A sound novel is a term trademarked by Chunsoft and is really just a fancy word for what some would call visual novels ironically with no voice acting. The sound here is referring to SFX and a novel doesn't really talk to you at least back before Audible became a big thing for busy Millennials. Anyhoo, I figured it was my Jhipster duty to check out Chunsoft's sound novel series starting with Otogirisou. I played the PS1 remake and the intro gives off a really good vibe.
Oh boy, this looks scary!
Unfortunately, the writing doesn't quite live up to the enhanced graphics. You can finish this game in a few hours and is designed to be replayed many times. According to the manual, you should replay at least 10 times to get to the "truly interesting" parts.
Oh man, this DOES look scary!
I thought the idea behind the game was certainly interesting. There are tons of dialogue options (supposedly over 1,000) and while the basic premise of the events are the same, it's slightly different and feels fresh every time. For example, the first playthrough shows a photo of the inside of your car while the next playthrough might have a little animation with trees whizzing by.
I'm a sucker for these old school photos
Unfortunately, the freshness lasts maybe about 4 or 5 playthroughs and you quickly realize it's the same basic scenarios. You're driving in the car with your girlfriend Nami, some accident happens, you happen upon a mansion in the woods, etc. etc. The dialogue options get sillier and sillier as well with tons of cheesy puns and it's clear they don't really reflect on the following dialogue.
Ketchup on your salad eh?
Since these scenes are designed to be stitched together in semi-random order, after the first few playthrough, it was mostly a tedious exercise of holding down circle. No skip option is just such a time sink. One might say it's amazing that the story still holds up together even when it shifts and changes but to me, it just means that the story is not that involved.
The rain moves in the background. It's like a novel but EVOLVED!!
Score: 2 desperately trying to get with your gf no matter how fucked up things get out of 5 (15 playthroughs)
Some of the endings were good and it was interesting somewhat but overall I was underwhelmed. Sometimes it got a bit too silly for me and I just couldn't tell if the game was trying to be scary or funny. It wasn't particularly good at being either.
Unfortunately, the story is just not as scary as this picture suggests
However, being the obsessive compulsive that I am, I couldn't help but find all 10 endings to get the pink bookmark. Due to how the story changes up, there wasn't a clear guide and it wasn't that easy but I soldiered through it. The manual suggests some ecchi fanservice with the pink bookmark but I mean, don't get your hopes up. You're not going to be seeing Corpse Party style low angle shots of a girl hanging in a toilet stall. (You sicko.)
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
If one of my many, many readers were to ask me which I liked more, Gundam or Macross, I would definitely have to go with Macross. As my long-time readers are aware, I like music so that's a no-brainer for Macross. I also think the battles with Valkyries are cooler, the way they transform to take advantage of each form etc. Though I'm not quite sure the point of the half plane/robot form.
So far, I've only watched the first Macross TV series (all 36 episodes!), Macross Frontier, and the first movie from which this game is based on. The movie is pretty good though the plot is obviously super rushed to fit 36 TV episodes in under two hours. The soundtrack is awesome and the old school hand drawn battle scenes are simply amazing with intricate details we'll likely never see again with all this fancy computer shit these days (old man grumblings).
God, I love this 80s shit!
As for the game, I played the PS1 version and it is a pretty good looking side-scrolling shooter. It also summarizes the movie in between levels with a mix of short animated clips and some audio narration. You may want to watch the movie first before playing the game unless you really want to save yourself time from watching the movie.
Intro cutscene in the game actually takes place before the movie
So yeah, the presentation is pretty good and it plays ok as a game. However, there's only like 11 levels and you can literally beat the whole thing in a day. As a busy, pro reviewer, I love that I can finish the whole game in no time and put it up for sale on ebay. Being a shmup (EXTREMELY RARE!!! BID NOW!!!), I'm hoping to make a little profit by selling this back. Sooo glad I didn't waste that money on an S&P 500 ETF fund, making market average returns like a real adult.
