Arobi

Reviewing this as someone fairly new to visual novels, having only played little less than half a dozen previously, I have to say I felt this game was a treat to play. It has a fairly typical setup of a boy (you) going to an island for the summer, supposedly to help out his aunt but really to escape his life which seems to have entered a downward spiral. As he arrives you meet the characters that will fill/flavour the story(s) you choose to engage in and get an introduction to their basic characters. You then get to pick which route you want to progress with and uncover the story and secrets behind each character around whom that route is based around. So far pretty typical for the VN’s I have played I have three elements I believe make it objectively better, which I will get into first, and then some personal preferences I will mention. Objectively, I feel these three elements in particular make this a notably good VN; Firstly, the music and visuals are fantastic. Newer games tend to overshadow older ones but so far, of the ones I have played, this is easily the most aesthetically pleasing as well as having music that pulls you into the moment while being subtle enough not to steal the show from the story. I could go on and on about these elements but a quick youtube of the OST and a search of the images associated with this game will do a better job than I ever could. Secondly, it is lighter on the more typical tropes that I do not, personally, enjoy. These include panty shots and characters making Olympic leaps of logic toward the perverted, in most cases, in a way in which no reasonable person would. However, this is far less frequent than other VN’s and most of which happen early enough that it doesn’t break the immersion. While, as is the case with VN’s, relationships move far too quickly into deeply emotion for the characters involved, it does it in a way that makes as much sense as it could. The main character’s background and circumstances do describe someone who is likely to fall into firmer relationships of friendship and romance, more quickly. Especially when dealing with girls. While as an adult though it seems dubious, when I take the time to recall how quickly relationships do move when you are a teenager, and conceding to this, I have to give the narrative its due credit in this regard. Nothing happens so out of pace that it strains credulity such that the immersion is ruined. Thirdly, is the way in which all of the routes are loosely connected. You cannot hope to understand everything you experience in one playthrough. By coming back and replaying it, the new information adds great depth to what were previously simply background elements to the previous route. At the same time, no route ever overshadows the others and seems/feels more important outside of your own personal favourite. The only hiccup to this is there is one route that is key to understanding all others, the problem with this being if you happen to pick that one first you can gain insight as to what is to come and if you do it last then you will be left with questions as to exactly what happened in certain instances in the other routes. For the completionist, this isn’t a problem, but if you are very much the pick and choose type, this could be a fair concern. Lastly, as far as my personal preferences go; as with any VN the routes are hit and miss but really depending on what types of characters you like. However, I found when I finished the prologue there were only half of the stories heroines I was particularly interested in finding more about, however, one route in particular, as it was the one I thought I would enjoy the least became a major dark horse for best story. This was Tsumugi. While I still feel she loses out to Kamome to the best route, it highlighted to me how this game can and will subvert your expectations. I will say no more as I don’t want to dip into spoiler territory but I will finish on this; Give each route a look into, some of them will surprise you in the best of ways. I hope this review has either helped you decide to purchase the game or validated your own thoughts by hearing something similar come from another.