The Fate of the God-Murderer: Review of the Ikusa Megami Series

Foreword: When I first played the Memoria remake in 2014, I thought it was a very good game with amazing character design and a unique gameplay, and found it unfortunate that the story was not quite up to par. My review also revealed that I had only gone through what was the tip of the iceberg, with two prequels that I’ve completely neglected.

Ikusa Megami Zero

Ikusa Megami Verita

I’ve taken the time the past 2 weeks to actually go through every one of these games in its chronological order (with a maxed out savedata; grinding is so annoying), and found out that the story is indeed much better in the beginning games than the successive ones. In fact, I felt like a dumbass when I figured out that by playing the remake first, I’ve effectively spoiled the entire series for myself. Fuck you, me from 2014.

What I’d like to do to myself from 2014

This’ll be a fairly long review WITH SPOILERS discussing the main characters, story, and gameplay. I’ll try to go deep into what I found good about the series and what I didn’t. Now, please do keep in mind that I’ve only played the Ikusa Megami series from Zero -> Verita -> Memoria (remake). This may have biased my viewpoints onto Serika instead of Louie. In addition to this, I’ll be less descriptive about the Louie side of the story, because I have not yet played this “arc” of the series. One thing to note is that “Memoria” which is a remake, is pretty much the “Ikusa Megami 1” that was released waaaay back in 1999.

Also, you may notice that I use my own spelling instead of the Englishese that Eushully presents in the game. I personally think their “translations” are freaking retarded, so please forgive me in this aspect.

Please note that this game contains HEAVY spoilers! It contains a LOT of my personal analysis on the implications made within the game.

Title: 戦女神 (Ikusa Megami; Battle Goddess) Series.
Producers: Eushully
VNDB Link: Zero | Verita | Memoria (remake)
Game Type: Fantasy Novel with “Final Fantasy-Style” (SLG) Combat System

Summary: What do you do, when you lose your loved ones? How would you respond if the entire world hated you, and sought your death? What if your eternal, immortal life was filled with sleepless nights and silent anguish?

Don’t think society is the only thing that shuns your existence; gods will find your presence disgusting, monsters will haunt your back for as long as you breathe, and evil will always follow the path you walk.

At least for Serika, he didn’t know he would be walking this path as he returned from the Nohia Ruins after an expedition. As he is completely unaware of his eternal fate after returning to Markle, he meets a beautiful girl whose name was Satia.

Do you believe in Destiny? Serika replies with a strong “no”, but his own will drag him into the depths of Death and back.

Love… isn’t something you “do”. Review of [140627]Koi ga sakukoro sakura doki

Foreword: Sorry for not being active on this site for a while! Sakusaku (which is this game) completely caught my attention, so I was pouring the last 3-4 days into completing this title instead.

In reminiscence, sakusaku was actually a pretty good title, but it’s far from a kamige. It also falls short of my expectations, so I’m unfortunately glad (?) that I didn’t pre-order the game (although I did miss out on Izumi Tsubasu’s signature *screaming in agony*)

I’ll probably include my personal analysis of the mysterious scenario writer: “Minase Mirai” as well, and as always, include boatloads of CGs because you know…

Izumi Tsubasu is a goddess.

P.S. Oh, I actually found this “manga” while on the web. It’s already translated and leads up to the pool scene of An’s route, so if you guys want to get a quick glimpse of the story without actually playing it, here you go

P.P.S. Starting with this 99th post (holy crap, the next one is my 100th! O_O), I’ve decided to also include in a “Protagonist Rating”. Hopefully, this doesn’t make anything more confusing…

Title: 恋がさくころ桜どき (Koi ga sakukoro sakura doki) [Lit. Trans: The cherry blossoms when love blossoms]
Producers: Palette
Release Date: June 27, 2014
VNDB Link: http://vndb.org/v10304
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=742762
Game Type: “Pure-love” Romance Novel with fantasy themes

Summary: Yuma is a student who is extremely popular in school. This is because as he works in the infirmary, he consults various girls with their love problems. In return, his looks and cool attitude also attract girls to hold affection for him.

Despite this, Yuma is not interested in love. In the various consultations he did, he slowly became desensitized and finally came to a point where he says “Love is stupid”.

However, this will change when a “bounty” is placed on him, and whoever finds him a girlfriend will receive 21000 en (~210 USD). While Yuma originally ignores this prank, his “bounty” rises again and again, and even involves his younger sister.

This is the start of Yuma and various characters including a self-proclaimed love fairy who lives with Yuuma and his family, and invites him to “fall in love”.