The graphics are pretty good for a PS1/Saturn game
Now, I'm not like a super expert shooter gamer. Sure, I played the shit out of Astro Warrior as a kid and almost beat U.N. Squadron (rented, never owned unfortunately) and as a typical gaming hoarder, I have a stack of games to play one of these days. But even as a novice to the genre, I really wouldn't say this was a good shooting game. It's more about experiencing the movie via a video game like one cool part where you play it sideways. (Is playing a side-scrolling shooter on the side actually like playing it straight? Here at Jhipster Gamer, we tackle life's most important questions!)
1st level again, I assure you I beat the game, just not on an emulator for screenshots #FakeGamer
I mean, yeah, it's technically a game. For instance, you can change forms and I guess it kinda matters because only the robot form can shoot backwards and when the boss is in background but really, it doesn't matter for the most part. Mostly, you'll just be constantly holding down and releasing the square button to fire like a million missiles. There's also not a lot of room for you to maneuver because you take up so much of the screen. This becomes particularly apparent when the Meltrandi show up.
Score: 2.5 prepare to be humming those damn catchy 80s tunes for a while out of 5 (optional 0.5 bonus Jhipster smugness points for never having to know what the fuck Robotech is)
Captain, we have Harmony Gold USA on target, permission to fire?
Overall, despite not being a very good game, it's a pretty nice package as long as you didn't pay full retail price for a few hours of gameplay. I played through it twice on normal and hard and I was like, "Meh, I guess it was fun." At the very least, it gave me a good reason to finally finish watching the movie. I felt bad for Minmay, I would definitely marry her or even Iijima Mari if she wasn't like 60 now. Sigh...
Oh man, if I could travel back in time...
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
Continuing the tradition of documenting my gaming history on the internet for posterity (otherwise known as the cesspool annals), I have to say I never really got into Biohazard (Resident Evil for the non-Jhpsters). I was sufficiently hyped enough by a raving review in some gaming magazine to buy a copy on the ol' ebays but never could finish it. I wasn't a fan of the stupid tank controls (and no fuck you, bad controls don't "enhance" tension) and most importantly, the ribbons were torture for an obsessive saver like myself. I think I will enjoy the remake now that I'm more comfortable with the limited resources nature of survival horror but at the time I probably would have enjoyed KOUDELKA far more. It seems like the perfect game made for RPG fans like myself who want to get a little taste of the horror genre. In fact, I really wished Square had made Parasite Eve 2 more like this game instead of the shitty Biohazard clone that it is. Speaking of Parasite Eve, I wonder if the founders of Sacnoth "borrowed" some tech from Square because the CG cutscene at the end really reminded me of Parasite Eve.
Strong female protagonist but was weak as a child 2/10 - SJW Reviews
The one negative part about this game you'll likely hear are the super slow random encounter battles (probably by the same people that rave about the completely pointless and avoidable battle system in Chrono Cross). Personally, the slow battle system didn't bother me that much because you just don't have to fight as often as a regular 40-60 hour long RPG. This is a pretty short game I beat in about 12 hours and the random encounter rate is low enough that you could easily navigate several rooms before running into enemies. I didn't mind the short length because, 1) I got this game super cheap, and 2) I'm a pro gamer that needs my time to be respected. Joking aside, given the story and setting, I felt like 12 hours was about the right length.
"Random encounters like this are why JRPGs died" - some know-it-all blogger
Overall, I found the game balance to be on the easy side as you level up pretty darn quick from just a few battles. All the bosses are pretty easy except of course for the gargoyle. I could not for the life of me figure out how to kill the gargoyle even with the gargoyle killer which requires you to save the game exactly 11:11:11 hours in with a certain number of items. Fortunately, the gargoyle is an optional boss and the final boss wasn't too hard as long as you use reflect even though you're supposed to lose for one of the endings. I also threw away the pendant to make room, which happens to be an item needed to beat the game but you can just get another one from the black cat at the last hidden save point.
