Princess x Princess is the sequel/extension of Rishia's route from Shuffle 2. Essentially, it begins with Rishia enthusiastically searching out extra wives for Raito while he has difficulty adjusting to his girlfriend's values. However, this quickly expands into a game that, to some extent, can actually be called a sequel rather than a fandisc. This is similar to how the original Shuffle's 'extras' functioned more like true additions to the original game than fandiscs.
I'm going to be blunt... this is better than the original game, to a significant degree. A lot of the things I hated about how they handled Shuffle 2 are done differently in this game, and the style in general is much closer to how the original Shuffle was put together in terms of humor and character interactions. For fanboys of the original Shuffle who hated or just weren't satisfied with Shuffle 2, this game is a saving grace.
That said, this game has the characters traveling to different parallel worlds, where they are inserted into their own roles (with varying degrees of memory alterations) in them. In each, there are differences big and small (there is even one world where every character holds a near-perfect replication of the personality and role of a corresponding heroine from the original Shuffle), but the theme is mostly centered around Raito dealing with the issues in his own life using the experiences he has in these parallel worlds.
The 'paths' in this game are either threesome or harem combinations with Rishia, based on how Raito takes in his experiences in the various worlds. There is a threesome with Selena, Ai, and Lapis, with a full-on harem path and a Rishia-only path put in for kicks.
For fanboys of the original, this game also succeeds in clarifying the 'canon' of continuity to this game from the original Shuffle. The canon apparently is that Rin married Shia but died a significant period of time before she did.
Kurogane Kaikitan part 1
Kurogane Kaikitan is the port of the Vita game by Minato Carnival. It is a somewhat more action-focused game than is the norm for Minato Soft and its subsidiaries, with a much more serious subject matter. The protagonist, Habaki Masamune is the leader of a student anti-terrorist task force using mystical weapons called Kurogane that manifest certain 'recorded' phenomena that can be controlled by the user (this is not explained on the official website, which annoyed the hell out of me when I was reading up on the game beforehand). Masamune is a heavily-scarred victim of terrorism that hates terrorists to an incredibly strong degree, to the point where he is willing to cut them down mercilessly at a moment's notice.
In Kurogane Kaikitan's world, Manhattan was destroyed by a mysterious explosion, obliterating the city and allowing Japan to sign a peace treaty with more of its political and military power intact. As a result of Wall Street being gone and America's resulting economic downturn, Japan was able to take the helm of the world's economy, becoming a special financial zone and the battleground for various countries proxy terrorist activities. This necessitated the creation of units devoted to dealing with this, which at first was the Special Police but more recently a militarized unit called SWAM. The protagonist and his comrades are in training to join the Special Police.
The first thing most people will notice on beginning the game is the horrid use of Live 2d that can't be turned off. I will say that it was a huge quality of life crapfest that they didn't allow the turning off of the sprite motion system, since it isn't that good. Normally, I don't comment on visual aspects, but this was worthy of mention for its negative impact on the experience.
The prologue/common route of the game is pretty long, at just over seven hours on its own (though I wasn't reading it hurriedly, so I probably could have shortened the experience to five or six if I tried). In exchange, the first two paths I did, Amakuni's and Kotetsu's, were roughly four hours in length each. The prologue does an excellent job of developing the cast of characters to the point where you know which heroine you want to pick first (though you have to do Amakuni's or Fusehime's path first), as well as introducing the most important elements of the setting and setting the stage for the events that follow.
Amakuni
Amakuni is the protagonist's childhood friend, who was sickly as a child but became healthy by the time the story begins. She is a master of combat iaido (the action of drawing the katana, slashing, then returning it to the sheath), and she is the classic 'self-proclaimed fiance' heroine. Her path has a good mix of action, ichaicha, and feels, with two arcs (a 'buildup arc' and a finishing arc) that succeed in making her path feel like an extension of the prologue instead of being a random story based loosely on what happened before (as is common with a lot of VNs). Her ending is highly emotional and somewhat bittersweet (a theme for this game as a whole).
Kotetsu
Kotetsu is a different animal entirely from the aggressive and tennenboke Amakuni, as she begins as a quiet loner who turns into a koakuma heroine later on. I mostly picked her for my second heroine because I was extremely curious about her reactions to various events in the prologue and Amakuni's path. She is the type of heroine who, once she falls for the protagonist, becomes somewhat emotionally dependent on him. Her path is cute up until the point where events start rapidly occurring and certain facts about what was going on behind the scenes come to light. Kotetsu's situation is one that draws pity naturally from the reader, so don't be surprised if you find yourself tearing up or wanting to look away because of some of the events of the story. The ending is somewhat less satisfying than Amakuni's unfortunately, but that was perhaps inevitable considering the situation in both paths.
Nene
Nene is the teacher of the protagonist's class and the overseer/handler of the Kurogane unit for the First School. Her path is significantly more twisty and labyrinthine than Kotetsu's or Amakuni's paths, whose trials were mostly personal for the characters involved. Nene is that classic 'older heroine who falls apart in private' that Minato Soft and its subsidiaries love to put into their games. She is also the equivalent of this game's Momoyo (in other words, the trump card/ultimate power that can flip the game board if put into play), albeit with none of Momoyo's whims. I enjoyed this path, but like Kotetsu's path, the epilogue was somewhat unsatisfying.
Tamane
Tamane is the oldest member of the Kurogane unit, a member of a military family famous for its skills with the bayonet and rifle. She often plays the mature and stern older sister role in the group, except that she, like Nene, tends to fall apart in private due to her weakness to those she cares for. Her path, like Nene's, is pretty twisty and complex in comparison to the first two routes I played. I enjoyed this path (the action toward the end, in particular) a lot, and the epilogue for this path is as good or better than Amakuni's, with the parting point in taste being whether you want sweet or bittersweet.
Fusehime
I don't like Fusehime.
I have messed around with a lot of heroines I didn't like over the years, especially in serious games, but Fusehime is this game's Victim A, an out of place character who should have been just another class member. I know that there is this temptation to put a morally naive party member into every 'group of friends', no matter how dark the setting, but Fusehime is particularly bad this way. Naive, idealistic, and full of delusions about what her job is about... just about everything about her rubbed me wrong. So, don't be surprised that I skipped this path, bwahahaha!
Kaikitan Path
This is the game's true path, devoid of romance. It is also the path where a lot of the story's hidden elements come into the open and some of the best battles occur. However, it is also a path that is somewhat rough emotionally on the reader if they came to like the main cast. Honestly, I thought it was a bit too predictable compared to what it could have been with a little bit less teasing in the other routes.
Extra Endings
All the heroines have extra path/endings after the Kaikitan path, based in a different timeline (specifically stated). Like the original timeline, it is a 'what-if' world that is meant for those who like happy endings. These secondary paths are actually reasonably enjoyable, but I honestly enjoyed the main game's paths more.
Conclusion
An enjoyable game based in a what-if world. The world it is based in isn't the one of Majikoi, Tsujidou, and Tsuyokiss, for those who are curious. It could have been a great deal better if they spent less time on SOL, but considering that this is Minato Soft (well, one of their subsidiaries), I suppose it was inevitable that it wouldn't be like that. In a lot of ways, the version of Japan portrayed in the game reminds me of a Japanese-flavored America, in that it suffers from many of the same problems.
Those who talk to me regularly or pay attention to my lists will notice that one of the VNs that comes up fairly often is Draculius.
This is a VN that has had a surprising amount of influence on modern VNs... or rather, the Western VN world. Oddly enough, that influence is mostly indirect rather than direct (it isn't translated, so the VN's direct influence is rather limited).
The most obvious point is Grisaia... to be straight about it, it had the same writer as the Grisaia series, a fact that made me nod in recognition when I discovered it. Replaying Draculius, the points of connection are blatantly obvious... such as the fact that Misao's basic character is obviously the prototype for Makina or that Rian's characterization was the prototype for Michiru (though honestly, she is better than Michiru, lol). Zeno is Sachi's prototype (think if you added insane protectiveness and a tendency toward violence to Sachi and removed the good girl obsession). Last of all, Rika is Yumiko (except that the dependence comes out faster and Rika is a lot less weak-willed under the surface). It looks like Belche got split into multiple characters, probably because her role and characterization was so complex that building on her as is just wasn't possible (Amane, JB, and Chizuru).
Now, do I even have to mention how much influence Grisaia has had on the Western community? I'd be preaching to the choir at this point, I think.
A less-obvious point is Kyuuketsuki no Libra or Libra of the Vampire Princess, which is getting a localization through a Kickstarter sometime this year. To someone who played and loved Draculius, the older VN's influence on Libra is extremely obvious... Iris, who serves as an antagonist in the VN, is to some degree based on Belche (right down to her attitude toward humans and tendency toward obsessive love hidden under a cold exterior). The actual situation is a dead copy (play on Belche's special power, for those who have read the VN, lol) in the sense that both Jun in Draculius and the protagonist of Libra are young men who are the children of born vampires who died, leaving the child's mother behind, who then died before the story began. There are a number of differences of course... and I won't spoil the VN by telling you where a lot of the deeper similarities are (though I will give you a hint... the truth about the vampire hunter organizations).
Other than Dies Irae, I honestly can't think of a VN that has had more impact on the community without actually being translated, and as I re-read this VN for the third time, I find more and more common points with the VNs that came later on, lol.
First, for those wondering how I found time to do this... Fallout 4 is not a game you can play in small bits, so any time when I had less than four hours consecutively free, I went for this instead (generally it was twenty to thirty minute bouts during lunch, dinner, and breakfast, as well as an hour right before bed). For those wondering what I thought of the original, here is a link to the post in my thread: http://forums.fuwanovel.net/topic/2086-clephas-vn-of-the-month/?page=8#comment-159994 Now, first I'm going to say this game is generally better than the original. I make this statement straight-out because this one fixes a lot - though not all - of the complaints I had with the original, without disposing of what was best about it. The protagonist is generally more active/has more of an effect on the world around him, and he is a lot less of a non-entity, thus putting his character setting to at least some use. This VN follows a different heroine as canon for each heroine route, so I'll list which heroines from the first one were chosen to reach the events in each heroine path in this one here. Kana>Alysticia Haruhi>Usagi Sera>Masshiro Yuzuki>Tateha In many ways, the heroines in this one follow the same pattern as the original. Alys and Masshiro are both ojousamas, Usagi is an idol, and Tateha is the 'futsuuko' of the game. Also similarly, the heroines' deredere-ness is off the charts once the protagonist becomes their lover. In particular, Masshiro is a bit freaky that way. There is a fifth heroine, Anna, but she is a sub-heroine whose path lasts about twenty minutes, so I'm not going to bother covering her here. Similar to the original, the two presidential councils (seitokai) face off against one another in 'elections' where their competing ideas are looked over and picked by the students. There are some differences... such as the fact that the deadlock at the beginning in this one is caused by bloc votes from the cultural and sports clubs and that Gekka's school president is not a charismatic individual (most people are - unjustifiably - terrified of her, and Masshiro is generally considered the face of the council) and Usagi, the idol who leads Tendou is not pushing fun like a dealer with a new, profitable drug like Haruhi in the original was. This deliberate toning down of the general capabilities and the overenthusiasm of the two councils allowed the protagonist to step forward more in this one, allowing him to actually be something other than just a catalyst for events. For this reason, it was much easier to get behind his eyes and enjoy the story than the original. On the down side, this means that there wasn't really an absolute defining heroine, like Haruhi was in the original. In exchange, Mokomoko-san (also known as Alysticia) has the best 'issues' in her path. Her psychological/social issue is pretty obvious from early on, and it is the defining issue with every story element dealing with her. In many ways, this follows a pattern drawn after than of Shino from Uruwashi no, though it is far less severe and the heroine in general is actually interested in 'fixing' herself from the very beginning. Unfortunately, the very fact that that one heroine has pretty deep issues (Usagi also has some nice drama) outlines how weak in terms of non-romantic issues Masshiro and Tateha's paths are. I'd honestly thought Masshiro's path would turn into a typical ojousama drama... for the first five minutes after the drama began, until it concluded (at the end of those five minutes). Unfortunately (since I actually like that particular trope) that didn't happen, and the path itself was defined mostly by endless ichaicha and (as usual well-done) H-scenes. Tateha's path... is just dry of anything interesting, probably because they put all that effort into developing Usagi and Alys. Overall, for those looking for a good charage with great visual and musical quality, this one is an excellent choice... just don't expect brilliance where you are guaranteed to get average-quality.
This game, is to some extent, a redemption of my hopes for Ensemble. I say this from the beginning because I will inevitably be critical in a familiar way about some parts. However, this game was far closer to Ensemble at its best than we've seen in the last six years.
The story is set in an academic city in a school that has a weird setup where individuals who want to get involved with student government join the Knighthood, with Chevaliers and apprentices serving in roles from librarian to student council president all under the same title/role. The protagonist, a ninja (yes, a ninja) essentially transfers into the school because of evidence that a hacker/political activist/mischief-maker called the Bat is using it as their base of operations.
