Posts Tagged ‘PSP’

Bounty Hunter Grimm

Quinrose’s newest game is about a bounty hunter and the men she gets tangled up with – both the wanted men she hunts, and other bounty hunters. Not too much info right now, but here are the characters.
Heroine: Riza Bernet
Adolf Rooto – An up-and-coming bounty hunter who decides that Riza is his rival, he often shows up to compete with her. He also really looks up to Bremen.
Bremen Marsh – Riza’s mentor and former bounty hunter, now he runs a bar where bounty hunters come for info. He seems very nice, but actually still has underworld connections and is very crafty.
Henzel Nashkatz – A conman and thief who uses traps.
Gretel Nashkatz – With his older brother, also a thief who specializes in traps. Both brothers love sweets.
Jure Rosmond – An assassin who uses both knives and poison. He’s always sleepy and is often late.
Rapunzel Doturm – A master spy and thief, he pulls off really unusual stunts. Apparently the heroine met him in her past.

Aoiza Kaika Bunmei and Storm Lover – Version 2

This doesn’t happen often – a game released for the SAME platform twice – and two companies are doing it almost at the same time.

Otomate and Furyu are releasing a new, improved version of Aoiza Kaika Bunmei this year, with scenes and stories that ‘couldn’t get told’ in the original. I don’t know if they mean that they ran out of time on the original, or that they were added. I’ve been playing Aoiza recently, and it’s true that there are many questions that aren’t answered fully in this version, so it might be the former case.

D3 is also releasing a powered-up version of Storm Lover called Storm Lover *Kai*. It will be about 2 years after the original release date. This one will also have extra scenes and events.

But I have to say, I think it’s kind of unfair to release the same game twice on the same platform, fairly close together. There have been a few cases of this – Hisui no Shizuku Hiiro no Kakera 2 was re-released with significant changes as Shin•Hisui no Shizuku after the original did poorly, and Quinrose re-released Wizard and Master. However, Wizard and Master was after five years with totally new art and voices、I don’t consider it the same at all really.

Since these are both on the PSP, couldn’t they make the extra stuff available as a download on the PSN? Why make people buy it all over again if they want the new material?

Another game that did something similarly annoying was Harutoki 4 – its “fandisk” was more of an extended version, except the extra material was all in flashback-type screens; I don’t even think there were more CGs. I thought that was a bit much as well (though I bought it because I was hoping for more).

Though I’d like to play the new material, I　don’t think I’ll get these – I just checked, and Aoiza was released in August, and the new one comes out in May. 9 months between the original and the ‘improved’ version…no.

I know we often complain about companies emptying our wallets, but has there ever been a game that you REALLY felt ripped off by? I might add Love Root Zero to my list, as I found it had unacceptably low production values.

Diabolik Lovers

Diabolik Lovers is the new series being published by Otomate. As you can see by the banner add on the right, the art’s pretty nice, and the character designs are interesting. The story is that the heroine has to transfer schools because her parents move abroad for work, so she moves in with her relative and transfers to a night school that’s full of up-and-coming entertainers. It also has a shady reputation though, and the heroine’s relative runs (or lives in, not sure) a boarding house where six troublemaker brothers live. There are even rumours that someone was attacked by a vampire, but the heroine doesn’t believe them. In the drama CDs that are coming out monthly, the brothers actually suck your blood (they’re all vampires, and S).

From the left: ??, Shuu, Kanato, Ayato, Raito, Reiji
The six brothers are the other main characters (apparently Kanato, Ayato, and Raito are triplets), and they’re all vampires:

Ayato (CV: Midorikawa Hikaru) – A huge S, loves teasing, and has no commonsense

Kanato (CV: Kaji Yuuki) – the smallest and weakest, he’s easily sent into temper tantrums, and is also S and kind of yandere.

Raito (CV: Hirakawa Daisuke) – a perverted S who’s often suspended from school for harassment, he talks fast when he gets excited.