One potential barrier to entry for casual gamers is figuring out how to allocate your stats as some of them are quirky. For example, Piety increases max MP but it also makes you more resistant to healing. There's an in-game explanation of each stat that was handy. (Manuals? No thanks, I just ate.)
Oddly, the names are still in English for the reverse weebs
As for the story, I was thoroughly impressed at how good the writing and English VA was for a game made in Japan. I have so many questions about the script and cast for example, who is Vivianne Bateman, the VA for Koudelka and how did she get cast for the role? How did they do motion capture at a Santa Monica studio? Why was the word "gypsy" censored out of only the Japanese version of the game? Yes, in one cutscene, there were a bunch of annoying skips that seemed to be at very specific points during the dialog. Sure enough, looking up the same cutscene on YT, the audio cuts out every time the word "gypsy" is mentioned. Like Japanese people are totally listening to the English dialogue and would get super offended at the racial slur? #MJGA
We don't adhere to that kind of language here. We're equal opportunity killers.
Score: 3.5 the first law of ____ies is to never talk about ____ies out of 5 (12 hours to beat)
Overall, I enjoyed all 12 hours of my time playing this game and it ranks as an above-average game of the PS1 era for me. I'll definitely be keeping this one around in my hoarder collection. The plot is a fun, classic adventure with a motley cast that is both funny and interesting to watch as they learn about each other over the course of extraordinary events. The gameplay while flawed was still fun to play and the music was good. At the very least, I had way more fun than the shit turd Chrono Cross I played previously and I'm looking forward to seeing what the rest of the series has to offer.
"I like how the music is not in your face" - random YT comment
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
Full disclosure, I'm pretty much a Chrono Trigger fanboy. I still remember watching the trailer over and over at Toys R Us with my jaws on the floor. Holy shit, the Toriyama Akira art, the amazing graphics, the music, it was a trifecta of perfection. I saved up my arubaito money and bought a shady CIB copy at the flea market for the cheap, cheap price of $70, probably like $100 in today's money adjusted for inflation.
As a stupid kid, I lost this poster along with the game.
Several years later, as an older and wiser gamer, I bought a used copy of Chrono Cross on eBay probably for like $15 or something. Despite not splurging on it on release like a craven Youtuber, I was still super hyped, that is until I started the game. The music was pretty good. It's not as good as Trigger's kami OST but not bad and that's about the only good thing I can say about the game. I eventually stopped playing around the part where you rescue Rideru not because the game was terrible but for a reason that's almost worse, it was just boring. This time, as a fully evolved Jhipster, I decided to finish at least the true ending hoping that the original Japanese script will make things better. It didn't really.
Meh, not my jam really.
Here's the deal, Chrono Cross is the kind of title hipster game journalists will hail as "underrated" as they masturbate to their droll, creative lit 101 inspired review. I'm just a dumb gamer so I'm gonna call this spade a duck (or whatever, I'm not a "pro" writer). This game fucking sucks ass.
You would imagine a team would have to mentally prepare themselves with balls of steel to create a follow-up to one of the greatest games of all time by the "Dream Team" of RPGs. For you kids, that term is no joke referring to a team with Jordan, Magic, Bird, Pippen, Barkley, and Ewing. It was like watching somebody play 2K with cheat codes in real life, to give you an idea of how ridiculously OP that was. So when the sequel doesn't even recognize the save files and makes me move the cursor to "Continue" every time and doesn't even remember the last save slot, I could already tell these fuckers did not take the task at hand seriously. How the fuck do you have the balls to make a sequel to Chrono Trigger with a sloppy and shitty UI? I know it sounds like nitpicking but it just shows a lack of polish that also speaks to the rest of the game.
Chrono Trigger team but more Japanese and slam dunking brilliant game design.
As soon as you start the game, it's apparent that it looks nothing like the original and not in a good way. I'm not super picky about graphics but man, they couldn't cut Toriyama a check? The character design is so fucking generic. It's especially jarring for some characters that are supposed to look a certain way based on the first game and they totally don't.
