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Marine Philt is the only masterpiece of March 1993. 1. Hatsukoi Monogatari 初恋物語 [930305] Game Technopolis 1 2 An ordinary Japanese student finds a floppy disk on the street; using his computer to load data from it, he miraculously summons Foltjunia, an intergalactic warrior who fights evil in her robotic armor with three companions. However, Foltjunia has lost her powers and as a result stays with the hero, giving him advice as to how to conquer the love of a schoolmate. Game Technopolis games have always been weird AND bad. It's not an exception, as usual. Biggest flaw lies with the system. SLG elements are overflowing for a sim. Text usually takes half of the screen, images are small. BGM is monotonous. Mouse is not responsive... In this raising sim... you're even raising the protagonist to suit the girl. Maybe it was novelty and all, but production values were not high enough to enjoy it. 2. Bell's Avenue ベルズアベニュー [930312] Wendy Magazine 1 Bell's Avenue is a collection of three very short games, all of which play like minimalist Japanese-style adventures and have stories that revolve around sex. The interaction follows the standard verb-command "Look-Talk-Think" template, without any sub-menus that would allow interaction with different objects. The Lyrical Story After Rain, the shortest of the three, is an episode from the life of a lonely teenage girl, who meets another young girl on the train and later has erotic fantasies involving her. Paragon Wing Bird is considerably longer and has a sci-fi theme, the protagonist being a male adventurer from the Earth, who has encountered a race of human-like creatures in deep space and is interested in their sexual traditions. Kara is the longest of the three, is set in a high school, and describes a group of young girls who are eager to have their first sexual experience. This game allows menu-based navigation through various locations in the school and non-linear story progression, which can change depending on the player's choice and order of locations to visit. Bell's Avenue also contains Under Deep, a very short futuristic story, basically consisting of two bizarre sex scenes and having no interaction at all, and Minimum Hour, which presents, in a comical way, a few ideas for sex-based arcade games, which are not playable. Yet another multiple ero-oriented stories under one title. This time even without cute heroines. And since it's Wendy Magazine, without males. 3. Marine Philt マリンフィルト [930312] Fairytale 1 2 3 4 In the first half of the 21st century, humanity started building space satellites, trying to sustain the working conditions in outer space by using a drug known as Marine Philt. Eventually the project was abandoned. One of the deserted satellites fell onto the Earth, causing a radioactive accident that forced the inhabitants of Neo Tokyo to dwell underground. One day, a young man named Seed heard a news report about a gruesome murder that occurred in a research facility. Together with his friends, Seed ventures into the building, only to discover another horrifying result of the satellite crash, which may put the entire city in immense danger. There are English reviews. 4. YES! - Youthful Eager Stories [930312] Himeya Soft A collection of three short stories: 1) "Last kingdom" is about the queen being escorted out of the kingdom by the guards due to the order of the king who is about to meet kingdom destruction. 2) "BT-3" is a love story between the android BT-3 who suffers a space shuttle crash and a local girl, who gets involved in fight after pursuers find the crash location. 3) "Western mansion vampire" is a about a school girl who enters a western mansion to rescue her friend who was missing after visiting that place. Whoa, even Himeya Soft followed the craze and made its own multiple stories game. But unlike the other companies these three stories are short and ero-centered, but scenario driven and and intriguing to read. Both character design and CG styles are familiar to me, so I enjoyed the work moderately. 5. Aa! Megami-sama! ああっ女神さまっ [930320] Banpresto 1 2 3 4 Based on the anime series Ah! My Goddess, the game follows the story of a Japanese high-school student named Keiichi, who has accidentally summoned the powerful, yet very lovely Norse goddess Verdandi (mercilessly misspelled Belldandy in the game) and pronounced a wish to stay with her forever. Now the gorgeous goddess has become a part of his life, and the two find themselves involved in constant misunderstandings and comical situations, yet also develop feelings for each other... There are English reviews. 6. Marginal Storys マージナルストーリーズ [930331] Forest 1 Marginal Storys (sic) is composed of two short visual novels, which are accessible from the main menu and are not related to each other story-wise. The first one, entitled Forbidden Rhythm, is a bizarre horror story. The protagonist, a young man named Kyouichi, finds himself in an old mansion, which seems to contain an evil energy - dead bodies, ghosts, apparitions haunt Kyouichi, who has to recall childhood events and the incestuous feelings towards his sister. The second story is named Cosplaytor II (sic), and is set in Tokyo, in 2019. Entertainment as we know it has disappeared off the face of the Earth, replaced by a global virtual reality game, that became the ultimate reality for many people. The player controls an agent known only by his codename ("Z"), who has to investigate criminal occurrences that might lead to a world-wide cyber-conspiracy. I'm prejudiced against multiple stories works, but this work stands out among those. The reason is the horror atmosphere that's created partly by peculiar palette and drawing, but mostly thanks to the great sound support. Those cicada sounds get really stuck in the mind. The shortness and the hazy ending leaving the conclusive events to the imagination hurt the overall impression, not leaving it rise as a masterpiece. 7. Wonpara Wars WONPARAウォーズ [930331] Mink 1 2 3 God has created a paradise called Wandante. Men, women, and animals lived together in peace. But where there is God, there is also Devil; where there is love, there is also hatred. The hatred between men and women grew, until it resulted in a bloody war. Having superior physical strength, men were victorious for a while - until female demons offered their help to women's army. Men's army was nearly destroyed. It was at that time that the hero, named Leopard Chateau-Lyon, appeared in Wandante. He is the only hope of the men, the one who will have to defeat the demonic women and to bring peace to both genders. There is an English review. 8. Psychic Detective Series Final Vol. 7: Solitude (Gekan) サイキック・ディテクティブ・シリーズ・ファイナル Vol.7 ソリチュード(下巻)[9303] DataWest Katsuya Furuyagi lost the psychic ability, so he dives into the mind of his former lover in coma state Aya Shingonji with the help of Rosemary. Will he bring back his love to the world of light, get over his trauma and perhaps save the world or is there only desperation ahead? First of all, the game cost 12,800 yen upon release, same as the 6th part of the series, so quite few fans decided to buy the game after the negative reception of 6th part. The tempo of the game got even worse due to the need to move through the rooms one by one thoroughly searching them over and using DAPS replay ability. There are puzzles and to solve those many recollection scenes are shown which was watching the same scenes again for the veterans of the series. There is no such thing as happy ending in this last work and thus the aftertaste is quite sour.
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Cosmology of Kyoto publication month is unknown, so I just put it to February that had relatively few titles. Cosmology of Kyoto is the only masterpiece of February 1993 and thus VN of the month. 1. 3x3 Eyes ~Sanjiyan Henjou~ 3x3 Eyes ~三只眼變成~ [930205] Nihon Create 1 2 3 4 5 6 Sanjiyan Henjō is based on the manga and anime series 3x3 Eyes. Pai, a young girl from the immortal tribe of sanzhiyan, three-eyed demons of Chinese origin, wants to become a human again. She meets a Japanese teenager named Yakumo Fujii, whom she accidentally turns into a "wu", an immortal obedient servant of a three-eyed demon. Together, Pai and Yakumo try to regain their lost humanity. There are many English reviews including mine. 2. Bishoujo Audition - Idol o Sagase! 美少女オーディション アイドルを探せ! [930205] Tomboy The previous winner of MISCON left it with a scandal and now the reputation of the competition is on stake. Only the best candidates should pass the audition. A minor title. You hold an audition and try to get through a whole mess of different stats. 3. Hacchake Ayayo-san 4 - Sexy Olympics - Ayayo's Live Affection はっちゃけあやよさん4 セクシーオリンピック AYAYO'S LIVE AFFECTION [930213] Hard 1 Ayayo's Live Affection is the fourth entry in the Hacchake Ayayo-san series. This time Ayayo and Tomoko meet new friends who convince them to participate in the Sex Olympics. The rest of the plot consists of various sexual encounters that constitute this bizarre tournament. The new part of longest standing erotic series, now with improved graphics and animation. Ero-centered bakage. 4. Animahjong V3 あにまーじゃんV3 [930226] Sogna 1 In this pre-Viper game by Sogna, an elderly mahjong master with no sons seeks a male successor. When he discovers the protagonist, he offers him one of his three daughters for a wife. His daughters, Rumi, Miyabi, and Yumika, disagree because they've never met him, so the old man suggests they play strip mahjong with him in order to get to know him. Since they are all skilled mahjong players, they think they will embarrass him and agree. This time the strip mahjong goes with some kind of synopsis and animation. But it does not affect the outcome. 5. Cat's Part 1 Cat's Part 1 [930228] Cat's Pro. 1 Cat's Part 1 casts the player in the role of an unnamed protagonist, presumably young, male, and very interested in the members of the opposite sex. One fine day he meets Stella, the queen of magic world. She tells him that her duty is to sustain the balance between worlds, but now her power is fading, which means a new queen has to arrive and take her place. To find this queen, Stella tells her companion Pixie to open the gates to seven different worlds: three modern-day ones, three futuristic ones, and one "past", and sends the hero on the quest for balance in the world... and numerous sexually fulfilling encounters with pretty girls from different dimensions. Point-and-click adv travelling the seven different worlds looking for queen. Despite being a dog the hero gets to observe all kind of erotic situations in each world. The graphics and sound support are also above average, so it's an ok debut work for Cat's Pro. 6. AIDS Watashi o Aishite... Jinai Seijin AIDS私を愛して・・・神愛聖人 [93] Medic Main hero is an ordinary salary-man of 25 years old. He has a girlfriend, but they have not spent much time together since the beginning of the week. Now hero gets a bonus payment at work. How will she spend the money? The premise of the game is to show how a night adventure can turn into death disease and how easy it is to go to public health examination. 7. Cosmology of Kyoto [93] Soft Edge 1 2 3 4 5 6 Step into the mind of an ancient Japanese person in the Heian period in ancient Kyoto. Live their fears, fight their demons, and understand their history and legends by actually experiencing them first hand. There are English reviews. 8. Himitsu Chouhou Buin - 00Nanako-chan 2 秘密諜報部員00ななこちゃんII [93] Overture Nanako has become a full fledged spy out of an apprentice. Now she gets a new important mission. This time there are much more locations and it's easy to get lost.
