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elyusionI had a lot to say about this 20? 30? hour game, clearly. Making my icon for this post Eisen because I think he's soooo cute :3
This is the last post of this silly series. I'm free... I'm finally free.
Gameplay: This game is part simulation game, part JRPG, although the "sim" part is so light I'm tempted to call that half a VN. Anyways, pushing the simulation thing to the side, I'd like to say something about the RPG part. I mean, a turn-based otome game. Doesn't that sound great? Well, that part of the game kind of sucks.
It's not BAD, per se. It's not a problem of encounter frequency or balancing or clunky controls. It's just REALLY simplistic. I've played a decent amount of JRPGs, so I'm no baby. I'm not the best at them either - I still have no idea what to do in Minstrel Song - but I still felt like "should I be insulted by how easy this is?"
There are no levels or experience points. I actually... couldn't read well enough to confidently tell you how leveling works. I believe once you rid an area of oni, an elemental power goes up. And the characters definitely have stats, and I assume they go up... I didn't pay enough attention to them to notice, because the game was so easy it never mattered. And HP never went up, the easiest stat to see, so.
You control your own/the heroine's actions (attack, spell, cheer, escape, some secret fifth one I'm forgetting which is possibly defend), but you don't control the other two's actions. Yes, despite there being 8 love interests, battles only happen with 2 at a time. I will say that the spontaneity of their actions is probably part of the appeal - being guarded is much more impactful if they're doing it because they want to and not because you ordered them to do so, and etc.
Despite how painfully easy it was... it was also cute. I liked how it was POV, and they turned their heads to talk to me, and I could see them spread their arms to take attacks for me. Being able to cheer them on and figuring out how they like to be encouraged was fun (ex. one guy might like to hear "Do your best!" while another is like "Do you think I'm not already doing that? Be quiet so I can focus," and such). So was figuring out what to say while hurt (some guys like "I can't take it anymore..." while some prefer "I'm okay! Focus on the enemy, not me!"), or what to say when someone else is hurt, or when someone gets a crit... things like that.
When I think about it too hard, I wonder if it's insulting that they (mind you the team is mostly women, okay?) made the game so easy, as if a girl would struggle with your average JRPG - mind you I'm sure PLENTY were playing Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy - or if it's nice they thought to make a game so friendly to beginners. After all, Angelique is a simulation game, but they made it so that if you lose the contest part of the game there's other nice endings. I don't think there's even any endings that are "bad" except in the sense that you, the player, weren't trying to get them.
Plus, from the way they marketed Angelique I know they wanted to gain an audience of girls who weren't normally into games. The same probably applies to Haruka. But they made Angelique: Tenkuu no Requiem because the demand for a JRPG was great, and then they made Haruka because the reception for Tenkuu was so good they wanted to try again... And the girls thirsty for a JRPG in the first place were asking because they were already familiar with them, right? Right? ... Well, no matter what: I understand it might suck trying to romance someone but then you get stuck in a dungeon or something -- Haruka has no dungeons btw!!!! -- but like. Come on man. (Mind you Tenkuu no Requiem has dungeons. But I digress.)
Art & Sound: It's great! They went all in on the Japanese, or specifically Heian, atmosphere. Even the text box is vertical and on the right side of the screen. The backgrounds are beautiful. There's a great appreciation for the beauty of nature going on. The sound fit the vibes too, although no song was crazy bananas. They did a good job setting the mood, is what I'm saying. One caveat is that the art style for the characters is sometimes just a little awkward. Just a little. It's probably something that would kill your vibe if you're the kind of person who only likes newer art styles, but that ain't me. In the future Haruka art by the character designer will be amazing and the CGs will get better too, but for this first game you can kinda smell the amateurness. And yet, you can also see the talent and passion and love put into the characters and their art and beautiful designs. Big fan, big fan.
Characters: I was going to say I love them all, but remembered the love interest I'm meh about at the end of my paragraph. They're all neat characters though; Inori just isn't my type. They're more flawed overall than Angelique characters, but still the love interests are all good people. The villain of the game is a little hot, and I think everyone noticed, because I know in future releases and the remake he's romanceable. I wonder how evil he stays by the end of his route in those games... By the way, the grunts are all sympathetic because they're truly loyal to the Akram (the big bad) but he tosses them away once they fail in their missions, but Akram isn't sympathetic. He talks to the protag in a "you belong to me" kind of way, you know? Kind of crazy for someone unromanceable (for now).