I'm sorry but this looks like something a bunch of Korean contracters would knock out on the cheap
In addition, while the battle system is balanced, it's slow and boring as fuck. What makes an RPG fun like Dragon Quest and of course Chrono Trigger, is watching your characters get stronger as they progress. Apparently they forgot that, as well as, obviously missing Horii himself. In this game, you get a star and level up when you beat a boss but only very, very minor stat increases for regular battles so there is literally zero incentive to the whole thing. The economy is broken so there is no monetory incentive either. I spent the entire game trying to avoid the enemies as much as possible and still had little trouble beating the game. As a game, Chrono Cross isn't any fun, which is primarily why I stopped playing back in the day. But another reason I stopped was because the story just didn't go anywhere.
People don't understand the story because it's never shown, not because we're not "pro" enough to understand it. In the original game, we traveled around the world across many ages and experienced an amazing adventure first-hand whether it was dragging Robo's broken body to a dome or bumping into a cute girl at the festival by chance. In this game, some shitty ghost characters tell you some mumbo jumbo about multiverse and some Captain Planet shit about the planet moving cities to try to protect itself from humans or whatever. But really, what you're actually doing is going back and forth to the same but slightly different set of islands, collecting shit and fighting boring enemies with no backstory. The switching was especially annoying too. What, they couldn't make it a menu option? You constantly have to go back to the beach, skip the cutscene, go talk to this character, collect an item, etc., and switch again for the next thing. I don't remember what happened in which world and honestly it doesn't even matter.
At least Jhipsters don't have to read Kid's stupid Australian accent, eh mate?
You never get to leave the islands, you don't get to see the main continent they keep talking about, you're just going to the same tiny islands at least twice cause you know, alternate reality! Wow, what a clever way to recycle the same shit... Urr I mean set up an "equally valid, separate, and well-developed world" that's not a "rehash" to quote a "pro" journalist. It really reeks of a low budget game maybe because they were so busy writing tiny variations of dialogue for all the random characters that join you for no reason.
I don't know what the fuck they were thinking with all the random characters. Most don't add jack to the game and you're not going to convince me that their little side stories are equivalent to the deep character development from the original. They also tried to do a half-hearted token shoehorn of Maou but instead fucked up one of baddest, coolest villians in game history.
Fuck you Arufu, you ain't shit
And that's my major beef with this game. It's not a horrible game, it functions and would normally be around a 2.5 score but I cannot forgive it for fucking with the story of Chrono Trigger. They added this ending in the later DS version as a tie-in to Chrono Cross, kind of like how that stupid Anakin kid shows up at the end of the "enhanced" version of Return of the Jedi instead of Darth Vader.
Meesa thinks this game sucksa.
It's the most pathetic ending I've ever seen that just left a bad taste in my mouth. Basically, there's a boss you're not strong enough to beat because you have to wait for Serge or some shit. Yes, the original cast with better design, infinitely better character development, been through way more shit than just floating around some islands somehow couldn't deal with it. Instead, Serge has to... you know what? I don't even know what the fuck he did. The story is so abstract and lectured to you, what did Serge actually do besides being born? The true ending with the Chrono Cross melody that I had to google ends the whole thing with a final boring lecture. I had more fun watching a documentary about quantum physics. (To be fair, quantum physics is cool... and WEIRD.)
Score: 1.5 Jar Jar Binks out of 5 imagine if Solo doesn't even shoot in the cantina but instead lectures about protecting the environment. (40 hours to beat)
Apparently, Chrono was too busy drinking green milk to deal with things this time. Actually, the game never explains that part. It leaves a lot of things unexplained, which hipsters love. But Katou, I just wanted a fun game. If I wanted to play some artsy, hipster shit, I would rather play Moonlight Syndrome and that pretty much sums up how much I hated this sacrilegious "Indiana Jones Crystal Skull" level of butt fuckery.