Essentially, the role of the ninja in this setting is as a sort of secret police that exist to stabilize the nation's politics, quietly manipulating things so the worst of the worst get knocked out of power without disrupting things and taking down terrorists and other problems before they surface. The protagonist is a young member of this organization (which is deliberately nameless) and has several successful missions under his belt. His personality is serious and loyal to his mission, while having a surprisingly strong sense of decency and justice without letting it get in the way of what is required of him. He is fairly capable, but, by his own description, he is at best near the middle or somewhat above it in the organization's ninjas. He is unfamiliar with women in general due to having grown up basically doing nothing but training to become a ninja (honestly, this part of the setting makes the least amount of sense, since classic ninja settings have the ninja deliberately making their personnel familiar with sex to use it as a tool or prevent it from being used against them).
To be honest, this setting made me rofl a bit, since it almost felt like a 'pirates vs ninja' kind of setup, and he does, indeed, face off against a few of the knights during the progress of the story.
One thing that struck me is the improvement in the action scenes from other Ensemble games. While they are still more generalist than some would like, they are far more detailed than is the norm in non-chuunige, and the CGs are actually halfway decent. The protagonist shows off his abilities only occasionally during the story (mostly because combat isn't his job), but when he does, it is sufficiently impressive to satisfy.
Story-wise, this game actually has a story *pauses for screams of shock* which is something most Ensemble games of late have lacked (maybe they finally figured out that while fluff sells at first, it doesn't make for repeat customers... nah, this is a Japanese company we are talking about). The common route serves as a more than adequate introduction to the heroines, and choices are kept to an absolute minimum - one - which was pleasant (to be blunt, excessive meaningless choices do nothing but disrupt the storytelling).
The heroines are: the overly serious but compassionate knight Kagura; the mischievous but pragmatically idealistic Knight Captain Mai; the unsociable but kind-hearted and capable coder Yui; and the overly enthusiastic but troubled (deep under the surface) wannabe ninja and classmate Kanon.
Kagura
Choosing Kagura for my first heroine was a no-brainer for me. I'm a sucker for serious warrior heroines from old families, and she fits the bill nicely. I will say that I disliked one part of how they handled this part... despite the fact that she has restrictive and controlling parents, there is no actual conflict with said parents in the path. That said, the actual drama that is present is better than decent, and Kagura is a great deredere heroine once she falls for Jin.
In this path, Jin takes up a number of roles other than lover toward Kagura. He is a sparring partner, a friend, and a protector (despite her being capable, he is moreso, lol) which struck me as unusual for an Ensemble game, where it has become the norm to kill any talents the protagonist might have in the heroine paths.
If I have one serious complaint about this path, and it goes for all the paths in this game, is that Ensemble still used the 'we are going to have a fandisc where we tease at adding content but don't actually add anything but H' system for the endings. While there is a significant climax to the story in this path, there is a distinct lack of after story beyond the usual 'a few days later' copout.
Mai
Since Mai shares VAs with Maia from Hapymaher, it is literally impossible for me not to pick her early on. Okajima Tae (under various names) has voiced a surprisingly large portion of the best supporting female characters out there, along with a number of truly awesome heroines. She has a particular flair for mischievous but deeply perceptive characters, which fits in perfectly with Mai's characterization.
Mai's path is similar to Kagura's, albeit it is more wrapped up in the internal politics of the Knighthood than in the personal issues of the heroine herself. The role the protagonist plays in this path differs, in that Mai serves in the 'older sister wife' type role, pampering him in a way that his mother doesn't (though she dotes on him too, lol). He does aid her in similar ways (both with behind the scenes activities and by helping her perfect her swordsmanship), but his role is more blatantly supportive in this path.
The ending of this path is, again, a decent climax with not nearly enough after story. This path in particular could have done with a 'five years after' epilogue, because of the nature of the decisions Mai made toward the end of the path and the resolution of both Jin and herself in regards to those decisions.
Yui
Yui is a fairly straightforward archetype. Her character is the overly serious and socially inept nerd with sister issues. She is kind-hearted and finds it difficult to turn away those who come to her asking for help, but few people get past her tendency to present herself as being a somewhat thorny individual.
Yui's path is the first path in the VN that actually focused on the Bat, which is perhaps another area I should have complained about, but since the Bat isn't that interesting in concept as an antagonist, I mostly wasn't bothered by it in the previous paths. Unlike in Mai and Kagura's path, where there were serious combat scenes present, this path is more about the slow revelation of one aspect of what is going on behind the scenes through solving Yui's issues.
Jin's role in this path is very much that of the older partner in a romantic relationship, but it is also a surprisingly equal relationship, perhaps because Jin doesn't need to worry as much about hiding his abilities from Yui as he did from Kagura or Mai.
This path does have a good climax, but again, it lacks an after story to close things off.
Kanon
Kanon is our wannabe ninja girl... a foreigner (as usual, Northern Europe with no country name given, lol) who got hooked on ninja anime (the hero type) and by accident discovers Jin is a ninja (though not his full identity, which he conceals throughout all the paths). She is a bright and cheerful girl with a strong sense of justice and a compassionate heart... though she is more than a little bit of an innocent.
Her path is, like the other paths, full of various incidents and drama with a huge amount of ichaicha on the side. It was a decent path, but she isn't my type, so I can't say I was emotionally invested this time around. There are some good - but very short - fights in this path, but they are mostly one-sided affairs. Like the three previous paths, this one lacks a good after story.
Secret
Secret is the name I given to the overall 'incident ending' that you can access after finishing all three paths. In this ending (basically, it can be interpreted that any of the girls is your heroine), you finally get to discover the antagonist's identity... and it is one that might surprise you. There is also a really good battle scene to treat you to, and the reasons for the antagonist's actions is a bit of a surprise...
Conclusion
This is, by far, the best Ensemble game made since Ojousama wa Gokigen Naname. It doesn't make it to kamige level and it shares the ending problem that most of the more recent Ensemble games have had, but it has a decent story, good characters, and enough drama to be memorable. While I'm probably not going to place this on an all-time favorites list, it is one of my favorites for this year so far.
First, I should state that I'm avoiding the after stories for now, simply because I'll want to see them for the first time immediately after replaying the original game, rather than over a year after I originally played it, when my memory for details has faded as much as it has right now. As such, this post will focus on the Ayaka and Mina paths that were added on for this fandisc release.
Common Route
The common route covers a summary of the events that happened in the first game and serves as a basis for just how much Ouro has 'remembered' about his own past with certain female personages and what he knows about certain figures vital to the story. It also covers the basic (very basic) resolution of Ouro's personal issues (in a really off-hand manner) in such a way that it means the writers are just 'letting you know' they won't be important to the two new paths. This ends once the summary passes the winter holidays and school is about to go back in session.
Ayaka
Shirogasaki Ayaka was the heroine who should have been instead of Akane. I say this because it is the same thing every Saga Planets fanboy said immediately after finishing the game... Akane had no business having a path in the game when Ayaka didn't. The tightly-knit nature of the group of heroines other than Akane and Ouro made the gap between Akane and the others as a heroine far too wide for a mere genkikko to really be considered a serious heroine in comparison. Ayaka, however, makes a strong impression from the beginning and involves herself (albeit in a negative way) with them from the beginning.
This path is hilarious. Anyone who played Rena's path will probably have some idea of just how hilarious a character Ayaka can be when she isn't putting her mind to it, but in her own path, I found myself giggling constantly. The way she and Ouro get together is so absurd, and the buildup to it is so... funny. Even after they became lovers, I couldn't take the serious stuff seriously because they made me break out laughing ever few minutes. I definitely rate this highly as an add-on path, and it is as long as the paths in the original game, so you can't say Ayaka was gypped.
Ayaka also has a 'what-if' append story that appears in the extra section after you finish her path. This what-if is just as hilarious in its own way, and it focuses on what she 'knows' pretty early on. This what-if dramatically alters her attitude toward Ouro in a way that is as hilarious as she was in her path, if in a drastically different fashion...
This is a path without any emotional catharsis, but in exchange you'll probably spend a great deal of time laughing.
Caminal
As anyone could guess by the way she and Ouro interacted in the original game, Mina's path's theme is, in opposition to the ero-comedy of Ayaka's path, a straight out cute romance. As such, there isn't a whole lot I can go over here without spoiling details, sadly. I will say that the relationship formation is typical for this type of heroine, in particular because, unlike Sylvie, she is a lot less honest/familiar with her own emotions. For Mina, who has a strong sense of herself as a princess first and an individual second, dealing with emotions like those born out of young love is a bit awkward.
Unlike Ayaka's path, you probably won't find yourself laughing every few seconds, though Sylvie and the crew are as generally amusing as they were in the original game.
The append story for Mina is a straight-out after story, focusing on the aftermath of the two settling in as publicly (at the school) acknowledged lovers and dealing with Mina's homeland (which isn't as dramatic as you might think). As usual, the focus is more on the cute romance, so you won't see any real drama here (there isn't really a ton of drama in the main path either).
Conclusion
While the new paths aren't as straight-out powerful as the ones in the main game, I found myself more or less satisfied at Mina and Ayaka finally taking their rightful places as heroines. The laughs I got out of Ayaka's path made it worth shelling out the money to get hold of this, and I'm sure I'll enjoy the append stories for the other characters once I get around to replaying the original, lol.
Edit: Ok, so I couldn't resist. I broke down and played Ria's new path after all... I tried to stop myself, but my curiosity got the better of me... and I don't regret it.
If Mina is cute romance and Ayaka is ero-comedy, Ria's new path is a pure catharsis. For those who didn't like the ending of Ria's path (there will always be those who complain when the ending is bittersweet like that), this path is probably what you were looking for. I enjoyed it and came out of it feeling good, which is nice... but I do think that this path is pandering a bit too much to fan pressure. Well, since it is a fandisc, I suppose that was inevitable, in any case, lol.
I love 'psychologically challenged' characters, whether they are heroines, protagonists, or antagonists. That said, I don't mean those cookie-cutter 'villains' and 'serial killer' types when I say this. I mean characters who are twisted up inside and as a result have a completely different outlook on life or appear inconsistent on the surface as a result. Villain and serial killer types, who just cause harm because they want to, just aren't that interesting. Here is a shortlist of good VNs that also have a few psychotic characters that are interesting to me.
Ojou-sama wa Gokigen Naname (Yuuzenji Tsurumi)- Antagonist of the story, she is passionately and with utter seriousness in love with money. She will honestly and totally love anyone who gives her money, but that love disappears the moment that they have nothing left to give her.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier (Okada Iori)- Iori is the partner heroine of Ryouma. She is the very picture of someone twisted by her job, as she is an assassin for the anti-Shogunate forces who is more than a bit yandere. Her twisted need to be controlled and have sex with the one who tells her to kill is a primary personality trait for her.
Devils Devel Concept (all heroines and Sora)- Sora is a young man with a domineering and tyrannical personality and an obsession with transactional interactions with others in the form of 'contracts' (not to mention a psyche that reacts to violence, pain, and inflicting pain with joy). All the heroines are a bit broken in various ways, though each has a different broken point. There are also a lot of other broken characters, lol.
Draculius (Jun and Belche)- Jun is normally an easygoing and kind-hearted young man, but he is insanely protective of 'family', to the point of extreme ruthless cruelty if he feels it necessary. Belche is an ancient Irish vampire who bases her entire worldview on her service to a master and just how much she can give to him, while also being a coldly ruthless monster who would willingly kill entire towns if her master asked it of her.
Grisaia trilogy (seriously, does anyone need me to point out all the broken characters here?)
Comyu (Kagome)- ... anyone who has played this game knows Kagome is crazy, so I don't know any reason why I should continue.
Silverio Vendetta (Zephyr and Valzeride)- Zephyr is a cowardly deserter who is normally happy to drink himself into a stupor and engage the services of easy women, but when cornered he becomes a sadistically brutal monster who will happily torment and slaughter those who oppose him using any tool that comes to hand. Valzeride is on the surface the ultimate, perfect patriotic hero. However, his hard-working nature goes beyond the norm, as he is quite literally incapable of not pushing his own limits and enduring the most hellish of experiences solely to be the 'Enemy of Evil' as he terms it. He fundamentally loves destroying evil as the root part of his nature, and he naturally seeks to turn the ruined lives he leaves in his wake into the base for his nation's prosperity.
Silverio Trinity (Gilbert and Dainsleif)- Gilbert is a hero-obsessed strategist who always has a scenario ready to get the best result out of any situation. Dainsleif is also obsessed with Valzeride and those like him, desiring nothing more than to be the one to oppose and destroy heroes as a self-styled evil dragon.
Dies Irae (Reinhard Heydrich and friends)- That there is something wrong with the psychology of every single person on Reinhardt Heydrich's side, as well as most of Ren's side is a self-evident reality.
Tokyo Babel (Setsuna) - Seriously, talk about overweening arrogance hidden in a huge lump of self-pity and self-hatred, lol.
Yami to Hikari no Sanctuary (Souji)- With Souji it is mostly a result of his upbringing, but he seems so normal... even as he kills.
Yurikago yori Tenshi Made (everyone)- No normies in this game, nothing but psychos.
Izuna Zanshinken (lots of people)- Lots of crazies and oddballs in this game.
Vermillion Bind of Blood- Toshirou, Ariya and Tri-finger. Figure the rest out yourself, lol.
