Zolnir Posts
Btw, how is Lightning Raiden 3 (if that's what it's called) to you guys? I need a review before I DL it.
EDIT: And uh, apparently I forgot to put my Rewrite review here, so!
Finally finished this. Took me around 3 to 4 days to go through everything of importance with a walkthrough.
This time I'll talk about the faults of the game first. Number one would (still) be the map movement mini game. In the past I was annoyed by it so much 10 minutes into the game that I literally quit for months before picking it up again lately. Make no mistake, it CAN be rather fun as you read through those funny lines, but that doesn't change the fact that it's tedious and annoying. To make a player to move their mouse blindly in search of a event-revealing pixel - 18 of them in the forest - is just stupid, especially when the map itself isn't big enough in order to simulate the size of an actual Mappie.
As for those who ask why I don't just use the autoskip button, that's because I'm dislike playing a game while skipping what seems to be a core aspect to it. It appears from the walkthrough that some parts of the mini game is related to heroine choices, and finally since I'm actively reviewing every VN there's no avoiding that I must fully experience every major aspects it has to offer. However, that does not change the fact that I was at one point, extremely disgusted with it and nearly lost sight of this epic VN forever.
Next would be the poor art drawings, choices and presentations in certain routes. Certainly I am not the only one who thinks that the art does not do its story justice; this could've been so much more better. I believe there are many who believe that for Chihaya's route at least the artist could've been more diligent and show some proper CGs instead of Muscle Girl urging Koutarou forward like a Pokemon. That CG felt almost lazy. At many times of the game it felt as if a certain scene could've used a CG for better presentation, but they did not. There are also CGs that did not feel like one (just go through Chihaya's route and you'll get what I mean). As a disclaimer, I am not commenting about the art style, but rather the lack of proper visual illustrations that would've made this an absolute top notch VN.
Also, there were many unsolved mysteries in Rewrite that just begs to be explained. For example, Kotori never visited Koutarou at the end of her route when he was rehabilitating at the hospital. Why? In the other routes we can simply explain it as her giving up all hope on life and (probably) committed suicide, hence zero contact with Koutarou, but that theory could not work in her route. And this is but one of the many mysteries of Rewrite, and they most likely will never be answered in the future even if there's a sequel.
The other would be Kashimi Sakura. I never really felt her so-called space time transcending hatred for life (which you would only experience once in Moon, and even then it was unreal), and in Terra the old woman almost seemed amiable. She was at least polite enough not to outright murder Koutarou given his supernatural abilities. She didn't even do anything against Koutarou from the beginning to the end, who was a very dangerous and random element. This part of Rewrite felt unnatural to say the least.
The final scenes of Rewrite felt dissatisfying to me, but that's an extremely subjective opinion on presentation technique so just food for thought.
... And now that's done, let's talk about the goods about this VN. I'm going to go through this briefly because there's probably more than enough praises already.
So first, the writing, story and plot. Absolutely beautiful and Key-unique. Needless to say, this stands at least on par (though definitely not above Clannad) with the best of VNs from Key. My favorite routes in descending order are: Shizuru, Akane, Lucia, Kotori and finally Chihaya, even though all of them are equal if we simply read the story by script (means text only). The reason for Shizuru being at the top was that there were a lot more effective CGs to aid with the presentation. Even the ending video managed to draw the best possible emotions from people, though unfortunately not all of them provide as much meaning and feelings.
The music was beautiful. Not really sure what else to say except that the ending songs grew miraculously moreheart-touching with every route you cover until one could cry at the end of Terra. I honestly don't remember any VN that could do such things. Like wow.
The art/visuals, while not perfect, was definitely stunning in Shizuru, Moon and Terra's route. Shizuru's route won full marks in this; her final CG was most impactful and stunning.
System-wise, everything was again pretty standard but effective (thank god for auto saves). I especially like what they did with Koutarou's Rewrite meter which indicates the amount of times he can use his power before he goes past his limit; it was kinda cool.
Overall, 8.8 out of 10. The map mini game was a hit or miss and in my case it was a miss, and that is why I did not give it a 9 at least.
EDIT: And uh, apparently I forgot to put my Rewrite review here, so!