To explain why I can't help, first, are you familiar with string theory?
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
Let's talk about my gaming habits because this is valuable information that I must leave on the internet for prosperity. As you can plainly tell, I'm pretty far behind on almost every popular game series that has continued beyond the PS1 era. As I mentioned, I was too poor to have more than a couple games as a kid and I also had a pretty long blank when I was preoccupied with real life and trying to figure out jobs n shit. So these days, I'm mostly playing "retro" games (as the kids call em) while for some stupid reason still buying new shit cause you know, nowadays games are strictly, totally, "if you don't buy like RIGHT NOW it's incinerated so nobody else can ever have it" limited.
Oh I'm sure this collector plays ALL his games (wink wink)
Unfortunately unlike the hoarders collectors on social media, I can't afford a giant room filled with games so that means I often have to go through all the shit I bought and figure out what needs to go and at last we get to the topic on hand which is today's game: Dancing Blade: Katte ni Momotenshi II.
As I noted when I played the first game, these "games" are basically animes with a few selectable clips that can be beaten in under an hour. So when more packages showed up at my door, I knew it was time to go load this anime up and get it prepped for the Gamestop dumpster.
Liked the cover but you know, I ain't got a game room, much less a game house.
I don't know how well the first game sold (lol the poor sods paying 5800 yen on day one) but they were probably planning on this sequel anyway as evidenced by the sneak preview in the first game's omake. It's pretty much the exact same system and once again no way to skip segments you've already seen. In fact, I'm now starting to think the lack of skip capability was intentional as it would be pretty laughable to charge full price and have the poor suckers manage to watch every clip in a little over an hour.
Of course, that just means you're multitasking and waiting instead of just being done with it. In fact, because this game has 7 endings, 3 more than the original, it means even more time wasted. More endings would suggest that there's more content but remember the only difference is a short clip at the end. It has the same number of discs and is still essentially 2 OVAs depending on the first choice. This time you can either decide to stay in the city for the main scenario or go to the sea. Actually, two of the endings were tricky to figure out because you have to go through both scenarios.
What if you eat burritos instead of ramen? That could totally be a life changer! (not really)
At least in this final Momotenshi game, you get some kind of conclusion. I didn't get into the plot for the first game but the whole premise of your journey is that you are trying to find out why Momo was born from a giant peach. The first game pretty much ignored that objective in both stories so at least this time they answered some questions. Unfortunately, I couldn't give a rat's ass about Momo's biological origins so it was pretty much a mediocre anime once again. Oh yeah, I guess you can also enjoy like 10 secs of Suzuna's naked shoulders if that's your kind of thing.
This screen cap does not reflect the core values of this blog.
I noticed Otsu-hime (the girl/mermaid from the sea episode) was voiced by the same girl who did Yue in Memories Off. At the very least, I'll probably check out the drama CD just to get the full franchise experience.
Score: 2 wheeee time to go order some more shit on amazon jp!! out of 5
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
Well, that was quick! While I was going through my customary purge cleaning sessions in a desperate but ultimately futile attempt to make some more space in my Closet of Shame™, I came across a copy of Dancing Blade: Katte ni Momotenshi! (PS1 version). I kind of heard this "game" was short so I decided to pop it in and play through it before I toss it for the Gamestop dumpster divers and I'm now writing this 3 hours later. Even shorter than I imagined (always a plus for the pro reviewer #respectmytime)!
