Sampaguita（サンパギータ）

I have not been in the mood to write about video games lately mainly because of how fucked up things are but oh well, what else is there to do these days? Go outside? Ya right.

So here we go, Sampaguita, the fall-themed 3rd entry in the Yarudora series. Once again, you play a random dude that happens to meet a girl that lost her memories for some reason or other. This time, it's a brown immigrant from the Philippines and thankfully in this fictional world, she doesn't get brutally beaten or killed for no reason by the police. (Did I mention I'm not in a great mood?)

You see any south east Asians... or any other suspicious colors...?

Overall, I think the Yarudora games are one of the more higher quality interactive anime series out there and this one is no exception. One big departure is that the male lead is voiced as well though you can turn it off if you're one of these weirdos that don't feel "immersed" when a character is voiced by well... obviously not you.

Damn accurate depiction of the real you, no I mean you, not me

Another interesting change was the addition of hints after you reached a bad ending that will successfully lead you to at least the first of the good endings. It won't help you reach all the other endings though cause it wouldn't be much of game at that point, now would it?

Based on a few Japanese reviews, this 3rd entry seemed to be viewed more favorably in the series due to the hard boiled story or whatever. Personally, I preferred the previous game's emotional drama even if it was more "galge". Maria's voice acting was very well done considering it was a Japanese person acting as a Filipino with supposedly 6 months of Japanese lessons.

Realistically, she should be like, "What the fuck you saying now?" half the time

Overall, I personally thought the story was not that super interesting. Well, I think the endings were pretty good, but the main events were nothing unexpected. I like the character design. I think someone from Ghost in the Shell was involved (dunno the details).

The story routes seemed a lot simpler this time around, most of the choices leading to the same overall plot with minor variations or just a bad end. It didn't have those side "what if" paths like Double Cast nor the complicated piecing together various events to figure out the truth in Kisetsu wo Dakishimete. Oh well, that just means I can move onto the next game even sooner!

Hey, are you going to buy me that animal crossing?

Score: 3 sitting here depressed that 40% of American STILL approve of Trump out of 5 (7 hours played, all endings)

As usual for this series, the music was pretty good but I don't think I'll be holding onto my PS1 copy of this game. I need to make room in my closet for that tiny Game Gear! (not)

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

Tantei Kibukawa Ryousuke Jiken Tan - Kamen Genei Satsujin Jiken（探偵・癸生川凌介事件譚 仮面幻影殺人事件）

It's been getting more difficult to make these posts more interesting as gaming news seems slow these days. Then I figured since Tantei Kibukawa is a game written by a game scenario writer about the same game scenario writer playing an online MMO to find a murderer in the game in the game so that he can make a game based on the murder that happened in the game in the game, why don't I make this blog post about how I'm writing this blog post to be meta. Unfortunately, I couldn't really tie my meta blog post into talking about the game so I gave up on it.

"passwords" is not a typo here, you need more than one to log onto the PC in the PC... in the PC

Of course,  I'm sure you realized by now that the previous paragraph is about how I failed to write a meta blog post about a meta game with a meta intro. Yes, I just pulled a "if god can do anything, he can make a rock to heavy for him to lift" paradox. Mic drop!

Reminds me of the good ol' days when the gov did shit... (CDC? Who needs that?)

Anyways, I know I've been going on and on about getting rid of my more mediocre games in order to make more room in my (sister's) basement. Of course, you never know if a game is good or bad until you play it. That's just common sense unless of course, you're a paid game "journalist".

I assumed that Tantei Kibukawa on the DS would just be another mediocre mystery ADV game with horrible visuals. I mean, if you go by just the game cover, it looks... unique. However, I can agree with many of the reviews on Amazon Japan that the graphics grow on you to the point where characters such as Izuna and Rio actually look cute over time.