There's 8 love interests because there's 2 for each Heavenly Beast. Every pair doesn't get along at first, so if you like that kind of thing, it's there. I liked it! I thought it was fun. Not really enemies to friends, but "I don't like that guy at all" to friends. And it's not all in the same way, the dynamic, who dislikes who more, how they express said dislike, and how they express reconciliation too!, are all different.
As you may expect, a route consists of helping a guy solve a problem. Some mental issue, to be specific. For example, Eisen has low self-esteem, so you can guess how that goes. This game isn't so much about YOU, the protag, but she does talk a lot more than any protag from earlier Neoromance games. Depending on what you choose, she often comes off as a lot "stronger"(?) than any Ange. Angrier, even, which is good and makes sense considering her circumstances.
The guys having solid flaws are probably because the game has that classic "the routes are 'i can fix him'" otome game thing going on. May or may not be the first otome game to do it? Gal games have probably done it before... maybe... I need to play more gal games...
If you're worried about romance, it has that in spades, althoughhhh it's very chaste. I say this, but I didn't romance the playboy guy, and in the manga he lowkey seems pretty sexually active so. That's something to ponder.
There's 2 girls in this game who become your friend :3 I like Fuji and Ran :3 Princess Fuji is like a cute little sister, and I think Protag/Ran has yuri potential but I failed in completing her little route 😔😔😔😔😔
By the way, my faves are Eisen and Yorihisa. Eisen significantly more than Yorihisa, but I like them both in a different way than the others.
Enjoyment: A game that's slightly above mid, just like Angelique (1994), but also like Angelique I care the characters so much I don't mind that the gameplay is just Okay. I'm kind of a characters guy at the end of the day. Partly because the gameplay wasn't awesome I took a long while to play it at first (half a year for the first 15 hours of the game), but I kept coming back... okay, partly because of my mission to play every Neoromance game, but also because I would wonder about the cast. They're cute. It's a cute game! It looks nicesies! But I think you wouldn't like this game unless you're 90s- and otomepilled. The game released in 2000, but it's pretty much a 90s game, you know how it is. Uhhhh check out the opening movie! Personally, I'm a big fan of opening movies.I should upload a higher quality version at some point.
Since I started this series of posts I've also finished Resident Evil 4 (the Wii port with improved graphics and stuff, not the remake), but I don't feel like reviewing it. Everyone knows RE4. All I will say is I had fun and I liked it, but I could only play it in short bursts because it made my motion sickness act up badly. I kind of want to draw Ashley and her big ears.
This is the last post of this silly series. I'm free... I'm finally free.
Harukanaru Toki no Naka de
Gameplay: This game is part simulation game, part JRPG, although the "sim" part is so light I'm tempted to call that half a VN. Anyways, pushing the simulation thing to the side, I'd like to say something about the RPG part. I mean, a turn-based otome game. Doesn't that sound great? Well, that part of the game kind of sucks.
It's not BAD, per se. It's not a problem of encounter frequency or balancing or clunky controls. It's just REALLY simplistic. I've played a decent amount of JRPGs, so I'm no baby. I'm not the best at them either - I still have no idea what to do in Minstrel Song - but I still felt like "should I be insulted by how easy this is?"
There are no levels or experience points. I actually... couldn't read well enough to confidently tell you how leveling works. I believe once you rid an area of oni, an elemental power goes up. And the characters definitely have stats, and I assume they go up... I didn't pay enough attention to them to notice, because the game was so easy it never mattered. And HP never went up, the easiest stat to see, so.
You control your own/the heroine's actions (attack, spell, cheer, escape, some secret fifth one I'm forgetting which is possibly defend), but you don't control the other two's actions. Yes, despite there being 8 love interests, battles only happen with 2 at a time. I will say that the spontaneity of their actions is probably part of the appeal - being guarded is much more impactful if they're doing it because they want to and not because you ordered them to do so, and etc.
Despite how painfully easy it was... it was also cute. I liked how it was POV, and they turned their heads to talk to me, and I could see them spread their arms to take attacks for me. Being able to cheer them on and figuring out how they like to be encouraged was fun (ex. one guy might like to hear "Do your best!" while another is like "Do you think I'm not already doing that? Be quiet so I can focus," and such). So was figuring out what to say while hurt (some guys like "I can't take it anymore..." while some prefer "I'm okay! Focus on the enemy, not me!"), or what to say when someone else is hurt, or when someone gets a crit... things like that.
When I think about it too hard, I wonder if it's insulting that they (mind you the team is mostly women, okay?) made the game so easy, as if a girl would struggle with your average JRPG - mind you I'm sure PLENTY were playing Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy - or if it's nice they thought to make a game so friendly to beginners. After all, Angelique is a simulation game, but they made it so that if you lose the contest part of the game there's other nice endings. I don't think there's even any endings that are "bad" except in the sense that you, the player, weren't trying to get them.