Hapymaher (Maia)- Say what you want about Maia, but she is probably one of the most internally conflicted characters I've seen. The reasons make perfect sense, if you know what to look for. Tohru is a bit crazy too (anyone who has to fight that much with his own desire to dream forever is a bit brain-screwed).
Butterfly Seeker- Another game with a lot of messed up people.
Psychologic Love Comedy- Craziness everywhere
All the Smee Seasons games (Harumade, Natsukumo, etc)- craziness is this series' selling point.
For those of you who didn’t already know, this VN is based in the same setting as Nanairo Reincarnation and by the same company. Nanairo Reincarnation was my VN of the Year 2014, and it is a VN that has remained strong in memory ever since.
This VN has a much stronger ‘horror’ influence than Nanairo, which tended to be more of a nakige for much of its length. The protagonist, Yashiro, is a young guy who was born particularly vulnerable to spiritual influences while not having the ability to see ghosts or spirits… meaning he is basically a walking target for stuff like that. At the beginning of the story, he finds out he is cursed by the ‘Ghost of the Old School Building’, one of the ‘seven mysteries’ of his school. This curse is fairly simple… it tries to get him to kill himself by jumping off the roof of the school building.
A lot of the common parts of this VN focus around dealing with the mysteries and trying to discover a way to put the ghosts to rest, and in that sense it is almost identical to Nanairo… except that the protagonist, while central to the story, is essentially a ‘normal guy’ who got caught up in the mess involving ghosts and spirits. The protagonist from Nanairo makes several appearances in the VN, as do his ‘family’ members, and it is based about two years after the original story. There is definitely enough influence from the original that I have to recommend you play Nanairo first.
This VN… tends toward an aura of sorrow, for much of its length. The moments of fear are there, but they tend to be less common than ones of sorrow/grief. There are a total of six heroines in the VN (five if you count Riri and Ruka as a single heroine), with three major arcs…
The first arc is the Velvet Arc, which has the twin kami (Riri and Ruka) path splitting off midway. Riri and Ruka’s ending… leaves a really strong impression, to say the least. Technically, they are sub-heroines, but their ending is in no way neglected, either for detail or emotional value. If there is a significant difference from the main part of the arc (Velvet’s path), it is that it is somewhat shorter and less dramatic. Still, I cried for a half hour after it was over. Those who liked the red-head from Hikoukigumo no Mukougawa’s ending will like this one. Velvet’s ending… is closer to what I would call a ‘bittersweet romance’ path. Velvet has serious psychological problems, all wrapped up in her past (I won’t spoil it), and dealing with those issues is the main focus of her path.
The second arc is the Older Women Arc, which contains Misato’s and Youko’s path. I’ll be straight… play Youko’s path first. If you play Misato’s path before Youko’s, it will destroy you utterly, whereas it is merely saddening when you play Youko’s first. Honestly, since I like that type of ending, I really did like how Youko’s path turned out, but it isn’t really a romance path (neither was Ruka’s and Riri’s). Misato and Youko’s paths branch off from one another dramatically very late on (from a story perspective), and Misato’s path follows a far less dramatic and painful road to the end, one that is closer to what romance fans would like.
The third and last arc is the True Arc. This path contains Kana’s and the True ending. Kana’s path… is probably the most normal of all the paths, at least until the endgame. To be honest, Kana’s path is the reason why I won’t be calling this one a kamige, though it isn’t horrible. It is just… difficult to empathize with Kana (by the time I got to her path, I just considered her Idiot Friend #2, so I couldn’t see her as a romantic partner, even through the protagonist’s eyes). Nonetheless, as paths go in a general sense, it was still pretty high quality. However, where this arc shines is, of course, the True path. The True ending is… really heart-breaking. What you might or might not have figured out from the clues about the mysteries behind what is going on at the school are brought to light in full form, and the issues that were generally laid to rest outside of the protagonist’s control or in a way that didn’t reveal the whole mystery were brought to a head in the protagonist’s personal viewpoint. I cried for the True path. I seriously cried. If you don’t cry after you see what there is to see in this path, you probably should go to a psychologist.
A few other comments before I go to my overall wrap-up. My favorite heroine in this VN was undeniably Velvet, both because of my tastes in heroines (you’ll know what I’m talking about when you know her secrets), and because I just really, really liked her ending. The protagonist’s degree of personal growth – and even his personality or outlook on life – will often be changed dramatically during the course of the paths, and this is one of the reasons I would love to give the kamige stamp to this one, despite the fact that it doesn’t quite reach Nanairo’s level.
Overall, this is definitely one of those VNs I’ll still be recommending to people five years from now, along with Nanairo. It is a bit guro at times (at about the same level as Nanairo there), and the protagonist is a bit too typical of protagonists in the kind of situation he ends up in at times. However, as long as you can get past these issues (or actively enjoy them) this is a great VN to play. I will say that I really wished they would have done another adult protagonist, like Makoto from Nanairo. I don’t really see the need to go back to student protagonists, but I guess that is just an inevitability when companies are under the kind of pressure of tradition these are. I am seriously looking forward to more works from this company and this writer in the future, and this one is a solid (almost inevitable) VN of the Month candidate.
I've had numerous comments from people who were asking, 'Do you still play VNs?' in the last year or so because I hardly post anymore. When I do, it is usually litrpg, random commentary, or maybe one game a month. The short answer is yes. The full answer is a bit more complicated.
First, I should note that a lot of this is about timing... to be slightly more specific, a confluence of factors that created a singularity of me just not posting anymore. The events in question are my increasing intolerance for disinteresting themes and pure SOL (that is, slice of life without a central plot, even if it is loose); Coronavirus causing a dramatic drop in the release of non-nukige JVNs; and the resulting tendency I had for going back and replaying stuff I've already posted about in the past (sometimes multiple times).
While the sheer number of VNs I play per year has gone down from 50-70 to about 20-30, a good portion of those are replays. I'd say about a little over two-fifths of all the VNs I've played in the last year and a half have been ones I've already replayed multiple times, another fifth were ones I dug out of my archives, another fifth were kusoge not worth posting about, and the remaining fifth are the ones I posted on.
A contributing factor to this is Coronavirus and the resulting depression in the non-nukige VN market for PC (which I play almost exclusively, since I don't want to mod my consoles for the sake of VNs alone). Companies that once put out games multiple times a year have maybe released one in the last year and a half, other companies have quietly gone out of business, and yet other ones had to drop projects because they couldn't work around the health restrictions. Charage alone have seen an unprecedented decrease in production, with entire months going by with NO releases (something that would have been unthinkable before Coronavirus).
The last major issue is that my burnout on pure SOL (at least high school SOL) has turned into a complete intolerance. I once thought it would ease somewhat with time, but, if anything, it has gotten worse. If there isn't something besides pure SOL in there to catch my interest (like nakige, utsuge, or plotge elements), I simply won't be able to finish them.
If the protagonist is interesting, I can still (barely) play school life that have something in the way of non-SOL elements, but otherwise, they are unplayable to me.
Let's first get this out there... I did not play the original game. The reasons? Well, mostly because it was supposedly horribly buggy and I have no patience for bugs and glitches. The other part was that it didn't sound that interesting to me. It sounded like an occult take on SAO. However, I decided when this came out that I would buy it and later play it. Why? Because Touyama Mai is a much more interesting protagonist than Shina or Arata.
The game begins with Mai being driven to murder her father after he threatens the life of her younger sister. Her younger sister, who was at an orphanage/school in a small town called La Choara, stopped contacting her, so Mai decided to use the opportunity of being a recently-made orphan to search for her sister, Sanae. Her arrival in La Choara and the Wordsworth Dorm begins a series of horrific incidents that sometimes made me wonder if Clock-up had decided to make an all-ages game.
Now, it needs to be said... this game is made by Idea Factory, so it has an 'innovative' battle system with tons of problems, lol (this is essentially what IF is known for in jrpgs). I'm just glad that Idea Factory's glitches no longer include ridiculously long load times and sudden game freezes for no particular reason, hahaha. The gameplay is that of a dungeon-crawler, with some puzzle elements and a battle system based around positioning and skill combos where you can position yourself freely. The key to most battles is positioning your character and using a knockback skill to knock enemies into one another like pool balls (and making them hit your allies), thus magnifying damage greatly... sometimes even exponentially. There is a special mode in battle called 'glitch mode', where the characters transform into a battle form. Mai's is particularly... yander-ish? I mean, she wields a hatchet that looks like it is straight out Higurashi and her finishing move completes with her splatting the enemy with it.
For story, this game is split into SOL events with the orphans, story events at the end of each day, and events during the night exploration period. Needless to say, most of the important events happen at night, and they are often gruesome and horrifying. The mystery of La Choara is pretty horrifying, and insanity seems to be the name of the game at times. I do think that it stretches the limits of belief how Lottie and Lilliana fool themselves about people and what is going on while Mai keeps her mouth shut and her expression flat. Of course, that is part of the point... there is at least one point in every chapter where you can pick an option that kills you because you pushed too hard by making a certain choice or just stumbled down the wrong street.
In the end, the story was fun while it lasted, but this game is only around twenty hours long, so I blew through it in a week of playing it on and off. The question is, what did I think in the end? Well, I feel like I got my money's worth (All hail Steam sales!!!), and yuri-guro-horror-mystery is a genre I hadn't yet experienced, so that was new. However, I do feel like there were numerous points were just changing a few lines or adding in a little more detail would have made the events more emotionally powerful or impactful. If I had to give this game a rating on my VN scale, it would probably fall short of VN of the Month quality while still being worth having played.
Ryuusei World Actor Badge and Dagger
I'm going to be blunt, I'm not fond of what was done with the previous game, and I felt like this one was a repeat of the same mistakes. That's not to say there aren't a lot of good points to this game and its predecessor. Kinugasa Shougo is an excellent writer (as VN writers go) with a great skill in characterization and scenario design. However, just like the first game, this one cuts off without completing the story.
I'm not nearly as angry this time, as I was expecting it. This game was obviously meant to be just another part of a longer series of games (probably a trilogy, given the situation with Ruka at the end). I don't feel this game deserves a horrible rating, but I also feel that it doesn't deserve to be rated overly well until the series ends.
For those interested in the paths, a similar tactic to the original was taken here, where the heroines are mostly irrelevant except as characters. In a sense, that is even more true this time around. Ryouko and Fuyumi are never really presented as real heroines (for one, because their characterization is ridiculously weak), and one can't really call Ryouko's path Ryouko's path, since it is essentially semi-casual H on the way to progressing the main story instead of actual romance or a connection between the two.
Honestly, I felt that Kinugasa managed to be slightly less haphazard with the 'ending' while completely mishandling the heroines this time around. The cut-off for this game feels more like building up for another episode than an abrupt severing of the plot like the first game. However, in exchange, he botched the heroines.
I am not going to hate on this game as much as I did on the first... but I recommend that most people wait until the series concludes before playing to avoid frustration.
Dies Irae Interview with Kaziklu Bey
Yes, I finally pulled this one out of the dusty bin for a rainy day last week. My need for chuunige has been great lately, with there having been no new good ones since Silverio Ragnarok a little over a year ago and nothing since Trinity before that. I'm going to start out with a clear statement for those who have played Dies Irae but not this game... it quite surprisingly doesn't really add anything significant to the canon or exceed expectations, at least in my eyes.
This game is essentially an opportunity to get to know a character who was central to both KKK and Dies Irae but who generally took on the role of being kicked around in the latter and had an odder role in the former. Wilhelm Ehrinburg is a man who considers himself to be a vampire, reborn in the mud of the slums of Hamburg before World War II and the killing of his own parents. He is the kind of psychopathic monster that pops up periodically throughout human history (more often lately), and he was a perfect fit for the Black Round Table and its soul-sucking adherents. In Dies Irae, it is easy to perceive him for his humanity because there is a much crazier person in his immediate vicinity (Schrieber), but the fact is, he is the kind of person that would have ended up on death row in any peaceful era.
This game does a very, very good job of showing you Wilhelm's personality flaws, his hangups, and his particular 'curse' (if you are unfamiliar with Dies Irae, Mercurius essentially proclaims the 'curse' of each of the Black Round Table's members' destiny). The girl who serves as the heroine of the story is a perfect foil to his dark nature, a pure-hearted girl who, while born under similar circumstances, managed to be a person of virtue and piety.
This game is based in the 'blank period' between the historical assassination of Reinhardt Heydrich and the events of 1945 Berlin set in Dies Irae. This period is not referred to in the Dies Irae story in any significant fashion, and most of the characters tend to focus on the period before that assassination when reminiscing about the past in the original game. The exception would be Kristoff, whose fate was decided shortly after this game's ending.
This game was written by Masada, so it is obviously well-written and excessively wordy. Due to DMM's drm, I had to read it without aids of any sort, so my head was hurting seriously by the end (really, why does Masada feel the need to use so many obscure kanji I don't normally find in paper books, much less VNs?). Yes, I could have read it in English... but I think most of you know my hangups about reading other people's translations by this point.
There is only one serious battle in this game, which occurs toward the very end, and the game as a whole is much more predictable than most Masada games (mostly because it is made to fit within the canon, so you know certain people won't die and certain people probably are dead). However, I will say this game has a great deal of charm for someone who liked Dies Irae. Seeing the Black Round Table characters without the distraction of Ren's perspective or a short side-story was enlightening in some ways and in others only confirmed my impressions from the original.