I would date her, but then again who wouldn't I date? Real girls, that's who. (Self proclaimed voluntary incel aka vincel #yaRight)

Not only are the graphics actually endearing, the story is also surprisingly pretty darn good. You know, I play obscure games with the faint hope that some of them would be a hidden gem but it's pretty rare unless you think hidden means "is not FF or Pokemon" like some YTers. And dare I say it, this game is kind of a hidden gem. Or at least good enough that I would be interested in playing more but oh, sorry, this is the only port among a whole series of games that are now completely unplayable without resorting to buying somebody's old Japanese flip phone with the game installed. So much for game preservation... You would think at least the series author would still have a copy around but well, here's a recent tweet from him.

永劫会の動くガラケーを手に入れたぞ！ pic.twitter.com/BHpJakndeq

— 生王正生 (@ikrmmso) January 5, 2020

In terms of gameplay, it's nothing more than your typical menu based detective ADV game. I did however get stuck just a couple times as you need to poke at some parts of the background to progress (that amazing DS innovation!) You also get a chance to exercise your deduction skills by answering Izuna's questions correctly. The only penalty for getting those questions wrong is you get a lower rating from her at the end. A better rating just unlocks some more memos to read about other cases, which are of course trapped on garake phones.

Whoa, a hand icon? DS is the only console that can handle this kind of gameplay!

I was hopeful that there was going to be some interesting gameplay when you're asked to select your character class in the MMO. It went into quite a lot of detail on the differences between choosing to be a policeman, reporter, etc. I don't know if that was too much to implement but you never really play the MMO as they describe it.

Score: 3 eh, I'm sure nobody will miss the other 18 or so games out of the series (shrug) out of 5 (12 hours to beat)

As usual, unlike the "pro" reviews, I feel no need to provide even a basic summary of the plot with my shitty writing and leave it as an exercise to the reader to check it out for him/her/etc self. I would say that if you like ADV games, this is definitely one worth giving a shot. (Sorry, Jhipsters only. I assume too obscure for fan translation.)

Now, my only issue is trying to decide whether to dump this game to make more room or keep it around as a "hidden" gem in my DS collection. Sigh, decisions, decisions. It may seem insignificant but I live in a modern, advanced society. It's not like I have to worry about life and death situations such as plagues from the old barbaric medieval times...

P.S. For future reference (if we're all still alive), I'm talking about fucking COVID-19.

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

Kisetsu o Dakishimete（季節を抱きしめて）

Some of you may recall that I didn't like the first Yarudora game Double Cast that much. After all, that's a post currently tied in first place for the record of most number of people to leave a comment. Unfortunately, it was not able to reach what would have been a record at 3 people but at least I know 2 people know what I'm talking about.

Would it kill you to leave a comment? Anybody? Hello?

Maybe this post will finally reach the record because I'm happy to report that the 2nd game in the series was much more to my liking. It may not be everybody's cup of tea as it's not suspenseful like Double Cast but I like these sweet, wistful love stories. This old man remembers back when I was young lad, playing FF7 by myself, holed up in my room. Back then, we jerked off to Tifa even if her boobs were a single triangle polygon, none of this complaining about sports bras. Ahh, to be young again!

Ack, the sun... and a girl! That's like gamer kryptonite and garlic!

Even if you prefer a more dramatic story like the first game, I'm sure all (three) of us can agree that the animation is much improved in this game. The PSP version constantly nags you with trailers of the other games when you reach an ending so I was reminded of how bad the first game looked every time I saw the trailer.

The story is about a young girl you run into that appears to have lost her memories... AGAIN. Yeah, I guess if you're going to make a sequel, might as well keep the same theme? However, this time, it's just a cute girl in a school uniform that thankfully isn't violent (except for the panty shot kick to the face).

This plot has a twist: normal brain functions!
Ah wait, nope, false alarm. Amnesia again.

You know, normally ADV games have a separate system save file that tracks what choices or endings you've seen and how many hours you played across your various saves. This allows you to save at what looks like an important point and then try both ways without having to play again from scratch. Unfortunately, these Yarudora games require you to keep saving over one file after you reach an ending. Even though the skip function is pretty good, it was annoying to have to start over and over again.

Fortunately, at least this game makes use of that annoyance by having some clever variations and endings depending on the last ending you saw. For example, if you make the right choices to make Tomoko happy in the beginning of the game, she offers to show you her legs. Like any normal gamer, I wanted to see that again, but on the subsequent playthrough, even if you make the same choices, and you're like, ok time to show your legs, she's like, "What the fuck you talking about?" I thought that was pretty clever. My translation may not be totally accurate. The only Japanese words I know are "Rasengan" and "kawaii" after all.