Finally finished this. Took me around 3 to 4 days to go through everything of importance with a walkthrough.
This time I'll talk about the faults of the game first. Number one would (still) be the map movement mini game. In the past I was annoyed by it so much 10 minutes into the game that I literally quit for months before picking it up again lately. Make no mistake, it CAN be rather fun as you read through those funny lines, but that doesn't change the fact that it's tedious and annoying. To make a player to move their mouse blindly in search of a event-revealing pixel - 18 of them in the forest - is just stupid, especially when the map itself isn't big enough in order to simulate the size of an actual Mappie.
As for those who ask why I don't just use the autoskip button, that's because I'm dislike playing a game while skipping what seems to be a core aspect to it. It appears from the walkthrough that some parts of the mini game is related to heroine choices, and finally since I'm actively reviewing every VN there's no avoiding that I must fully experience every major aspects it has to offer. However, that does not change the fact that I was at one point, extremely disgusted with it and nearly lost sight of this epic VN forever.
Next would be the poor art drawings, choices and presentations in certain routes. Certainly I am not the only one who thinks that the art does not do its story justice; this could've been so much more better. I believe there are many who believe that for Chihaya's route at least the artist could've been more diligent and show some proper CGs instead of Muscle Girl urging Koutarou forward like a Pokemon. That CG felt almost lazy. At many times of the game it felt as if a certain scene could've used a CG for better presentation, but they did not. There are also CGs that did not feel like one (just go through Chihaya's route and you'll get what I mean). As a disclaimer, I am not commenting about the art style, but rather the lack of proper visual illustrations that would've made this an absolute top notch VN.
Also, there were many unsolved mysteries in Rewrite that just begs to be explained. For example, Kotori never visited Koutarou at the end of her route when he was rehabilitating at the hospital. Why? In the other routes we can simply explain it as her giving up all hope on life and (probably) committed suicide, hence zero contact with Koutarou, but that theory could not work in her route. And this is but one of the many mysteries of Rewrite, and they most likely will never be answered in the future even if there's a sequel.
The other would be Kashimi Sakura. I never really felt her so-called space time transcending hatred for life (which you would only experience once in Moon, and even then it was unreal), and in Terra the old woman almost seemed amiable. She was at least polite enough not to outright murder Koutarou given his supernatural abilities. She didn't even do anything against Koutarou from the beginning to the end, who was a very dangerous and random element. This part of Rewrite felt unnatural to say the least.
The final scenes of Rewrite felt dissatisfying to me, but that's an extremely subjective opinion on presentation technique so just food for thought.
... And now that's done, let's talk about the goods about this VN. I'm going to go through this briefly because there's probably more than enough praises already.
So first, the writing, story and plot. Absolutely beautiful and Key-unique. Needless to say, this stands at least on par (though definitely not above Clannad) with the best of VNs from Key. My favorite routes in descending order are: Shizuru, Akane, Lucia, Kotori and finally Chihaya, even though all of them are equal if we simply read the story by script (means text only). The reason for Shizuru being at the top was that there were a lot more effective CGs to aid with the presentation. Even the ending video managed to draw the best possible emotions from people, though unfortunately not all of them provide as much meaning and feelings.
The music was beautiful. Not really sure what else to say except that the ending songs grew miraculously moreheart-touching with every route you cover until one could cry at the end of Terra. I honestly don't remember any VN that could do such things. Like wow.
The art/visuals, while not perfect, was definitely stunning in Shizuru, Moon and Terra's route. Shizuru's route won full marks in this; her final CG was most impactful and stunning.
System-wise, everything was again pretty standard but effective (thank god for auto saves). I especially like what they did with Koutarou's Rewrite meter which indicates the amount of times he can use his power before he goes past his limit; it was kinda cool.
Overall, 8.8 out of 10. The map mini game was a hit or miss and in my case it was a miss, and that is why I did not give it a 9 at least.
I got it from him too so, ^_^
If I remember correctly, the key to defeating the secret boss is to kill all its minions and kill him as fast as possible. Not particularly hard honestly, most bosses in Gears of Dragoon far exceed Eiyuu Senki's secret boss in terms of difficulty (itemization alone can make you tear out dem hairs man >_>).