Shuu (CV: Toriumi Kousuke) – the oldest brother who’s lazy and unspirited about everything except music (also S).

Reiji (CV: Konishi Katsuyuki) – he acts and talks kind of like a butler, but is a very strict S about etiquette and sometimes makes up his own etiquette rules. His hobby is collecting fine china.

Subaru (CV: Kondou Takashi) – the youngest brother and violent S, he’s a loner who’s quick to start fights and doesn’t like his brothers prying into his business. He usually stays in his room.

Storm Lover Natsukoi!! Mini Review

I’ve been playing through several heavy story games on the PSP and got a bit burned out, so for something a bit more casual I put in Storm Lover. It’s great during times when I only have a few minutes, because there’s no huge plot you have to remember, you can play a few days quickly, and you really don’t need to use a guide. It does take a while to get through a year, but overall it’s great. It’s kind of like Tokimemo, but less random in who you encounter, and easier in general (no need to figure out what subjects or datespots your guy likes!)

After finally getting Kyousuke’s (CV: Terajima Takuma) best ending (I think), I thought I’d try the fandisk, Storm Lover Natsukoi!! It plays pretty much like the original, except compressed into a few days of a beach field trip, with no need to study and higher limits on texting, as well as a little minigame to choose who you sit beside on the bus to and from the beach. There are two different modes, you can choose to start either already dating one of the guys or single. I don’t know what happens in the first mode, but I think you can build up someone else’s affections like in the original and have some love triangle drama. I believe that you can also get endings with two side characters, Takashi (CV:Kimura Ryouhei) and the school nurse Inuzuka (CV: Onosaka Masaya, or Momoshiro, for any PoT fans out there), and a totally new character Shiina (CV: Okamoto Nobuhiko). So far it’s a lot of frothy casual fun, and I definitely recommend it to anyone who liked Storm Lover and wants some more.

Review – Sangoku Rensenki

Sangoku Rensenki was originally a PC game, the first ever put out by publisher Daisy². When I first saw some pics for it, I thought it looked cute, but figured it would be one of those quiet releases that mostly get ignored, especially after it was delayed a couple of times.

To my surprise and joy, not only was it released successfully, but it steadily got really good reviews, despite still getting minimal press, and was consistently on the list for most-wanted to be adapted for consoles. It finally was adapted for the PS2, and will soon be released for the PSP as well. I wasn’t able to get a copy until I went to Japan in October, and I’m finally playing it now – I thought I needed to have a good chunk of time to get into it, and I was right.

What’s it about? Well, it’s a time travel story, normal high school girl gets transported to chaotic era with lots of attractive men. Sounds pretty familiar. The specifics are that Hana, the heroine, is working on a history assignment when an old book about the Three Kingdoms (ancient China) sucks her back in time, I think to AD207. She gets picked up by one warlord, Gentoku, but throughout the game is kidnapped by Moutoku, the current most successful warlord, stays with the last major warlord Chuubou, and also goes even further back in time for a bit and sees the origin of the current situation.

The first time through, you can’t “win” anybody, Hana has to go through the story trying to figure out why she’s there and what she wants to do. Unlike many other time-travel/AU stories, Hana isn’t a legendary priestess and her arrival wasn’t foretold; most people don’t even know that she’s from another world, just that she’s foreign. When she first arrives, a voice tells her to go meet Gentoku and tell him that she’s an apprentice of Koumei, a scholar and strategist. That’s how she gets treated as a guest. The book she read comes through with her, and when she tries to read about what’s going to happen, it’s blank. That is, until she figures out what she wants to happen, and then the book will show how that could work.