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VN of the Month January 1993 - Mamono Hunter Youko: Tooki Yobigoe
kivandopulus posted a blog entry in Vndbreview
There are no masterpieces this month, but I rate Mamono Hunter Youko: Tooki Yobigoe above others and thus it's VN of the January. 1. Gram Cats 2 グラムキャッツ2 [930108] Dott Kikaku 1 Marine and Sayaka arrive to the Scherer Island which is known as a luxury resort with a great hotel and famous nudist beach. Their goal is to investigate island secretly for the traces of an alien base. I prepared a full review. 2. Mamono Hunter Youko: Tooki Yobigoe 魔物ハンター妖子 ~遠き呼び声~ [930108] Tenky 1 2 Tooki Yobigoe is a direct sequel to Mamono Hunter Yōko: Makai kara no Tenkōsei, continuing where the story of the previous game left off. Yohko, Shoma and Setsuna are attacked by demons on the flying ship, and have to use their recently found powers to fend them off. As opposed to the previous game, where Shoma was the protagonist, Yohko is the player character in the sequel. There is not much of a story here, but there's much action, so it looks even better than the prequel. It's one-way road and it's impossible to die here. It's a one-time game, but light and fun so it should be treated this way. 3. Tenshi-tachi no Gogo V ~Nerawareta Tenshi~ 天使たちの午後V 〜狙われた天使〜 [930114] JAST Main character is a lover and a producer of a selling singer. An incident occurred in which the acquaintance was shot dead during the singer live performance ruining the event. Hero decides to start his own investigation. The reason why the hero starts an investigation is very weak. There are many interrogations to be done, so the game differs greatly from the other parts of the series. There are many bad endings and most of H events are only accessible while pursuing those. The poor interface resembling pc-88 games leaves a feeling of a half-baked game. 4. Akiko 亜紀子 [930122] Red Zone 1 Akiko Yagami is a young woman who has just accepted a teaching job offer from the Noble Girls High School. She is determined to be a good teacher and concentrate on her work. But upon arriving, she realizes that the school is a playground for wild sex. Akiko is seduced by her female boss, witnesses sex scenes between students, and finally gives in to her urges... Fairytale X-Shitei disbanded after the scandal, but it does not mean Fairytale dropped its adult direction branch. Redzone took the place and even remade Kounai Shasei series adding censorship so that those could be sold again. In this first work Redzone accepted the rules of the game and produced a censored game, but of extreme content. The game has little in the story department apart of the fact that Akiko appears to be a secret agent sent to uncover the disturbing events in this school. The game was first in the sales in January 1992 which shows that the theme answered the wishes of the audience. 5. Premium II [930128] Silky's 1 Premium 2 has exactly the same premise as its predecessor - play through four erotic scenarios, each dedicated to a specific theme, without any over-arching story line. The gameplay is exactly the same as in the previous game: the player goes through simple context-specific commands to trigger the next scene. The situations are entirely dedicated to sex. CG beautiful as ever and the "plot" part is quite non-existant. There are some bad endings on poor choices. 6. Fushigi no Umi no Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water ふしぎの海のナディア THE SECRET OF BLUE WATER [930129] Hudson Soft 1 2 3 4 5 6 Fushigi no Umi no Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water is one of the several games based on the anime series of the same name. The game assumes familiarity with the story of the anime, taking the player directly into the time frame of late episodes, where Grandis and the jewel thieves have already joined Jean and Nadia on their travels with Captain Nemo on his submarine "Nautilus". Following a dramatic scene that reveals more about Electra's past, the crew is stranded on a mysterious island. Jean, Nadia, Marie, and the lion cub King decide to explore it, and discover an ancient civilization in the process. There are English reviews. 7. Beast 3 ビースト 3 [9301] Birdy Soft One day Mr. Sato rang saying that she felt foggy. When Soga and Kotone made it to his place, man was missing. First step is to seek at university where he was last seen. Game is now set outdoors! So we search information from inhabitants of one area, get the lead to next area and so on. There's almost no H-scenes. There are a lot of gags on the previous parts scattered around. So the serious atmosphere of the first parts is totally ruined, maybe for the best. Still, beast trilogy stays one of the three pillars of Birdie Soft company on par with Joker and CAL series. -
Year 1992 was much to my liking with few eroge and a great number of elaborate plots. The notable features of year 1992 included: - Implemented censorship rules resulted in private parts censored and at some cases companies set self-censorship to a degree when no private parts were ever on a screen or sometimes even to no nudity at all - Regulations led to bigger emphasis on the story and experiments with the genres - Horror mysteries with gore pictures started to appear as a genre - Several sepia color works appeared to underline the warm atmosphere of the past events - Pure romance works started to appear, but Nanpa games were still larger in number - In several games individual endings for each heroine were implemented - As for system, several games had very weird choices for text window and icon/command window The number of good high quality games increased significantly. Masterpieces of 1992: 1. Armist 2. Can Can Bunny Premiere 3. De-Ja 2 4. Doukyuusei 5. Dracula Hakushaku 6. Ginga Ojou-sama Densetsu Yuna 7. Joker II 8. Kiss 9. Koroshi no Dress 3 10. Kurutta Kajitsu 11. Martial Age 12. My Eyes! 13. Phobos 14. Shinjuku Monogatari 15. Sotsugyou Shashin / Miki 16. The 4th Unit - Wyatt And there was a good number of works with good atmosphere and story. At first I was pretty sure that Crazy Fruit (Kurutta Kajitsu) must be the game of the year 1992 since the year born so many horror mystery novels. Then I got really intrigued by Shinjuku Monogatary. Doukyuusei (Classmate) and it struck me as a very bright and novelty game. It was supposed to be another nanpa game or dating seem and turned out to be a collection of stories that you choose yourself. It's a game of events as something keeps happening everywhere and it's up to you whether you stop and try to get to know the people there or keep on exploring. Game has very attractive characters and huge replayability potential. It's not a strategy, not an RPG, but the amount of freedom you're given makes you think it's an entirely new genre. And yet my personal preferences demand a story game for the winner. And I personally liked the story of Phobos the most among the visual novels of 1992.
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Doukyuusei and Koroshi no Dress 3 are the masterpieces of December 1992, but I just can't rate a good story game lower than a very good, but still nanpa game. Koroshi no Dress 3 is the VN of December 1992. 1. Chikyuu Bouei Shoujo Iko-chan ~UFO Daisakusen~ 地球防衛少女イコちゃん ~UFO大作戦~ [921204] Chime Defender of the Earth girl Iko-chan defends the planet against alien monsters. This is a part of media franchise that by 1992 counted three OVAs, TV Dorama and manga. Battles are done as a card game, but it's hardly possible to lose. It's more like a parody to the series, so no point discussing it without knowing the original. 2. Mirror 鏡 -mirror- [921209] Studio Twinkle 1 Young man enters the shop "Mirror" and touched the doll as the puppet-like owner Heine said. The next moment he found himself in a hospital with amnesia facing the woman who looked like a doll. Now it's time to find out the truth, if there is one. New Birdie Soft brand so expectations are already high since visuals and sound should be on high level as always. But new studio name and being an 15+ work hurt the sales badly. So it is a romance story in the hospital, but with a quirk of suspense and good atmosphere created by talking with nurse and patients. And it's an ADV which is very rare while interactive adventures were dominant. Overall a high quality comfortable to play game with an intriguing story and good text. 3. Moonlight Energy ムーンライトエナジー [921210] Interheart 1 2 The heroine of the game is a high school student named Maki, who is focused on just one thing: sex with girls. Interheart first game and a nukige right off the bat. The story is extremely lightweight and comical. 4. Ginsei Senshin Guynarock 2 銀聖戦神ガイナロック 2 [921211] Silence 2125. Half a year after the first incident. This time the SIS crew stumbles upon another ghost spaceship. Having found nothing, they move on, but two girls develop some body abnormalities. What kind of disease is brought from the abandoned spaceship? A new Silence game which means it's not a long, but a highly animated game. This time the contents is less hardcore and presented by nude body parts at best. The turn of events here is curious, but not as thrilling as in the prequel. Perhaps for that reason the prequel gets a remake later from Sogna, but this second part does not. 5. Will no Dengon ウィルの伝言 [921211] Cocktail Soft Heroine Lucia lives in a peaceful town of "Will". She hears from boy Rui who she helped in the forest that the neighboring town Wolfe is going to attack. There was a legend that once per 400 years a demon comes down to Will and Wolfe intended to utilize his power. To stop the assault Lucia is preparing to attack the front base of Wolfe on an aircraft. The setting is rather elaborate and it's very unusual for Cocktail soft to issue a serious all-age science fiction story. The story had big emphasis on mechanisms, but soon forgot about then. This devil part looked totally unsuitable for the setting. Commands are given in words rather than in icons at the top of the screen, but there is little motivation for exploration since command feedback was limited. The relationship between two main hero mechanics was good. But the scenario was lacking and without H part it did not have a success. 6. Dalk [921215] Alice Soft 1 2 3 4 5 6 Hero gets involved into conflict between gods Martis and Mira. As a servant of Martis, he needs to unseal this goddess, protector of women. Fourteen girls will fight alongside in his quest deep into the mountains. The game is an RPG and it was famous for 1,000 faces on the pc-98 box. Game had personal different scenes for each of 14 girls to accompany hero. And after clearing the game there was a 1000-floor dungeon to dwell deeper and deeper. It was indeed a colossus work. There are complaints on the battle map part, clunky moving part, but overall it was a good relaxing time killer with pleasurable gameplay. 7. Doukyuusei 同級生 [921217] Elf 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Takurou is a high-school student who transfers to a new school and who wants to find his only one partner during last summer break before the graduation. It was the first epidemic VN. Released on 17 december, it was a perfect Christmas present. 14 girls to combat for attention. Concept of time introduced, so there is always something new showing up with consecutive playthroughs. It's map movement on the global map and point-and-click type inside buildings. But together with the concept of time, multiflag, individual routes for each girl, nampa elements and first class romance scenario, there was a feeling it was a totally new genre. It was this multi-layer system that created the impression of game supremacy. You could enter an any building out of dozens, talk to any character so satisfaction was above a typical ADV novel. Cute loli Himo was supposed to be the main attraction and main heroine, but surprisingly many players like Hisa girl with a tsundere character the most. So it might be the beginning of tsundere stamp as well. There are a lot of working ladies as well. The scenarios were unique and well made and picture does not lag behind. BGM was perfect. Later versions got voicing as well. Console versions had no H images and H scenes and it was still good. Original game did not have much emphasis on romance, but windows remake tried to follow the trend and the charm of the work was gone to a point. So it was a revolutionary game in many aspects and a great popularization of the genre, so many people considered this game to be starting point and never knew about the previous games. 8. Floppy Bunko 14 - Sadistic Gamers Syndrome - Episode 1 フロッピー文庫14 サディスティックゲーマーズシンドローム エピソード1 [921218] Sixteens 1 You play as a boy who is getting real bad grades. You get a tutor in the form of a strict looking woman who is secretly into some vaguely kinky stuff. She thinks that smart people are sexy, so if you show her how smart you really are, then maybe the game will start to get sexual. The quiz will cover all sorts of topics, though none of the questions are presented in a way that makes it particularly funny. There is an English review of the game. 9. Pastel Lime パステルLime [921218] Naxat Soft 1 2 Yū is a young apprentice magician who lives in the Fairy World. One day, a magical error occurs, and Yū finds herself on Earth. In order to return to her world, the little fairy must find three stones that must be inserted into her magical brooch. A young girl who finds the first stone becomes Yū's companion (and the game's protagonist), and together they must find and recover the other stones. There's a good English review on this game here. 10. Red [921219] Discovery Investigation assistant got a letter mentioning Luna city and the letter was posted a month ago from the location of explosion accident. So investigation started. This very solid work was buried under overwhelming popularity of Elf's Classmate. Science fiction setting, very likable characters and intriguing plot - it had everything to get popular. On the other side the work was clustered - it used icons for interaction, shooting modes and additional commands and phrases in dialogues. H-scenes weren't obligatory and after clearing they became available in reminiscence menu anyway. Otherwise it's a one-way scenario. 11. Koroshi no Dress 3 殺しのドレス3 [921220] Fairytale Masashi Satoru is a Shibuya policeman set on a series of murders targeting only single males. And suspicion immediately falls on his lover. First of all I should mention prequels. First part was issued in 1987 and it was a genius work, but with not enough volume at that time. Next part drifted away from suspense into eroticism and generally considered weak. So now we come to part 3 which is spiritual follower of original. Graphics are more anime-style compared to realistic style of previous games. A feature of this game is cuts from the viewpoint of the criminal which rose interest greatly. One by one new murders take place and inter-human connections of the victims get exposed. And the story has an adult feel and look. With those criminal cuts it's watched almost as dorama and all the tension brings to a satisfaction in the end. So it's a masterpiece work of its time. 12. Mischif ミスチフ [921223] Basement 1 Long time ago, the Magic World and our world were not on good terms. But now, it has become different - or has it?.. In any case, a young spoiled boy named Frito, from a rich Magic World family, has to get married - and his father tells him to choose a spouse from our world. Frito's trusted servant, an elf-like creature named Fin, finds three suitable girls: a Japanese high-school student (naturally), a maid, and a Wild West farmer girl. Who will become the happy bride?.. The second and last title of Basement who gave us Armist. Despite the fantasy setting quite a normal nanpa game. The difficulty is actually high since you can easily overdo something during H scene point and click session. There is an ending for each of the brides plus a hidden ending. 13. Beyond the Wall of Stars [921223] R. A. Montgomery 1 2 3 The planet Celadon is in trouble and needs help. In this story, you will become part of the expedition team which will try to reach Tara, a recently settled planet far beyond the Wall of Stars. Along the way, you'll get to affect the outcome of the story by making a series of critical decisions about direction, strategy, tactics and teamwork. It's EVN, so it naturally has English reviews.