If I remember correctly, the key to defeating the secret boss is to kill all its minions and kill him as fast as possible. Not particularly hard honestly, most bosses in Gears of Dragoon far exceed Eiyuu Senki's secret boss in terms of difficulty (itemization alone can make you tear out dem hairs man >_>).
Sanada, you can finish all the events in a single playthrough. It's designed to let you enjoy absolutely everything without needing to repeat the game. On of the many Pluses I find in Eiyuu Senki.
First impression on YU-NO.
First, thanks amorim! This really went above my expectations considering how old it is. So first, I'm not that deep into the story yet so I can't tell how it's going to turn out, but suffice to say the mystery drew me in quite strongly. It's been a while since I've read a story - real books aside - where I couldn't guess how it'll progress or end.
I'll lay out the single, most incredible positive point of this game: Creativity. The story itself is unique, its gameplay is intriguing (but pretty much impossible to go through without both visual and text walkthroughs), and incredibly nolstagic as you - ahem - casually enter a lady's room and begin rummaging through her stuff. That excitement never grows old lol.
The amount of objects you can point and click are surprisingly plentiful. Too often I've seen in games (well maybe the gamers are also lazy) with little to no objects that you can actually interact with. It's practically non-existent in current VNs!
The Time Map though is pretty much useless honestly. Still, it interacts well with the Jewel Save, and heck, this is probably the only non-RPG/SLG/everything kind of read-only Visual Novel that implements a limited save system, that I enjoy! Man...
First impression on YU-NO.
First, thanks amorim! This really went above my expectations considering how old it is. So first, I'm not that deep into the story yet so I can't tell how it's going to turn out, but suffice to say the mystery drew me in quite strongly. It's been a while since I've read a story - real books aside - where I couldn't guess how it'll progress or end.
I'll lay out the single, most incredible positive point of this game: Creativity. The story itself is unique, its gameplay is intriguing (but pretty much impossible to go through without both visual and text walkthroughs), and incredibly nolstagic as you - ahem - casually enter a lady's room and begin rummaging through her stuff. That excitement never grows old lol.
The amount of objects you can point and click are surprisingly plentiful. Too often I've seen in games (well maybe the gamers are also lazy) with little to no objects that you can actually interact with. It's practically non-existent in current VNs!
The Time Map though is pretty much useless honestly. Still, it interacts well with the Jewel Save, and heck, this is probably the only non-RPG/SLG/everything kind of read-only Visual Novel that implements a limited save system, that I enjoy! Man...
That was his fault without a doubt, but the decision itself was agreed by all of TSM. If they really wanted to keep Chaox all they need to do is to vote for him... But no one did. Or if they did, Gamecrib didn't show.
Oooh, good one amorim, it does look interesting! I'll see if I can find a working link.
And Sanada, there's no turn count limit (not until the very last boss if I remember properly) so just skip all you like and get dem gold. =3
And Sanada, there's no turn count limit (not until the very last boss if I remember properly) so just skip all you like and get dem gold. =3
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I'M SO FUCKING BORED WHERE ARE THE GOOD VNS?????
*dies*
*dies*
Finished Rewrite Harvest Festa. It definitely helped resolve some dissatisfying, mysterious endings of Rewrite.
Kotori:
Chihaya:
Lucia:
Akane:
Shizuru:
Kagari:
About Rewrite Quest, I lost interest when I found out that it was an event that happened during the time of Moon. I would've played it to the end if they say that it was a future scenario after Terra, but well, shobon. T_T
Kotori:
Spoiler:
Chihaya:
Spoiler:
Lucia:
Spoiler:
Akane:
Spoiler:
Shizuru:
Spoiler:
Kagari:
Spoiler:
About Rewrite Quest, I lost interest when I found out that it was an event that happened during the time of Moon. I would've played it to the end if they say that it was a future scenario after Terra, but well, shobon. T_T
Shizuru's route also have more CGs that were put to better use as compared to the other routes. Some of them just made me felt tears and Clannad when the scene played out. I never understood the great amount of rejection I got from the vndb forums (lazy to argue with them) when I told them that.
No,
Also, what do you think of Shizuru's route? I personally think it's the best out of all the heroines (in terms of presentation), but why on earth people keeping dissing about it?
