How will you Act when you Realize the Truth? Review of [161222] Shinsou Noise

Foreword: Without a doubt I’ve been slowing down. While there’s definitely my fault in this delay of finishing and writing reviews, I also want to place at least a portion of the blame on generic titles which I was simply not interested in or annoyed me to the point I put it off. Instead, I found myself going to doujin titles, games (admittedly, I played roughly 10-15 doujin titles between the last review and this one), and MMOs instead of galge, which is like one certain friend who went down this path (although for other platforms) much earlier than I.

For that reason, the bottom portion of this review (or where I place my “dropped games” explaining my reasoning) may be quite long. I still haven’t really figured out what I wanted to do with all these dropped titles because they’re now becoming rather increasing in number compared to actual review posts (wow much quality)

Let’s get to the review of the most recent game I played which left quite a bit of impression on me, I would first off say that as with a previous game I played, Senmomo, this game was actually rather fun. As that mystery game where you are required to use clues and various other hints to solve a crime or make various conclusions. It was almost like a puzzle game, which I really appreciated.

Obviously, however, this title wasn’t exactly the best ones out there, so I’ll be talking about the things that I found to be not-so-praiseworthy, which mind you, will take up quite a while. Let’s get started!

Please do note that this review may contain mild spoilers for this game! 

Title: シンソウノイズ (Shinsou Noise) [True Emotion Noise]
Producers: Azurite
Release Date: December 22, 2016
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v19684
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=916833
Game Type: Mystery/Suspense Novel with themes of Social and Human Psychology

Summary: Since he was born, Kazuma had a strange ability to hear the “inner thoughts” of people around him. These inner thoughts would never lie and always tell the truth, and would sometimes overwhelm the poor boy.

After being abandoned by his parents and raised by his grandmother who also had this ability, Kazuma learned to live his daily life by shutting himself apart from all his peers and refusing to associate with anyone. Despite how he was able to see the “truth”, it’s this very truth which pushed the poor boy into depression and despair as he saw the evils and trickery that humans were capable of.

It was around this time he meets Yukimoto Sakura, a mysterious girl who would often go to the rooftop of the school and simply stare at the sky. When looking at her inner thoughts coincidentally, Kazuma saw violent and gorey images of her death which at first made him almost want to regurgitate his lunch. However, this event also lead him to wanting to know more about this girl, as he stops her from committing suicide one day.

It won’t be long however, that on another certain day, Kazuma would hear a loud thud, and witness the death of the same person who was his first love, and the inner thoughts of someone who whispers:

“I Killed Her”

Scary!

All Alone in this Cruel and Harsh World: Review of [110128] Bloody Rondo

Foreword: Sometimes, life isn’t fair. Well scratch that. Most of the time, life just doesn’t go the way you want it to go, and at least for this game, that was the case.

3rd Eye is a company that I’ve been eye’ing (pun intended) for a while now, as their games are often quite interesting. This title is their first game, and similar to the previous review, related to vampires.

But it sucks.

Never have I in my 4 years of Visual Novels have I seen any worse writing. It’s just so bad and there’s just nothing good about the novel portion of the game that I have a ridiculous headache. I know this game is from a while back, but that still doesn’t mean that you make a story like this.

Oh man, this is gonna be one of my “usual” rant reviews, so take it easy, grab a can of soda, and get ready to laugh at how horrible this game was.

Title: BLOODY†RONDO
Producers: 3rdEye
Release Date: January 28, 2011
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v5349
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=692831
Game Type: Mystery Action Novel with themes of Vampires

Summary: Shinkuro is an under-cover independent Vampire Hunter who hides his identity by acting as a “Student Detective” in the daytime. At night, he would go out to take out Master-less vampires who have gone out of control attacking other humans. As expected, Shinkuro hates vampires for killing his family in the past.

One day, his fate is changed when he sees a girl being assualted by multiple of these vampires. Saving the girl and bringing her back to his home, Shinkuro lays her on his bed.

Instead, however, this girl reaches out and bites him on the neck. Realizing that she is also vampire, Shinkuro points his gun at the girl’s head, ready to kill her at a moment’s notice, until the girl’s stomach growls loudly and crashes the serious atmosphere.

From then on, this vampire named “Luna” starts to live with Shinkuro, and their story has only just started.

And this would be Luna, voiced by none other than Aoba Ringo *fanboy scream*

Story Length: Moderate (20 hours)
Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Slightly Difficult
Comments: The difficulty stems from the fact that all the path splits are exactly the same as the other; there’s no word change that would suggest any forms of hints to which heroine you’re befriending, so that made it even more hard. While this is a minus for poor design, it pretty much forces everyone to use a walkthrough.

The Finale of Leyline: Review of [150130]Tokijikake – Asagiri ni Chiru Hana

Foreword: I’ll be honest: this game was the most hyped for me this month, and possibly even the entire year. I held so much expectations from its previous titles, and I was just twisting in agony of what was to happen after the first two parts.

MFW This game

Well my dear friends, you have the finale of the trilogy and the end to the title “Ley Line”. The one thing I really appreciate about Unisonshift Blossom and this game is that they know when to stop, unlike other companies who try to milk out as much money from sequels and fandiscs as humanly possible. There will be no other games relating to this series from Unisonshift, but I’m looking forward to their other games, which have a great setting of their own.

Finished in a single day, this short game delivers a promising and definitive conclusion to the end of the series. Let’s see if they did it effectively, yes?

Just a fair warning, however, that to effectively deliver my point, I will have to include some minor spoilers. Sorry guys :|
(I’ll try to be as conservative, though)

Title: 時計仕掛けのレイライン －朝霧に散る花－(Tokijikake no Ley Line -Asagiri ni Chiru Hana-) [Lit. Trans: The Clockwork of Leyline – The Flower that Wilts in the Morning Fog-]
Producers: Unisonshift Blossom
Release Date: January 30, 2015
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v16212
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=831780
Game Type: Sci-fi mystery novel

Summary: The mystery is solved, and the Special Task Force group has finally defeated the Evil of the school… maybe…? Well, the problem is that the events from 20 years ago is still not solved, and the German guests from the 2nd title are still staying over for some reason. In addition to the real Michiru (who is currently recovering from using a large amount of magic) still frail, Mitsuyoshi (the protagonist) is really at a loss to what to do.

Otherwise, it’s just a peaceful day without troubles… until there’s some rumors regarding an artifact (Myst) in the infirmary room. However, the team soon realizes that this was just a trap set by Futahi, the cunning Homunculus Headmaster. The team soon find out that the Headmaster has not given up on reviving the “Students of the Night” and will go through anything possible to do so.

Just what happened 20 years ago? Who is the mastermind behind this? Working together, the truth behind the tragic story is slowly revealed… which started out with a simple “Hello”.

By this character, who’s supposed to be an important character, but gets the least amount of screentime

Story Length: Short (10 hours)
Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Slightly Difficult.
Comments: As with other titles, the difficulty doesn’t stem from multiple routes, but the fact that the game asks you “questions” which you answer with what you think happened. At the end of the game, there is a “scoring” section where you are given a rank depending on how well you answered questions. For the first two games, I received SSS and SS ranks respectively, but for this game, I got just a plain “A” rank, which suggests that either I forgot most of the plot from the previous games or was a little dull when answering these questions.

If you don’t want to bother, feel free to use a walkthrough or just save-and-reload. You are given a humorous CG corresponding to your rank.

SSSS-rank quality CG right here