Now Playing: Games I’m Currently Playing – November/December

Since last month I’ve finished Psychedelica of the Ashen Hawk and that’s about it… I’ve been trying to find a good fit for my next big game, so there’s been quite a bit of shuffling going on behind the scenes. But, lucky for me, my backlog is a treasure trove of hidden gems, so I’ll never truly run out of games to play.

I’ve kinda been dipping my toes into a number of games these past few months, while I try to find a game that I actually want to finish. I’ve said this before, but I’m not so much a completionist when it comes to games. Visual novels take awhile to get through and don’t believe in forcing myself to finish a game once my interest has waned. Every so often I come across a game that is so good I can’t help but finish it, but those are few and far between…

MazM The Phantom of the Opera

I’ve been playing this one off and on during my commute to and from work, usually when I can’t get a seat since I usually have my phone in my hand anyway. It’s no secret that I am terrible at keeping up with mobile games, I lose interest in them fairly quickly and the pay walls and other story stop gates, like ads, don’t really make for the most enjoyable experience. That said, I really like MazM’s The Phantom of the Opera, it’s more of an interactive novel than a game, combining the point and click gameplay of an adventure game with the connected narrative of a visual novel.

The Phantom of the Opera is a story that has been done over and over again, but I was surprised at just how faithful the game is to the Leroux novel. There are of course some artistic liberties taken here and there but this is one hell of a faithful adaptation. Like the original novel, your perspective jumps between different POV characters, so one minute you’re Christine, the next your Raoul, and in my most recent playthrough, the story is being told from the perspectives of the new Opera house owners, Armand Moncharmin and Farmin Richard. It’s a really nice touch that really broadens the scope of the story.  The music is really good, like REALLY good for a mobile game, the soundtrack is heavily inspired by the opera, with these epic instrumental tracks and there’s even a few times when you actually here a few snippets of opera singing. And there are also these really neat sound effects (like people screaming and heartbeats during tense scenes) that really help immerse you in the story. The art is gorgeous and the chibi sprites are just so cute, they have this quality to them that kind of makes you feel like you’re watching one of those paper doll puppet shows. This is just an all around great game, buuuut since MazM is still releasing chapters, I’m going to take my sweet time playing it…

Seiyuu Danshi

Seiyuu Danshi is one of those games I’ve been playing off and on for months and I’m in no rush to finish it either. I am not a fan of stats raising games and life simulators, they’re a pain to get through and one mistake could seriously mess up your chances of getting the best end even if you do EVERYTHING ELSE RIGHT! I’ve been burned in the past by stats raiser games *cough*DANDELION*cough*BACKSTAGE PASS*cough* so I went into Seiyuu Danshi determined to do everything right—I raised all my voice acting stats, I did all the Auditions perfectly, I relentlessly stalked Tocchan— and I guess I might have prioritized the VA stats more because on my first playthrough I STILL GOT THE BAD ENDING!!!!

Thankfully I had like 50 save files so I was able to go back two months and fix it, but damn if it wasn’t a pain in the ass to go back and redo all those events! I took my time with this game, only playing about an hour or two a month to avoid burn out and I’m proud to say I finished one whole route. But, I won’t be diving back into this one anytime soon. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a cute story and I really enjoyed the characters (Haato is just a smiiiiidge annoying), but raising the voice acting stats were fine, but the RELATIONSHIP STATS were a whole different ballgame. First, I have to spend time going from strangers to acquaintances to friends and when you finally reach Lovers, you have a whole new level of stats to maintain… BRUH!!! It’s worse than being in an actual relationship! Even Storm Lover Kai wasn’t this bad—granted I was too busy bouncing from guy to guy—but still, Seiyuu Danshi is a lot…

Code Realize Guardians of Rebirth

For the longest time I would switch between P4G and Ashen Hawk, in the end Ashen Hawk won out. But now that I’m finally done with Ashen Hawk, I fully intended to pick Persona 4 up again as my commute game… buuuuut I didn’t. Instead I decided to revisit Code Realize Guardians of Rebirth for the umpteenth time. I’ve been playing this game off and on for the past five or so years and you know, I think this is the year I’ve made the most progress with it. Everyone has been telling me how amazing this game is and despite my best efforts I’ve never quite been able to finish a single route, but that’s all about to change! I am in the final chapter of Impey’s route and I’m going to be completely honest, I’m not completely sold on Code Realize just yet.

Impey probably wasn’t the best first route, since I don’t especially like genki guys (Mineo in Collar x Malice being the only exception) so I’m not really feeling the love for him or his storyline. It’s just kind of OK. He’s nice, but his constant flirting and declarations of love towards Cardia just weren’t doing it for me at all. And I can’t for the life of me figure out why Cardia is even “in love” with Impey in the first place… the first half of the game game goes super hard for Lupin to the point that I don’t even see the other guys as potential love interests. But, least of all Impey, he doesn’t really scream Prince Charming. I kind of feel like I like him more as a side character than an actual love interest… eh, we’ll see how I feel after I finish his route in the next day or two…

Nameless The One Thing You Must Recall

This is another game that I decided to finally pluck from the abyss that is my backlog and you know what I am ashamed to admit that it has taken me this long to finally play Nameless. Now, I will fully admit that the main reason it’s taken me so long to play this game is Dandelion… that game is an absolute chore to get through with all the stats raising and random events… God if I never have to suffer through another life simulator/stats raiser it will be too soon! But, thankfully, Nameless is just a standard visual novel, albeit depressing as hell at times, but I’ve come to accept the fact that Cheritz likes writing tearjerkers. All of their games start off simply enough and then WHAM all aboard the feels train! You’d think it’d be fun to have your dolls come to life, especially when they’re all super hot guys, but no…. NOOOOOOO!

Each route has the dolls going through their own existential crisis and in Lance’s route he reveals that some dolls are given souls so they can experience human emotion in order to make them more appealing to their owners. But, then Lance recalls what it’s like to experience human emotions and feelings while also being unable to do anything about it because he’s a friggin doll! He even says outright that he wishes he was never given a soul in the first place because of how painful it is to know that he is just a doll and that one day he’ll be discarded when he’s outlived his usefulness. This game gets super dark, but I’m hooked so I’ll probably finish this game just to see what becomes of Eri and her sentient dolls…

That’s all for the games I’m “currently” playing, this list is subject to change at any time and I can tell you right now, Seiyuu Danshi is going right back into my backlog where it belongs (at least until I forget how much of a pain it is to get through). I want to make it my mission to finish at least one route in Code Realize before the year ends and unless something drastic happens, that seems doable. Though, I will say I’m kind of invested in Nameless right now… Lance’s route was so good, kind of depressing at times, but it was enough to make me want to play the other routes of the game. I already know about Tei being a secret Yandere with “damage”, but for the rest of the guys I’m a blank slate! 

I also have a huge backlog of game requests, that I promise I am working through… just really slowly… Maybe I’ll bang out some mini reviews to fulfill those obligations… 

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