The Love Story that Starts in Winter: Review of [160826] Giniro Haruka

Foreword: As a super-delayed review, I feel that there needs to be some form of explanation.

I generally didn’t really want to touch any tone work’s titles purely because of the fact that it’s super long (I didn’t touch games like Hatsukoi 1/1 for the same reason). After hearing people suggest this game for me, and me myself having played relatively longer games like Sengoku Koihime, I thought I would be able to handle it.

Oh boy was I wrong.

The reason why I’m making this a short review instead of a full fledged one is because I ended up getting sick of it after completing Yuzuki, Bethley, and 3/4 of the way through Mizuha’s route and ended up going “fuck this shit” and dropping the game. For this reason, I won’t be talking about the characters at all, but basing my scores purely on what I experienced with the game so far, as well as my opinions.

For this reason, please understand that my review for this game is greatly unreliable. Please only use it as another player’s opinion instead of a source of solid information/criticisms. Let’s get to it.

Title:  銀色、遥か (Silver Color, Far Away)
Producers: tone works
Release Date: August 26, 2016
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v18778
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=885200
Game Type: Realistic Romance Novel

Summary: Yukito’s childhood wasn’t colorful like anyone else’s, but it was definitely filled with kindness. His 2nd year in middle school was filled with potential as his younger sister Yuzuki hastily followed him outside to his “present”, and it’s not long until both of them form and remember new and old relationships.

The transfer student from Canada Bethley, Yukito’s new classmate Momiji, Yuzuki’s new best friend Hinata, Mizuha their childhood friend who they soon reunite with, and finally his own sister Yuzuki.

This is a story about them and their friendship that creates a group of inseparable friends. Even when Bethley returns to Canada, they are sure they will be able to meet again soon.

The Incarnation of the Poem of Sakura [151023]Sakura no Uta

Foreword:

Okay DAMN. People said this game was good but I did NOT know it was going to be THIS good. Well, only parts of it.

This title’s definitely on kamige level, but it’s really unfortunate that I can’t really say it’s a kamige because of a couple of reasons. Despite this, I wouldn’t hesitate to call this one of the most impactful games out there and MAN it really left a big impression on me. More like, why didn’t I hear about this title before? The all ages trial was from 2008! Ya’ll need to make recommendations like this more often because I often find myself missing them. Though to be fair on the other hand, most of my bias for this game comes from the fact I love seeing philosophy in galge/eroge in general. It really gives me a lot of “shower thoughts” that I can ponder about for the next few days.

While I’m going to be praising this game for the most part, it isn’t without flaws. I’m going to point out some major kinks that this game had that makes it awfully awkward in some areas and may be more of a turnoff. I think Sakura no Uta would be a great example of how a lot of amateur players scream is the best game ever, and completely ignore said fatal flaws, lol.

This review will contain minor spoilers and analysis of the game! Please only consider reading this review if you didn’t really understand the game or have already played it!

Title: サクラノ詩－櫻の森の上を舞う－ Sakura no Uta -Sakura no morino uewomau- [Lit. Trans: The Poem of Sakura – Dancing above the Forest of Sakura-]
Producers: makura
Release Date: Trial released in 2008, Official Release in October 23, 2015
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v562
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=44121
Game Type: Philosophical Poetic Novel with Slice of Life Themes

Summary: Naoya’s father died, who was his last blood relative. With no other family left on this planet, Naoya also refuses his father’s inheritance of 150 million en (Roughly 1.5 million USD) and now penniless, he somehow still finds the leisure to mess around with his friend Kei. However, as the funeral in the forest of cherry blossoms end, Kei’s older sister Ai invites Naoya to live with them in return for making meals at their house, which Naoya agrees to.

It’s been so long since that unfortunate accident 6 years ago that left Naoya, a world-famous artist himself, refusing to draw again. Now with the innocent childhood friends all grown up, Naoya must move on from the death of his relatives and live his own life with the relationships that he has. However, little will he know that he’ll be the center of even more; more pain and suffering for the people around him. He’ll never understand until much later how much of an influence he holds as the son of the World-Famous Artist.

What is mind? No matter
What is matter? Never Mind.

Gathering your Emotions and Putting it on Paper: Review of [151030]Koi x Shinai Kanojo

Foreword: I hope to have done all the apologies and notifications on the previous post that I’ve made, and bring you the most recent title I finished, Koikake. At this point, I’d like to introduce you to some humor as I did NOT know where the “kake” came from (since the words read out loud is “Koi Shin Ai Kanojo”), then realized the “x” in between and took literally 5 minutes to realize that Japanese call the x-symbol “Kakeru”.

Man, I felt like an idiot.

Well, with me being an idiot and an asshole (?) aside, let’s get to the review! For the most part, I thought this game was pretty plain, boring even to an extent… but only partially. The thing that really kept me going was the absolutely gorgeous music and cute characters, but I finished several hours of the game’s worth in a single sitting because it had so much impact, which I’ll explain a bit further down below.

Furthermore, I warn readers early in advance that this game will contain HEAVY and MAJOR spoilers! PLEASE DO NOT READ THIS REVIEW if you do not want to be spoiled! 

And without further ado, let’s get into the review in quite a while! Here’s Koikake!
(…Shit. I was hoping I could get another review for a 2016 title and this one’s from 2015 T_T)

Title: 恋ｘシンアイ彼女 (Koi “kakeru” shinai kanojo) [Lit Trans: Romance “cross” New Love Girlfriend]
Producers: Us:Track
Release Date: October 30, 2015
VNDB Link: https://vndb.org/v17516
Getchu Link: http://www.getchu.com/soft.phtml?id=857308
Game Type: Slice of Life Romance Novel

Summary: Koutarou is a very introverted guy. Instead of playing sports or actively seeking new relationships, he would rather write his novels and stay inside. Naturally, he loves reading books and is actually quite fluent with writing novels, which even won him prizes when he was younger.

Koutarou has a dark past, however, since he still drags on his first love, which ended pretty bitterly in his opinion, when he gave a letter to the girl, who transferred the next day without telling him. Because of this, he often has humorous “allergies” to cheesy things such as romance or love.

But enough about his past; what matters is now, right? Because the past only makes up our memories; the present and future is what we make of it.

Carpe Diem, amiright?

Story Length: Moderately Long (30 hours)
Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Easy
Comments: The story has four routes in total, but seem to separate into two “splits” consisting of Ayane + Sena in one split and Yui + Rinka in another. I personally didn’t really like how these splits were pretty conspicuous, but did appreciate that across routes within a split, there was something similar between the heroines (e.g. Love Triangle for the former and the Destruction of the Old School Facilities in the latter).