/jp/ - Otaku Culture

Played through both the first and second Kara no Shoujo.

Anyone else thought the second one was kind of weak, overall? Story wise there’s a lot of reliance on longwinded flashbacks and drama rather than pacing them better between story events that actually push things forward, and instead of really continuing where the first game left off the second one mostly focuses on a new cast of merely okayish characters – all the while the reason anyone would likely buy a sequel gets put on hold – until the sudden true ending where the new stuff finally gets connected to first game's ending and things start getting expla- HAHAHA NOPE, a sequel hook it is. You could argue the first game also yanked the player’s chain for a sequel but at least it had the decency of solving its own mysteries.

The game system also somehow managed to be worse than the first game: slow skip, only a handful of new scenes sprinkled around for the second playthrough that in no way warranted forcing the player to replay the entire fucking game from the very beginning, especially with a second opening movie setting up new false expectations. Why did they even bother making one? Saying that about 99% of second full playthrough is repeated content isn’t likely even a hyperbole, and even most of the actually new midgame stuff was just showing things from other perspectives the first playthrough already made clear or strongly hinted at – or they ended up being an excuse for H-scenes.

First Kara no Shoujo was definitely convoluted without a walkthrough, but at least the ending requirements made a slight amount of sense because the protagonist found new clues or something (even if it was sometimes through a shitty coincidence), while in this game’s case it was just a whole load of padding for new scenes that happen with little rhyme or reason. I actually got stuck for an hour or two right at the very end, at complete loss what to do even when following a walkthrough to a T. Turns out the only reason I couldn’t get the true ending was that I hadn’t yet seen a certain 1 *minute* long midgame bad ending 冬子を捜しに・・・ that has zero story, no CGs or anything of importance and that you likely miss due to its obviousness unless you’re a 100% completionist – it’s so inconsequential that the two walkthroughs I consulted apparently didn’t even realize seeing it was one of the several unlock requirements for the final chapter. Also, I accidentally got the 託宣の御子 non-ending on my very first blind playthrough so you can imagine how livid I was at the fact it was caused by not having enough flags – and that I had more game to retread. In terms of game systems this is probably the unfrendliest title I’ve played where separate routes taking different turns makes zero sense from both gameplay and story perspective other than to artificially pad out playtime, like holy shit all my goodwill towards the second game gets drowned out by all the gameplay suffering you have to go through for the last bits of story that don't even give you a proper conclusion.