In the end, the only conclusion I can give you as potential readers is that this game really is only valuable to fanboys of Dies Irae. Despite the chronological order, I don't recommend playing this first, as it spoils certain aspects of the setting you aren't supposed to know about to enjoy the story of the original. As a stand-alone chuunige, it just doesn't work, but as a side-story prequel, it is just fine.
This is the latest kemomomi VN from Lump of Sugar, whose best VNs all have kemomimi girls, lol. In this one, the protagonist Takuto and his little sister Shiina are transported to the world of the gods, where human perceptions of the world, mythology and legends come to life. As a game, this story feels a lot like a 'gentle and slow nakige'.
To be blunt, the first thing I think most people will note upon getting past the prologue of this game is... that Roka is the most moe-moe heroine they've seen in a VN in years. Roka, the kitsune, is probably the most perfectly moe character I've seen in an anime or VN since before 2010. The desire to pat her on the head and spoil her rotten was the first emotion I felt in this VN.
That said, I could do without her being a heroine. Does that sound odd to you? Well, I've never been fond of lolis as heroines, and lolis like Roka really seem like they shouldn't be heroines to me. Her mother, Kuzuha is much more to my tastes... to the point where I'm a bit irritated there isn't an extra H-scene for her, hahaha.
I got a bit off track with my kitsune moe obsession there...
Anyway, this VN has four heroines: Mikoto, the combined avatar of the Rabbit of Inaba and Tsukuyomi, who is a natural mischief-maker; Roka, the avatar of the concept of the nine-tailed fox, who is basically an adorable child being mothered by he predecessor; Chiyo, the embodiment of the concept of the Tsukumogami (objects that gained sentience from Japanese myth); and Shiina, the protagonist's stoic but mischievous little sister.
This VN is heavily winter-themed, based in an old-style Japanese town. The backgrounds are all beautiful and well-done, and it leads to a very 'cozy' feeling that enhances the slow and quiet feel of the game's atmosphere.
The common route of this VN is focused on the protagonist living a quiet life in the gods' realm while he waits for the chance to go back to the human realm, and it is pretty much a lot of cute and/or comedic sol with a surprising amount of traditional 'lucky sukebe'. While there isn't a lot to remark on here, I will say that the common route does a great job of filling out the heroines' personalities and background, thus fulfilling the role of helping you decide who to pursue first.
Roka
As I said above, I could have done without H content for Roka. However, seeing Roka's adorableness increase in her path made it worth playing. If you paid attention to the world-building in the common route, you can probably guess what the drama in the path is about. However, I will say that the ichaicha here is very reminiscent of the odd relationships between Makina and Yuuji in Grisaia and Tonoko and Tsukasa in Kamishino (hint-hint) at least in general outline. I found this path enjoyable and emotional, even if I didn't want any H for it.
Mikoto
Once you've played the common route, you'll probably be able to guess what the conflict of Mikoto's path is (they foreshadow both paths during the world-building). So, I'll focus on her personality. Mikoto is a 'stereotypical bunny girl' in some ways, and not so in others. Like the stereotypical bunnygirl, she gets lonely easily and has a somewhat dependent personality that she covers up with her smile. Unlike the stereotypical bunnygirl, its causes are a bit more esoteric and deeper than simply 'she is a bunny'. Overall, her path is even more emotional than Roka's, though there is a lot less cuteness (you all know from above about how I feel about Roka, lol). It also has a very, very extensive epilogue that made me smile through the catharsis of the main part of the path.
Chiyo
For those who are unfamiliar with the concept, a tsukumogami is generally an object that has been treated well and used constantly for over a century, causing it to become self-aware (this is why tsukumogami are usually things that would normally be well-preserved, like antique bowls, cups, chairs, swords, etc). Chiyo is the embodiment of the 'concept' of the tsukumogami rather than an actual tsukumogami, which means she doesn't have an object that serves as her real body.
Chiyo's path was the first one that wasn't foreshadowed in the world-building. It was also the strangest romance so far... not the least of which because Chiyo's desires are a bit different from human desires in some ways (well, I imagine there are people who have similar hangups, lol). It was actually a pretty decent path, but the drama felt more forced than either of the previous two paths, perhaps because Chiyo's character had no obvious issues that would cause drama on their own.
Shiina
If there was one word that would describe Shiina, it would be 'eccentric'. At first glance, Shiina seems like a stoic, unemotional heroine, but she frequently teases and makes jokes with a straight face. Her reactions are often off-center/odd compared to normal people.
I'm honestly glad I left this path to last, because my intuition screamed at me to do so from the beginning. I recommend that anyone who plays this game do this path after Mikoto's, at the very least, as playing this path will spoil the experience somewhat. Shiina's path is the most dramatic path in the game (and not for the usual incest reasons). It also has a large infodump about the general setting toward the end. For those who like incest paths, Shiina is a great imouto character, as well.
Conclusion
Lump of Sugar games tend to vary widely in quality, from total kusoge to kamige. While this one falls short of kamige level, it is nonetheless a first-class VN with a good story, excellent characters, and great characterization. I wouldn't object to future games being based in this setting, either, lol.
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b264/Rihochan/Ojomasu.png
Now, this was a game I didn't really have high hopes for, but I am glad to say that I was pleasantly surprised. While this falls short of kamige level (primarily due to the disproportionately short epilogues), it is definitely an interesting take on the trap protagonist ojousama-ge.
Generally speaking, trap protagonists and ojousama-ge go together like hot fruit pie and ice cream. While the formula (begun with the original Shugotate by AXL) hasn't changed significantly since it came into existence, it has a lot of minor variants. However, in this case they took a rather unusual path with the character settings... for one thing, the protagonist is not the timid type in any way, shape or form. For better or worse, most of the trap protagonists in these games are somewhat timid but talented and deeply kind-hearted or are actually almost afraid of women (for hilarity's sake). The protagonist in this game, Hajime, is an agent for an organization that primarily involves itself with money and politics, for no apparent goal beyond gathering power to itself. Is it an evil organization? The question is hard to answer based on what comes up in the game, but I sort of lean toward yes, considering what gets revealed in Arika's path.
Hajime is cool-headed, ambitious, and pragmatic on most issues. He does have a tendency to help people where he can, but he doesn't go out of his way to help people that aren't actually in front of him. He is also capable of being coldly manipulative when responding to the orders of the organization. He also has none of the usual hesitations or inhibitions this type of protagonist tends to have about sex (he rather casually mentions he enjoys it but is quite capable of going without... and proves it). This makes for some... interesting situations. This definitely isn't a pure love game, but it isn't a nukige by any stretch of the imagination either. The common route is seriously long...
While there are numerous characters in this game, there are only three heroines. They are: Arika (the granddaughter of his organization's leader), Benio (a young girl from an influential kenjutsu/kendo dojo), and Peko (the princess of a fictional East European country). The other girls are basically Hajime's targets... he needs to gain influence over them for the sake of his mission, but they aren't love interests in the context of the game. In fact, he rather coldly manipulates some of them, albeit not in a way that harms them (he actually helps them, in his own way).
Arika is... one strange girl. In some ways, she is reminiscent of Kamio Ami from Semiramis no Tenbin. However, she is far more open about her nature (she is a mischief-maker who just enjoys making situations more chaotic for her own amusement), and she isn't a near-sociopath. She simply displays her affections in ways that are extremely troubling to anyone and everyone involved... or even merely in the vicinity. She is also extremely lazy about anything she doesn't have an interest in.
Benio is Arika's opposite. She is simple, straightforward, and rather obvious about everything. She is a lover of the way of the sword and has no real hesitation about living to become the next head of her rather large clan's dojo. That said, she is rather blind to anything that isn't on the surface, and she frequently gets into fights with Arisa, who seems to take an endless pleasure in setting her off.
Peko is perhaps the most easy to understand heroine in the group. She is very kind-hearted and sensitive, with a strong sense of compassion and dignity fitting for postmodern royalty. That said, she also has a surprisingly strong will hidden under that soft surface, and it comes out in full in her path.
Overall, I found this game to be an immensely pleasurable experience, and while I could have used more action scenes and perhaps more cold-blooded manipulation on the part of Arika and the protagonist... this still turned out to be a game worth remembering. I'm glad that this month already has at least one solid VN of the Month candidate, hahaha...
Raillore is 3rdeye's most recent chuunige, made back in 2019. At the time, I tried to play it and dropped it after the prologue, for a number of reasons. The primary reason was the lack of narration in combat scenes... For some reason, 3rdEye has almost no narration in this game, comparative even to charage. Instead, battle scenes are done using CGs, brief animations, and sound-effects. Unfortunately, this means you generally have no idea of what is going on, due to the limitations of such things. The second issue was the second protagonist, who is your classic sorta former-criminal dameningen, Grey. Grey is... very familiar. He is the type of guy who has frustrated anime, manga, and LN fans for decades with being the lazy and feckless bastard who is only good at tricking people. This type of protagonist makes for a very predictable story that is not in the least bit interesting, at least in my experience. The last was the pacing... which is generally awful. Though, it is hard not to be awful when no real effort is put into explaining the world outside of the ever-increasing number of encyclopedia terms hidden behind the game's clunky menu.
Supposedly, Raillore is at least a few generations later than us, after some kind of apocalypse that destroys civilizations and leaves pockets of people with weak superpowers excavating the ruins of their ancestors living in primitive cities like Raillore. At some point before the story began, some people began losing their original superpower and gaining the power to transform relics of the old civilization into working artifacts. Unfortunately, due to several incidents, these poor individuals experience extreme persecution and, at first, are hunted to death then later are inserted into a machine that erases their power and memories.
The first of the protagonists is Reno, one of the two boys in the prologue, who has been through enough hell that his personality seems to have been cut down until he became a machine-like warrior existing only to follow orders. He is a Snatcher, (so is Grey), his power allowing him to take others' superpowers temporarily and convert them into power to fuel is much more powerful superpower, which increases all of his physical abilities in exchange for transforming his personality into a berserker of sorts. Since Reno is already at Cloud (from FF7) levels of physical ability even before the transformation, this means stone buildings blowing apart at a blow and tiles cracking just from him running around, lol.
Snatchers seem to suffer under a similar - if less intense- level of prejudice from the population of the city. Snatchers are generally feared and used as weapons by the authorities, partnering them with powerful supers who are tasked with judging when is best to give them permission to 'Plunder' others' powers.
All of this means that if I hadn't had to dig for every, single, frigging detail by going through the encyclopedia there was an immense amount of potential for this setting. There is a lot that could be played with to make the story interesting, but the fact that you have to actually search for even vague details means that there is no real enjoyment from the world-building aspect.
Similarly, this game's story should have been interesting, the battles should have been epic, and the characters should have been memorable...
Unfortunately, 3rdEye's approach to the game meant that none of these promises were fulfilled. In a VN, especially an action VN and/or a plotge, narration is the foundation of the story. You can fool around with visuals all you want to color in the gaps and give people something to build on, but it is the narration that makes the story. The near-complete lack of narration in this game, particularly in battle scenes and important story scenes, is fatal to this game's quality.
Saga Frontier is one of the most oddball rpgs to have been released on the ps1, and the ps1 was long considered the 'era of classics' for all jrpg-dom, with remakes of the earlier major names and innumerable newer classics being released for the system. The Saga series in general is something of an acquired taste, due to the sheer opaqueness of the leveling mechanics and odd, often nonsensical experimentation with random game elements.
In terms of game mechanics, Saga Frontier is easily the most well-explored of the series. It's devoted cult of fanboys and -girls have revealed everything of consequence about the original version over the years, so how much is this changed from the original?
First of all, for those of you who have played the original, a number of quality of life improvements. The ability to quicksave and autosaves at important points mean you are far less likely to trap yourself into having to spend hours regaining progress. The immense expansion of save slots makes it possible to backtrack when you underleveled for the final zones. As important in its own way, the spark trees and probabilities for weapon/fist techniques have been unified into a single one usable by all human and half-mystic characters. Last of all, New Game+ lets you bring over character progress, money, skills, and items between paths, making it unnecessary to keep re-leveling them each time you start a new character path.
However, for true fanboys, the true wow moment is the added content. Now, Saga Frontier is a game that is very sparse on active storytelling. It has the same 'silent presentation of the environment' that can be seen in a lot of the pre-2000 jrpgs taken to extremes, and this is the primarily element that takes the Saga series into a niche of its own. More than anything, I loved that they added in all the cut-out content from the original... especially a ton of content in Asellus's story, which was my favorite and most painful (leveling Asellus is painful at first) path from the original. This includes extra ways to get out of the first area (depending on your method, you end up in different places and have slightly different experiences), the fixing of the old Asellus path bug that sometimes made it difficult to get the Half-mystic or human endings, and a general polishing of the experience in general.
The other chunk of added content is the Fuse path. In the original game, Fuse was a curiosity of a character usually gained too late for him to be of any use (the method for obtaining him requires confronting a firebird on steroids who can incinerate your party in one hit). In this game, he has his own path, which is essentially his case files on each of the characters where his own work intersected with theirs. Since these are always told from his - slightly narcissistic - point of view, they are highly amusing to someone who has finished all the other paths. While this path doesn't add anything story-wise, it is still funny to go through.