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Dracula Hakushaku is the only masterpiece game of November 1992. 1. Iris-tei Serenade イーリス亭小夜曲 [921113] Agumix 1 2 Iris Tei Serenade is set in a medieval fantasy land. For seven years, the two most powerful countries - the Empire of Aimar and the Kingdom of Langbard - have been at war with each other. In order to secure the victory, the people of Aimar turned to Imar, their hero and guardian angel. Imar's mission is to infiltrate the Langbard kingdom. However, once he arrives there and stays at the inn run by three young and lovely sisters, his mind turns into a direction quite different from war and politics... There is an English review. 2. Jan Jaka Jan 雀JAKA雀 [921113] Elf 1 2 Hero gets robbed on a street, but since this town is famous for mahjong tournaments, he decides to get money this way. All mahjong games look alike to me. Here you can buy items to increase your condition. You actually need to win four mahjong dojo girls and in order to do that you earn money to afford entrance fee and one by one make those girls respect your skill in the game. Some games can't be won without special item. 3. Nooch - Abakareta Inbou ヌーク あばかれた陰謀 [921113] Softhouse Bonbee Bonbon 1 Umechiyo finally met with his childhood friend Piliru, but she is now pursued as she holds knowledge about her country underground activities. It's not really a criminal story. Piliru is just 180 IQ girl who knows the secret recipe to drug curing cancer. Game has many alluring points, like charming characters and good tempo. Light and fun work. The flags are a bit difficult to track, but that's ordinary. But the game received many negative reviews just due to the fact, that right before the last scene there's like 16 puzzles timed for 2 minutes. It was impossible for most of players to complete the game because of them. And walkthrough was not as easy to get as it is nowadays. 4. E [i:] Tokyo Kyonyuu Story E[i:]東京巨乳ストーリー [921120] Apple Pie Hero works at the counter of a coffee house along with five beautiful women. He lives on the second floor of the same building since it belongs to his father. One day he discovers a TV set that is connected to hidden cameras around the coffee shop... On par with the title of Tokyo big boobs story the aim is H even with every girl. We get to decide each day which girl to help around the shop. 5. DOR Part 3 DOR Part 3 [921127] D.O. 1 DOR Part 3 is, as the title implies, the third entry in the series. The game's structure is identical to that of the predecessors: three completely unrelated scenarios, which can be accessed from the main menu. The first scenario deals with a young man who is bored working for a company called D.O.. Luckily, on that particular day the company decides to interview a few young and pretty women, and naturally, the hero is glad to jump at that opportunity... The second scenario depicts an average guy on a plane who pretends to be a real hijacker, threatening the passengers and coercing the female flight attendants to perform services of sexual nature for him. The third scenario tells the story of a mad scientist, who has invented a machine that would turn human being into his willing slaves. At first, the scientist decides to use this machine on his cute female assistant, but in an unexpected turn of events, new victims appear... New set of nukige stories. 6. Dracula Hakushaku ドラキュラ伯爵 [921127] Fairytale 1 2 Count Dracula wakes up after 300 years of slumber only to find his seven vampire brides dead and the world not terrorized by vampires anymore. Time to turn things to their original state! But first need to get rid of hunter Abraham Van Helsing annoying presence. Point and click adventure by Fairytale. Or better say choose icon-point and click game. You actually move with arrow buttons at moving sections from a first person perspective and there are even items to get. Graphics is very impressive and characters are beautiful. By the end of 1992 the regulation of ero scenes in games in Japan was very harsh, that's why there were very few games that relied on ero scenes alone. Drakula Hakushaku has ero scenes, but rather few and unconvincing. Instead of sexual desire hero is more interested in sucking blood. Story is exciting, gory and satisfying. So this indeed is a good action masterpiece with great atmosphere. 7. Psychic Detective Series Final Vol. 6: Solitude (Joukan) サイキック・ディテクティブ・シリーズ・ファイナル Vol.6 ソリチュード(上巻) [921127] DataWest Several months after the events of the "Nightmare" part. - "Aya Shingonji is alive, I need your help" said the man who visited the hero at the hospital room. Katsuya Furuyagi lost much of his psychic force after the "Nightmare" incident when he spend almost all of his power to to drag the consciousness of murdered Langhao who got resurrected to the body of Rosemary girl. Aya was Katsuya former lover who lost consciousness and existed on a vegetative level with life support system. Is Aya truly alive? The biggest crisis of the series approaches. This is the first half of the final volume of the story and things get terribly complicated here. Lots of previous works are interlinked here, so trying to discuss the story without a firm knowledge of previous parts is useless. Retrospective scenes jumps here and there all the time and it's difficult to follow the story. The game only covers a week of living in the Aya parents house prior to the dive into Aya mind which happens only in the following game, so evaluation of this part as a stand-alone game is not high. 8. Camisole キャミソール [9211] Flat Heroine Tenjin Shima is a manager of the lingerie shop, but on the behind this is a private investigation organization. One day a request is received from the National Universtity to find the professor missing for a week already. All that's known is that professor was interested in excavation of an ancient civilization and searched for a hidden treasure. Synopsis looks exquisite, but story is quite simple. It develops without any mystery solving. Second half is crumpled and ends poorly. Many characters that show up aren't even involved in story in any way, more like random characters to fill the gaps. Game's very short as well, reaching 2 hours length only for slow-readers.
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VN of the Month October 1992 - Ginga Ojou-sama Densetsu Yuna
kivandopulus posted a blog entry in Vndbreview
Ginga Ojou-sama Densetsu Yuna is the only masterpiece game of October 1992. 1. Yawara! ヤワラ [921001] Sofix 1 2 3 Manga adoptation. Hero is a journalist who once witnesses how Yawara beats up and offender on the street and decides to write a report about her. There is actually a good English review 2. Present 2 プレゼント2 [921006] Orange House Collection of three short stories: - "Incest". Hero does not have siblings but meets a magical angel one day and confesses his dream of having a sister to him. When he comes home a sister is waiting for him. - "Cat girl Mina". Heroine catches a cold and takes a day off school. As she wakes up she finds a human shaped cat on the bed of the other room. - "Southern Cross". Noah plan to colonize another star is going to be carried tomorrow. Hero spends the last night before departure with his lover in a hotel. Stories composition is similar to the prequel. The main difference is that there is now more explanation of the setting in each story, so there is less negative impact. 3. Mayumi まゆみ [921009] Cocktail Soft 1 Generic high-school boy gets a letter from his sweetheart Mayumi that she's transferring to a faraway school. Something in the tone of the letter looks suspicious, so he travels to that school and finds out that Mayumi is kidnapped and this school has something to do with it. Mystery investigation adventure. You overhear that grandson of school president kidnapped Mayumi and the most unsatisfactory part is that he could not even explain why. So you investigate, manage to get inside the needed room and fight your way out. That's very much it. Screen is too small to enjoy the scenery. Story is quite serious, without spontaneous ecchi. 4. Charm シャルム [921010] P's PSYTEC Co., Ltd. 1 Charm is a visual novel that consists of five very short episodes from the life of a teenage girl named Eriko. The episodes can be accessed separately from the main menu. In the first episode, Eriko describes her ambiguous feelings towards her half-sister. In the second episode, Eriko has sexual fantasies about her female teacher. In the third episode (without adult content), Eriko participates in a cosplay. The fourth episode tells about her relationship with a female classmate, while the fifth is dedicated to her ambitions and desire to become popular with the boys. Five short stories requiring only pressing enter to progress. Game is unusual for presenting a yuri episode. Pale colors, yuri theme and woman as main heroine create a light unique atmosphere. Game is not so much about physical relations, but more about the mindset and the anguish of the heroine. 5. Presence [921016] Sur De Wave A sequel to Nostalgia 1907, Presence tells a totally different story. Hero is a psychoanalytic on board of a hijacked aircraft. Can the terrorist be reasoned with? Is there any hope for survival? Suspense work and with a tragic fate. Its financial fiasco led the company to a bankruptcy very soon. What two games have in common is dangerous incident on a vehicle. But this work is more about hypnosis, persuasion and mind battle. Colored graphics looked like a step back from atmospheric sepia tones of Nostalgia 1907. Interface looks poor in comparison to prequel. Criminal is not persuasive and he never kills anyone. Game has very advanced animation for pc-98 and sophisticated talks, but Nostalgia 1907 fans could not forgive the game for being this much different from original. 6. Sweet Angel スウィートエンジェル [921018] Active 1 The player takes the role of Seisa, a bald-headed photographer. He likes sneaking into a high school and taking pictures of pretty girls. But one day he was caught and beaten by a girl who didn't want to be photographed. So Seisa plotted an elaborate revenge scheme: he managed to learn a spell that allowed him to look like different girls. Naturally, being one of the girls, it becomes much easier for our heroes to earn their trust - and to seduce them! We tackled on Sweet girl 2 earlier, and this game is indeed its modified version. Same control of the hero movements, same multiple school locations to search for some new characters to appear each time, same impure intentions of the hero. 7. Ginga Ojou-sama Densetsu Yuna 銀河お嬢様伝説ユナ [921023] Hudson Soft 1 2 3 Yuna is a 16-year old winner of Galaxy Beauty contest who then became "The Savior of Light", a magical girl in power armor suit that can befriend opponents with an aim to defend the Universe. The series is quite popular and even this first game has a good number of English reviews 8. Kerakera-sei けらけら星 [921030] Cocktail Soft Hero attends a marginal boys school, hangs out with his friend Tamaki and likes to peep at top class girls school in the neighborhood. And he gets an invitation to girls school cultural festival from their bitter enemy, glasses girl Kumiko who managed to stop the peeping every time. Cocktail Soft made something fresh out of school story again. It looks very much like a bakage, but it's actually a youth growth story with dokan protagonist and some protagonist drama that looks entertaining. So it starts as bakage, continues as youth drama and ends as a bakage again as the hero chooses the friendship with his best friend over the romance with a girl. A very curious concept. -
My Eyes! is the only masterpiece game of September 1992. 1. Ryuu no Hanazono 龍の花園 [920904] Family Soft Hero comes back to his hometown to reunite with his childhood friend. However, the girl only leaves a note "Dragon flower garden" and disappears. Hero comes to her school to learn about her whereabouts. Mystery novel that features concept of time. Characters and events change depending on time of visit. Just imagine Eastern Express to get the grasp of it. Needless to say, difficulty was very high. Multiple endings depending on hero actions were incorporated. Game was only released for MSX 2, so it was never widely known. 2. My Eyes! My Eyes! [920910] Birdy Soft 1 2 3 4 Woman researcher Ryoko is nearing a groundbreaking discovery as she learns how to listen to and give information to a whale Gigi. However there are powers that would like to use mammal communication for their own benefit. There is an English review. 3. Premium [920917] Silky's 1 Premium consists of four scenarios, each one of which is dedicated entirely to sex (sometimes with a bit of conversation and very straight-forward seduction before). There is no real story, just a series of encounters of nameless protagonists with different types of young women. Each of the four scenarios is dedicated to a specific occupation, which are: school girl, maid, magician, and finally Buddhist nun. Second Sikly's game and again a nukige with top notch graphics. 4. Ms. DETECTIVE - File #1: Iwami Ginzan Satsujin Jiken ミス・ディテクティヴ ファイル#1 石見銀山殺人事件 [920918] DataWest Chisato Higari is a detective to receive a request to find client's missing father. You get to know that father is in Omori but when you get there there is a news report about his death and at the same time your client disappears. Is the corpse floating in the sea of Japan truly client's father? Where did the client disappear? Point and click adventure with live-action videos, so can be also described as interactive movie. Game had quite a big impact since it was the first game to have videos inserted and to have sound synchronized with the video. Local town locations are also represented truthfully. What hurs the game a lot is small picture/video size and constant repeats of videos on the same actions, like a car moving to some location. 5. Dengeki Nurse 電撃ナース [920922] Cocktail Soft 1 2 3 Tanchi is a doctor at the hospital. His boss reveals him the truth about Tanchi parents and crime syndicate Black Cross. At the same time there is a Black Cross female agent with codename 0074 who stays at the same hospital. There is a very nice English review 6. Super D.P.S. Super D.P.S. [9209] Alice Soft 1 Super D.P.S. is the fifth entry in the D.P.S./Dream Program System series. Like the other D.P.S. games, it is a collection of three short scenarios, which are unrelated to each other story-wise and can be played separately. Those scenarios are presented as cartridges played on a fictional console named Dream Program System. Each scenario allows the player to choose between two different protagonists, or two different personalities for the protagonist. All of the scenarios feature nudity and/or sexual situations. The scenarios in this game include: 1. A rather disturbing tale entitled Maria and Kanpan, which focuses on a young female robot specialist who falls asleep and is sexually "explored" by one of the robots. The player can view the events from either the girl's or the robot's point of view. 2. An adventurous scenario, which depicts the dangers encountered by a young couple in a tropical forest populated by local tribes. The two are imprisoned and have to find a way to escape. The player can choose to control either the heroine or the hero. 3. A scenario with sci-fi elements, involving a famous female space pirate named Camelia, who raids a space ship together with her pretty lieutenant. The story varies according to the player's choice to control Camelia herself, or a male soldier on the ship who captures Camelia's lieutenant. The first visual novel to implement as much as 256 colors with pc-98. Apart of that usual DPS content.