Spoiler:
Also, what do you think of Shizuru's route? I personally think it's the best out of all the heroines (in terms of presentation), but why on earth people keeping dissing about it?
Speaking of which, I totally forgot to post my 僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± review from vndb here. Also the reason why I may sound a little... tired of romance-centric stories, because this is just packed with em.
For those who knew me, they would know that I have a huge weakness for musical Visual Novels, and thus almost all the Visual Novels from Overdrive had a special place in my heart. First on the list would be of course Kira Kira, and everything else under the same universe (Kira Kira Curtain Call, Deardrops, Cross The Future etc). This is my subjective opinion, but Overdrive has made some of the best songs I’ve heard from Visual Novels, and only losing to one time epics Symphonic Rain (though I thought some Overdrive songs were certainly on par too). So when I saw this came out I immediately made it my first priority to play it just after completing Rewrite.
僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± is a Visual Novel which focuses on the theme †˜Music’ and †˜Fantasy: Angel’. You have a dark-spirited protagonist who seemed to view everything in the worst possible reality due to a terrible past, until one day an angel fell from the sky and changed his life forever. At first sight this wasn’t the best of openings even as a brief synopsis, but surprisingly enough I didn’t feel any skepticism when playing the actual game itself. The writer did well to create a sober enough atmosphere that nullified any †˜meh’ type of feelings when the angel, Aine fell from the skies. At that moment I already knew that this Visual Novel would most likely not disappoint me, for it had certainly caught my attention so fully that I wouldn’t even think to distract myself with other VNs.
So basically, 僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± narrates about the different types of love difficulties we may encounter in life. Each chapter is dedicated to tell one type, and for the common route they are:
The individual heroine routes are no different, as: . All of these problems were narrated in a condensed, simplified version, but they were definitely entertaining and each provided with a most realistic conclusion regardless of the protagonist’s decision.
Speaking about the choices. The protagonist would make a decision at each turning point of these relationships whether to †˜Return the Broken Piece of Heart’ or not that would decide the fate of these couples they’re trying to help (under Aine’s persistent pressure lol). Hence there are of course two different endings, and they were very realistic that not one – despite the very different outcomes – had a perfect happy/sad ending. It was always a mixture of sadness and happiness, some more than the other, but always a mixture. I absolutely love the VN for this one point alone: there is no perfect happy ending for ANYONE at all, not even in the true route, not even for an angel. Such is the way of life, and the way僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”±was so frank about this simple truth is a refreshing breath of the air.
The sub heroines and characters were fleshed out okay – not too good but not bad either. But this is also the only serious VN I know where every sub heroine route ended, regardless of their two separate endings, Yuri’s route was the shortest out of all (and in my opinion the worst, but make no mistake, it is still a good read) others, where the two of them attempts to deal with the problem presented by the crazy sister. To put it mildly (without spoilers), the good end puts the protagonist in a miserable state and the bad end utterly broke him and Yuri. THAT’S RIGHT, LET NO ONE BE HAPPY AND EVERYTHING ENDS IN DESPAIR! FUHAHAHAHA – ahem, woops. Inner demon be at peace, at peace~
Heavy Spoilers now on sub heroines’ route PLEASE AVOID! So while a devil spawn like this feels super fine and dandy, someone more normal might find it a little too hard and depressing to swallow. No, it’s not as dark as say Yume Miru Kusuri, but the constant bombs of sadness was enough to turn an angel’s wing black. And yet you must complete all the sub heroine routes first before you can progress to the true end, . Damn, I REALLY like this VN for what it is, LET THE DESP *stomps inner demon*
Now, about the system, 僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± offers something new. There are a lot more new functions (which I didn’t use, so won’t make much of a comment here) in the Config section, and the Mouse Settings page is… rather impressive. In the Omake (Extra section), announcements would be made if you have completed a certain heroine’s route to help keep better track of your progress. As long as you’re in the Omake the heroines would make funny jokes on occasion (though you can turn them off by clicking the microphone near the bottom left). For Scene Replays we have the Calendar interface, which organize things better than the conventional when trying to search for a particular scene to replay.