Now for my assessment of the base game...
First, the most opaque of the game mechanics, the Battle Rank System. To be honest, this is perhaps the easiest way for someone new to the series to self-sabotage. Every battle you undertake, whether it is against a slime or a dragon, upgrades your Battle Rank (which is unseen), eventually unleashing upon you a new tier of enemies for you to fight. To be blunt, if you sit around in the first area killing the same things, the game punishes you with monsters that can one-shot you in the next area, because you raised the battle rank too high. This means that grinding essentially requires you to leave whatever dungeon you are in every once in a while to upgrade the enemies into something you can actually gain upgrades off of.
That brings me to the second unusual mechanic, the leveling system. Saga Frontier and the series in general doesn't have linear numbered leveling such as is seen in Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy. Instead, depending on probability mechanics and what you did in the battle (hit stuff with the sword alone, used techniques, used magic, etc) you gain a stat upgrade of some sort at the end of battle, though this slows if you are fighting enemies below your character's (hidden) level. What adds an element of annoyance to this is that the probability of whether you get any gains or not is heavily dependent on the enemy group you encounter. This makes only a few of the scaling areas attractive for grinding (pretty much just the Bio Research Lab, which always has the top tier of the battle rank).
Last of all is sparking... which is the process of gaining new skills, techniques, and magic. If you use a sword in combat, your character will not only gain physical stats at the end of battle, but there is also a chance - based on the enemy's 'spark value' (a hidden factor) that your character will be inspired and obtain a new tech or magic. Sword and fist techniques are sparked randomly based on which tech or whether you simply used the weapon devoid of techs. Gun techniques are based off of you using a gun and are given to you after battle. Sparking magic requires that the character using the magic have its 'gift' (gained through quests), have used that school of magic during the battle, and the character's intelligence stat.
For story, Saga Frontier will always be a somewhat disappointing game, despite the sheer beauty of its visuals. There will be innumerable times any given player will have wished for a few extra lines to flesh out a dialogue or for clearer hints to find the next place you need to go. The fact that NPC dialogue doesn't really change significantly between paths says a lot in and of itself, and this is a common complaint for people who play any Saga game.
The fact that I found this to be an immensely enjoyable game is as much nostalgia as the game's actual worth.
Ryuukishi Bloody Saga might very well be the best unique work Akabei Soft 3 has created in the time since ABS2 forced a bunch of subsidiaries to merge to create it. It is a work I also come back to every few years simply because it holds a unique place in my heart.
Ryuukishi is the sequel to Ryakudatsusha no In'en, a Clock-up style super-violent H-horror VN written expressly for the purpose of setting up things for Ryuukishi. As such, to understand this VN, you have to understand the events of Ryakudatsusha, at least to some extent. Ryuukishi is written on the tacit understanding that you already know Roy's background, and there is little to no attempt to explain his personality or actions in the actual VN. Indeed, effort is made to keep you out of Roy's mind 90% of the time, with much of the story told from an unobtrusive 3rd person perspective.
For those who don't want to go through a Clock Up style experience, I'll explain the events in Ryakudatsusha (an outline) in the spoiler box below.
The Ryuukishi setting is one closer to the Witcher than to the Lord of the Rings. Humans only kill those monsters that exist with great effort (though weaker ones like goblins can be beaten easily one on one), and it isn't uncommon for areas to be plagued by monster attacks, though this has apparently lessened in recent times, as methods of driving them away (through planting certain plants that repel monsters and such) have been established. On the other hand, magic seems to be fading to the point where most cities have never seen a magic-user and only know magical energy as a legend, even if they see monsters on a regular basis. Roy himself, despite being a traveler, has never seen magic or magical energy used, to give you a reference point.
Roy is working as a traveling apothecary when the story begins, arriving in Vilduun, a walled city constantly plagued by the attacks of a red dragon. Roy, being obsessed with helping others, promptly plies his trade without compensation for the people of the city in the wake of the most recent attack. This leads to him being invited to live in the knights' garrison even as he helps with reconstruction. He also finds himself being watched over by four female knights (yes, this is a true harem VN) who have varying degrees of interest in him, ranging from budding attraction the case of Saria to suspicion in the case of Lize.
Generally speaking, the story is somewhat slow early on, and there is no dramatic scene where Roy shows up the knights as you might expect in another fantasy action VN. Instead, Roy serves as a constant catalyst for change, as events slowly build up momentum. Later on, there are some excellent action scenes and CGs, but those really are late in the VN.
Story-wise, this most recent playthrough has shown me how clever the design of the scenario was. Relatively minor characters like the Vice-Commander Malter and the seeming weakest of the heroines, Lize often serve to move the story along and prevent any sense of monotony. The villain characters (yes they exist) serve as counterpoints to the more 'normal' people in the story and echo Roy's past.
In the end, Ryuukishi is a story of redemption, where a man with a tortures past and a constant smile breaks free from that past and becomes something better.
Duelist Engage is one of a number of VNs I was pretty sure I underrated relative to my time doing VN of the Month. The fact that the VN stuck in my mind even almost a decade later says that this supposition was most likely correct. Thankfully, after replaying it (after so long it was mostly new to me) I found that this supposition was correct.
Before I dig into story and character issues, I need to note that one way this VN stands out over modern charage is the expressiveness of the heroine sprites. Before I went back and played this, I never realized just how much the expressiveness of VN sprites has decreased over the years, as well as the lack of any individuality. Certain restrictive conventions that came into place later on (no bangs overhanging the eyes, no extreme changes in posture, etc) are not found in this VN, and it is surprising the degree to which this gives each character sprite more impact. Monaka and Tomoe (his mother) in particular have extremely expressive sprites with a distinctive style and posture that is notably different from what you see in later VNs, even those just three or four years later.
It needs to be said that this is an old-style VN. That comes with positives and negatives. Old-style VNs tended to have stronger heroine routes than newer ones, and characterization was often more extreme to emphasize charm points of the various heroines. Newer VNs tend to be a bit more subtle with heroine characterization, and there is a lot less reliance on dramatic entrances and extreme personality traits. This led to a tendency - particularly in charage - for everyday life dominating VNs, versus the comedy drama that tended to be more ever-present in earlier VNs. It's a matter of opinion as to which approach is better, but I generally prefer the older style.
In this VN, the protagonist, Yukito, for the sake of saving his mother's restaurant, has to marry someone from Colangrein (initially his arranged fiance, Violetta) in order to gain access to an inheritance from his father. However, Violetta is a knight and immediately challenges him to a duel, with a ballooning series of antics going out from there as more and more heroines get dragged into a traditional 'shuraba' (numerous girls competing for a single - usually donkan - guy's attention). I'm not going to go into individual heroine routes, so I'll just give you an idea of what the game is like in general.
The heroines include: his fiance Violetta; his childhood friend Monaka; the aggressive loli (one year younger) Erica; the mysterious former student council president, Tsubaki; and the meek but surprisingly big-hearted Hina.
Violetta is your traditional stick-up-the-rear-end heroine, who refuses to marry anyone weaker than herself and is driven to achieve her ambition of becoming the next Knight King of Colangrein. While she is essentially good-hearted, her competitive side dominates her most of the time, and she naturally takes control of most situations just by being present. On the other hand, she is needlessly stubborn and surprisingly cute when she thinks no one is watching.
Monaka is the protagonist's osananajimi (tsundere due to the fact that Yukito is as dense as a warship's hull). Like a lot of early such relationships, the protagonist goes to wake her up at the neighbor's house every morning and feeds her as naturally as one would a pet. That said, Monaka isn't as much of a wild child as others of this particular achetype tend to be. While she can be aggressive, she is surprisingly thoughtful when it comes to others' feelings, which drives her crazy when Yukito fails utterly to notice her infatuation with him.
Erica is the token loli of the VN (token lolis were almost universal in old-style VNs, even chuunige). Like a lot of such characters, she is as childish as her physical appearance would indicate. However, this comes from her upbringing being a mixture of mental abuse and extreme sheltering. Her family isn't exactly warm-hearted, and her bodyguards are constantly trying to rein her in, thus leaving her devoid of anyone close enough to really serve as a mentor or role model.
Tsubaki is your standard Yamato Nadeshiko heroine... on the surface. She has a lot of things roiling beneath that calm and elegant exterior, not the least of which being an extremely aggressive personality that is a good match for that of Violetta, when provoked. She is also desperately poor, living in the belltower of the school, despite being a relative to a wealthy family.
Hina is the most 'normal' of the heroines (even compared to Monaka). At first she merely seems meek and timid, and this is a valid assessment much of the time. However, she has the force of personality necessary to remain next to someone like Erica without being overpowered, and she is perhaps the most honest with herself of all the heroines, especially when it comes to Yukito.
One thing that struck me when I played through the paths was the consistency of the main storyline. Like many early charage, this game has a solid main storyline that continues into the various heroine routes (albeit with dramatically different events following the split), and no relevant element of the setting is left ignored. The fights/duels, while not on the level of a true action VN, are still of some interest when they happen. In addition, this VN was really good at creating an emotional attachment to the heroines, which is an area where most charage tend to fail in the last five years or so.
Conclusion
Duelist x Engage is an excellent example of the best of the nascent era of charage, when they were just gaining momentum as a genre. As a result, it stands out greatly when compared to the charage of today, which tend to be more bland and mundane in comparison. For those who want a bit more substance to their charage, this is an excellent choice.
Tsukiakari Lunch is an oddball game that, despite the fact that I was in a particularly miserable state when I originally played it, I couldn't help but fall in love with. I was playing it in thirty minute snatches in between some of the hardest work I've ever done, and it took me almost two weeks (that's a long time for me) to finish it. Because of the way I played it, I've always felt that I didn't really do it justice, so I have wanted to go back and play this for years. I recommend it to people, but I couldn't really say I had a clear memory of all that went on it.
This game's structure is setup so that you first see the prologue (without going to the menu screen) and once you are done with the prologue, you go to the menu screen and start the main game. When the main game starts, you are immediately asked to pick one of the four heroines. The individual paths then proceed from there (and are of a pretty good length, though not as long as a chuunige path) to one of two endings (a bad ending or a normal/good ending).
This story is based in Hoshikage Gakuen, a mysterious school where it is always night and during the two hours of 'Lunchtime', a creepy period where color seems leeched from the world, shadows attack and individuals called 'Witches' seek to devour anyone else they find. The protagonist of this story, Shiki Haruhiko, is a wannabe teacher who wakes up with Fuyu, one of the heroines, sticking a gun in his face (what looks to be a Mauser C96). The situation that proceeds from there eventually leads to him meeting the four heroines... and finding out that one of the ways to leave the school and return to their various worlds is for someone to grant their wishes... with the catch that none of them remember those wishes (so remembering the wish is part of the journey). The nature of these wishes is such that they could not, under any circumstances, be granted in the worlds from which they came.
The Heroines
Fuyu- Fuyu is the first heroine the protagonist meets. She is an emotionless girl with an extensive knowledge of fighting, survival, and killing who always acts in a rational way and displays (and for the most part, feels) no emotion. Like all the girls in this game except for Aki, she lacks common reference points with the others, because her world is one that has been at war for so long that they are down to children and young women... and nobody else. It is so bad that she seems to honestly have no idea of the causes of the war or why anyone is fighting, save for survival.
Aki- The second heroine (and the one unlocked after all the others). Aki is a quiet, kind-hearted girl who tends to keep her emotions bound up inside. She is the most 'normal' of the girls on the surface, and she can generally be depended on to give good advice at the right times. She is probably from a world similar to that of Haruhiko, because she understands his perspective well and naturally enough (they share reference points). However, this is not certain, because she has no memories, including her name (Aki being the name Haruhiko gives her).
Natsuno- The third girl to arrive, a bundle of curiosity and smiles from a world where technology has advanced to the point where people are overseen by their computers, kept locked into a virtual space from birth to death, without any interaction with one another. She is a genius, capable of creating machines to do just about anything in minimal amounts of time, and she is curious about everything, especially other people. Because she has never had any real contact with others, her innocence is sometimes jarring on matters of interpersonal communication.
Avrill- A young princess from a world where humans wield swords and magic desperately to fend off hordes of monsters that plague their lives every day. She is definitely a leader type, with a tendency to forge ahead and take control of situations. However, she is rarely without a smile on her face, and she can be depended on to tease Haruhiko constantly. Above all the others, her personality is the most mature, most likely because she has, unlike Natsuno, experienced the dark sides of the world, and, unlike Fuyu, understands the emotions and feelings of others.
The Witches
Nishino- The individual responsible for summoning Haruhiko, an ever-smiling witch who loves nothing more than toying with others and watching their reactions. Like all witches, she loses her ability to think rationally and is driven by the desire to devour non-Witches during Lunchtime, but most of the time, she is actually fairly helpful. She is an alchemist and doll-user.
Kitayama- The resident witch of the infirmary, a handsome male witch with a tendency to sit around just putting his life into his research. He is a sorcerer type (magical attacks and the like). He is very wise... but like all the other witches, he too loses his rationality at Lunchtime and is driven by the desire to devour others.