I think the game is excellent in a few ways that aren’t common – first, Hana not being expected or treated as a “savior” until she proves herself (by using the book to figure out strategies). Even then, she’s just respected as an advisor, she’s not expected to do any magic or anything. Second, I found that her reactions are very relatable – the first time she’s in the field of war and witnesses people dying, partially due to her own strategy, she’s shocked and almost can’t handle it. Afterwards, it takes her a long time to reconcile what she’s doing and come to grips with the deaths that war causes, which is totally realistic for a young teenager who’s never seen violence up close and is totally unused to war. She continues to struggle throughout the game with moral questions like whether it’s right for her to help with strategies that might cause large casualties for the other side. It’s also really nice how the warlords all have their own moral code – for example, Gentoku is very strict, and will never take existing land from a present lord or heir (this agrees with the Romance of the Three Kingdoms apparently). Hana has to try and stop the war while dealing with everyone’s competing principles, which I thought was much more realistic than many other stories where once someone is convinced, they do whatever the hero/heroine suggests.

Also, the romances so far have been really light-handed but good, and in Gentoku’s route, pretty wrenching. It’s not really angsty but the situation was just…argh, hard to describe except that sometimes I really felt like skipping to the end because I couldn’t take it, but it was totally worth it in the end. Miki Shinichirou sounded more agonized than I remember hearing him for a long time, and it was awesome.

Gentoku

There’s also a bonus that I adore during the credits of each route – it shows extra scenes around important storylines where you get to see the guy’s side of it. It’s really great, and I’m glad that it’s shown after everything. There are even CGs just for the credits!

While playing through, I kept trying to find exactly what it was that made this game so good (because it’s good, it’s very good). What makes me want to play through again and again, getting different routes, even though I skip through a bunch of the strategy when they talk about tactics and generals and old Chinese place names? I think in the end, it’s the characterization, of Hana and everyone else. Not only do you have interesting romanceable characters, but lots of minor characters get enough details that they’re sympathetic as people and not just cliches or cardboard placeholders. When I first went back in time the second time and realized it was before the main story (so none of the romanceable characters are around), I was annoyed because I thought it was just a distraction from the main story. But the people you meet there are important in some of the routes, and they’re all memorable, and honestly it was really cool how the writers established how different the atmosphere was in the area just 10-20 years before the main story because of the different political situation.

SO, to make a long story short, I hugely recommend Sangoku Rensenki! Now I’ve gotta go, I have a warlord to romance…

Hakuouki Update

Hakuouki‘s English release date is quickly approaching, and there are some exciting things to report! Hakuouki is pretty much the first big-name otome game to be released in English widely, and there are many good things about it: it’s freakin’ gorgeous, it is going to keep the original Japanese(THANK GOD), and look, it’s cheap!

Normal edition: $29.99! Holy cow, for someone like me used to Japanese prices this is amazing for a PSP game.

Limited Edition: Only $39.99! It includes a 72-page artbook (very nice, as the art for Hakuouki is freakin’ gorgeous), and a soundtrack CD. I don’t really remember what the music is like. I’d rather have a drama CD, but considering it would be in Japanese, I can understand why they didn’t include one.

Hakuouki is set for a Valentine’s Day release (very cute!) and I am seriously considering having a party for it, or a podcast or something.

That’s it for today, sorry it’s short!

Gekka Review

I’ve now finished all the routes (there are four each) for three characters – Fuji-sensei, Aoi, and Wabisuke in Gekka Ryouran Romance. The four endings are decided by two stats, kindan no koi (forbidden love) and junai (innocent love). Each of these stats is further split into Hard and Normal endings, so for each character, there’s Kindan Hard, Kindan Normal, Junai Hard, and Junai Normal. The Kindan endings are totally different from Junai, and even Hard and Normal can be really different, so it’s worth doing them all. If you use the La Primavera guide, you can do up to chapter 5 for each character and then get each separate route in chapter 6, as long as you get the Blackouts – a minigame at the end of each chapter which is fairly simple. You roll the joystick as fast as possible to reveal a picture underneath, and if you succeed, each one will give you 5 extra points in both junai and kindan.