Also, in the Songs and BGM section, there are several new options that I’ve really come to like. Next to the Song List is a Playlist which allows you to, well, make up a playlist of music so you can hear them in any order you like. At the right there are 3 options you can select: Lyrics, Lyrics + Code and er, Slide Mode (Sorry my Katagana kinda fails sometimes)? They are exactly what they mean: Lyrics displays a white board with the song’s lyrics on it, Lyrics + Code adds additional text (again, sorry but I don’t understand what they mean) above the lyrics and finally Slide Mode displays CGs in succession until the end of the song. At the bottom you have a slide bar to control volume, and a number of buttons which symbolized †˜Previous (song)’, †˜Play’, †˜Stop’, †˜Next (song)’, †˜Loop’, †˜Loop Song Once Only’, and †˜Shuffle’. The knob thing actually means that you’re playing the entire Songlist or the Playlist. Finally, click at the chibi Aine portrait and she would make cute noises, though of course like I said you can turn it off if it gets annoying.
What I think about the music in general… let’s just say that Overdrive never disappoints me. What’s more, they actually made an improvement (subjective) by shortening the usual lengthy opening of a song. So yes, I’m both impressed and happy.
Now, about some of the technical faults of I find in the VN:
1) No Autosave function.
2) Interface text in Save/Load page is way, way, waaaaay too small.
3) They grey interface text at the Config section looks blurry.
4) At the Song/BGM replay section, the switching of songs when clicking †˜Next’ and †˜Previous’ is very slow.
5) I’m not exactly sure how to use some of the functions offered in Mouse Settings honestly. The help texts are a pain to read.
The non-technical faults are:
1) Since every single chapter focuses entirely on the topic †˜Love’ despite the difference it can easily get tedious. There were no breaks in between at all and it may stifle some readers.
2) The truth/final mystery+solution is kinda †˜meh, wut’ even though the ending was really cool. Also, I easily guessed all the truth to all the mysteries, so they don't surprise me at all.
3) Too short for me at least. A total of maybe fifteen to sixteen hours maximum if you play through all routes (with skip on common).
And that’s the end of my super lengthy review.
For those who knew me, they would know that I have a huge weakness for musical Visual Novels, and thus almost all the Visual Novels from Overdrive had a special place in my heart. First on the list would be of course Kira Kira, and everything else under the same universe (Kira Kira Curtain Call, Deardrops, Cross The Future etc). This is my subjective opinion, but Overdrive has made some of the best songs I’ve heard from Visual Novels, and only losing to one time epics Symphonic Rain (though I thought some Overdrive songs were certainly on par too). So when I saw this came out I immediately made it my first priority to play it just after completing Rewrite.
僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± is a Visual Novel which focuses on the theme †˜Music’ and †˜Fantasy: Angel’. You have a dark-spirited protagonist who seemed to view everything in the worst possible reality due to a terrible past, until one day an angel fell from the sky and changed his life forever. At first sight this wasn’t the best of openings even as a brief synopsis, but surprisingly enough I didn’t feel any skepticism when playing the actual game itself. The writer did well to create a sober enough atmosphere that nullified any †˜meh’ type of feelings when the angel, Aine fell from the skies. At that moment I already knew that this Visual Novel would most likely not disappoint me, for it had certainly caught my attention so fully that I wouldn’t even think to distract myself with other VNs.
So basically, 僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± narrates about the different types of love difficulties we may encounter in life. Each chapter is dedicated to tell one type, and for the common route they are:
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
Speaking about the choices. The protagonist would make a decision at each turning point of these relationships whether to †˜Return the Broken Piece of Heart’ or not that would decide the fate of these couples they’re trying to help (under Aine’s persistent pressure lol). Hence there are of course two different endings, and they were very realistic that not one – despite the very different outcomes – had a perfect happy/sad ending. It was always a mixture of sadness and happiness, some more than the other, but always a mixture. I absolutely love the VN for this one point alone: there is no perfect happy ending for ANYONE at all, not even in the true route, not even for an angel. Such is the way of life, and the way僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”±was so frank about this simple truth is a refreshing breath of the air.
The sub heroines and characters were fleshed out okay – not too good but not bad either. But this is also the only serious VN I know where every sub heroine route ended, regardless of their two separate endings,
Spoiler:
Heavy Spoilers now on sub heroines’ route PLEASE AVOID!