The blue "interactive anime" tag makes this a "game"
I'm not going into the whole hipster debate of what constitutes a game but straight up, this is basically 2 OVAs of about 30 minutes each with minor branching animation paths that lead to 4 different endings. In fact, the PSP version is just a plain interactive UMD Video. I would call this even less of a game compared to other animated adventure games where every other decision results in death (you know which game I'm talking about). It's literally just two anime OVAs with one short clip difference between the endings. Which OVA you "play" depends on your first decision to eat either Kibi dango or go to a restaurant. If you decide to eat Kibi dango, you watch the main story while the other option is kind of a fan service episode around Oinu (big boobs) and Kijime (even bigger boobs)
Aw fuck it, might as well watch
And that brings us to the plot, which is not exactly a Shakespearean masterpiece. You play some guy (voiced by Ogata Megumi-chan) surrounded by hot chicks whom you met by I guess whatever happened as shown in like 3 seconds during the opening song. Basically, it's like Momotaro but the dog, bird, and Momo are hot chicks and the monkey is some robot. Whatever, I'm not some Ebert anime reviewer but as animes go, it's about as unremarkable as you can imagine. At least the animation is pretty good and the transitions were almost seamless. The DC Complete edition seems to have a tiny bit more content but you have to hunt for it.
Pretty much half the game in a nutshell
The only real problem is that you can only skip the intro video. During the game itself, pressing start just prompts you to save and so be prepared to multitask as you wait for the animation to drag on to the next selection. Once you watch two of the endings, the rest of the hour or so will be spent watching minor variations and mostly waiting.
Score: 2 (well at least it's better than more SAO attempted rape scenes but that's just stating the obvious) out of 5
Besides the lack of skip option, there's nothing technically terrible about this anime but there's really no reason for this to be a "game". I will go with a 2 just based purely on the fact that it wasn't broken and the anime wasn't terrible but you can just watch the thing on YT or whatever. This will definitely be purged from my collection and so I have a bit more space to buy more useless shit. I guess onto the sequel!
Mission Accomplished!
The good ol' days...
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
It's fitting that I finished Last Bible II just before Labor day because slogging through this boring RPG was quite laborious or as our most eminent and erudite statesman today would say, "much bigly labor (at the golf course)".
I just like to snatch me some Gorgon pus- uh... where is it?!
Now, the first Last Bible game was localized as Revelations Slayer Demon Gods Ultra Cross-fire Deathrays on Sharks... or something, whatever the 'merican marketing folks thought would sell. Yet surprisingly, NOA decided to ditch the series starting from this one. I dunno, maybe because the game starts with mass infanticide? I don't know what the problem is, Reggie? Do you hate the bible? Don't tell me you're one of those atheist anarchist Antifa violence, yes there will be actual violence people??
Hey mom, what does "dispose of all babies" mean?
As we all know, there was no ratings board back in the good ol' days so really how were the parents to know not to buy this for kids? After all, it has cute anime kids on the cover and you can barely make out the crowd of demons in the backgrounds. Oh yeah, sorry not demons, these are magical beasts（まじゅう）cause you know, think of the children!
Oh I'm sure she'll be crossing her arms in the game as well. It's for kids after all!
However, thanks to the magic of Nintendo's "emuparadise killer" eshop, we now know that the series went from Cero A from the first game to Cero B. Oh thank goodness parents know not to expose their kids to infant genocide until 12 years old... um what? Cero B for "Sexual Content"? Spoiler alert but um... there's no sexual content unless they're referring to the monster designs in which case what's different from the first game? Oh right, ratings are totally subjective and arbitrarily.
I heard a rumor there's a patch that unlocks some hot green tea!
Anyways, I guess I should get on to talking about the game but I honestly don't have much to say about it. It's just a boring RPG all round and yes, even though it's a Game Boy game, it just doesn't have much going for it even ignoring the primitive graphics.
Is this 60FPS? Cause 30 gives me migraine headaches...
While in the first game, you kind of knew there were going to be 3 Gaia Masters for your party, this game is similar to FFIV in that people come and go throughout the story. I might be exaggerating by even calling it a "story" cause yeah, events occur but they're just kind of random as you go from one generic town to the next. There's so many towns I don't even remember their names or care. I do have to say the highlight of the game is Safia cause she's a girl that was so naughty, they had to lock her up. I don't mean naughty in any sexual way though despite her attire (and the Cero rating).