巨乳死すべし？ I'm fine with any size.

In fact, the last ending I unlocked was Bad Ending 12 because it requires 3 consecutive playthroughs. First, you have to slap Tomoko, then the game asks you at the beginning of the second playthrough if you're ok with violence towards women and if you respond, "Yes, the bitch deserved it." (again paraphrasing), you unlock Bad Ending 17. Then, you have to slap Tomoko again, and she fucking knocks you out with 3 hits to unlock Bad Ending 12. I think there's a lesson in there somewhere but I sure can't figure it out. After all, I'm just a normal, cruel, cisgender, white male with no perspective on anything other than how awesome life is.

Huh? Doesn't white privilege mean I get all the Japanese girls I want?

Score: 3.5 "Best not to think about how old Mayu looks like" out of 5 (9.5 hours to unlock all endings, 93% complete)

Ahem, joking aside, I thought this game was well done overall. The animation was good, both Tomoko and Mayu were cute and well voiced, and the music was great. At the very least, my plan to purge this game to make room was thwarted and I'll likely be holding onto my PS1 copy for now. Out of all the interactive anime games I played so far, if I were to recommend just one, this would be the one... at least for now. I'm not the only one that dug this game and the soundtrack as there's a theme song cover from Saekano, a reference I totally didn't get till now. (This old man still prefers the OG version, but cool cover for the kids.)

Oh I get the reference now! (Official anime game expert here)

I don't remember if there was a direct reference to this game in Saekano. It's been a while since I watched both seasons. Maybe playing the Saekano game will jog my memory (yet another game in my ever growing pile of games).

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

Double Cast（ダブルキャスト）

Long time readers of the blog (all 2 of you) may have noticed some recurring themes. Honestly, I'm running out of timely and topical material to keep these posts interesting. After all, there is nothing more boring than reading somebody's breakdown of a video game in a "traditional" review.

One issue is that YouTube is now a pedophile infested commercial sell out and I'm no longer interested in watching  "collectors" engage in their unhealthy obsessions. Speaking of unhealthy buying habits, there are going to be lots of anime games coming up. As I found out with Momotenshi, these games are great to blast through in about 5-10 hours and are easy to purge from the ever growing pile.

So why don't I start by giving a quick summary of the story of Double Cast, follow it up with my thoughts on the gameplay, and conclude with the good and bad points about the game... BOOOORIIIING!!

Wake me when you're finished or if Shitaku shuts down

Double Cast is the first title in the Yarudora series of anime games that I'm working on purging. As an anime, the animation is a bit rough at times and it's definitely not as well produced as Momotenshi. There were several scenes where it looked it was drawn by different people. However, it has a skip feature so that's a big advantage. Unfortunately, the skip option is buried in the option so I actually slogged through it 10 or so times before discovering the feature.

Not very automatic if you have to press △ IMO...

I played the PSP version as I owned the UMD (emphasis on the past tense). Fortunately, there is no real issue with the aspect ratio because the original PS1 game also had widescreen with a big black section for the text. You can either choose to view the text on top or adjust the aspect ratio to make room on the bottom. (why would you do that?)

I swear, this is like the 3rd WicDonalds I've seen in a anime/game.

Unlike some of the more "anime" type of anime games, this is definitely an ADV game with a whole butt load of endings and a fair number of dialogue choices. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out which choices mattered and I got stuck on a couple of bad endings. After the frustration of getting the same ending a few times, I eventually resorted to looking up a guide. The guide, by the way, has a whopping FORTY-FOUR playthroughs to get 100% completion. Like, fuck that shit, I played through it enough to watch all the endings and even then I only got like 93% or so. Good enough for me, I say.