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Kiss is the only masterpiece game of August 1992. 1. Kiss [920801] Ange Hero is a student who is invited to take part in the culture festival of an all-girl St Ange school. But to get admission he needs to get permission from five school student council officials. Oh just another charage. Wait. It might be the first charage apart of sims that got a separate ending for each of five girls. Thus this small game is probably the prototype of every second game that's released nowadays. Well, it might be partly a sim since you have a meter of sympathy that can drop or rise according to your answers. And even during H-scenes you need to choose right options or the love-meter drops. What stands out is very beautiful graphics and really good text. The same artist was responsible for this game who made characters for De-Ja. Also many items drawn on the map had animations upon click. There's also map movement incorporated. So it was a masterpiece game and had a long lasting effect on the whole industry, but was forgotten rather soon due to brilliant charage that spawned after that. 2. Mahou Shoujo Rina 魔法少女りな [920807] Family Soft 1 Rina wanted to get attention of older Tatsuya boy so she made a wish upon falling start to get older. The star held a small dragon imp who granted her power to get older, return to her normal self and even to take the appearance of other people. A magical girl story that's actually just a magical girl story. After all the more and more weird and etchi anime of our days that's a rare find. Well, actually, it's not that pure. In order to get into initial form a lesbian scene is required, but at least without any implicit details. The charm of this work is light adorable romantic atmosphere and bright shoujo type graphics, as well as some animations. 3. 48 Night Story 48夜物語 [920821] Silky's 1 Guess the favorite sex position of each girl based on their personalities and get a reward on the right guess. Silky's debut work and it's already terrible. Simple mechanics, no story. 48 girls. Elf-style drawing is top class, as usual. 4. Tesera Kimi wa Kegareta Tenshi ka Seinaru Majo ka!? テセラ キミは汚れた天使か聖なる魔女か!? [920821] IDES A mystery thriller where the hero helps mysterious girl Tessera to look for missing classmates. The main feature of this game is multiple starting points depending on skills and occupation of main hero. So the branching and variety is large. As with many Technopolis games, some redundancy in system is involved. You need more than one click to advance the phrases which is very annoying. Game has a mediocre feeling, but eyes and mouths are animated, so it can be enjoyed if you like one of the girls. 5. Pleria - The Royal Emblem Pleria - The Royal Emblem [9208] Orange House Pleria is a proof of succession to the throne in distant future imaginary kingdom and it was stolen by rebel army. Princess Miria asks her cousin Ariane to search for Pleria. Ariane takes priest apprentice Rena with him and sets on a journey. SF mecha imaginary fantasy kingdom distant future... that's what happens when you desire both typical fantasy setting and battles on mecha robots. Battles are made with command selection as well, but are given the rpg look. What this game is good about is the relationship between Ariane and Rena. They are in love with each other from the start and they care for each other and support each other gently. Graphics is good with many animated parts. Sound is good because it's among the few first games to use midi music. But the flow is not particularly thrilling and ending is abrupt upon finding Pleria, so overall impression is average.
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July 1992 has some fierce competition. I consider all of Armist , Phobos , Shinjuku Monogatari and Can Can Bunny Premiere as masterpieces. But since I rate serious SF stories above the others, Phobos is VN of July 1992. 1. Armist Armist [920703] Basement 1 2 You're the head of detective agency Armist and among your assistats are two deminoids or in other words androids with animal features. And a huge deminoid producing company requested to investigate a mass murder on its grounds. There are several survivors after the incident, so we start questioning them. One by one enemy demigods show up and eventually their leader as well. So the volume is not really big.But game is obnoxiously beautiful. There is a large number of awesome CG. There is almost no H-scenes, but fancy outfits make up for it. What makes this game awesome is that the communication choices that have been used up disappear so excessive repetition is avoided. So it's a great light fun short game to enjoy. 2. Image イマージュ [920710] Software House Parsley 1 Image consists of three short episodes; each episode, in its turn, contains two different scenarios. The two scenarios within each episode are similar to each other, featuring the same main female character, and sharing many of the scenes (mostly of sexual nature); however, the identity of the protagonist, the circumstances leading to the development of the story, the dialogue, and the commands required to choose in order to complete the scenario are different. All the three episodes are rather minimalistic, featuring only the protagonist and the female character; the object is always to have sex with the latter. The first episode introduces a girl from the tennis club, the protagonist being either an older boy or a younger classmate. The second revolves around a female high school student who stays in the school after classes; the protagonist can be a male classmate or a male teacher. Finally, the third episode is dedicated to the lovely school nurse, with the protagonist taking two alternate routes to win her graces. An ugly narrow-minded game. Wrong choice leads to game over. 3. Yumeji - Asakusa-Kitan 夢二 浅草綺譚 [920710] Fairytale The hero is a painter who got famous for a painting of a girl. But five years later he lost his wife and his paintings lost its colors, yet he remains well known. One day he had a dream that another man was selling his counterfeit paintings, but could not grasp the essence of a woman. And to get to the essence of a woman they went to a strip show. Again FairyTale and again quite an experimental work. Picture is again in sepia tone. Setting is Taisho democracy era which is rather unusual. Unlike Shinjuku Monogatari there are a lot of still standing CG and models here. It's more like a literature work, but with a rather weak ending. And due to the Saori incident just several months before the game's release, most of the H scenes were self-corrected. So this work remains one of the experimental era weird works that nobody knows about, with a very good Taisho atmosphere, but unsatisfying ending. 4. Alice no Yakata 2 ALICEの館2 [920715] Alice Soft An Alice Soft fan-disc containing four short games and varied extra content, such as being able to listen to the complete soundtrack of all their previous games. The following games are part of this collection: 1. A mini-RPG set after the events of Rance 3. You take the control of Patton as he tries to beat an M Land attraction during Hunty's absence. 2. A short adventure game about a pair policewomen trying to solve the case of a serial rapist. 3. After the disappearance of Rance at the end of Rance 3, the princess of Leazas Lia takes her frustrations out on monsters she takes captive. You play as a valiant Okayu Fever as he assaults Leazas castle to save the captive monsters. The game inherits the Rance 3 battle system and is composed of a set of preset encounters. 4. A quiz game in which you get a naked CG or a short ero scene with an Alice Soft heroine after succesfully answering the questions. Includes heroines from the Rance series, Toushin Toshi and D.P.S. SG Set 2. I can't really stand fandisks. 5. Phobos フォボス [920716] Himeya Soft 1 2 Mars colonists broke out a war for independence. Mech and android war came to a truce, but Mars resources were too exhausted to continue course on independence. Half a year later military secrets documents were stolen from Mars and private investigator from the Earth Ryuuichi with his android assistant Leyla are tasked to recover them. Himeya Soft games hold special place since they were the first to start translating their games in English. The more intriguing are their untranslated early works.This is a cyberpunk work so the city a major role - high tech devastated by war, Chinese mafia, gambling and giant companies - they all make atmosphere feel serious and cool. On the other hand there is a vivid depiction of protagonist anxieties after surviving the war and loosing his wife there seeking for a substitute in an android. So the first half of the game definitely gives a masterpiece impression, but after that a much more hasty direction is seen. The incident gets settled but the heart wounds of the hero remain and what persists is the feeling of lingering sadness. Both scenarios of Bacta and Phobos were written by Mr.Abe and they share such features as charismatic hero and grappling atmosphere. But while Bacta was more of a horizontal axis work with much fun scattered around and many unexpected events, Phobos is rather a vertical axis game with impact on logical unwinding story line. And it was very rare for that time to put so much emphasis on scenario alone. For that Phobos should be given credit as a hidden gem of pc-98 era. 6. Shinjuku Monogatari 新宿物語 [920723] Fairytale 1 Hero inherited an antique shop after her father who had disappeared. She has good intentions, but gets into various problems and does not even neglect transportation of white powder as luggage. And eventually she becomes a target of a professional killer. This work has exactly one suiting word - "experimental". After Saori incident Fairy Tale explored many directions, but this one is probably the boldest. First, graphics is made in sepia color. Second, this is an all-age story. Third, character design is prepared by manga writer and it totally differs from anything presented in VN games before. Fourth, almost all images imitate a cinema and there aren't still images - every CG shows the motion. Fifth, a rare girl perspective. There were several popular youth novels in 1980s and this work definitely has that spirit inside. Running away from the house, meeting new people, travelling around the country - that kind of spirit. And this game has a huge number of charming characters. Game has a very fresh look and great spirit. It is one of the best games of 1992 and is unduly forgotten. 7. Can Can Bunny Premiere きゃんきゃんバニー プルミエール [920730] Cocktail Soft 1 2 Lonely man returns home after work only to find seven Gods of Luck sitting in his room. Goddess Swatty explains that she's going to use the power of seven Gods of Luck to help hero find a girlfriend. There is an English review, but it's written by a person without knowledge of Japanese. So first three works in the series had nothing common with a VN. And it's the first work to introduce well-known in pc-98 era Swatty goddess. Basically, this is a Nampa game. Compared to earlier strategy Can Can Bunny games the degree of difficulty has fallen considerably. So it's a nice game with good characters and talks and no H material. The only problem that year 1992 is the year of Classmate game made by Elf and that game marked a totally new era for VNs dividing the games on before Classmate and after Classmate. 8. Kikou Soushin Val-Kaizer 機甲装神ヴァルカイザー [920731] Silence In 21st century humanity started other planets colonization. Along with "bioloader" research to create a strengthened outer protective skin was underway. The lead researcher was afraid of military use of bioloader and set an explosion in the laboratory. His sister was found on the place of explosion miraculously saved. The company originated from MIN and had close ties with Sogna, so it's not a surprise that it's a graphics oriented story with frequent use of animation. This is a fast-paced action story about Luna, her kidnapped sister, military organization and small robot Val-Kaizer who has some connection with Luna. Game features pseudo-rpg exploration while escaping the facility, but overall is a very easy command selection type of game. Game does not have HCG, but at the end it features part 2 of the story with HCG, but part 2 never came out. The visuals and cute characters make this short game very entertaining.