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
Now, about the system, 僕ãŒå¤©ä½¿ã«ãªã£ãŸç†ç”± offers something new. There are a lot more new functions (which I didn’t use, so won’t make much of a comment here) in the Config section, and the Mouse Settings page is… rather impressive. In the Omake (Extra section), announcements would be made if you have completed a certain heroine’s route to help keep better track of your progress. As long as you’re in the Omake the heroines would make funny jokes on occasion (though you can turn them off by clicking the microphone near the bottom left). For Scene Replays we have the Calendar interface, which organize things better than the conventional when trying to search for a particular scene to replay.
Also, in the Songs and BGM section, there are several new options that I’ve really come to like. Next to the Song List is a Playlist which allows you to, well, make up a playlist of music so you can hear them in any order you like. At the right there are 3 options you can select: Lyrics, Lyrics + Code and er, Slide Mode (Sorry my Katagana kinda fails sometimes)? They are exactly what they mean: Lyrics displays a white board with the song’s lyrics on it, Lyrics + Code adds additional text (again, sorry but I don’t understand what they mean) above the lyrics and finally Slide Mode displays CGs in succession until the end of the song. At the bottom you have a slide bar to control volume, and a number of buttons which symbolized †˜Previous (song)’, †˜Play’, †˜Stop’, †˜Next (song)’, †˜Loop’, †˜Loop Song Once Only’, and †˜Shuffle’. The knob thing actually means that you’re playing the entire Songlist or the Playlist. Finally, click at the chibi Aine portrait and she would make cute noises, though of course like I said you can turn it off if it gets annoying.
What I think about the music in general… let’s just say that Overdrive never disappoints me. What’s more, they actually made an improvement (subjective) by shortening the usual lengthy opening of a song. So yes, I’m both impressed and happy.
Now, about some of the technical faults of I find in the VN:
1) No Autosave function.
2) Interface text in Save/Load page is way, way, waaaaay too small.
3) They grey interface text at the Config section looks blurry.
4) At the Song/BGM replay section, the switching of songs when clicking †˜Next’ and †˜Previous’ is very slow.
5) I’m not exactly sure how to use some of the functions offered in Mouse Settings honestly. The help texts are a pain to read.
The non-technical faults are:
1) Since every single chapter focuses entirely on the topic †˜Love’ despite the difference it can easily get tedious. There were no breaks in between at all and it may stifle some readers.
2) The truth/final mystery+solution is kinda †˜meh, wut’ even though the ending was really cool. Also, I easily guessed all the truth to all the mysteries, so they don't surprise me at all.
3) Too short for me at least. A total of maybe fifteen to sixteen hours maximum if you play through all routes (with skip on common).
And that’s the end of my super lengthy review.
@Cyndas Oookay, shit, that's actually pretty damn sad to watch. Whoever made this video definitely had the right image in mind alright. *sobs*
Now for MORE LOVE to supports!
Now for MORE LOVE to supports!
It definitely adds strain on the developers, but whoever manages to pull it off successfully would have one helluva game that would attract many attention. I'd like to point that Katawa Shoujo Act 1 (the demo, not the complete game) is one of those rare games that has some pretty complex and interactive choices that DOES allow you to influence events - and even introduce those that you did not expect - but as shown was pretty damn hard to implement properly.
Ultimately it's between the balance between quality and budget, and given unlimited amount of cash any passionate (and not lazy)developers would've made their games so immersive that it's like being there for real.
Ultimately it's between the balance between quality and budget, and given unlimited amount of cash any passionate (and not lazy)developers would've made their games so immersive that it's like being there for real.
Dendenden has a pretty meh title but seemingly cool gameplay. I was unfortunately not that impressed when I watched its gameplay trailers, but hopefully a play will change my mind. The character designs were good enough that those overly large boobs did not dent my spirit, so I guess it's good news? >_>
Edelweiss Fantasia's short hair girl's route has a most wonderful CG in her route and is definitely worth a read just for it btw; the romantic level is over 9000.
It's a little late now so let's do this quick. This is an extensive review on Alicesoft's latest product 'Pastel Chime 3 Bind Seeker'.