These black screens show the MC's emotion without showing his face

Some saavy gamer who's played this game might catch me in the act and say, "Hey, these screenshots are from like the first 5 minutes of the game! I bet you didn't even play it!!" Oh my, you got me! Time to make an apology video on YT. I'M GOING VIRAL!!! Actually, I just loaded this up in an emulator to post some screenshots after I played it for like 15 hours (most of it spent watching it skip forward). I never could bother to figure out those plugins or whatnot on my PSP to take screenshots.

Trigger warning! There are a couple panty shots. (Spoiler: Pure white)

Score: 2 the panti is pure white but the girl... not so much out of 5 (15 hours played)

Kidding about trigger warnings aside, this anime/game is not super gory like Elfen Lied but the fact that I even compared the two might be a sign that some shit is going to go down. By the way, am I crazy or is Elfen Lied not even that great an anime?

Overall, I found the story pretty cliché and mediocre. I mean, it's a group of college kids making a movie and the title is Double Cast. Not so hard to guess what the game is about. The OST at least was pretty good. I jammed to a few tunes.

Granted, I haven't played a ton of these interactive anime games but the mechanics at least were ok provided you looked in the options menu. I can only hope that the later games offer up a better story and animation. However, watching the same anime over and over with a few scene variations is not exactly my cup of tea so maybe this isn't my type of genre. At the very least, I was able to sell this one on the ol' eBays to pay off 1% of my latest payday loan. #MAGA (obligatory hashtag)

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

Taiko no Tatsujin Portable（太鼓の達人 ぽ〜たぶる）

The Taiko no Tatsujin games are pretty fun when you have a giant taiko to bang on, though Japanese arcades are always so loud that the fun is diminished cause you can't hear jack. However, on home consoles, it becomes a rather simplistic rhythm game that's pretty limited musically. I mean, there's only so much you can do with just BOOM and CLACK. I know next to nothing about real taiko drumming but I don't think these games are exactly an accurate representation.

I tried this on my PSP and now I need a new one #Patreon #HALP #$$$
While it's fine as a mainstream, newb rhythm game, I find it pretty lacking compared to oh say for example, Beatmania (#fuckKonami?). Now, don't get me wrong, it's not like the game only has super easy songs. I definitely can't clear some of the more difficult songs in Oni mode. However, the issue for me is that the base mechanics are a bit too basic. So when my Closet of Shame™ started running out of room and I had to purge some shit, the taiko games on the PSP were the first on the chopping block.

Some of the songs on the first portable version is for me a nostalgic trip back in time to 2005. Those were the years I was actually living in Tokyo so it's not even fake nostalgia. Songs like マツケンサンバ really takes me back.

Oh god, now I feel really old. Still damn catchy though.
Of course, I was ignorant gamer at the time so I was mostly busy working overtime and playing mainstream DS titles like animal crossing and brain age. I didn't even know about the PSP, so big FAIL on Sony's marketing division there.

While the 38 songs isn't exactly a terribly small list (the online songs are now all offline), most of the songs didn't really do it for me. It has the standard set of "classical" and Namco originals that are whatever and overall, the set was just meh for me. It doesn't help that Taiko sound effects don't really go well with most songs and the other sounds such as farts were not better. Not surprisingly, We will rock you was the best match for this type of game. For some reason, this one also has DBZ Head-cha-la. CHA LA! HEAD CHA LA! Ahem, excuse me, reflex.

Score: 2 I actually watched マツケンサンバ on TV (yeah, I'm a dinosaur) out of 5

There's nothing wrong with this game, it plays just fine and that would normally be good enough for a 3 average score but the rather lackluster song list brings it down a notch.

I unlocked all the songs, got up to Meijin rank, and cleared a fair chunk of songs on Oni difficulty mode and that's good enough for me. Now I have a little extra space to BUY BUY BUY some more games. Mission accomplished.

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

The Legend of Heroes: A Tear of Vermillion（英雄伝説 ガガーブトリロジー 朱紅い雫）

I'm gonna try to not rehash all that stuff about how Tear of Vermillion is LOH IV blah blah blah. To make a long story short, this is the second entry in the LOH Garghav trilogy. Chronologically, it takes place before White Witch but story-wise, the two games have pretty much zero connection so it really doesn't matter.