Azuma- A cold-eyed witch who wanders the halls of Hoshikage at random, searching for quiet places to be alone. While she is apparently close to Nishono, her reactions even to her tend to be very kuudere-ish. She really does resent interruptions and having people chat her up, and she likes even less other people asking her for help.
Minami- A kind-hearted witch who ends up serving as Haruhiko's assistant homeroom teacher. Her gentle manner and inability to handle sexual jokes hide a surprisingly sharp mind. She warns the most strongly of the witches about running if they meet her during Lunchtime, and she can be made to blush easily by Haruhiko's stare or oddly suave words (since he never talks that way to anyone else).
The Paths
Fuyu
Fuyu's path begins with the protagonist, Haruhiko, gradually gaining understanding of her as an individual, pulling out the emotions she cut away to allow herself to survive. Fuyu's transformation from what amounts to a living doll to a warm-hearted and deeply loving (almost motherly) woman is one of my favorite parts of this game, even aside from the reasonably good battle scenes. This path is highly emotional, in part because her wish is so basic that in any sane world it would have been possible to grant without being dragged into Hoshikage Gakuen. I spent the last thirty minutes solid crying.
Natsuno
This is becoming almost a theme for this VN, but I spent most of the last part of this VN in or on the verge of tears. Seeing Natsuno evolve from a true innocent into someone who understands at least something of how actions have consequences was interesting... and the relationship between her and the protagonist is gentle and beautiful. Sadly, I can't go into details, because that would spoil the path... but it ends on a somewhat bittersweet note (the bad ending is sort of sexy).
Avril
Avril's path, while having a some dramatic moments at the beginning, is mostly a gentle one. Like the previous two paths, this path was about the heroine's personal growth and her achieving a personal salvation that wasn't possible on her own world, a world plagued by endless hordes of monsters. Like Natsuno's path, the road to the ending is full of love, joy, and salvation... even for the witches. The ending, true to form, is bittersweet. I also recommend that people play this path third, regardless of the order you played Natsuno and Fuyu's paths, because the after scene is too revealing about what lies behind the scenes of the stage they are acting upon.
Aki
Of course, Aki's path is the final path, revealing everything that lies behind the curtain (as opposed to merely hinting or giving you bits and pieces, like the others). You find out what precisely the 'witches' are and the how and why of Hoshikage Gakuen's existence and purpose. However, like all the others, it begins with opening the heroine's heart to the protagonist... but in the process, you also learn about the hidden aspects of Shiki Haruhiko's own presence in the school. This path has a happy ending, and it also shows ending parts for the other three heroines that tell you what happened to them 'afterward', leaving you satisfied as to their fates.
Conclusion
As I always thought, I definitely underestimated this VN due to my situation at the time I originally read it in 2013 (I already updated my rating of it on vndb). Though I knew most of the important details (remembered them), I still laughed, cried, and enjoyed the process of figuring out the school with them. One thing that I didn't mention above is the degree to which the paths reveal individual witches' fundamental humanity, which periodically switches to the monstrous shell they wear during 'Lunchtime'. I should note that the Bad Endings for Natsuno and Aki are worth watching, simply because the endings are in the best tradition of such endings.
Overall, I can honestly state this game is a kamige. It has everything, good music, good visuals, an excellent plot, near-perfect pacing, and great characters. The stylistic choices in the writing at certain points were a true work of art, and I can honestly recommend this game to anyone who wants a good cry.
This might seem like an odd choice for a blog post, but it should be noted that, after more then twelve years and seven hundred VNs, remembering each and every one is impossible. In fact, I hardly recall roughly 70% of all the VNs I've played, and less than 10% are memorable enough that I consider replaying them once in a great while. I'm somewhat infamous for my lists, but I figured one more wouldn't hurt. Remember, these are the VNs I still remember to the point where I can state almost everything about what I like and hate about each. This list is going to be split into two parts, the VNs I loved and the VNs I loved to hate.
The VNs I loved to Hate
Suburashiki Hibi- Yes, I hate this VN. In truth, I hate almost everything written by Sca-ji that I've read. Sca-ji's style drives me up the wall (for some reason, it presses all the wrong buttons), and his love of unreliable narrators only makes it worse. Suburashiki Hibi is just the most obvious example of a VN I can't forget, even though I want to, badly. I can admit that Suburashiki Hibi is interesting... but to me that just doesn't stop me from hating it anyway.
Aiyoku no Eustia- For a chuunige fan like me to actually outright hate a chuunige is actually fairly difficult. 90% of the reason I eventually came to hate Eustia was because of its true/Eustia route. I didn't like Caim's rapid personality change, the fact that elements of the setting introduced in Eustia's path make all other paths impossible, and I absolutely loathed Eustia herself (what is it with the love for the helpless and frail heroine in some games?). That said, it doesn't change the fact that I liked most of the game before I got onto Eustia's path... but it does mean that I will never admit this is a truly great game.
Ryuusei World Actor- Similarly to above, this is a chuunige I love to hate, despite it being memorable. There is one simple reason for this... it was made to be a prequel rather than a whole game in and of itself. There is no sense of completion, no satisfaction to be gained by completing this story. In addition, it was only recently that its sequel was - finally - announced. Worse, Kinugasa Shougo's style of never really explaining the setting, except in the most oblique of fashions, greatly harms the enjoyment of this game's plot. In the case of his previous works, it was relatively easy to extrapolate and speculate yourself into an understanding of the setting based on what was there, but there is a definite sense that way too much is left unsaid about this setting.
Sakura no Uta- Oddly, this is a game I thought I would have loved, given the twisted relationships and messy backstory involved. However, once again Sca-Ji's style of presentation and love of unreliable narrators drove me nuts. Not to mention the constant abuse of foreshadowing and repetition
VNs I Love so much they are unforgettable
Dies Irae- Obviously, Dies Irae is one of the penultimate chuunige ever made. While I personally think Masada turned into a complete incompetent after KKK, there is no denying the quality of Dies Irae's narrative, its characters, and the way it seems to age so well. Dies Irae is one of those rare VNs that doesn't suffer at all from the passing of a decade or more between its original release and now. That isn't to say it hasn't been left behind somewhat by the conventions of the genre, but in the end, that doesn't matter as much as you would think it would.
Fate/Stay Night- Arguably the VN that turned chuunige from a mere curiosity to an actual niche genre. While many people have a love/hate relationship with Shirou and the Nasuverse, there is no denying that much of the game is enjoyable and it embodies most of the virtues and flaws of the early era of the genre.
Draculius- The VN that changed my viewpoint on the harem ending and actually did vampires right (outside of the comedy, anyway). In all honesty, before I picked it up at random, I had no idea this would become one of my most-replayed VNs of all time. While this game has aged poorly in some ways, in others it's presentation is almost ideal.
Evolimit- In my mind, this game is Higashide's masterpiece, the defining game of his career, whereas others will argue that it was Ayakashibito. However, for all that I enjoyed Ayakashibito, this is the game I go back to play over and over, whenever I want my faith in JVNs revived.
Devils Devel Concept- No, this is not the best game out there. It is a total niche within a niche game. I love its characters and setting, but most people would probably drop it solely based on the artwork. Devils Devel Concept taught me that the protagonist didn't need to be the good guy to be interesting and that heroines didn't need to be fainting lilies to make a chuunige work.
Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- Let's be clear... visually this game has aged horribly. It is from a much earlier era than most of the games on this list and it shows. However, I have to note that it is one of the single best nakige ever made. I can still go back and cry for Tonoko, Shino, and Miyabi no matter how many times I replay it, and the sense of salvation after the end of one of those three paths, the catharsis is so strong that my stress buildup is perfectly lanced afterward.
Houkago no Futekikakusha- I frequently give this as an example of the ideal 'hard' utsuge. The situation the protagonist is in is hopeless from the beginning, and his suffering his pre-determined. Moreover, when the story begins he is already broken almost beyond repair. The way it is presented provides great catharsis, though like many hard utsuge, the setting is all over the place.
Konata yori Kanata Made- Many consider the first Konakana to be the ideal for the 'soft' utsuge genre, and I don't generally bother to argue with them. While similar games were made later on occasion, one can always feel the influence of this game in them, often to the point where it feels like they are almost plagiarizing parts of it.
Akatsuki no Goei- I have a love/hate relationship with Kinugasa Shougo. He hates completing stories, he never explains anything unless he has to, and his endings are always open-ended unless he is coerced to make them not so. Akatsuki no Goei (the series) embodies him at his best, with Kaito being a complex character that only appears to be your typical 'dameningen' protagonist if you aren't paying attention.
Hapymaher- What often comes back to me about Hapymaher, compared to later Purple Soft games, was the ideal synchronicity of its aesthetic and its music. It is very, very rare for me to bother complementing a VN on its music, since most essentially use rearrangements of old BGMs without accounting for unique themes and atmosphere. While there are some severe obstacles to making this an easily replayable game (the Christmas arc is overwhelmingly boring the second time around), it is still a VN worth experiencing.
Semiramis no Tenbin- Semiramis no Tenbin is an oddity. It is a game based in a school setting in modern Japan that doesn't gloss over Japan's social flaws or exaggerate them to excess. I say this because the Japanese are as good at pretending certain issues don't exist as we white Americans have been at pretending racism doesn't exist. Not to mention that the beginning of this game locked it in my memory eternally.
Nanairo Reincarnation- This is one of the few games in my VN experience that I actually out and out named a kamige on first playthrough. I don't regret it today, and I don't think I ever will. I could put down any number of reasons to love this game, but it is better, in this case, for readers to make their own conclusions.
Akeiro Kaikitan- I mostly chose to keep multiple VNs by the same author and team off this list. However, I should note that I have actually replayed Akeiro six times since its original release... despite it having been released in 2016, a mere six years ago. I play it about once, sometimes twice a year. Why? Because it is still interesting no matter how many times I read it. The presentation of the various paths is about as close to the storyteller's ideal as it is possible to get, making it difficult to get truly bored of if you put some time in between replays.
Komorebi no Nostalgica- Say what you like about Takaya Aya, but his moments of brilliance definitely leave an impression. Komorebi no Nostalgica is easily the best (mostly) non-action sci-fi VN I've ever read. Ironically, the primary reason for this is how the central non-heroine character, Cinema is handled in the various paths. It is impossible to fully explain to someone who hasn't played the game just how powerful a role Cinema plays as a supporting character as well as the game's central character, and I'm not even going to try here.
Ayakashibito- While Evolimit is my favorite Higashide game, I can't fail to mention Ayakashibito here. Ayakashibito is the work of a genius, and it most definitely shows. It was also the VN that first showed Higashide's basic style, which almost always utilizes a protagonist with an intimate relationship with the true heroine that continues to thrive regardless of heroine choice. Ayakashibito is less refined than Evolimit, but in exchange, it also feels more freeform than some of his later works. It also established his creation of high-quality antagonists (Kuki Youkou, Shannon Wordsworth, etc).
Ruitomo- Ruitomo is probably the most famous of all the Akatsuki Works games, for good reason. It is a high-quality classic plotge from an era where such games were relatively plentiful, and its style was the one that defined the expectations of fans for the company's games, though they later took things in a more action-focused direction.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier- This VN is one I push for weaboos who like the romanticized eras (Sengoku Jidai, Bakumatsu era, etc). It is based in an alternate world where young Japanese women are sometimes chosen by 'demon-aura stones' that grant them immense physical powers and heightened intelligence in exchange for being unable to have children and being naturally more aggressive than is the norm. As a result, these women are generally adopted by samurai families and raised to be bodyguards, assassins, and in various other roles normally reserved for men. The protagonist is a young man raised by a feminized version of Kondou Isao and Hijikata Toshizo and is essentially Okita Soujirou. It begins previous to the formation of the Roshigumi and branches off after the initial stages of the rebellion that began the collapse of Tokugawa power.
Sekien no Inganock- This is pretty much the only Liar Soft game I didn't have trouble playing. In retrospect, it isn't as good as I remember it being, but it is still enjoyable.
Majikoi- Say what you want about Majikoi. Various people either love or hate it and everything by Minato Soft, but I personally think it was an excellent base that they used effectively to milk the setting. Later games and fandiscs added depth to the characters and expanded the cast, and this, the original was a great game (in my eyes) in itself.
Grisaia- Probably the most popular VN to introduce VNs to newbies now that Tsukihime and FSN have become so dated as to be almost unreadable for new people. Like many VNs that got translated, it has a lot of people either worshipping or hating on it, but its quality (in Japanese) is undeniable.
Soukou Akki Muramasa- Easily the best game Nitroplus has ever produced. While it is a heavy read, it is also a VN worth reading at least once, if you have the mastery of Japanese to do so. However, it is also emotionally draining, so many who start it never finish it.
Hello, Lady- I could have chosen any of Akatsuki Works' chuunige, but with the final version of the game that includes the FD routes and the new true route, this game has easily become my favorite Hino Wataru game.
Kitto Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo- A game by Shumon Yuu. Nothing else needs to be said. Play it, or you aren't a true JVN fanboy.
Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide- An oddball sort of chuunige by Shumon Yuu. This one is fully voiced (protagonist included) and has a solid story and cast of characters.
Silverio Trinity- of the three Silverio games, I'll say right off that this is the one I liked the most. While Vendetta has some great moments, Trinity is where I thought the setting first came alive truly.