Plus, from the way they marketed Angelique I know they wanted to gain an audience of girls who weren't normally into games. The same probably applies to Haruka. But they made Angelique: Tenkuu no Requiem because the demand for a JRPG was great, and then they made Haruka because the reception for Tenkuu was so good they wanted to try again... And the girls thirsty for a JRPG in the first place were asking because they were already familiar with them, right? Right? ... Well, no matter what: I understand it might suck trying to romance someone but then you get stuck in a dungeon or something -- Haruka has no dungeons btw!!!! -- but like. Come on man. (Mind you Tenkuu no Requiem has dungeons. But I digress.)
Art & Sound: It's great! They went all in on the Japanese, or specifically Heian, atmosphere. Even the text box is vertical and on the right side of the screen. The backgrounds are beautiful. There's a great appreciation for the beauty of nature going on. The sound fit the vibes too, although no song was crazy bananas. They did a good job setting the mood, is what I'm saying. One caveat is that the art style for the characters is sometimes just a little awkward. Just a little. It's probably something that would kill your vibe if you're the kind of person who only likes newer art styles, but that ain't me. In the future Haruka art by the character designer will be amazing and the CGs will get better too, but for this first game you can kinda smell the amateurness. And yet, you can also see the talent and passion and love put into the characters and their art and beautiful designs. Big fan, big fan.
Characters: I was going to say I love them all, but remembered the love interest I'm meh about at the end of my paragraph. They're all neat characters though; Inori just isn't my type. They're more flawed overall than Angelique characters, but still the love interests are all good people. The villain of the game is a little hot, and I think everyone noticed, because I know in future releases and the remake he's romanceable. I wonder how evil he stays by the end of his route in those games... By the way, the grunts are all sympathetic because they're truly loyal to the Akram (the big bad) but he tosses them away once they fail in their missions, but Akram isn't sympathetic. He talks to the protag in a "you belong to me" kind of way, you know? Kind of crazy for someone unromanceable (for now).
There's 8 love interests because there's 2 for each Heavenly Beast. Every pair doesn't get along at first, so if you like that kind of thing, it's there. I liked it! I thought it was fun. Not really enemies to friends, but "I don't like that guy at all" to friends. And it's not all in the same way, the dynamic, who dislikes who more, how they express said dislike, and how they express reconciliation too!, are all different.
As you may expect, a route consists of helping a guy solve a problem. Some mental issue, to be specific. For example, Eisen has low self-esteem, so you can guess how that goes. This game isn't so much about YOU, the protag, but she does talk a lot more than any protag from earlier Neoromance games. Depending on what you choose, she often comes off as a lot "stronger"(?) than any Ange. Angrier, even, which is good and makes sense considering her circumstances.
The guys having solid flaws are probably because the game has that classic "the routes are 'i can fix him'" otome game thing going on. May or may not be the first otome game to do it? Gal games have probably done it before... maybe... I need to play more gal games...
If you're worried about romance, it has that in spades, althoughhhh it's very chaste. I say this, but I didn't romance the playboy guy, and in the manga he lowkey seems pretty sexually active so. That's something to ponder.
There's 2 girls in this game who become your friend :3 I like Fuji and Ran :3 Princess Fuji is like a cute little sister, and I think Protag/Ran has yuri potential but I failed in completing her little route 😔😔😔😔😔
By the way, my faves are Eisen and Yorihisa. Eisen significantly more than Yorihisa, but I like them both in a different way than the others.
Enjoyment: A game that's slightly above mid, just like Angelique (1994), but also like Angelique I care the characters so much I don't mind that the gameplay is just Okay. I'm kind of a characters guy at the end of the day. Partly because the gameplay wasn't awesome I took a long while to play it at first (half a year for the first 15 hours of the game), but I kept coming back... okay, partly because of my mission to play every Neoromance game, but also because I would wonder about the cast. They're cute. It's a cute game! It looks nicesies! But I think you wouldn't like this game unless you're 90s- and otomepilled. The game released in 2000, but it's pretty much a 90s game, you know how it is. Uhhhh check out the opening movie! Personally, I'm a big fan of opening movies.
Since I started this series of posts I've also finished Resident Evil 4 (the Wii port with improved graphics and stuff, not the remake), but I don't feel like reviewing it. Everyone knows RE4. All I will say is I had fun and I liked it, but I could only play it in short bursts because it made my motion sickness act up badly. I kind of want to draw Ashley and her big ears.