Waaait! My pants!
They added a token demon magic beast fusion system and some other ways to grow demons such as carrying an egg and defending it from attacks. Honestly, I really can't think of a reason why you would want to play this game. I only made it through thanks to fast forward on my PSP err... I mean... they have fast forward on 3DS virtual console right? But yeah, seriously, save your 617 yen unless you have an unhealthy obsession with playing things in order.
Score: 1.5 let's see if this qualifies as an Adsense violation out of 5
Wide open arms, damn false advertising!
The game got particularly annoying near the end when it started getting coy about where you were supposed to go such as buying a certain type of claw to open a floating rock to get the Lapis. Thakfully, there was a playthrough on YouTube but then I had to wonder why I didn't just watch the rest like the kids these days.
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
Sometimes, a little perspective goes a long way. While I didn't think too much of Never 7 (called infinity at the time), it's WAY better than Prismaticallization, even though it only came out a few months later. I can't help but compare the two games because Prismaticallization is like an earlier and crappier version of Never 7. It has the exact same basic concept except without any voice acting and crappier BGM. I bought this game purely on the cover art, so fool on me I guess.
Yesh, it doesn't take much to convince me to buy (if under $10)
It first starts out by warning you that there's nothing to do put read for the first 30 minutes. Pfft, 30 minutes?! Yeah, no worries there, I'm not an ADV newb. At the end of your first playthrough, you pick up an odd green prism crystal thing (hence the title). This prism crystal can be used to remember up to 5 things.
Be prepared to loop through this damn game at least 100 times
It's a very annoying user interface as you constantly have to loop and often run out of space on your crystal. I went to about 100 playthroughs and 7 hours before I cleared the first ending (the game helpfully keeps count in the upper-right corner). Yeah, if you follow a guide, you can clear an ending in under 20 but I was playing blind. Most of the time was spent holding the △ fast forward button so this game is totally a multitask affair. It really was an awkward way to play an ADV game and kinda unnecessary in my opinion. I mean, it was kinda fun at first, but it got old pretty fast. At the very least, maybe if the prism could hold 10 things or there was a skip to next choice feature (not fast-forward but instant), it would've made things quicker.
Unlocking the swimsuit scenarios were especially annoying as you have to first play a tarot game (1 loop). This set you on a path to one girl (chosen randomly). Then you have to remember the correct cards to win a card game (2 loops). Finally, you can unlock the swimsuit at the beach (1 loop). You then have to win the card game AGAIN (1-2? loops) and trigger the swimsuit memory at the beach a second time (1 loop). This takes about 5 loops for each girl (you may have to reload if you get duplicate random girl).
Well, I guess the effort was worth it for Miyu sukumizu
As I said, the BGM is not so great either though it sounds much better on the Dreamcast version. It feels like they spent all their budget on the pretty good opening animation and the ending song. Otherwise, this game is pretty darn low on both the polish and quality front.
The OP and ED were good but that's about it
Still, despite the overall cheapness of the game, the illustrations were not bad and it could have redeemed itself with a great story but unfortunately, it falls flat in that department as well. None of the characters were well developed and pretty much almost nothing is explained even after watching all the endings. The only good thing about the story was that it wasn't too long-winded and I was able to beat the game in about 12 hours. I did not unlock all the swimsuits however cause it's a pain in the arse and Miyu is really the only girl for me anyways.
Fake imouto was almost enough to make this game a 2. Almost.
Score: 1.5 sometimes even an imouto is not enough to make a decent game out of 5. (12 hours to beat)
I didn't think this game was terrible. It has some funny moments and some decent art, I just don't know if it was worth it. I certainly won't be keeping it in my ever shrinking closet of shame. If for some crazy reason I wanted to play it again, it's also available on PSN, though I would probably recommend the DC version for the better music and some extra scenes.