Review of [130125]Shiro Pika

Foreword: WARNING! EXTREME CUTENESS! Not for the faint of heart. I don’t make jokes about stuff like this: you will be sent into a coma from how cute this game is, unless you brace yourself for it.

One of my friends said that this game was an “…upgraded version of Wanko to Kurasou…”, and she was certainly correct; I found myself charmed to the bone with this game, that contained the most adorable characters that I’ve ever seen.

Title: しろのぴかぴかお星さま (Shiro no pikapika ohoshisama, Lit. Trans; Shiro’s sparkling Star)
Producers: Sweet Light
Release Date: January 25, 2013
VNDB Link: http://vndb.org/v11070
Game Type: Regular Novel

Summary: When Yuki was young, he had a pet dog named “Shiro”, that he loved with his life; they did almost everything together. However, ten years ago, Shiro died.

Yuki cried for weeks and months, and even believed at one point, that Shiro would come running through his door into his arms. Since then, he’s been having strange dreams where someone continuously calls out to him. He doesn’t know who is calling for him, so doesn’t really pay attention to it too much.

Before the 10th anniversary of Shiro’s death, Yuki is dragged into a strange dream, where a girl in a white one-piece and hair jumps into his arms. For some reason, she seems to know him, and claims that she is Shiro, his pet that passed away 10 years ago! Yuki does not believe this, and wakes up, but he realizes the same girl is now sleeping on his bed!

Shiro’s return as a human girl will cause chaos for Yuki, but he will soon realize that despite having a different form, he loves this girl who was once his best friend.

Story Length: Moderately Long (30 hours)
Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Moderate
Comments: Be sure to be “kind” to all four heroines before the split, where Yuki is trying to hide Aurora. The story splits when the group is preparing for the oceanside BBQ.

Aurora was arguably more of that “cliche” character that I didn’t like. At least she’s a loli nekomimi? (irresponsible)

Character Design Rating: 5/10
Story Rating: 5/10
Game Quality: Moderately Low
Overall Rating: 4/10
Rating Comments: Another inferior game. Yes, the characters are super-adorable. Yes, I was cringing from the cute-ness for the duration of the entire story, but that was pretty much all of it. Nothing real special about this story other than the previous factor. It is possible to feel affection for Shiro, who comes back to Yuki because she loves him so much, but there’s also that “character contradiction” where Shiro doesn’t see Yuki as a “male”, but rather as a “master” until her route. Additionally, the character design was rather “cliche”, meaning that they were far too predictable. For experienced players like myself, we end up seeing how the story would end midway, and get bored with the game quickly. I was even able to realize the background factors of the “Fairytale Land” quite early on in the story. This hurt both the character design rating and the story rating quite a bit.

Eternal Dance… I wonder what that means?

Sexual Content: Moderately Low

Comments: Quite unfortunately, one of the more annoying factors of this game was the small cutscenes. Whenever Yuki would come from or go to the Fairytale Land, or whenever Aurora transforms into a cat from a human and vice versa. For these, you just need to hold the skip button, but that got annoying after a while too.

Nonetheless, if you’ve already played Wanko to Kurasou, you’ll realize that Mikan and Shiro has the same voice. I was unable to confirm that it was the same CV, but I’m guessing they are, because they seem so similar.

As stated above, extreme cuteness.

One other element of this game that I found as a minus was the side stories. Instead of a main plot, this game seems to favor more side-stories than creating one plot to support the background of all the other stories. These side-stories seem to usually take place in the Fairytale Land, and range from 100% correct fortune cookies or the “Life” game. The reader CAN get a few chuckles here and there, but these side stories really does nothing to the overall story, which was a disappointment.

Affection for the Characters: Moderate

CG Quality: Low. While some CG is detailed, most of it was decorated unnecessarily with special effects like sparkles. While I can see that “pika pika” in the title, which translates to “sparkling” can be a plus for this special effect, too much of it kinda hurt my eyes.
Music Quality: Moderate. Most of the music is gentle and soothing, but they seemed too “plain”. I was hoping some theme of “nostalgia” within the music, but I didn’t see much of it.

Airi trying to lure a cat. She’s unfortunately avoided by animals, despite the fact that she loves them. Airi’s often jealous of Yuki, who is loved by animals in general.

Addictiveness: Low. Yes, this is a cute game, but otherwise, it gets pretty off-track and even annoying in some areas. If you’re not a hardcore loli maniac, you would get tired of this game very quickly.

Conclusion: Great story for drooling at loli characters, or if you like kemonomimi, then you might be okay with this story as well. Very inferior otherwise as a story as a whole, so not recommended for players who may want a “good story”.