsu is 3.73 mb
• Clannad is 3.16mb. 
• Kimi ga Nozomu Eien is 4.05 mb

[wyldstrykr]

5 hours ago, Bolverk said:

If you want to count on TLwiki the sizes of text scripts and I think you can.

• Grisaia no kajitsu is 3.73 mb
• Clannad is 3.16mb. 
• Kimi ga Nozomu Eien is 4.05 mb

can you compare that to the upcoming da capo 3? ty

[ChaosRaven]

On 29.9.2016 at 2:42 AM, wyldstrykr said:

can you compare that to the upcoming da capo 3? ty

Da Capo 3 has about 4 MB of text.

Still, I can just laugh about those numbers. I'm currently playing Shin Kohime Musou which has almost 6 MB of text. And I just found out that my eagerly awaited 'little' Unionism Quartet fan disc which will be released in a month, will have over 5 MB of text too. *hysterical laughter*

Oh man, I need a second life to finish all that stuff...