This is the newest game by Alcot, based three hundred years before Onigokko (yes, it is a prequel, sort of) during the time of the infamous Tokugawa Yoshimune (who is the central character of the jidaigeki Abarenbou Shogun), the first Shogun to take the title based on the 'gosanke' system set up by Ieyasu to prevent the end of the shogunate due to the end of his direct descendants.  The protagonist of the story is a young man who has been dragged into the body of a person of the same name in the past from the modern era named Nobuyuki.

Like all of the 'main team' Alcot games, this game has a combination of serious drama with layers of slapstick comedy, with overblown villains and a reasonably capable protagonist (in his own way).  As such, anyone who has played Onigokko, Osananajimi wa Daitouryou, or Naka no Hito will be familiar with the atmosphere of the game. 

There are four heroines in this game.  First, there is Nobuyuki's adopted little sister Tamaki, who gets switched into the body of a girl named Tama, dragged along with her brother to the Edo period.  She is a rather straightforward brocon imouto, driven by lust and jealousy, as well as a certain belief that it is the duty of all elder brothers to marry their little sister.  Second is Tokuda Yoshimune (obviously, an alias), a skilled swordswoman with a strong sense of justice who befriends Nobuyuki and invites him to help her solve the mystery of the recent kidnappings in Edo.  She is something of a battle maniac, as well as an idealist... to be honest, despite her being the main heroine, I left her for last.  Third is Tokuda Muneharu, a careless spender and famous lover of sweets who wanders Edo looking for good things to eat.  She is crafty and calculating at first glance, but under the surface she is (of course) a lonely little girl at heart, lol.  Last of all is the classic Alcot-design loli for this particular game (most main team Alcot games contain at least one adorable loli heroine or side-character who is a little tsundere).  She is an excellent cook and loves food in general, and she is generally loyal and stoic by nature, when things don't involve food, lol.

Muneharu

I went for Muneharu first.  I don't really have a strong reason... none of the heroines in this VN are really my type, so I just rolled the dice.

Her path was a bit high on the ichaicha for my tastes, despite having a good story.  I suppose it is because I've been spoiled by other 'go back to the past with modern knowledge' VNs, but I honestly got tired of the way they handled customs and attitudes of the time for the most part (don't expect realism on any level), and the 'convenient' way Muneharu's path draws the 'love with obstacles' card was excessively obvious.   I suppose it is because I've played so many 'ojousama-ge', but my standards for that kind of thing are high.  That said, there were some high points... while the action scenes aren't anywhere near chuunige-level, they are still about as decent as you get it with charage.  The actual drama falls into the usual Alcot absurdity (if it didn't, they'd probably get bashed by the fans) before the ending, and I had to snort with laughter, despite the seriousness of the situation in the characters' eyes.

The ending was... actually excellent.  It covers the actual immediate results of the path's drama, as well as the historical consequences of Tamaki and Nobuyuki remaining in the past, a bit of detail that is out of character for this company (since short-term endings are one of this company's plagues, like many charage-variant companies).

Rin

Rin... is adorable.  Of course, she is a loli, so adorable is default.  However, Alcot's lolis are almost always tsundere, almost always turn into kittens when they fall in love, and make me want to pat them on the head and give them candy before sending them back to their parents.   To be honest, if this game were devoid of erotic content, I would probably lap this path up, but it does have erotic content, and I've gotten to the point where loli-H makes me mildly nauseous if they aren't centuries old or a youkai. 

Now that I've gotten this out of my system... Rin, like Kureha from Onigokko, is a kunoichi type thief, though her motivations differ.  Her path, for most of its length, is involved with retrieving treasures (the same treasures from Onigokko) with the protagonist at her side.  I can honestly say that I found most of the path amusing (though not laugh-out-loud funny).  One way this game treats Rin different from Kureha in Onigokko is that there are a lot fewer lolicon jokes (yes, Onigokko went there... like crazy).   The drama at the end of this path has to do with the Tsuchigumo clan, and is thus a bit less absurd than Muneharu's path was. 

Her ending... is not that interesting, when it comes down to it.  It is a standard 'we are still in love' ending, when it comes down to it.

Yoshimune

Yoshimune is your classic 'hakoiri musume+master swordswoman' heroine (yes, that is an archetype... only the otaku media could make that into an archetype).  She is a lover of justice, but if someone talks about ecchi things, she immediately goes beet red.  Her relationship with Nobuyuki is, from the beginning, one of comrades in arms.

Her path, like Rin's, is generally amusing.  The ichaicha is a bit excessive at times, but it doesn't go so far as to put me to sleep.  Her path has several long fights and it centers on the internal affairs of the Bakufu as a government, and the way she and Nobuyuki end up together is absolutely... rofl.  Surprisingly, this path did not exceed the previous two in quality or focus, which probably means that, while she is the 'main' heroine, this game doesn't possess a true heroine.

 

The Setting

As I mentioned above, they did a horrible job with the setting of this VN.  Understand, I don't expect true-to-history events, and the existence of Western underwear over a century before it became widely available even to the nobility of Europe doesn't really bother me all that much.  No, the real problem is the haphazard way they handle the customs of the day, sometimes being off-hand and then forgetting about them, then taking others seriously on all levels.  It is a lot of little things that built up as I played.  Of course, that is the downside of using a well-documented era for this kind of thing.

My Dissatisfaction

Perhaps my biggest dissatisfaction with the game is the way the game doesn't have the protagonist use his future knowledge to create all sorts of interesting results, which is, when it comes down to it, the best part about games where characters go back into the past in times of trouble.  Of course, there are exceptions, where they stick to the historical line, but those are relatively rare and tend to have a more realistic bent than this game.  While I didn't expect something on the level of Sengoku Koihime, I was hoping the protagonist would make the best of his knowledge, lol.

Overall

This is a decent comedy charage, with drama that doesn't go too far into darker areas, meaning it remains a charage.  Like all of the Alcot games based in this particular universe, serious moments are frequently broken up by goofiness, but if you like that kind of thing, this VN is a decent choice, if you've already played Naka no Hito and Onigokko... and you still want more.  I didn't bother with Tamaki's path, simply because I honestly didn't have an interest in her as a heroine.  I might add a commentary on her path here at some later date, but for now I'm ending my assessment of this VN.