To be honest, it's been a while since I beat this game so I don't really remember the story details but I do remember it started out with a bang. My theory is it was to fix the absolutely mind-numbingly boring start of the previous game.

IMOUTO TAIMU, always a good start to a game. Oniichan is here Aimeru!!

In terms of graphics and game engine, everything looks pretty much the same as the first PSP port except they changed the weird pseudo ATB nature of the battle system into a standard turn based affair. I actually preferred the neat trick in the previous game of cancelling out of the menu and letting everybody duke it out automatically so having to select attack for every party member every turn was a bummer. At least it does a better job of showing your attack range so you don't have to waste a turn just trying to reach your enemy if you don't want to.

Attack, attack, attack, attack, standard RPG fare...

To be perfectly fair, you do want to use spells and skills that have area effects when the enemies are bunched together Chrono Trigger style. The change to a clearer turn-based system does make timing things easier compared to the rather chaotic free-for-all of the first game. Overall, there's nothing too special about the gameplay. Some of the more challenging boss battles did require some planning for special attacks since they charge over time (the POWER meter). The difficulty was a bit better balanced this time around compared to the super easy previous entry with the weird difficulty spike at the end. I actually died once or twice in this one.

Overall, I enjoyed the story much more than the previous game as well. The characters were more interesting and there was some good character development for at least some of the characters if not the main character. Sure, some of the plot elements are a bit cliche at this point but hey, this is a remake of a PC98 game from 1996. The music was pretty good too overall.

For some reason, I found this tune really catchy
The main "heroine" or as we now call it "damsel in distress in OMG TRIGGER WARNING MISOGYNIST WOMEN HATER GAME", is actually your little sister. So there's not much of a romance, but it was still cool to join in Avin's frantic quest to reunite with his cute imouto. Hey, if my sister was cute and 2D, I would have done exactly the same (my real 3D ones... um... not so much).

Score: 2.5 oh those innocent days before oreimo when everything wasn't tinged with weird imouto incest fetishes out of 5

Get a room, you guys!
Also, I hear it's legal in some States?
Might wanna check that out.

Obviously, in today's modern enlightened times, an RPG about chasing after your little sister would look very different (and to be perfectly honest, I would totally be all over that). Regardless, while nothing too special, I found the second part of the Garghav trilogy to be adequate enough to be an average fun title overall.

Given the scale of the ending in White Witch (which frankly was poorly done and came out of nowhere), I think there was a missed opportunity here to expand upon the overall story and grow the universe. Unfortunately, the tiniest bit of connection to the first game they show doesn't really add anything to the story as a trilogy. It remains to be seen if there's a larger picture here in the 3rd entry: Song of the Ocean. At this point, I think it may be too late to really tie anything together but we'll see I suppose.

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

Another Code（アナザーコード ２つの記憶）

I literally have nothing interesting to say about Another Code: Two Memories so this is gonna be a short post. I'd say that also reflects upon the game itself as it's not very interesting and very short.

It's not that the game is bad per se, in fact, I would have a lot more to say about a bad game. It does at least make clever use of the DS hardware with some of the puzzles. I must admit I got stuck on a couple of those, like closing the DS and stuff like that.

The graphics are not bad either and once again I just don't have much to say except, meh, I guess this game was aight. If you like puzzles and adventure games, at least get this on the cheap. For the 500ish? yen I paid, you know, whatever, it's aight.

yeah, I lifted this from hardcoregaming.net, that's how lazy I am

The story premise had potential for some feels but it kinda falls short. Ashley is a likeable character but certainly nothing special and somehow I don't really feel like the developers know what it's like to have kids as the story was just lukewarm in general. As for the game's length, sometimes a game is good because it's short and sometimes it's just... short

I guess there's a bad and good ending? I really can't be bothered to play this game again though. Here's hoping the sequel is better cause I paid like almost 1,000 yen for it. Oh, and as an obligatory Jhipster comment, I have to say the localized title "Trace Memory" is like the most generic and boring game title I've ever seen. Good job as usual, localizers.

Score: 2 I honestly can't think of a single clever thing to say here out of 5 (6 hours to beat)

Liked the main character so hopeful for a good sequel

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