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De-Ja 2 is the only masterpiece game of June 1992. 1. Mahjong Gensoukyoku 麻雀幻想曲 [920606] Active 1 2 The hero was a price of a small country but he became just an adventurer after a witch destroyed his country. He studies to be a mahjong warrior and participates in mahjong competition with the hand of Tanya as the prize. Mahjong undressing game. I tend to hate Mahjong with all my heart, have not even watched a single Mahjong theme anime - and there are a LOT of them. So moving on. 2. Uchuu Bouken Shoujo Nami Davie Jones ~Umi no Akuma~ 宇宙冒険少女NAMI Davie Jones ~海の悪魔~ [920624] Popcom Soft In 2991 in addition to speed of light space navigation humankind acquired the technology of hyper jump system (HJS) from ruins of ancient alien civilization. The government now succeeded in production of minimized versions of such hyper portals and one such device was planted in the suitcase of space delivery company pilot Nami. Game is based on manga so it's very dense in details and elaborate in plot. It utilizes command selection bruteforcing. It's quite unexpected to see such an old-school space adventure in 1992. Anyway the game is quite an obscure one with too few reviews around to discuss its qualities. 3. De-Ja 2 DE・JA 2 [920625] Elf 1 2 3 This time you're interested in the legend of crystal skulls. But your only lead to them is the mad archaeologist who is found dead. I've prepared a full review. 4. Hoshi no Suna Monogatari 2 星の砂物語2 [920625] D.O. 1 The second entry in the adult detective/mystery series describes another case in the life of the young amateur detective and nearly professional seducer of pretty women, Gengorou Imai. The stage of events is once again a boarding house in the country, this time in the winter season, with skiing and other attractions. Gen is having a good time with the young, but "demanding" Reiko Honda, when the news strike: a family friend, a young foreigner named Eddie, is stabbed by an unknown assailant. The only clue Gen can find right away are strange letters written in blood: H and O. What do they mean? Why would anyone want to harm the young boy? With the help of the many pretty girls at the boarding house and its surroundings, Gen begins the investigation, determined to find the criminal... Another murder case, but now on a ski resort. This time there are even multiple endings prepared. But the governing element of the game is eroticism and graphics. The story really feels inferior here. 5. Bishoujo Tsuushin - Chat no Susume 美少女通信 CHATのススメ [920630] Cocktail Soft Interactive chat with girls from previous Cocktail Soft games. This is the first attempt to make an interactive chat and it's indeed a crude one. You can't even choose phrases, just icons that are meant to represent some emotion. The girls talks is also robotic-like - it's not interactive at all. Game should be treated just as a fan disk to meet favorite characters again.
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Foreword: I liked De-Ja a lot so sequel was a natural choice. Title: De-Ja 2 Original Title: デ・ジャ2 Developer: Elf Release Date: 1992-06-25 Summary: After events of De-Ja you're the winner in life. You have fame, respect, money and the love of pretty Gachako. What else to wish for? New adventures and unveiling new mysteries, of course. You get intrigued by the story of "crystal skulls" and one mad archaeologist knows exactly how to find them... VNDB Link:https://vndb.org/v2349 Game Type: Command selection with elements of point and click adventure visual novel Story Length: 12 hours. Complete Story Clearing Difficulty: Easy! Comments of Difficulty: You can see story progress in percentage. Difficulty was surprisingly subpar to prequel. The greatest planets puzzle was rather easy since the only information you got was light to the light and dark to the dark and it was repeated over and over. Compared to infodumping of prequel puzzle, it was a paradise. There was also the puzzle for piracy - the puzzle that you were supposed to clear only if had brochure shipped with the game. But unlike prequel, there was no randomization on this part, so in just 3-4 errors you inevitably make it to the finish and you don't even need to load game for that. Character Design Rating: 6/10. Story Rating: 8/10. Protagonist Rating: 7/10 Game Quality: 8/10 Overall Rating: 7/10 Rating Comments: Well, that's a harsh one! It's classic Elf adventure that we're talking about! But that's how I feel. I see every element as inferior to De-Ja either for a reason or sometimes because that's not fresh anymore. I felt bad about too many things. Length got almost twice as long. CG got really scarce. Protagonist stopped being that badass hooligan, Gachako got lots of bi@tch traits. And with all this huge length (some people claim to spend over 30 hours on it) very monotonous gameplay, quite an inarticulate story line and lack of really funny moments to cheer up in the mids of the journey. Structure: 100% division just as prequel. Story: Because of implemented command selection variant I may have missed some parts of it since you have to click at everything up to five times and while reading same lines over and over tend to skip even important parts. So one mad archaeologist makes us really interested into the crystal skulls story. But you soon find him dead in his own house almost simultaneously with his daughter. As you prove to each other that you're not the killers there's a natural desire to investigate the death together. With the safe deposit key found in his pocket you discover a green crystal skull inside the cash. With that you make your way to Palau temple and thread by thread approach the secrets of this temple and locations of two other crystal skulls. Archaeologist daughter get mysteriously killed in the process and with Gachako you manage to unwind this knot of secrecy only to discover the identity of the enemy and his plot just in the final of the game. I don't think I spoiled much, actually since there are lots of characters and details not even scratched. Characters summary: There are quite many characters here, but I found all of them (besides old acquaintances from De-Ja) quite dull. Girls were pretty, but I was shocked by their minor role as one-scene filler in the mids rather than original characters the prequel had. There is exactly one other girl that Hatsushiba Hakase got into relations with, the mad archaeologist's daughter. But she appears kind of late, disappears kind of soon and she plays an important plot role. Without spoilering too much, I'd just say that's she's not really mad archaeologist's daughter... a Gachako: Whoa! Miss Gachako got even more... how do you say it... mature. But as for me her character went awry. All she's saying all the time is "Say that you love me", such sleazy talk. She demands constant attention, behaves as if she owns Hatsushiba Hakase and bi@tches about everything. But the culmination for me was meeting her with another guy (archaeology institute worker from De-Ja) by chance. Her motivation was "You aren't paying me enough attention so I wanted to have fun and invoke jealousy". That's just boring, really. I just see here how netorare Elf is being born in this very moment. And it's not even close to the really intriguing relationships like in C's Ware "Desire". Just stupid woman stuff. Protagonist: So it's same Ryuusuke, but he's called Hatshushiba Hakase so often that original name rarely shows up. He's still cool and he's kinda totally pro sticking his hands everywhere. Just impression is not as fresh. But Protagonist is really a savior of this game. Sexual Content: Look at the picture and hereby try to believe that there is nothing going on with this girl. She's just a hotel owner. Not a scene... nothing. And now imagine that there are lots of other cute girls that play their minor roles that have nothing but the flirt. And now you know the sexual content of De-Ja 2. Apart of Gachako and that archaeologist daughter there is actually nothing. But there are as many as two H-dreams. So even this part is lacking. Affection for the Characters: Low overall. Women play too small roles and there aren't charismatic males. CG Score: 7/10. CG aren't bad. They are just way too scarce for this volume. Women are depicted with care, but you better remember this or that stance because you'll hardly be able to see another one. Sound Score: Voicing is good in multi-pack version. No protagonist voicing of course. Addictiveness: I'm rather spectical about this work. Technical Aspects: So game is command selection. And quite a determined one. It's not rare that you have to click everything up to 5 times to progress. It has point and click moments only to search the dead body or among the shelves of books or on a desk. It could easily be pure command selection, not much of a change. It's said to be such mix because players weren't ready to such bold jump to point and click on ELLE release. Pretty weak argumentation. There are animated objects like in ELLE, but they are scarce and they aren't fun when you select them upon the look menu and finding them out directly by clicking. So yet another step back from ELLE. Conclusion: It's not going to be game of the year 1992 of my choice. Most of Japanese reviews I read claim this game to be another masterpiece. It might be, actually true. All I rant about is that I was not thrilled since the beginning, then there was not a definite goal and not even a clear enemy, just some loose events that somehow manage to lead somewhere out of coincidence. Repeating choices mechanics did not let me enjoy the talk puns. I did not like the characters. And I especially did not like the ending where upon real 30 minutes time you're being told what this game was really about, what were the people and circumstances behind the so random events which somehow managed to lead to a final. It's like you played for 15 hours and did not even notice events were made up for it. How could I even notice that behind the randomness and foolishness. I'm sure this game can be enjoyed a lot if you find the story or the character of your liking. I failed to find an appeal point and little irritations piled into this review.
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Kurutta Kajitsu is the only masterpiece of May 1991. 1. Kurutta Kajitsu 狂った果実 [920501] Fairytale 1 Satoshi Kanou encountered a cheerful girl at professor party and it turned out that she's been cheerful for the first time in her life towards anyone, so Satoshi was invited as tutor in the house. However Satoshi witnesses an accident with professor's older sister and he soon finds himself into a whirlpool of events. It's a classic depressing mystery novel - utsuge made by the same Fairytale company as Dead of the Brain and Lan-Mal last month. And it's the first utsuge, before that the genre did not exist. It has a suspense tv drama as the origin, but the theme was changed for the game and much more cruel scenes were incorporated. Year 1992 is known for a big number of depressing games, but Kurutta Kajitsu presides over them. Story might be not too original, but the perfect graphics and scenario left a lasting impact on the generation of players. One by one everyone around main hero starts to die in a most unnatural manner and you probably won't be able to look at some of the home appliances the same way after reading this VN. And as with most utsuge, there is no happy ending ... only jealousy, anger, hate, depression, pain and despair. 2. Minimum Guynarock みにまむがいなろっく [920508] Techno Brain This is an alternative version of Ginsei Senshin Guynarock telling the shortened version of the story with chibi characters. The playthrough is done withing some 7 minutes, for real. The second part of the game is issued in December 1992, so my best guess is that this game is to refresh the memories on the events of the prequel and produce some gags. 3. DOR Part 2 DOR Part 2 [920519] D.O. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 The sequel to DOR is structured exactly the same way as the first game: play any of the three unrelated scenarios, accessible directly from the main menu. The first scenario takes the player into France of 16th century, during a witch hunt. The playable character is a young girl who is falsely accused of being a which and is taken into a dungeon, interrogated, and tortured. The second scenario follows the adventures of a young boy who has lost his way in a forest. Suddenly he meets a cute little female elf, who is willing to help him find the right way, in exchange for some other favors... The third scenario is named "Armored Fighter Gyleban" and is in a way a parody on sci-fi anime movies. The player controls a commander of a unit of female fighters with enhanced abilities, that must stop an evil organization from conquering our world. Since the English localized version included one story from DOR part 2 all the reviews apply here as well. 4. Réserve 2 [920501] MIN The final chapter in the Reserve series once again stars Mio but this time the creatures from the diminsion she travelled to in the first game have come to her school and are haunting her classmates and teachers. She suspects there's something funny about the new girl in class - who turns out to be Koumori in human form and hiding out from Lucifer and his minions. Game's very short and oriented on ero-scenes while losing to different monsters.
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The 4th Unit - Wyatt is the only masterpiece game of April 1992. 1. The 4th Unit - Wyatt 第4のユニット WYATT [920403] DataWest 1 2 Judge Badnack is restoring vicious criminal organization and for doing that he kidnapped Zero and took control of UN assault space satellite Wyatt. Bio-win and Dalzy must use any means necessary to oppose Badnack and rescue Zero. This is the last episode in the story before company went bankrupt so the story is left unfinished. This 7th episode is the most technically advanced with timed choices left only for battle scenes so it finally can be run like a normal VN. BGM and voice sounding are also improved. Difficulty-wise it has become relatively less punishing with only one serious pitch moment to reload a lot. 2. Dr.Stop! Dr.STOP! [920415] Alice Soft 1 In Dr. Stop! you control Takumi, who works in a hospital and whose mind is mostly occupied with female patients, most of whom are young and pretty. One day, during a visit to a patient, an explosion occurs. Who caused it - one of the patients or an outsider, or maybe a staff member? It's up to you to investigate, and win the affection of your lovely patients. An unusual work in that text takes from half of the screen here to the whole screen and the pictures change location all the time and are sometimes presented by just a modest square in the corner. It's a suspense game in the hospital, but also a charage. All the characters are weird, but funny enough. In the end the lack of backgrounds and graphics is a big hit on the impression. 3. Lam-Mal 蘭丸 [920424] Fairytale Yagyu Jubei orders secret order ninja Ranmaru to investigate Yoshiwara murder case and you are an assistant of Ranmaru. The story looks serious with the Edo period Joy resistance as a theme, but actually story is all messed up from youkai to the aliens. What's weird about the system is that upon command selection you need to click on the head part in right lower corner and clicking on bare brains is not too nice... While story moves in ordinary command selection pattern, battles are done in RPG manner and weapons can be bought. Some subtle aspects of the game leave a pretty sour aftertaste. So even if you're ready to listen to an unserious story, there's no guarantee that you'll enjoy it. 4. Dead of the Brain ~Day of the Living Dead~ DEAD OF THE BRAIN ~死霊の叫び~ [9204] Fairytale 1 2 3 4 5 6 Cole's friend Doctor Cooger invented a tissue that caused zombie infestation. Now Cole and assistant Sheila need to find a way to stop them. There are English reviews on the game. 5. Lunatic Fantasy Lunatic Fantasy [9204] Studio Light Cross 1 2 The story starts with an amnesiac woman, who is only able to remember her name - Fab, waking up in the forest. With the help of local dryads Fab reaches a nearby town and stops at the tavern. Suddenly she is approached by a blind girl who proclaims: "Mommy, you finally returned"... There is an English review.