Sakura, Moyu- Honestly, I think this is the best VN, by far, that Favorite has produced. I cried more while I played this game than in all the other games combined, and I was more emotionally invested in the story than any of them by far.
This is the newest game by Minato Soft, the makers of Majikoi. As per usual, I'll be straight with yall and say that I thought this would end up essentially being a slice-of-life failure like a lot of Minato Soft's non-Majikoi VNs. However, this game is actually much closer to a chuunige in nature than I anticipated. In the end, I gave this one of the highest ratings I've given in a long while, but there are some issues, which I'll mention farther along.
Wagahime's protagonist is a young lad from the frontier called Shaon, the adopted son of the Great Tenken Master Figaro. Shaon is, personality wise, very much like the harem protagonists you see so often in charage. However, he does have the will to fight when necessary and the ability to commit to a course of action when needed, so he definitely stands well above that crowd. At the beginning, Shaon contracts with the Artificial God, Minjara, and gains the power to fight like, well... a god for three minutes every three days, in addition to his pre-existing Tenken, which lets him heal and strengthen others. He then sets off on a journey to see the world and find a wife, along with his little sister Ebiita and his father's friend Peta (a sapient rabbit-type person).
One negative I have to put forth about this VN, though it makes sense considering that the Tenmazoku route is the true one, is that the route order is locked, forcing you to do the Empire and Federation before you can do the Tenmazoku (Krone). There is no common route. Instead, there is a storyline for each country, with a single heroine (and a bunch of fake endings with other girls that just consist of H-scenes). In the case of the Empire, it is the Empress Noa. In the case of the Federation, it is the proxy PM, Erin; and in the case of the Tenmazoku, it is the Tenmaou (Queen of the Tenma) Krone.
Empire
The Empire route is the most SOL-friendly of the three routes, focusing on Shaon journeying across the empire, then his time in the capital, before the climax of the story. Due to events early on, Shaon gets his foot in the door and meets Noa in a fashion that is relatively realistic, albeit only within the setting (it requires suspension of disbelief that a 700 year-old Empire would fail to insulate their royals better from the nobility and commoners). Shaon, given his bond with Minjara, of course quickly manages to gain the interest of a number of players in the political game, making his stay there the most complicated of the three, in terms of personal relationships.
In many ways, this path justifies the locking of the paths the most. The drama here would lose most of its impact if you were aware of the events of the Tenmazoku path, and the drama is pretty good. Action scenes here are very similar to those of Majikoi, albeit often longer-lasting (Momoyo not being there to end things in an instant and most people being on more even terms when it comes to power). The romance portions are pretty innocent as these things go, though the issue of social status does come up (and is promptly squished).
The Federation
The Federation path starts a bit more abruptly than that of the Empire. The Federation is a nation formed on the old frontiers of the Empire by escaped slaves and dissidents from one of the darker eras of that nation. It is a nation of numerous races with a system whereby each province selects a governor, who then votes for the PM. The PM is more of a 'first amongst equals' than a true federalist leader, and the elections are often... lively beforehand.
This path is more action-packed from beginning to end than either of the other two paths, for reasons that make perfect sense as part of the story. Erin, the heroine of this path, is an elf and a politician, through and through. That is not to say she is black-hearted. Rather, she is perfectly willing to use every opportunity to gain positive publicity in the course of pursuing the good of her nation. The protagonist's role here is a bit more specialized (outside of the romance).
As I said before, this path is more action packed than the other two paths, mostly because Erin is so desperately moving around to get elected as the next PM, which results in her personal subordinates having to deal with a lot more in the way of tribulations on a daily basis. Romantically, the issues here are predictable to anyone who has read enough high fantasy with relationships between races with different lifespans.
Tenmazoku
The Tenmazoku path's heroine, Krone is a lot like Momoyo (except about five times as powerful) if she didn't have her grandfather to rein her in and everybody around her encouraged her bad habits instead of restraining them. At the same time, she has the same intensity to everything she does, her affection bringing back memories of Majikoi for me. Honestly, this was my favorite path (obviously), and it was apparent from the beginning that this was intended to be the true path, at least to me.
This path is very revealing about a lot of the setting's peculiarities, certain characters' motivations, and a number of other issues. There are a lot of good action scenes, a lot of familiar comedy routines (to those who played Majikoi), and I honestly liked the parts on Rancage (the Tenmazoku continent) for the sheer contrast to the mainland countries. That said, I believe this path could have been greatly enhanced if more detail went into the early parts of this path after the arrival at Rancage, because it felt like there was an excessive focus on Krone's obsession with Shaon, lol.
The last stretch of the story (the romance is pretty much just an evolution from the main part of the path) is pretty much solid drama and action, and while it lacks the sheer impact of something written by Nitroplus or Light, it was still an enjoyable experience.
The Negative
I'm going to be straight here... they set this game up for a Majikoi-style fandisc or discs. The other 'endings' are simply brief event and h-scenes that cut off abruptly once they've done the deed, which is less than pleasing for me, since I was looking forward to the possibility of actual heroine routes for some of the sub-characters, like Youksha.
Conclusion
Overall, if you liked Majikoi and Minato Soft's style, you'll like this game. If you didn't, there is a good chance you'll have the same issues here. This game has first-class production values and characters, but if you don't like the style, it might be hard to enjoy. The issue with the sub-heroines is a seriously annoying one, albeit one that is likely to be solved in a year or four with a fandisc or two. I gave this game a pretty high rating, and I don't regret it. I also don't doubt that some people will hate on this game, hard.
While reading litrpgs, I sometimes come across ones that stray into the realms of Xianxia or are simply Xianxia mislabeled as litrpgs. Xianxia is a genre of Chinese-origin, creating a system of magic and abilities based off of Qigong practices. Technically, stuff like Naruto and Hunter X Hunter would fall into the realm of Xianxia, given its use of many of the same concepts.
Xianxia books have a number of common issues, in my opinion. Some of them are quite enjoyable, but even the enjoyable ones seem to love the heavy-handed ladling of the 'power is everything' and 'hubris comes before the fall' themes. In some series, a protagonist will constantly obsess over the former and get kicked in the ass by the latter several times over the course of a single book. This is particularly bad in the case of Xianxia translated from Chinese, where genre tropes are almost as ingrained to them as charage ones are in Japan. Another trend is protagonists who are so amoral they aren't even really characters, as well as protagonists who are inconsistent and hypocritical to an extreme degree, even to the layman's point of view. I love the ones who go on to create or destroy worlds, and I love sagas spanning ten books and hundreds or thousands of years. What I hate is that every Xianxia novel that gets translated seems to read like a reprint of the previous one.
There is another type of Xianxia, mostly written by Westerners (I call it Weabooist Xianxia), that combines these tropes with a tendency to sound like a bad translation from Japanese. They will constantly repeat the 'I need more power', the infamous 'it can't be helped', and other turns of phrase that will cause winces from any experienced translator. It is appalling that anyone who considers themselves a writer would consider some of the crap that comes out of many of the Western-based Xianxia writers to be even adequate, much less good. It never fails to amaze me that some of these people actually got through the editing process.
The very best Western Xianxia writers manage to do something great with the genre, something that the Chinese, as restricted as they are, seem to be incapable of doing... breaking out of that seventy-meter-deep rut. The worst read as badly as the worst translated Xianxia.
Let's be clear, I really, really enjoy the gradual power-gaining of cultivation worlds, the martial arts, the gratuitous and even casual violence, the duels and rivalries. What I don't like are the linguistic conventions and pathetically overused tropes that seem to get dropped into so many of them.
It was remarked by Veshurik recently that it seemed like I wasn't really around anymore... but that isn't really the case. I still play VNs, but the fact is, I don't play many new VNs that I haven't already blogged about yet. I simply can't muster enough interest to play most of the new stuff that comes out, simply because there just isn't that much that looks interesting coming out at any given time. Senkou no Clarias, by Team Baldrhead, was the game I thought would break through my boredom, and while it succeeded at the time, it was nonetheless a depressingly underwhelming game in the end.
First, the gameplay... this is perhaps the most easily maligned part of the game. I say this because Team Baldrhead made two cardinal mistakes... choosing to partially replicate the much-maligned Baldr Bringer battle system and linking character affection to both path choice and character ability progression. The first is problematic to rally insult, because it was obvious they were trying to pose the game as Escaflowne to the Baldr series being Gundam. It was made clunky because the mechs were supposedly magical constructs without most of the purely mechanical aspects that made the Baldr series combat so fluid pre-Bringer. However, this makes for an incredibly frustrating experience when there are enemies who can mix ranged and melee and your characters are solely one or the other outside of special moves. Not only that, but the counter and evasion systems are downright awful... yes, it is possible (with a really long learning curve) to master the system. However, the difficulty of doing so is definitely a put off for someone who enjoyed the intuitive nature of pre-Bringer Baldr series.
The latter issue is more problematic... Linking affection to both heroine choice and mech growth was incredibly stupid and short-sighted on the part of a team as established as this one. In a lesser company, we might see this kind of mistake, but in this case, it was jarring. It essentially creates a situation where the player must keep heroines crippled to let you pick your favorite. If you are following Sherry's path, this is actually not much of an issue, since the game naturally provides more in-story opportunities than any other character to build her affection. However, if you are picking Yakumo - or god-forbid - Camus, there is a distinct need to cripple the growth of all other heroines almost completely.
Now, down to the story... tbh, this is something that will be very, very familiar to fans of early isekai fantasy anime and manga. The protagonist finds a weird egg in an exhibit in a train station in London and gets transported to a magic-driven otherworld full of mechs and sorcery. There are a few reasons why this setting is hard to suspend disbelief for. One reason is that there is absolutely no way whatsoever that Sherry's position in the setting would have worked out the way it did in a nation as autocratic as Seirem. The missing traitor's daughter? Prison or execution, one or the other. No powerful (and Seirem's monarchy is powerful) monarchy would ever leave such an obvious scapegoat to live the quiet life trying to clear her name.
Another issue is Ruu... while it might make sense for a neutral country's nobility to send their kids to school in a powerful neighbor's capitol, for them to allow a former enemy (as in less than a generation in the past) to do so beggars the imagination, given that there were no apparent diplomatic concessions made one way or another.
I'm not even going to mention Yakumo or Camus' situations beyond that it was obvious they were essentially stuffed into the burrito of this story for the sole purpose of providing a variety of heroines.
In terms of actual storywriting, setting aside issues with setting and character backstory, I actually found it relatively enjoyable, though those issues I just mentioned constantly scraped at the edge of my consciousness. There were a few issues here too, though. In particular, splitting up the sub-character events even though they don't effect the story to any significant degree struck me as unnecessarily immersion-breaking. Another issue is that relatively little attention is given to making you actually care about the heroines. Most chapters consist of a very brief setup for the chapter's drama before you get plunged into battle. Heroine characterization is kept at a minimum due to this, mostly relying on the optional (and free of context) scenes you can pick on the free days.
All in all, while I just bashed this game up one end and down the other, I don't hate it... I just felt like Team Baldrhead made a bunch of immersion-breaking and amateurish mistakes in how they handled this game. A lot of the methodology for progression used here is methodology that was rejected by fans years ago in other genres. The fact that the heroine paths have relatively little difference and all end the same way is the final nail in the coffin.
In conclusion, this was a game that showed signs of potential all over the place but fell well short of where it could have been, despite an obviously large cash investment on the part of Giga.
Recently, I've been devouring anything written by Daniel Shinhofen, the writer of the Binding Words series I recommended in a previous post. Shinhofen is a harem specialist that can vary from having non-existent ero to full-on BDSM in his stories, but a common element to all of them is that all his protagonists end up with a harem and that harem is happy (for the most part).
Lest I make that sound like he scrimps on story, the very reverse is the case. Every one of his series is extremely dense and packed with deep characterization and storytelling. The reason I chose to do these two very different litrpg series in a single post was because they represent opposite ends of the spectrum for the writer's characterization and storytelling.
Apocalypse Gates is a story focused in a game world where the protagonist, Alvin, is a brain-copy of his original self (sold by his cryo-corp) to serve as a test subject for a post-apocalyptic digital world with permadeath. Alvin is... well, he's what is called an amoral familist. This term is one that isn't in common use, but its essential meaning is that the individual in question only really sees people that are a part of his group as people and all others are merely objects. Alvin frequently self-describes as a sociopath, and in a very real sense, when it comes to non-family/non-friends, that is true. Alvin frequently and quite happily blows the brains out of people who even look like they are going to seriously annoy him, and he has absolutely no moral qualms about it. However, he is passionately, even obsessively protective of the small circle of 'real people' he builds around himself.
Another issue is that he has an extreme reaction to abusers (rapists and those who take advantage of the helpless), and he will kill them with extreme prejudice wherever he finds them, regardless of consequences. Considering that Apocalypse Gates is a digital version of the year 2000 where the Rapture occurred and all those soulless bodies rose as zombies to attack the living, this means he ends up killing a lot of people across the series. I won't spoil his harem for you (really, seeing it get together is a treat, though it is definitely a BDSM harem) though. This series is full of blood, gore, and looting the ruins while screwing like bunnies in their free time (and happening to make the world a better place as an entirely unintended side-effect).