Fuji Sensei

Each character has their own major issues – and so far they’re fairly serious. Fuji (CV: Hirata Hiroaki) has a lot of baggage from an abusive relationship from his past (to not spoil things too much), Aoi (CV: Terajima Takuma) has a really good reason for not caring about the future (and no, he doesn’t have a terminal illness), and Wabisuke (CV: Hino Satoshi) has an obsessive sister complex. Wabisuke actually was a big part of one (two?) of Fuji’s endings, that’s why I got interested in him.

Aoi

This game is, as advertised, pretty dark. In each route, the other characters seem fairly normal, but when you get into their routes, they`re all pretty messed up by one thing or another. I`ve enjoyed the stories, they`re all very different, although I still don`t really get why they focus on Nazuna so much (except Wabisuke, he has history with her). They all say things like she seems really pure, and they want some of her innocence, but whenver I see things like that I wonder that they couldn`t find any other normal girls at their school – Nazuna is principled but not usually a martyr, and at least one of her classmates seems just as nice as her. But this is something that you sometimes have to just accept in an otome game, and as long as you can suspend disbelief about that, most parts of the story make internal sense, even when it`s twisted sense.
There`s also sex! Of course it`s off-screen, but it`s fairly plainly laid out (it`s usually in the kindan hard route), and I found that very believable, because let`s be honest, angsty teenagers in love usually don`t stay chaste. Lastly, something I really liked was the monologues at the end of each chapter by the guy you went on a date with – it gives an idea of what they’re thinking and some foreshdowing, without taking all the suspense away.

Wabisuke

As I described in the first thoughts post, the production values are very high in this game – the menus and dialogue boxes are very nice, and the art is beautiful. The characters are differentiated mostly by face and hair colour, they mostly have the same body type (tall and skinny), but they`re all quite attractive (still not sure about Seri though, he just LOOKS so young even though he`s not). The music is well chosen too, there are some creepy atmospheric tracks that enhance the feeling of wrongness in the stories when really bad things are revealed.

Overall, I`d recommend this for people who enjoy angst and real drama, as long as you can handle some heavy topics like abuse, mental instability, suicide attempts. etc. This is not the game you want to play when you want cheering up, but the characters are all fascinating in their own way and I do want to finish the rest of the routes. I think I’d even buy a fandisk, because there are three teachers who are fairly involved in the stories, but you don’t get to really know them well, and they’re all really good seiyuu as well, so I’m hoping that the fandisk will include scenes/routes for them (and considering one of them got 3rd place in the character popularity contest, there’s a good chance!). There is a drama CD and fanbook coming out in January as well.

So all in all, Gekka = thumbs up! And don’t forget to check the LOVE.101 site tomorrow for a short story!

Gekka Ryouran Romance – First thoughts

When I first started this game up, it was more just to get an idea of it, as I didn’t have much time. I was still in Japan and in the midst of shopping heaven, but I couldn’t wait to see what it was like.

The first thing I thought was, ooh pretty! It has a distinct art style, partially in the characters but even more in the menus and dialogue boxes, with little details like a rose indicating the end of each sentence which is depetaled when you click for the next statement. the dialogue boxes are also vertical, besides the characters, which I feel makes a lot of sense on the widescreen PSP. The character art as well is very pretty, with wispy hair and shading that fades from light to dark on each character.

At the beginning, Nazuna is living almost alone while her parents work long hours and her older brother is away at a boarding school. She’s very focused on grades, especially after being dumped a while ago, and is at the top of her class.

Then her parents move away and she’s sent to board at the same school as her older brother. When she gets there she’s the object of attention from a select group of students in the ‘date club’, which sounds like a host club but even more sketchy since you go on dates potentially to secluded areas where you can do pretty much anything. They trick her so that she owes them money for dates (which she didn`t want), and a huge amount at that – over $10,000 by my estimate. She doesn’t want to pay, and I really liked her for this. If she had been alone she would have resisted to the last, but her brother is vulnerable since these students are all very powerful, so she agrees to a bet for the money: she’ll go on dates with them, and if she doesn’t fall for one of them, she wins and the debt is waived. If not, her brother has to join the club and pay the debt back 300Y per date at a time (this after saying their fee is 300,000Y each time). Also, until they decide the game is over, her brother joins the club as collateral.

