Baldr Heart
Entry posted by Clephas ·
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Now, for those who are wondering, the reason I chose to play Baldr Heart first is fairly simple... it is the VN most anticipated this month, at least by the people I talk to. Baldr Heart is the fourth game (if you count the Skydive and Zero games as a single game each) in the 'primary series' started with Baldr Force. This series follows the evolving interrelations between humans, the net, extreme VR, and AIs, storywise. The gameplay in all the games is a relatively fast-paced battle mech action system that evolves a lot of explosions and bullets flying. Except for Zero, the series retains a pixelated appearance that is reminscent of the ps2 or psx eras for its gameplay. The series tends to be heavy on the dystopian elements, as well as transhumanism. Zero's setting in particular is horrifyingly dystopian, with children selling reservations for their own body parts and dismemberment videos in advance to strangers on the streets.
Baldr Heart doesn't go that far... though it definitely strays into the area of mad science. I can't really say a whole lot about the setting without spoiling Skydive and Zero, sadly. This game is based 200 years after those games and the events in them are the base upon which the entirety of the society in Baldr Heart is constructed.
Now, I feel a need to address the biggest complaint from those who were looking at this game. The fact that most of the characters are students... a definite divergence, as the series has in the past had most of its main characters in their early to mid-twenties, save for a few rare exceptions. That fact is one of the series' main attractions for many readers, as many VN fans go to the Baldr series specifically to escape the slice-of-life-in-a-school-setting that plagues most VNs. So, in the eyes of many fans of the Baldr series, this was a huge betrayal... or at least a turn-off.
Typical of a Baldr game, this element, that would normally have been a simple way to dumb it down for the 'mainstream' (as so many readers name it contemptuously) is actually used to accentuate the sharp differences between the Baldr world and the modern Japanese settings of most normal VNs. While it is true that Sou isn't as bitter and broken as a lot of Baldr protagonists either begin as or end up, he nonetheless has his own share of horrifying experiences in his past, and he has taken lives in combat before. He is a mercenary who returns to his homeland after receiving a brain injury trying to save a young girl trapped in the net.
There is a play order to this game... Tsukuyomi>Mao>Yuri>Nagi. With each successive path, more of the game's mystery is revealed, until you reach the core of things in Nagi's path. I'm going to be blunt... if you thought Yuri's path was a bit screwy, Nagi's is even twistier. The Baldr series loves its mindfuck plot twists filled with pseudo-science and philosophy, and in that sense, this is the Baldr series at its best. However, this story structure means that Tsukuyomi's path, in particular, is fairly unsatisfying since it reveals next to nothing about what happened in the past or what is going on during the story. I also felt that the game fell back on emotionalism a bit too often for my tastes... while it almost always comes down to that in any given Japanese game, I honestly thought the 'Fay' were going a bit too far that way. I know they were probably searching for a new theme after Zero, but I still found it a bit trite.
That said, this is still a Baldr game, and thus a mix of filthy human desires and high ideals stain the world crimson with the blood of thousands along the way, leaving me satisfied that Giga didn't abandon the series core precepts. They were just a bit too obvious when they designed the setting and theme, lol.
Overall, this game will get mixed reactions from Baldr fans while being perhaps slightly more accessible for those who might have had trouble with the much darker atmosphere of the previous games... in that sense, I think Giga probably made a mistake, as that dark atmosphere is one of the series' attractions. As a VN, it is very well written and smooth to play... showing off the skills of Giga's writing staff to their fullest. It reminds me of why so many who read Giga games say 'Giga is great... if you just play the Baldr series.'
- ChaosRaven, Vorathiel and Tenkuru
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