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VN of the Month March 1992 - Sotsugyou Shashin / Miki
kivandopulus posted a blog entry in Vndbreview
Sotsugyou Shashin / Miki is the VN of March 1992. 1. Yamamura Misa Suspense: Kinsenka Kyo Ezara Satsujin Jiken 山村美紗サスペンス 金盞花京絵皿殺人事件 [920306] TOSE Software 1 While on a trip to Kyoto a restaurant review writer decides to investigate the murder of a woman from a rich family. As far as I know all the games of TOSE Software are based on real life novels, so reality and unexpected turns is what they excell at. It has all the ordinary stuff like questioning and exploration, but there's also an element of 3rd sight view, zooming and lots of point and click action. This point and click actually brought the most damage since it was not comfortable and it hurt the tempo. A solid plot and enjoyable Kyoto views, but overall it's a modest work. 2. Otogirisou 弟切草 [920307] Chunsoft 1 2 3 4 5 A couple gets lost in the wood and decides to spend the night in the abandoned mansion. A classic horror tale that even made its way to PlayStation 1. There are quite a few English reviews on the game here. 3. Sotsugyou Shashin / Miki 卒業写真/美姫 [920312] Cocktail Soft 1 2 3 Sotsugyō Shashin / Miki consists of two Japanese-style adventure games that were not released separately before. Both focus on the theme of high-school romance. In Sotsugyō Shashin, the player takes control of a male high-school student. Unable to form a solid plan for his future studies, he is more interested in romantic relationship, and attempts to make things right with his schoolmate Hiromi Kamura before the graduation ceremony takes place. In Miki, the protagonist is Shinji Fujisawa, who attends the high school of the peaceful mountain village Tsubana. During a kagura dance performance, a time slip occurs, and he and his schoolmate Ayumi are miraculously transported to the feudal Edo era. Shinji's soul enters the body of the young blacksmith apprentice Shingo Benibana, and he attempts to change the tragic events of the past involving Shingo's love to the beautiful Miki. There are English reviews, but they fail to grasp the uniqueness of the work. First of all it's all ages work, but it's mentally suitable for adults the most. Secondly, it's a rare work to cry of drama content right from the box cover. Graduation photo is the main work here. Even though heroes have tender feelings for each other they have to part and treasure their graduation memories. PC-Engine version introduced multiple endings, but totally contradicted the original atmosphere. Miki story is there to offset Graduation photo. The theme of first work is sadness about not being able to change past, but Miki actually is a story about travel to the past and changing dramatic events that used to happen and it all ends with a happy ending. At the same time both works are beautiful and have good sound support which makes the whole play a pleasant trip. 4. Mamono Hunter Youko - Makai Kara no Tenkousei 魔物ハンター 妖子 魔界からの転校生 [920313] TamTam Co., Ltd. 1 2 3 108th Devil Hunter Mamono Youko gets transported to another dimension with her classmates Shoma and Chokako. Somehow this world inhabitants are familiar with the guests. There is a nice English review here and since it's not original story, but an anime side-story, it looses much of its appeal. 5. Phantasy Star Adventure Phantasy Star Adventure [920313] Sega 1 2 3 4 5 The player's character is an agent in the town Paseo on Motavia. The year is 1268 A.W. The player's character receive a letter while on base from a long time friend Ken Miller. Ken is a scientist currently studying on the ice planet Dezolis. The letter is rather cryptic and only says the following: "How are you? I have succeeded in the discovery of the century. You must come and see it." The player make plans to travel to Dezolis and find what Ken is so excited about. After take the space shuttle to the planet, you travel to the town of Carsonville. There, you discover that Ken invented a machine that can transform humans into immensely powerful beings. Because of the implications of such an invention, Ken is kidnapped and his device is confiscated. As an agent, the player must solve this mystery. Ken's sister, Lila,assists the player during the investigation. There is enough information in English. 6. Tenshin Ranma 天神乱魔 [920318] Elf 1 2 3 Angels and demons are determined to decide human race fate by evaluating the abilities of a school boy Takami placed inside a dungeon swarmed with monsters. Yet another school student Yuima realized possession of magical powers and she is going to help Takami and destroy the rules once and for all. Finally a game without an English review! And an Elf game besides. It's a dungeon-crawler and only available for old platforms. Whether you choose boy or girl - they meet early in the game and venture deeper together. The game linear and it makes it very tedious to run over all of the shrines just to advance some talk. Every enemy attack was animated and while usual monsters had just two types of attacks, bosses might have much more. The mechanics were kept as simple as possible - only basic stats, very few armor and weapon types, few spells etc. And you can only equip main character but not your companion. So it is a nice mediocre game, but its mechanics prepared ground for one of the most famous Elf titles - Words worth. 7. Fushigi no Umi no Nadia ふしぎの海のナディア [920327] Gainax 1 2 14-year old French inventor boy Jean travels with runaway circus actress Nadia to reveal the secret of her pendant. Gainax lost 80 million yen on anime series without rights to gain profit on it. But it had the rights to make games on the franchise... and it made as many as seven (!!!) game releases under this franchise to get balances even. And so finding information in this mess was not easy, but there seems to be quite many English reviews on this exact interactive adventure game of 1992, so let's enjoy them together. 8. Martial Age マーシャルエイジ [920327] Tenshindou 1 2 Masahito is a Japanese teenager who studies martial arts. However, instead of studying, he prefers to chase pretty girls. Finally, after a quarrel with his father, Masahito leaves his home. Accidentally, he bumps into Keiko Yashima, the principal of Yuai girls school. She tests Masahito in combat, and against all rules, accepts him as the only male student in the school. Naturally, our hero uses this opportunity to "get lucky" with his all-female school mates... Tenshindou debut work, but I actually rate it as masterpiece. The story is not much as you mostly meet girls and challenge them for a fight and that remaining 1% of the game is the actual tactical fighting mini-game. The basic tactic with the nine opponents is weakening hits, then a hit to a crucial area (restoring hp during battle is ineffective and a waste of turn). The game is notable for H events mostly. The text is dense and Tenshindou does miracles with 16 colors in skin drawing. Anyway, the impact was big. -
Joker II is the only masterpiece game of February 1992. 1. Bacta Bacta [920204] Himeya Soft 1 2 Jinpachi looks out for demons and fights them. Since demons may hide as female humans, he has to use unorthodox physical techniques sometimes to reveal their true identity. The protagonist really sticks out as a cool guy always wearing glasses and having affinity for guns. He has two important talents - ability to detect demons and ... he likes women. He's absolutely sure that upon reaching orgasm any demon would flee from possessed body. Demons have "Bacta" engraved on the body, but game's not really telling us what it is or maybe they don't know for sure themselves. And there's hardly any conclusive apart of blowing demons headquarters. It's a light game where hero actually rapes women on suspicion but does not feel bad about it. Game has a serious atmosphere, but actually it's a collection of gags. What makes it special is that it's first game of Himeya Soft, brand very well known in the West due to the fact that they officially released every VN in English since 1996 till breakup in 2003. And although it's not a serious game, the impression is brilliant for a new brand. 2. Joker II ジョーカーII [920214] Birdy Soft 1 The story picks up 6 months after prequel. But the job is not done. Laura keeps coming to him in dreams asking to rescue her and this time he has to get to the bottom of it. The first part ended in devastation for Wild, so this time there's a more satisfying ending. Systems have not changed since the prequel, maybe with the exception of graphics. The number of girls is still big and vampire Blanca is still gorgeous. Unusual wild west setting in combination with fantastic atmosphere make Joker II very cosy. Prequel really seemed short and lacked impact. You literally came to town, gathered information, involved in relationship with a girl, confronted monsters and night and that's it. So few of the owners of Joker were motivated to try the sequel. This time the story gets darker, much longer and even more serious with an abundance of blood scenes. A masterpiece game, actually, but it was easily forgotten of in Windows era. 3. Uruma うるま [920227] Softhouse Bonbee Bonbon Takeshi went hiking with his girlfriend Mai. As they approached a strange monument it burst and Takeshi regained consciousness at the hospital. The local townspeople explained that it was a monument to Chinese humanoid god Uruma and hero who unlocked the seal now got the ki power to attract women. In order to save Mai Takeshi needs to cross the sea and seek advice from the shrine maiden on a Sun island. First Bonbon work has a clunky interface and not really intriguing story. 4. DOR [920228] D.O. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 There is a door in front of you... A strange door, which has been created by the Devil. On the other side of it, three different worlds await you. Don't be scared, but don't get caught up in the realms of fantasy! The Devil is waiting to lead you along... Kanako's Depression You don't have a girlfriend, and you don't have any money either. You're moping around in your apartment, when a girl suddenly shows up at your door. Her name is Kanako; she's a timid little thing, but wait until you find out what she really is...! The Telephone Scandal You want to have a girlfriend. You call a dating service and guess what!? You get a girl and go out on a date. Wait a minute... Is this girl...? Planetarium The scenario depicts a meeting between the male protagonist and a mysterious young woman near a giant observatory telescope. The hero finds out about the woman's tragic past and proceeds to "console" her. Game has enough English reviews. 5. J no Higeki Las Vegas Renzoku Satsujin Jiken Jの悲劇 ラスベガス連続殺人事件 [920201] Thinking Rabbit You are a detective in Los Angeles and need to investigate a murder case with a more veteran policeman. Man was murdered in hotel room and had baseball chip in his pocket. Basically it's remake of JACK VN back from 1988, now for pc-98 machines. And it was not officially released, more like published unofficially after company bankruptcy. And since we tackled on JACK story and appeal points previously, moving on. 6. Abunai Bunkasai Zen'ya あぶない文化祭前夜 [9202] Alice Soft Bonus game included on Rance 3 Hint Disk It's a mini-adventure with culture festival a the stage. Command selection is used to look around, talk with everyone and just be at the right place in the right time.