So first, the plot. Overall the storyline is nothing special - basically the heroes building themselves up, conquering one obstacle after another, take down the final boss and save the world. It's a little different than usual at the end, but yeah.
Still, this reads very impressive considering that it's - ahem! - Alicesoft after all, even though the Pastel Chime series has one of the best storylines out of all Alicesoft products. I could still recall how amazed I was at the predecessor game 'Pastel Chime Continue' who managed to tell a compelling story with short, simple but absolutely effective setup and narrative. But I'm derailing myself here.
Basically, PS3 did not disappoint. With the exception of most sub characters - though Muscle Man did get his own background told in a most satisfying way in one of Mari's relationship events - every one of your playable characters can be explored extensively through event selection, and honestly if the game wasn't kinda short I could even see glimpses of Majikoi's epicness radiating from all their stories. Call me an Otaku (Ain' you all), but man was the Otaku priest goddamn motherfucking hilarious and super cool at many times. And it's not just him; for example Riki's wasn't relegated to simply playing the fool in the team as we see him in a more personal light near the end of the story. The VN actually (somehow; I had thought it very hard) managed to make me see Riki the clown as a serious, dedicated rocker who have feelings and well, not a stupid clown, and that's great. That's very great.
Besides when a game make a loli their main (and most likely true) heroine you just KNOW they're awesome. :P
About the system. Apparently Alicesoft did a complete revamp to it and we're finally free from the demon that is System40, and FINALLY EXECUTABLES AREN'T JUST NAMED GODDAMN SYSTEM40.EXE. YAY. Anyway the interface are obviously a heck lot more smoother and easier to use than before (though the more complicated system options still leaves even me with tonnes of headache), with innovative sprite displays and animations to boot too. Really not much to say except that after this I'll never be able to go back to those terrible days of Rance Quest without screaming bloody murder and tearing out my own scalp. I hate that game even when we exclude the system though so whatever.
Gameplay-wise, they've replaced the core setups for the Pastel Chime series and replaced it with a chessboard style SLG game. It was a necessary change because if the old style had remained it would've constrained the storytelling too much, but still I believed they could've kept the stat training from Pastel Chime Continue, but never mind. It wasn't really challenging as most of the time, if you get your characters up to the recommended level to fight a quest you'll most likely beast through everything with Lilium and Eiji easily slaughtering the horde like they're made out of paper. If you go for Lilium's route you'll easily see the numbers jump to 2k or even 3 (depends on your equip, level, bind etc) since you get an epic 10% Magic Damage + passive from relationship events. That's a LOT considering Alicesoft's history of being an ass to every single gamer ever, especially the Rance series (Though Rance 6 remains fun even though it's the single most tedious dungeon crawler game I've ever played).
Also, I was never really forced to utilize Binds effectively until the final boss (which, mild spoilers, was a little bit of a surprise and anti-climatic) one-shotted some of my characters and deal 1k damage every time with his Double Action. Perhaps things would be better with Hard Mode, but I'm never going to play that since there's no change to the storyline and hence no replay value for me, so that's a food for thought.
PS3 is also one of those games where the main storyline does not branch out with the heroines. Usually it would make the game a complete disaster (Ex: Material Brave), but the 8 relationship events of each playable character (and an extra 5 for chosen heroines) are so well done and detailed and diverse that there is NO NEED to branch it. Certainly it reduces the game's replayability, but the storyline can't quite accommodate that - to forcibly branch it would only serve to make bad experiences - and it still remains as a quality read that I did not regret one bit.
In short, an 8.5 for this game, with points taken because it could be longer, removed too much of its core gameplay, can get repetitive with little battle map diversification, does not force clever Bind utilization and finally poor exploration of sub (gag) characters. Otherwise, it is definitely a good game that continues the unbroken quality of the Pastel Chime series.
So first, the plot. Overall the storyline is nothing special - basically the heroes building themselves up, conquering one obstacle after another, take down the final boss and save the world. It's a little different than usual at the end, but yeah.
Still, this reads very impressive considering that it's - ahem! - Alicesoft after all, even though the Pastel Chime series has one of the best storylines out of all Alicesoft products. I could still recall how amazed I was at the predecessor game 'Pastel Chime Continue' who managed to tell a compelling story with short, simple but absolutely effective setup and narrative. But I'm derailing myself here.
