Now Playing: Games I’m Currently Playing

I’ve seen a few bloggers do this for the new anime seasons, and I figured why not do the same things for the games I’m playing. Nothing fancy, just a rundown of all the games I’ve been working on this past month. During September and October I picked up quite a few games, some I finished and some that will take a bit of time to get through, but there are three that I’ve been actively playing consistently.

I’ll probably do full reviews on them when I finish them, but that could take anywhere between a week or three months so I wanted to get my first impressions and thoughts out there in the meantime (since there’s a high chance I might never finish them).

Psychedelica of the Ashen Hawk

Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly was such a letdown, that I didn’t have high expectations for Ashen Hawk. I couldn’t have been more wrong, the two games are like night and day! Ashen Hawk is a much better game in every way, the characters are all likable and the premise is much more polished and the art is gorgeous! Though, the flow chart is back, but it seems to be better executed… While it’s not a direct sequel to Black Butterfly, the two games are set within the same world with different characters, there are some callbacks to BB that were fun little reminders that the first game wasn’t just a vivid fever dream.

The characters are all much more developed and Jed, bless her, is the kind of heroine we need more of in otome games, she reminds me a lot of Haruhi from Ouran High School Host Club. She’s been raised as a boy so she doesn’t act like a meek Mary Sue that needs a strong man to save her, she kicks ass all on her own and she isn’t afraid to give people a piece of her mind! I also like that you can experience certain aspects of the game differently depending on whether Jed is presenting as a man and as a woman, it was a nice use of the crossdressing premise. The love interests are a bit hit or miss, there’s nothing really wrong with them, but they can be a bit dull… like Lavan is just kind of a bland nice guy/big bro and that’s about it… but I LOVE LEVI!!

Persona 4 Golden

So, I bought this game years ago, started it and then randomly picked it up again on a whim. Since I couldn’t remember what was going on in my save file I had to start all over again and I have been hooked ever since! It’s an RPG which is a bit of a shift from my usual otome game choices, but P4G is very story heavy so it’s pretty much the same thing as a regular visual novel… except with monster battles. I usually suck at RPGs so I have the difficulty set at the lowest setting, otherwise I feel like I’d probably die a lot more. The battle system is easy to follow, though it can get a bit repetitive when you’re slugging through a dungeon trying to level up before the big boss battle.

The characters are fun, the protagonist is the usual Persona silent protag and I kind of like it, it reminds me of Red from the OG Pokemon games and the other characters have more than enough personality to make up for his lack of dialogue. P4G does have relationships, so you can have the protagonist, who I named Nick, date any of the available female characters. Yukiko would NOT stop flirting with him even though I was shooting for Chie! And Chie wouldn’t give Nick the time of day until midway through JUNE!!! Relationship drama aside, the game is a mystery, so you spend most of the time investigating a string of kidnappings/murders, the only reason I’ve stuck with this game so long is because I wanna know who the hell is behind everything!! I NEED TO KNOW!! I feel like I’m so close to the truth!

Nightshade

Right, so everyone has been singing the praises of Nightshade since it was released a few years go, but… I just can’t understand why? I went in expecting this revolutionary game and what I got was just another otome game about ninjas. I’m three routes in and I ‘m not gonna lie, it’s a very slow go… the game is pretty enough and the premise is cool, but Nightshade just isn’t doing it for me at all! *Unpopular Opinion Alert* The game sets Enju up to be this badass rookie shinobi, but she winds up devolving into a damsel in distress that has to be rescued by whatever guy you’re pursuing. She kind of has a few moments of awesome, where she takes down Goemon on her own and a horde of shinobi, but those get bogged down by everything else.

The love interests… Goemon was cool, but his route kinda went off the rails towards the end. Gekkamaru is clearly the CANON ROUTE, but I was instructed to save him for last, so I have to constantly friendzone him the whole game. Kuroyuki is a child that needs a spanking. Chojiro is the mature dad of the group who I always feel sorry for, since he’s stuck babysitting TODDLERS. Hanzo is too good for Enju, but I like that he helps her grow as a character and as a Shinobi… so for me he is best boi. I ended up putting this game on hold, but I plan on getting back to it later… when I’m more in the mood for it.

I might make this an ongoing thing (I dunno, let’s just play this by ear) so if you like this post let me know what you think. 

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