Alpha World... is not what you would think from reading its description of the first book. While there is plenty of sexuality, there are no actual sex scenes in this series (as compared to Apocalypse Gates, where sex scenes were ubiquitous for the first five books before it settled down later). In this series, a convict named Seamus, in hopes that his experimental data will be used to take the pressure off of the overcrowded prison systems and provide help for victims of crimes similar to the one that drove him to his own, agrees to be permanently placed in a pod for a virtual game called Alpha World.
The first book has him forming his initial relations with the people that will later become his friends, family, guild, and harem- of course. However, it is later books that really make this series stand out... to be blunt, this series reminds me of a nakige. The characters, including Seamus, face issues of extreme emotional depth born out of their pasts and their emotional scars, showing off their flaws and virtues to the reader in such stark detail that, for books three and four at least, this aspect eclipses the other aspects of the story entirely. I cried for almost the entirety of these two books, I cried for Fluff, I cried for Karen, and I wept for Seamus.
This particular series also confronts an issue that will inevitably pop up as AI becomes more advanced and our games become so immersive we have trouble telling the difference between real life and the game... is there any essential difference between a fully-sentient digital character and the human minds interacting with them? This particular aspect is deliberately kept partially vague, with Stacia - the protagonist's NPC lover - being the only NPC whose perspective you get to see through. However, Stacia's depth as a character - despite her somewhat simple and straightforward personality - definitely represents the argument for there being no essential difference.
My favorite character in Alpha World, surprisingly, is Fluff (aka Fluffball or Julia). I'll be straight with you... Fluffball's past is heartbreaking to a degree that will make any soul with a scrap of compassion furiously angry and extremely protective at the same time. In many ways, Fluff is the most important character when it comes to forcing the others to confront and overcome their own issues. Her intense vulnerability and fragility serve as a counterpoint to Karen's ferocity and Stacia's inherent resilience, while also putting up a mirror to Seamus's own fractured spirit.
Overall, these two series showed me the depth of this writer's talent, and I thought I'd share it with you all.
Everybody Loves Large Chests (the series) by Neven Iliev is probably the most horrifying dark comedy fantasy I've ever read. I laughed almost constantly throughout the first five books (what I've read) of this series... simply because it is just so far out there that it insulates you from the sheer horror of what is going on.
This series is focused on the antics and life of an aberrant, sociopathic, homicidal and ever-hungry mimic (yes, the treasure-chest monster) named Boxxy T Morningwood (yes, that's its name, lol). It begins with the nearly brainless creature devouring a hapless adventure... and gaining a few levels and some intelligence in short order.
I say intelligence, but Boxxy is pretty much an idiot savant with a gift for homicidal mayhem, torture, and somehow always making out better than it should have been able to. While Boxxy begins passively killing and eating 'tasty' adventurers and collecting 'shinies' in a dungeon, it quickly progresses to... doing the exact same thing (with added flair) outside the dungeon (well, with 'tasty' extending to just about everything along the way). This ever-hungry idiot savant is somehow one of the single most hilarious protagonists I've encountered... anywhere. Some of the things he gets up to (actually, most of them) are straight out of a Clock Up VN, and he only gets more horrifyingly evil as time goes on.
Even though he does get more intelligent as he levels and evolves, his central interests forever focus on 'shiny' and 'tasty'.
Let's be clear, if I didn't make it so above... Boxxy is evil. There is no redeeming value to him, despite what you might think of him at times. He likes eating things, collecting shiny things, and killing to level up. However, he proves that evil can be hilarious, if you know what you are doing.
The Otoboku series is often put forward as a prime example of a sub-genre that first gained popularity about eight years ago... the 'trap protagonist in a girl's school' type. However, there are a number of aspects that make this series a bit unique... or at least make them feel unique.
One is their protagonists... despite their differences in personality and upbringing, all three protagonists end up taking a similar role in the common route, even aside from the 'Elder' issue. To be straight about it, the Taishou-era 'oneesama' concept, where girls in an isolated environment form half-romantic relationships with older girls, is the biggest influence on these games. The odd irony of a trap playing the same role as one of those 'oneesama' characters often had me smiling in humor and exasperation, but for some strange reason, Takaya Aya seems to make it work every time.
Another aspect of these games that is unique is the rather blunt way each of the games portrays the 'old wealthy families' of Japan's attitude toward their females, as well as the attitude of the 'new rich' toward them as well. Despite skepticism on the part of some when I've mentioned this in the past, it has to be noted that the wealthy in Japan still frequently use arranged marriages to form connections and incorporate capable individuals into the top of family-run businesses. The former kazoku families, in particular, obsessively arrange the marriages of their children due to traditions going back over a thousand years (including a tradition of ignoring commoner's 'common sense'). While the most recent game is a bit lighter on that issue, you'll still hit it in several of the paths and even in the common route (though the common route is more like a gentle manipulation to try to stick two people together).
Last of all, in every one of these games, at some point, gossip gets out of hand and causes at least some of the characters to suffer. This is actually a common thing in games based in girl's schools, but the way Takaya handles it is generally more interesting and emphasizes the isolated nature of the gender-restricted environment.
All of this comes together to create a game that has a deliberate atmosphere of 'isolation from societal norms', one of Takaya's favorite themes in his games (every single one of this games does this, regardless of who he is working for at the time). For this reason, the series has a rather unique 'taste' to it that isn't quite matched by any of the other similar games I've played.
I apologize if this post seems a bit disjointed, but this game was long enough that I felt a need to write as I finished the paths.
First, Otoboku 3, as the nickname implies, is the third game in the series begun with the original Otome wa Boku ni Koishiteru. Unlike the previous two games, which were based in the same school, this is based in a sister school a few years after the original game (probably a few years after Futari no Elder, which apparently happened about a year after the events of the original). The biggest proof of this is that Shion, from the original game, is a teacher of several years experience at the school the protagonist attends (meaning that at least four, most likely five years passed, plus the several years of experience… so probably about eight years after the original).
The protagonist, Hisoka, is a young orphan who was raised by a friend of his parents to serve the game’s main heroine, Orihime. Hisoka is… one of those characters who can literally do just about everything to a certain extent. He can fight, he gets the highest grades, he can play piano (and pipe organs), he can cook (and do any other form of housework perfectly), and he can even draw.
He does have one huge personality flaw though… he is one of those protagonists who completely disregards his own needs, always putting others before himself. This is what gets him trapped into becoming Orihime’s bodyguard… while attending the girl’s academy with her.
He tries to live quietly, but that doesn’t last long (since Orihime instantly takes a liking to him). Before long, he is one of the three Elder Stars of the school (rofl, first it was one Elder, then 2, and now it is three of them… a bit obvious, isn’t it?). Being kind-hearted and perceptive, he ends up capturing the heart of just about every girl in the school, none of which know he is a guy.
Now, I should say that the common route of this game is… loooooooooong. In fact, it is even longer than that of Futari no Elder, which was pretty long itself… longer than Grisaia no Kajitsu’s common route, for that matter. As such, this isn’t a game for those looking for a quick common route followed by romance and sex galore. The sexual content in this game is actually quite low, lol.
I’m going to be straight with you… if you played Futari no Elder and enjoyed it, you’ll probably enjoy this one. The atmosphere is pretty close to identical, the protagonist’s role is identical to the previous two games, and probably the biggest difference is that this game is based somewhat later on in the same timeline. The reason this is important is because the game doesn’t ignore the real world… and as a result, the setting doesn’t allow for the kind of completely-closed environment the previous two games essentially were (in other words, far fewer of the characters are ‘ojousama’).
There is also one other thing that differs from the previous two games… this one has a much, much bigger emphasis on ‘slice-of-life as the story’. To be blunt, ninety percent of this game is Hisoka dealing with the various characters’ personal issues on one level or another while going about her daily business. While the same can be said, to an extent, about the first two games, the first two games also had a much more extensive focus on the heroines (longer individual heroine paths).
There are two main heroines in this game (well, obvious ones, anyway), Orihime and Mirei. Orihime is a pushy princess type, who has just been given a year of freedom after following orders her whole life. Mirei is your classic ‘new rich ojousama who is embarassed by/dislikes her father/parents’. She is sharp-edged, has an inferiority complex, but she nonetheless finds it impossible not to like the protagonist (there was one of these in both the previous games, lol).
Orihime’s ‘whim of steel’ is her defining trait throughout the game (partially encouraged by Hisoka). This continues into her path and is accompanied by her tendency toward ‘classical romanticism’ when it comes to falling in love (knight in shining armor BS).
Mirei’s growth during the game is perhaps the most obvious of the heroines, because she starts out as a living mass of inferiority complexes, defiance toward her position in life, and jealousy. The fact that, underneath all those negative aspects, she is actually fundamentally a good person (if somewhat dry and cynical by nature), is something that gradually comes to the surface during the course of the story. Mirei’s path is stand-alone, and it can be said that it has the strongest independent character development of all the paths in the game. There are several reasons I can think of for this, but the main one is that Mirei, due to her position at the school and as an individual, spends less time around Hisoka than the other heroines (most of the other ones aggressively seek Hisoka out or live in the same dorm).
Hana takes the same role as Kana-chan and Fumi from the previous two games, being the protagonist’s ‘imouto’ at the school. She is very devoted and innocent, but her clumsiness makes her an object of constant humor and moe for the people around her. Hana’s path splits off from somewhere just short of the midpoint of Mirei’s path. As a heroine, she is easily the weakest of the group (this can be said of her predecessors, Fumi and Kana as well), as she spends most of the game essentially being an appendage of the protagonist, her role almost exclusively involving making him look good (to be a bit overly blunt, lol). As such, she was the last heroine I chose to follow (I wrote the character intros before I actually played the paths). This path, unlike most of the others, has little in the way of 'outer influences' to create drama. This is because Hana is essentially a 'normal' girl. To be honest, I don't like the way that Takaya excessively modeled certain of this path's aspects after that of Kana's from the original Otoboku (though there is no attempt to grasp for tears in this one). It didn't really fit Hana's personality or character as a whole, though having Hana gain more confidence and take a more active role in her own life was a definite positive element. Really, the best would have been to avoid having Hana as a heroine at all, but having the 'imouto' as a heroine has become an Otoboku tradition...
Ayame and Sumire are twins who share a route in this game. Sumire is serious and straightforward, even slightly uptight. She prefers to act on logic and have a rational basis for any action she takes. Ayame is more intuitive, an artist by nature. Sumire is the school president and Ayame is the student council secretary. Their path is a rare twin love path (one of my favorite types), but it is pretty clear from the beginning that Takaya didn’t take this path that seriously, since it is easily the weakest one in the game.
Ibara Kyouko is the protagonist’s collaborator and backup bodyguard, a young woman with a sharp tongue and a fondness for teasing Hana in particular and everyone else in general. She obviously has some kind of darkness in her past, but she is very weak to Hisoka in general, though she is good at hiding it (or at least better than everyone else, anyway). Her path splits off from Orihime’s path (literally, the two paths split off at the end, just before things spill over into romance), and the ending is fairly amusing, given the personalities of the three involved (sharp-tongued and logical Kyouko, the whimsical dreamer genius Orihime, and the natural mediator Hisoka).
Matsuri is the game’s resident yurufuwa heroine. She is a violinist in the middle of a slump, who was sent to the school (which doesn’t have a musical support program) to recover after she became unable to use her arm properly for reasons unknown. Like Ayame, she is an artist, but she is very soft-natured and slow to speak. She is also probably the ‘happiest’ heroine on the surface of things, as very little seems to get her down, at first glance (another quality she shares with Ayame from the twins). Her path is surprisingly long (of the individual paths, it is probably the third longest), and I honestly enjoyed having her as a heroine.
For the information of those who are interested, depending on which of the final choices you picked, you get a different set of scenes for summer vacation, and depending on what heroine you ‘picked’ (based on your choices as a whole), who the protagonist spends his free time with at the culture festival changes. This is pretty much the only major change made to the common route based on your choices before the heroine routes, which might bother some of you.
For the most part, the endings in this game meet my approval, showing the characters years later, as opposed to merely just after the climax of the story. This applies even to the twins, who have the weakest path in the game. This is probably because the common route ends only a few months before graduation for Hisoka and the other third year students…
The writing in this came, as is par for the course with any game written by Takaya Aya, is first-class. Despite this game mostly being slice-of-life, I can’t really all it a charage or a moege, since not one scene in this game is meaningless, for all its immense length.
Visually, this game is Caramel Box to the core. If you like Caramel Box’s visual style, you’ll like the artwork. Otherwise, you won’t.
Musically, this game reuses some tracks from the previous Otoboku games, but I honestly only noticed this because I compared it on a whim. The important thing is that the music is used quite well.
It should be noted that about 1/3 of Hisoka’s lines are voiced, which is about standard for all of the recent works from Caramel Box and is effective for helping create Hisoka’s character and give life to him.
Overall, this is a first-class game. In some ways, it falls short of Futari no Elder… but Futari no Elder was something of a miracle kamige, so that was inevitable. I do wish that they’d spent more time on the individual heroine paths, but the degree to which the characters were developed in the course of the common route really made long heroine paths unnecessary. Oh, incidentally… I wish Miimi was a heroine, since she was my favorite character. I also loved her narration during the play scene.