Basically, PS3 did not disappoint. With the exception of most sub characters - though Muscle Man did get his own background told in a most satisfying way in one of Mari's relationship events - every one of your playable characters can be explored extensively through event selection, and honestly if the game wasn't kinda short I could even see glimpses of Majikoi's epicness radiating from all their stories. Call me an Otaku (Ain' you all), but man was the Otaku priest goddamn motherfucking hilarious and super cool at many times. And it's not just him; for example Riki's wasn't relegated to simply playing the fool in the team as we see him in a more personal light near the end of the story. The VN actually (somehow; I had thought it very hard) managed to make me see Riki the clown as a serious, dedicated rocker who have feelings and well, not a stupid clown, and that's great. That's very great.
Besides when a game make a loli their main (and most likely true) heroine you just KNOW they're awesome. :P
About the system. Apparently Alicesoft did a complete revamp to it and we're finally free from the demon that is System40, and FINALLY EXECUTABLES AREN'T JUST NAMED GODDAMN SYSTEM40.EXE. YAY. Anyway the interface are obviously a heck lot more smoother and easier to use than before (though the more complicated system options still leaves even me with tonnes of headache), with innovative sprite displays and animations to boot too. Really not much to say except that after this I'll never be able to go back to those terrible days of Rance Quest without screaming bloody murder and tearing out my own scalp. I hate that game even when we exclude the system though so whatever.
Gameplay-wise, they've replaced the core setups for the Pastel Chime series and replaced it with a chessboard style SLG game. It was a necessary change because if the old style had remained it would've constrained the storytelling too much, but still I believed they could've kept the stat training from Pastel Chime Continue, but never mind. It wasn't really challenging as most of the time, if you get your characters up to the recommended level to fight a quest you'll most likely beast through everything with Lilium and Eiji easily slaughtering the horde like they're made out of paper. If you go for Lilium's route you'll easily see the numbers jump to 2k or even 3 (depends on your equip, level, bind etc) since you get an epic 10% Magic Damage + passive from relationship events. That's a LOT considering Alicesoft's history of being an ass to every single gamer ever, especially the Rance series (Though Rance 6 remains fun even though it's the single most tedious dungeon crawler game I've ever played).
Also, I was never really forced to utilize Binds effectively until the final boss (which, mild spoilers, was a little bit of a surprise and anti-climatic) one-shotted some of my characters and deal 1k damage every time with his Double Action. Perhaps things would be better with Hard Mode, but I'm never going to play that since there's no change to the storyline and hence no replay value for me, so that's a food for thought.
PS3 is also one of those games where the main storyline does not branch out with the heroines. Usually it would make the game a complete disaster (Ex: Material Brave), but the 8 relationship events of each playable character (and an extra 5 for chosen heroines) are so well done and detailed and diverse that there is NO NEED to branch it. Certainly it reduces the game's replayability, but the storyline can't quite accommodate that - to forcibly branch it would only serve to make bad experiences - and it still remains as a quality read that I did not regret one bit.
In short, an 8.5 for this game, with points taken because it could be longer, removed too much of its core gameplay, can get repetitive with little battle map diversification, does not force clever Bind utilization and finally poor exploration of sub (gag) characters. Otherwise, it is definitely a good game that continues the unbroken quality of the Pastel Chime series.
Pastel Chime 3 super short first impressions.
The revamp of the system is awesome. No more dreaded System40 or, god forsake, System39! A PROPER TITLE FOR THE EXECUTABLE! HURAAAAAAAHHHHH!
The attempt at being more story-centric (only 1 type of gameplay) with minimum tediousness is also refreshing. Of course even I think they took away too much of the Pastel Chime series core gameplay, but SLG is my kind of game so whatever.
The revamp of the system is awesome. No more dreaded System40 or, god forsake, System39! A PROPER TITLE FOR THE EXECUTABLE! HURAAAAAAAHHHHH!
The attempt at being more story-centric (only 1 type of gameplay) with minimum tediousness is also refreshing. Of course even I think they took away too much of the Pastel Chime series core gameplay, but SLG is my kind of game so whatever.