Interesting, no? What’s also interesting is the whole feeling of this group being totally corrupted and generally immoral, which they really play up. I remember this being marketed as a very dark story, which aligns with this feeling. One other thing I loved is that Nazuna doesn’t just give up at this point, but tries to go to the authorities! She realizes that yeah, having a brothel openly operate on campus (not sure whether it goes that far, but they definitely try to give the feeling it does) should be way against school policy, and she goes to a teacher. Unfortunately, the date club students and their parents pay a ton of money for the school to overlook everything they do, so unless they’re caught doing something really illegal, the club is allowed.

This is the intro part, before you choose who you want to go on dates with, but it’s really long in-game. The first time I played I barely got to when Nazuna transfers schools.

However, once you get past the establishment of the bet, it goes fairly quickly. I’m almost done Fuji’s route now, and will have a review of that up soon.

Peter of Candy Island – Peter

So, Peter! I knew he would eventually be an adult because of the CGs and the box art, but they way they handled it was pretty interesting. I won’t say what it is because it’s a spoiler. There’s still a big mystery around him at the end though – I think I know what it is but I’ll have to play the rest of the game to see if you ever find out.

At first Peter is just a mega-annoying kid who likes to run around and be loud, and is totally selfish even with his ‘lost boys’, the other kids who live with him. They’re more like his servants, who always do things for him and try to think up games to amuse him – often ones that are dangerous/uncomfortable. While getting into his route, Wendy decides that he’s more ignorant than bad, and she’ll reform him, and she goes about correcting him and pretty much treating him like her own kid. Peter doesn’t seem to mind, although he humours her only because he likes her, and he admits to doing so. He has no sympathy for anyone else, and assumes he can do whatever he wants whenever he wants.

As Wendy gets to know him, Tinker gets more and more jealous, and finally Peter tells her off directly. As you might guess, Tinker comes back later and confronts Wendy, and this is a major turning point in the story.

Another thing that happens in this route is Peter trying to get Wendy to eat his candy, and her gradually giving in. I thought this was done well because it’s related back to Wendy’s complex about her mom, who never cared about her after her father passed away no matter how hard Wendy tried to please her. It’s also slowly shown to relate to Peter’s feelings about his life before Neverland, although this part isn’t shown as much. This is where their relationship really grows, and it’s pretty believable.

During Peter’s route I did feel bad for Michael and John, especially John, but hey that just means I have to do their routes next. I’m looking forward to seeing how Wendy deals with her family issues there and if it ends up very differently.

And ending on an Angelique note, I FINALLY finished the knights route, and yes I think I will love it in the end, though I was kinda fast-clicking a lot of parts. It pretty much went down the way I thought it would, though more dramatic and awesome. And now I get to go for Gerhart, yay! (yes Gerhart! Tachibana Shinnosuke doing a dumb but nice guy that uses a huge sword, what’s not to love!)

Angelique Story Outline

I realized that I didn’t say much about the story of Angelique last week, just the characters. The intro is really long and honestly boring at times, so if your Japanese isn’t great, or you give in to the urge to skip, you might find this useful.

Theresa lives with her adoptive mother and brother, Runo, in a small town on the planet Norg (style looks Medieval Europe-ishi). Runo acts younger than his age, because he was traumatized several years earlier when his older brother died, and he thinks it was his fault (I think the situation was one of those things like he died while looking for Runo or something).

