/jp/ - Otaku Culture

This game actually ended up a lot less "incomplete" than I feared. I guess the expectations and perhaps the little prequel I didn't read didn't do the game very well.

There are some issues with the company side of the cast, mostly in that you don't know much about them. There was no need to stage a silly war in a gigantic company void from any realism, but you still feel rather disconnected as there's just a little too much stuff you don't know. Just a better look at the situation and the relationships of the important people would've helped. The "big sister" remained a big question mark to me till the end and just felt like a horrible character. Why could she do what she did without anyone really caring or doing anything about it? Unless the main girl got pissed, than she had to backpaddle? So it can't be that they just can't touch her. This main girl also lacks a lot of background so you can understand her and perhaps root for her. I don't need a 5 hour flashback, but there was almost nothing here.
Part of all this lacking stuff may be explained in the "prequel", but why not have it part of the main-game if it's actually important enough? The dvd sure wasn't full yet.

The village side was much much better. Smaller in scale obviously, but you just got a fairly nice view of the characters, their troubles, how they proceed towards the future and about the main heroine of this side. You can get connected with her much easier than with the company's main heroine.

The route split was a little bit weirdly set, though the routes are awkward anyway. You don't know anything about the protag. He's a literal "who?". And suddenly you are supposed to buy the romance. Now, the romance is shit in many VNs with the protags just randomly switching from "don't care" to "love" when a route starts. At least this VN has an excuse for that: Only maybe 20% of the scene feature the protagonist. This was so weirdly done. Why wasn't he just a normal character like all others then?
In addition to that, I don't think Aya needed her own route, and the maid most definitely didn't need a route. This was a game with two heroines. Why tack the rest on? Aya having a branch together with Iroha is fine, solo it makes little sense, while the maid is just... there. If you'd want a third route, than I'd say a Nanoha with time-skip route would've made the most sense. AKA "fuck these two choices, I'll hide abroad", with Nanoha coming to search a few years later or whatever.


tl;dr: The story is alright, the presentation is pretty damn good, but you do feel like some things are missing. While some things can be considered fine (there's no need to talk about literally everything in depth, and enough eroge insert random ero-scenes), at least the company side feels in a few ways lacking, even if in my opinion the general direction and events of the game is fine and there was no need for additional 10 hours of company drama that'd probably end unrealistic anyway. This small scale infighting was just right. But there was just a little too much left in the dark. Including the "protag" you can hardly call a protag.