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Himitsu no Hanazono is the most curious game of January 1991. 1. Green Oasis グリーンオアシス [920120] Ucom Green Oasis is a system of rebuilding any undeveloped planet into an environment suitable for life over the course of several years. A development officer responsible for Oasis Plan on a certain star was attacked and injured with important documents stolen. Relix is an investigator sent to the star to deal with the incident consequences. So it's an SF investigation obscure game with no reviews in japanese. 2. Business Wars ビジネスウォーズ [920124] HECT 1 The game takes place during the 1980s in what would be called the Age of Consolidation. Companies were merging together to be conglomerates. All the consolidation among the corporations were starting to affect the U.S. economy in an unprecedented way. Even the Caribbean was affected by the corporate giants of the 1980s. A lot of strategy is used when players have to make decisions and negotiate. Messages always arrive using the data feed style to make the game more business-like. The game can end with a loss if the wrong decision is made at the wrong time (similar to dying in an action game). The player will have to deal with loan sharks in the Caribbean, ruthless corporate executives from rival companies, arbitration sessions, and components that make the game look more like a strategy game at times. There are no items to use and very little action (with moving the guy around a virtual office building). I'm not really going to discuss an economic simulator without a story and characters. 3. Gomenne Angel ~Yokohama Monogatari~ ごめんねエンジェル 〜横浜物語〜 [920131] JAST One day the hero picks up a notebook and it turns out to be a possession of a girl student of St. Francis girls academy where his fiance is teaching. All three of them meet in a cafe, but girl looks very anxious. Her sister disappeared. And we'll help to find her. First part of Angel's afternoon special series. Difficulty is high since you can't just bruteforce it - wrong actions can easily prevent further progress and result in bad end. You feel like on an Eastern Express - you need to be at exact place at exact order. You move from place to place and get information from beautiful girls, sometimes forcing a relationship to get it out. There are some 6 routes, so it looks much like charage. 4. Himitsu no Hanazono 秘密の花園 [920131] Tokuma Shoten Publishing Co. 1 One day a beautiful adult woman moves to live next to the main character. She turns out to be a new teacher, but she actually is a private detective investigating the case of school president granddaughter murder right at school. Hero gets to know about her true identity and decides to help the investigation. Command selection varies from spot to spot. Hero can investigate alone or with one of three girls including main heroine. There is actually one ending but in order to get there you'll need to switch heroines to accompany you a lot. This kind of character design cannot be confused with anything else. Urasuhara-sensei is in charge of graphics and it's supercute. There is also eye and lip animation. Story is actually lacking and full of H-scenes. But later there was pc-engine version that had all characters voiced and had all the H-scenes cut. So it turned out to become a noteworthy charage. 5. Himitsu Chouhou Buin - 00Nanako-chan 秘密諜報部員00ななこちゃん [920101] Overture Nanako comes from a spy family succeeding after her father and older sister. Finally she gets her first task... A doujin game on a horrible visual basic 5 engine that I failed to launch. Still there are couple gameplay videos at niconico. This is basically a bakage with weird events happening around Nanako. There are quite a lot of beautiful illustrations in the game.
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Year 1991 was the first with monthly issues and for that reason the hardest. Let's first try to determine its prominent features for VNs: - Number of adult games increased greately to some 100 titles overall - PC-98 era arrives with mouse support and the older systems finally lose support - RPG percentage remains high at some 20% while ADV grows significantly to some 50% - New sub-genres appear - point-and-click, quiz, board game. - Some games start to use action icons instead of command selection thanks to mouse use. - It's the last year without any government regulation. After November 1991 shoplifting incident regulations being created. Masterpieces of 1991: 1. CAL II 2. Cosmic Psycho 3. Cybernetic Hi-School Part 4 ~Ape Hunter J~ 4. ELLE 5. Gidyy 6. Jesus II 7. Nike 8. Nostalgia 1907 9. Psychic Detective Series Vol. 4: Orgel 10. Psychic Detective Series Vol. 5: Nightmare 11. Rance III - Leazas Kanraku - Those were the games with great stories and a professional touch. And I'm biased here towards ELLE since it's the only one that got renewed version in 2000s. Otherwise it might be a serious competition.
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Gidyy is the only masterpiece of December 1991. 1. Ranma 1/2 - Toraware no Hanayome らんま1/2 とらわれの花嫁 [911206] Tenky 1 2 3 4 5 6 Each chapter focuses on separate theme in Ranma 1/2 universe. There are English reviews. 2. Strush ストラッシュ [911206] Orange House Hero is ninja detective on a request to investigate disappearances in a famous private school. Mostly an average school mystery story. Characters are cute and moe enough with good animation of eyes and lips. Graphics is definitely above average. The feature of the game is that you have a partner following you and you can change that partner to another girl at will. There are H scenes, but they aren't abundant. But the story is rather weak. 3. Mirage ミラージュ [911210] Discovery 1 2 It happened long time ago, when mankind possessed the secrets of magic. One time, when a comet was approaching the Earth, a young woman gave birth to a baby. He was taken into the nearby village and grew up there. But he knew he was different from other children: he could not use magic, and on his hand there was a little star. He believed that he was cursed, and so did many people in his village. He learns that the ominous cave in the Northern Mountain might hold the answers to his questions. He embarks on this journey, determined to find out the identity of his father and his true role in the world. It's a story driven RPG and it even incorporates talk between party members while in the dungeon, even though without much success. The fighting is done without stress and the game can be enjoyed as an RPG. A good quality work. 4. Birdy World バーディーワールド [911213] Birdy Soft Birdy World is a collection of 3 games from Birdy Soft. None of them were released separate from this compilation. The three games are as follows: Sugoroku Game Pal 2 Joker Parody Demo I tend to dislike fandisks, but tried the board game for a bit. It lacks everything including common sense, so parodies must be the salt of the package. 5. Gidyy ギディ [911213] Heart Soft Main character here is left totally alone in this world with the death of his grandfather. But in grandpa's belongings he finds a time machine and gets back in time to conquer hearts of the most famous girls in world history. Wow, setting is exciting just because it refers to world-wide known women. It's a point-and-click adventure, but you actually need to choose an action icon before clicking somewhere on a screen. But at least there are more screen exploration options. And here there's also an inventory to keep and utilize various items. Game's cool because of long spiritual conversations with the famous women. We help each of them this or that way too. There are H scenes as well which are good. There are some bad endings along the way. So good impression is achieved mostly thanks to emotional affinity to such characters as Cleopatra and Jeanne d'Arc and the game can be considered a minor masterpiece of its time. 6. Mai - MAI Funifuni Papyuun to Iwasecharu! 舞☆MAI ふにふにぱぴゅーんといわせちゃる! [911214] Fairytale 1 2 3 Mai has cat ears and studies magic. She can be unattentive at times. After she cast a spell on her classmates her life turned to action. Dungeon crawl with cute pictures, but the system is quite serious. It's not just a gag story. There aren't real stats and battles are described by just text messages. Events are rare and most of the time we look at maze maps and brick walls. Nice retro dungeon crawl, but not exactly usual VN material. 7. D.P.S. SG Set 3 D.P.S. SG Set 3 [911215] Alice Soft 1 2 The scenarios in this game include: A rather mundane depiction of a young couple's day directly after their wedding. The two return home and prepare for the "big event" in the night. The player can choose to control either the husband or the wife. A story entitled Graduation, which begins with a rather standard premise of a shy high school boy trying to express his love to a pretty school mate. However, the events take an unexpected turn when a dragon appears and the girl is hurt. The player can determine the personality of the hero before the start of the episode. A bizarre fantasy tale with the title Rabbit P4P. The protagonist follows a mysterious "bunny girl" into a fairy tale-like realm, where he has to figure out what to do in order to win the graces o Game has an English review. 8. Ranma 1/2 - Hiryuu Densetsu らんま1/2 飛龍伝説 [911220] Bothtec 1 2 3 Game features an anime side-story focusing on relationships between series characters. There's an English review. 9. Beast 2 ビースト 2 [911227] Birdy Soft Events take a year after the prequel end. The relationships between the characters still remain uneasy after what had happened in the mansion. Main hero girlfriend Itoko's mother starts to behave strangely. Once again friends gather together and forward to Itoko house only to find out that a mysterious organization is involved. Prequel gameplay was boring as hell and now it's even worse. Point-and-object clicking every pixel to move on. Same maze structures with infinite rooms. The number of H-scenes decreased at least. 10. Karei Naru Jinsei - Mina-san no Okage Desu 華麗なる人生 みなさんのおかげです [911227] Fairytale 1 It's a board game like Monopoly and adult dating sim in one set. Up to five players/AI make turns while encountering life events and girls. Finally a really relaxing game without frustration and the need to brute force every option/pixel. There are three stages for every game match - high school, university and work and in the end whoever gets the more money wins. Maybe one match is not too long, but there are 55 girls available to get acquainted and even having H scene upon reaching certain stats levels. It's a mediocre game since gameplay does not change with number of matches and quantity definitely prevails over quality. There's only one thing I'd want to say to creators. Brilliant life! Thanks to everyone! 11. Momotarou Gaiden Momoko-chan Fight 桃太郎外伝ももこちゃんファイト [911230] Softhouse TODO Story is based on Momotaro classic fairy-tale. Momokodokoro goes to fight demon marauders, but their leader princess Kokeshi easily seduces him. A doujin fantasy with H-tilt. 12. Phantasy Star II Text Adventure: Nei no Bouken ファンタシースターII テキストアドベンチャーネイの冒険 [91] Sega 1 2 3 This chapter features Nei (Japanese: ネイ, Nei) - a Numan created through an experiment to breed humans with biomonsters. After her escape from Neifirst, she is rescued by Rolf and adopted as his little sister. Game is localized and has enough information in English. 13. Mana [91] BMP A short date with girl Mana. It's not the same BMP that issued Mana'94, so better use japanese name for search. Needless to say, nothing is known about this weak doujin game.