In the town there have been several girls kidnapped recently, but they were each returned after one night away. And of course, one evening when Theresa is out to fetch Runo, who’s been praying to his brother in the nearby church as he often does, Theresa gets kidnapped. However, she’s returned after one night, and she doesn’t remember anything. Runo was really upset taking the blame for her kidnapping on himself, so he’s ecstatic when she comes back unharmed. He goes out to gather some fruit (IIRC), but this time he doesn’t come back. Theresa and his mother search far and wide for him, but there’s no sign of him. After a few days, the mother goes back to work, confessing to Theresa that she always felt that one day Runo would leave her. Theresa can’t stand the thought of just giving up, so she continues looking, and after a week she is looking in the forest when she finds a new path that she doesn’t recognize. A man shows up and suspects her of being a spy, and when she’s too afraid to answer, he says he’ll kill her to keep her silent. Theresa is so scared she runs away deeper on the trail, and comes to a large fortress. She sees many men doing military drills in the courtyard, and is looking for a place to hide when two men notice her.

She runs away again back into the forest. Somehow (sorry this part is hazy, and it doesn’t matter much) she passes out from fear, I believe because the first man has shown up and is threatening her again. When she wakes up shortly afterwards, many men are around her, including Runo! She’s very happy, but Renour says that he’s not going back home with her, he needs to stay there. Theresa doesn’t understand until a new man comes who seems familiar, and Runo calls him brother. The leader of the men, Levias, is a ringer for Runo’s dead brother, and Runo feels that he’s supposed to help Levias (also, this kid is very emotionally fragile). When she realizes his determination, Theresa decides to stay as well, and convinces Levias by saying she’ll take care of Runo. She’s also very surprised to learn that not only is he in Levias’ army, he’s a captain! All the men are, and Runo is learning magic from Levias.

I believe this is where the intro ends. The army is actually kind of a mercenary army, travelling throughout the universe (yeah they have a spaceship) and helping local wars be ended quickly through their overwhelming strength. The first time through you can’t get a character ending, so you go through the story of taking care of Renour, having him accept the violence of war, getting to know the other knight-captains, and eventually (IMO this part took too long), Theresa realizing that she has magic capability as well. You see, even before they met everyone, Theresa could always feel where Runo was, though vaguely. And after being kidnapped, she could tell exactly where he was – it was how she eventually found him. During their time at the fortress, the enemy (who at that point was unknown) attacked with magic, and Theresa somehow felt where the magic was coming from, allowing the knight captains to capture and interrogate the enemies. Though all the captains know about her ability, apparently it doesn’t occur to anyone that maybe Theresa would be more useful as a magician than the maid and quartermaster (that’s what she ends up doing most of the time, including making tea for everyone).

When she finally does start learning magic is after an episode where the fortress is attacked, and Levias says they need to power up the spaceship using Runo’s magic (Levias and other magic-users contribute as well, but Runo’s magic is pretty strong). But Runo is in no shape to use magic, and Theresa asks if she can try. She ends up filling the whole thing almost by herself.

Between the fighting and training scenes, we find out that the attackers are the Empire which rules the universe. Right now the Emperor is the fourth son of the previous Emperor, and Levias really doesn’t like him. It’s also implied that Levias is part of this family as well, and is planning a coup.

I’ve just gotten through a major plot twist, so I won’t say more than that as it’s probably near the end. But as you can see, the story of Angelique Maren Rokukishi is pretty complicated. I’m not sure how I feel about being forced to do a plot ending before I can really get into the romance – it’s not too bad, and you still get to know the guys, but not in depth, and the story can drag sometimes when characters are talking strategy and tactics – not just Levias’ army but you also see the Empire side. I also am hoping that in the other routes there’s less Runo, as he kind of annoys me whenever he shows up.

This is Otomate, so of course the art is pretty and the seiyuu are great. I love how the guys are actually varied in body type – you can see how Gerhart is large and strong and Giovanni is shorter and more lithe. In the first route there haven’t been many CGs, which is fine with me as I’d rather have them focus on the character routes. I think I’ll really like doing those, as several appeal to me, but right now I don’t even have much hint of what their route might be about (though it doesn’t stop me from guessing!). I bet once I start one of those, it will go really fast, but I have to admit right now I’m playing through just to get to the end.

So a bit of a lukewarm review right now for Angelique, but I’m hoping that will change. And now that you know the first 2/3 of the prereq story, you can just speed right through that and get to the good stuff