Oddly, this illustration was in a different style from the rest of the game
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
So I decided to check out the Memories Off series once 5pb. was kind enough to put a bunch of their PSP titles on a 100 yen PSN sale. Not to mention the fact that I have a stack of these games that I might want to get rid of once I finish them. (I'm running out of room in the shame closet.) There's like a bazillion titles in this series so it must mean they're good right? I mean every Call of Duty I've ever played has been like one masterpiece after another.
Yeah ok fine, COD jokes are getting old. SORRY
Apparently this game was super popular(?) because there's like a bazillion ports and on every possible type of media: manga, anime, novel, and drama CD. The PSP version I played contains the prequel Memories Off Pure and a new! exclusive!! After Story which as the amazingly clever title suggests is a story that takes place after the main game. By the way, I am NOT planning on playing the ponjan spinoff Festa.
2 down... umm 7 more to go?? I'm so confused.
I'm up to my 5th galge (6 if you count Never 7 which kinda is but not really), and I've started to notice that the more recent titles are a lot lazier in the branching path territory. Harvest OverRay has like a total of 3 dialogue choices and bitter smile. even kept a score to show you exactly which girl's branch you were heading for. '&' has a bunch of new choices that pop up as you unlocked certain endings that have nothing to do with the girl it leads to. The common theme I've found is that you have one main branch that you only really play once, then you go back and pick one branch per girl.
Memories Off on the other hand recalled some of the fun of those choose-your-own adventure books back from the day. There's tons of dialogue choices and branching paths all over the main scenario before you enter a girl's route. Even once you enter a certain route, there's plenty of opportunities to derail into the bad ending. However, the game makes navigation simple by showing you an avatar of the girl approving or disapproving of each dialogue option. I enjoyed trying to keep track of the various paths and finding the tiny bits of dialogue that would change just to make the narrative consistent.
31,971 messages... hmm, that's a lot of dialogue but how's the battle system?
Interestingly enough, I happened to get to the True ending on my first blind playthrough in about 9 hours. It's not hard thanks to those avatar hints but usually, the true ending is something you unlock at the very end and I guess the PS version is a lot more difficult to get the true ending. Combined with Pure Story and After Story, I was able to unlock 11 of the 13 endings blind and still spent a bit more time exploring some of the other paths.
I thought the VA was pretty good, except for Ayaka. All the girls were cute and unlike the hentai censored consumer port games I've played till now, they weren't all up in your business for absolutely no reason. (I know it's not actually hentai, I'm just trying to the make it easier for the non-jhipster philistines to understand.) In fact, as crazy as this sounds, it was kinda nice to play a pure game with no obligatory pool or hot spring fan service scenes. I don't think there's a shred of fan service to find in this game.
Almost like a real girl, if you were like umm... 2D n shit. Darn!
As for the additional added content, while the prequel was a nice side-story to fill out some of the details of the main character's past, After Story was pretty meh. Maybe too much time had past to get the original voice actors but there's no VA and no branching paths and the story was a bit silly to boot. I did find it interesting to see the reinterpretation of the character design with a more "modern" look.
Welp, another fine work from the post moepocalypse era
Score: 3 pre-moepocalypse nostalgia out of 5 (34.5 hours to beat)
Overall, I enjoyed Memories Off (I spent over 30 hours on it after all). I thought all the characters were charming, and the illustrations pretty good. The true ending was touching and all the girls definitely had their own story to tell. In particular, Minamo's route was pretty messed up especially since in this version, she doesn't open her eyes at the end unlike some of the other ports.
Looks damn good for a remake from Neo Geo Pocket Color!
While After Story wasn't much to write home about, the PSP port didn't have any technical issues and had all the necessary features in terms of sound options, etc. Certainly worth the 100 yen I paid on PSN. I'm not sure yet how After Rain fits into the series but I guess I'll figure it out when I get to the pile of PS2 games in my closet. If you're looking for a nice pure story about dealing with loss while getting to know some cute girls, I would say give this one a shot.
The music was just the regular ol' visual novel stuff.
Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely