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VN of the Month November 1991 - Psychic Detective Series Vol. 5: Nightmare
kivandopulus posted a blog entry in Vndbreview
Psychic Detective Series Vol. 5: Nightmare is the only masterpiece of November 1991. 1. Shinsengumi - Bakumatsu Genshikou 新撰組 ~幕末幻視行~ [911110] Wolf Team An ordinary school girl experienced time slip to the Edo period while on a school trip. And since she resembled captain of Shinsengumi unit Okita Souji, she just pretended to be him. Who likes Shinsengumi? Or should I better ask who does not like Shinsengumi? Those brutal men establishing justice in the Edo are a safe pick for a story, but a woman as their captain does not look much better than those dozens of woman Oda Nobunaga countless parodies, to be honest. Game was issued after another shinsengumi tv show the same year. Graphics and especially depiction of emotions is great. Action is good. So it's a fairly enjoyable show if you can adapt to this fiction setting. And it was also quite disturbing to see how noone really figured out their captain was a female... not in bath, not in hot springs... 2. Vision 2 VISION2 [911110] MIN 1 In this sequel, the player, who is now in a steady romantic relationship with love interest Arisa, finds himself falling for another girl named Yui. Naturally, Arisa is unhappy about this. You must help the protagonist make the right decisions, or he'll have nobody at all. First part was mostly H oriented work, but this one becomes a story oriented love triangle story. Such serious stories weren't yet mainstream and a doujin company such as MIN was needed to raise the issue. Hero is indecisive and he is attracted to Yui mostly because he got in the same class with Yui and in a different class from Arisa. Game has few sounds, but those sounds are masterfully used like when players telephones Arisa to ask for pardon and she besides the phone and does not take it. Such nakige game does not lose its meaning even today, but at that time there were really few nakige. 3. Majokko Kumi 魔女っ子クミ [911114] Family Soft 1 Kumi is an ordinary Japanese teenage girl. At least she was ordinary until one day, walking back home, she spotted a shiny object falling from the sky into a nearby forest. Upon examining the object more closely, Kumi found a cute rabbit-like creature, who called himself Popp claimed to have come from a magical world. Popp granted Kumi the magical ability of shape-shifting: turning into an adult male of her choice... an ability Kumi will need in order to fulfill her mission: sexually satisfy female students and teachers from her high school... Command selection turns into point-and-click for H scenes which are quite numerous since there are five sub-heroines whom we must help and also the main heroine. It can even be observed as just stories of five women. But the graphics are beautiful and animation level is high which along with the playful magical events create a bright atmosphere. 4. XIX! ギゼ! XIX [911123] Fairytale 1 2 3 Young treasure hunter Zion found an orb in the ancient ruins and a girl came out of it. She needed to confirm something in the labyrinth beneath the ruins and Zion could not leave her alone there. First of all, Fairy Tail has given birth to several very solid RPGs by the end of 1991. So the field part of the game is very short and underground one is where the main game starts. So there are a lot of maze floor with enemies. Along the way, your companion Physis meets here acquaintances from perished 500 years ago civilization. It's an ok RPG. Slow, monotonous, but with a good old feel. But as a VN... plot is not exquisite, events aren't often and they are mostly about meeting sexy monsters or Physis getting tortured, wounded or just in need of attention. But if you've done with all Dragon Knight series and willing for more, XIX will fill its shoes allright. 5. Psychic Detective Series Vol. 5: Nightmare サイキック・ディテクティブ・シリーズ Vol.5 ナイトメア [911127] DataWest 1 The psychic detective Katsuya Furuyagi is finally able to enjoy a peaceful life with his sweetheart Rieka. But a strange nightmare begins to haunt him. He sees an unknown young woman locked in a secluded castle, begging for help. One night, the nightmare takes a different shape - the woman turns into a miraculous creature as Furuyagi enters the castle. Knowing that his unique psychic skills allow him to communicate directly with people's minds, Furuyagi begins to wonder if the nightmare has anything to do with reality - which he will find out soon enough. Another excellent game and it's not just a horror - there is enough investigation and plot twists. Alas, pc-98 and Win versions are very rare and FM Towns one can't be hooked. -
VN of the Month October 1991 - Rance III - Leazas Kanraku
kivandopulus posted a blog entry in Vndbreview
Rance III - Leazas Kanraku finally gets solid mechanics and is worthy to be called VN of October 1991. 1. Sore Yuke Nanpa-kun それゆけナンパくん [911004] Virgin House 1 A young man named Hidetsugu dreams of having a girlfriend. One day he meets a girl on the street and tries to impress her. However, a rival appears unexpectedly and the girl is unable to choose between them. The two have a conversation and agree that the stronger men is the one who has more experience with women. Hidetsugu then embarks on a quest to meet young women and work his charms on them. There's an attempt to depict nanpa in a comic way, but it's plain the worst topic for that. 2. Rance III - Leazas Kanraku - ランス III -リーザス陥落- [911015] Alice Soft 1 2 3 4 5 Rance is asked to help stop an invading force aided by demons from taking over the kingdom of Leazas. Game is localized and has enough information in English. 3. Present プレゼント [911017] Orange House A collection of three stories: - "Isolated island" is about the protagonist suffering a shipwreck and getting on an inhabited island with two beautiful girls. - "One's Last Resort" tells the story of protagonist infiltrating the base of a certain country on request as a free agent. - "Holy night" is spending the night on a date with a girl. The stories are lacking in explanation of people and scenes - that's why I don't like multiple stories. The stories are mostly to watch H events. There is no save function so one story should be done in one sitting. 4. Rose ロゼ [911018] Ange 1 The young private investigator Hiroshi Musō has a troubled past involving amnesia and the death of the man he considered his father. He opened his office to pursue crime, aided by his lovely servant Medi. One day, a school girl calls Musō and tells him her father has disappeared. The detective agrees to take the case and soon discovers a net of crime and corruption in the city. A girl requested to find her father and none of them expected of this case to develop into a drug story. Debut work of Ange. Overall a normal mystery case. One feature is that we'll be able to look from the eyesight of the guardian spirit as well. The atmosphere is good, but graphics are lacking and heroines aren't pretty. Story oriented work. 5. Saori -Bishoujo-tachi no Yakata- 沙織 -美少女たちの館- [911018] Fairytale X-Shitei 1 2 A young woman named Saori is returning home late in the evening. Sex-related events seem to pursue her, from the word "sex" written on the wall in the public toilet to a couple having sex on a bench in the park. Shortly afterwards, Saori is abducted by a sadistic woman who locks her in a mysterious mansion. By visiting the rooms within, Saori unlocks erotic memories of its inhabitants, ultimately exposing them to the owner's cruel pleasures. Game has an English review. 6. Cobra Mission: Panic in Cobra City Cobra Mission: Panic in Cobra City [911025] INOS 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 The story takes place on a small, fictitious island off the coast of Florida. The main character is Jr. (although the player may change their name). Right off the boat he spies on a nude beach and is quickly attacked by some of the island's punks. Jr quickly dispatches them through with the use of his gun. After which he meets up with his friend and high school sweetheart Faythe Watson who tells him that guns are illegal on the island. Faythe tell him the story of how girls on the island are disappearing at a rapid rate and the mob boss of the island Kaiser is believed to be the one causing it. Jr makes it his job to find and stop whoever is causing the girls to disappear. Game has English reviews. 7. Satsujin Roman Kikou - Koi no Nagano Bojou 殺人ロマン紀行 恋の長野慕情 [9110] Heart Soft Heroine works for top brand fashion company. One day the president of the company disappears. As the business starts to crumble hero with three friends go Nagano ski resort to cheer up. By coincidence this place is close to president's hometown and they get caught up in a series of murder cases involving the disappearance of the president. Game is point-and-click adventure! After encountering such mechanics in Elle and De-ja 2 I really prefer them to usual command selection. All of four friends are women and H element gets strong. Very few games had females featured as protagonist, so it's a fresh view presented here. As story goes the perspective changes from one heroine to another. The bad part is in the system. Heart Soft has done couple not bad SLG previously and now it intervened in pure adventure story with the strange solutions. RPG style map, direct movement can only irritate in pure VN. Writing is vertical - unusual, but tolerable. But screen is also divided in five parts with four for main heroines and 5th for random speaker. We get to watch at heroines portraits almost all the time and you never know where new text line going to appear. So a very very unusual work that has mediocre story and a lot of hindrances on the way to get to know this story. -
Cosmic Psycho is the only masterpiece of September 1991. 1. Joker ジョーカー [910905] Birdy Soft 1 2 Wild is the nickname of protagonist. The setting is american Wild West. Years ago "The Great Disaster" happened to the village and Wild's father sacrificed his life to deal with it. On the anniversary of the event talented witch Laura was to see the future of the village, but for some reason she saw nothing. You are sent to a neighboring town to find out about the upcoming danger for the village and probably for the whole world as well. There is an English review of the game. 2. Cosmic Psycho コズミックサイコ [910914] Cocktail Soft 1 2 High-school student Kazuki sees a dream where a girl asks for help. The next day after he receives a phone call he finds himself on board of space ship and the girl turns out to be special anti-alien squad member Marin. The phone call was for a different receiver, but it's of no help to Kazuki since he's not stuck on this ship. There is a good review of the game here but it's written from viewpoint of a modern user. Game indeed had morally old 200-lines graphics even for the time of issue, but this game was actually a masterpiece of 1991 and should be given its dues. Lower graphics level allowed to game to be issued for as many as four gaming platforms of the time. First of all it's Cocktail Soft. The same Cocktail Soft that issued astonishing 400-lines Nike two months before. Psycho in title refers to the psycho portal through which the teleportation to another dimension occurred and to alien monster race Ex. The story is not too good, but thriller part is. Game's been called roller coaster adventure for a good reason. While being shorter than usual there is constant sense of urgency in any speech. Events happen one after another and tension keeps stacking. Story develops slowly due to these constant interruptions. This can be called a new method in telling a story. Music was so good that it was probably the first VN that had a separate VN music CD issued. But unlike even in quality Nike, Cosmic Psycho has enough weak sides. And it should be treated as an ambiguous game that was a masterpiece of its time. 3. Hacchake Ayayo-san 3 - Watashi, Icchattan Desu - Ayayo's Life After はっちゃけあやよさん3 私、逝っちゃったんです AYAYO'S LIFE AFTER [910920] Hard 1 Watashi, Icchatta n' desu is the third installment in the Hacchake Ayayo-san series. This time, Ayayo and her friend Tomoko are taking a stroll and encounter a mysterious creature. Eventually they realize that they are both dead. From that point on the plot focuses on their sexual experiences with demons and Buddhist deities in heaven and hell. There should be no second thoughts what the third part of the series is about - only about H. And since it has realistic HCG, it got banned from selling after the Saori incident. 4. Vision VISION [91] MIN 1 When the hero goes to the shopping district it starts to rain. His classmate hides from the rain next to his house so he invites her to dry wet clothes. MIN is a doujin circle from where famous Sogna company originated. The volume is not big, but every wrong selection brings a game over. Game does not have animation, but heroines are cute and graphics are good, so it's a very high level compared to commercial brands. 5. Réserve 1/2 レゼルブ1/2 [91] MIN 1 2 3 4 5 You play as one of the regular enemies from the first game, who, this time, must go and hunt humans. Lucifer (Satan in translation) has put out a reward for human girls, and it's up to you to bring them to him. Game is localized and has enough information in English.
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I'm keeping a whole blog here on fuwa to dig for old VN gems. So far the quantity of VNs with interesting/fun plot in late 80s - early 90s surpassed my boldest expectations.
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Kimi Dake ni Ai o... is a very curious game and is worth being VN of August 1991. 1. 2069 AD [910803] Home Data Year 2069. The number of women decreased sharply. Many of the remaining women started to behave rigidly towards the men and men suicide cases skyrocketed. The hero starts to wear a dubious costume and the mask of a wrestler calling himself "Mr. S". He will punish arrogant women. The battle sequences don't allow to get bored. It's also the first game to have sound CG attached to the game. Overall the content is not special. 2. Can Can Bunny Spirits きゃんきゃんバニー スピリッツ [910810] Cocktail Soft 1 The third in the Can Can Bunny series, Can Can Bunny Spirits deals with a nameless hero (the player has to give him a name) who is - in accordance with Can Can Bunny tradition - a lonely guy who can't get a girlfriend. One night he sits at home and stares at the moon. Suddenly, the magic fairy Ariko appears in front of him and gives him... no, this time not the Magic Book, but a Magic Crescent! With the help of this crescent, the hero can turn into totally different young men - which will naturally increase his chances in impressing girls and ultimately having sex with them. Game has more than ever SIM elements. We get to choose one of two possible locations for the nanpa and customize lots of traits in the magical resume. Not only you should suit the selected girl, but also any really wrong answer immediately results in reject. 3. Youjuu Club 2 妖獣クラブ2 [910823] D.O. 1 2 Main hero is an evil wizard. He worships demons from another dimension. It’s your job to use your magic powers, open up a portal to Hell, and let the demons out so that they can feast on the humans. It's not really visual novel, just a Xonix game in PC98 version, so moving on. 4. Shangrlia SHANGRLIA [910828] Elf 1 2 Ordinary high school student Tooru was shocked to know that the soul of parallel universe Erion prince Nyuckel possessed his body and in 25 days will gain full control of it. There's no time to loose! Give orders to your ten female officers armies and try to stop the invasion. Elf's new game. Basically it's reincarnation of Foxy franchise in fantasy setting. Same TBS, as many as 10 types of units with advantages, disadvantages and a whole pack of characteristics. Complex rules and harsh penalties for withdrawal and defeat make this game quite difficult even for native speakers. And 10 campaigns are best to be played in particular order due to difficulty spikes. After each victory female general takes off one garment. After capture there are 20 more special maps that you can play with old units. 5. Metal Slader Glory メタルスレイダーグローリー [910830] HAL Laboratory 1 2 3 4 8 years after the great space war orphan Tadashi Himukai buys a mecha robot to set construction business together with his girlfriend. Robot turns out to be a war unit and he keeps saying that the Earth is in danger and to save it they need to find Creator as soon as possible. And so the space adventure begins. Game has achieved a legendary status, mainly due to 4 year development period and tragic fate. Game was issued at the same year as FF4 and surpassed it at graphics and animation. But it was released for NES and at the same year SNES machines started to sell so as few as 5,000 copies only were sold and company went bankrupt. Game was reinvigorated by SNES release 9 years later and Wii release even further. Plot is quality SF matter, but after Jesus, Jesus II and Snatcher it was not something special. But in addition to good plot game has great number of female characters drawn with love. It can be considered a first full-scale Moe game for NES platform auditory who had access almost ultimately to action games. 6. Kimi Dake ni Ai o... キミだけに愛を・・・ [9108] Fairytale 1 2 We play as Akio-kun who attends the wedding of his older brother Satoshi and his unrequited love Misa. But the newweds start to quarrel often and then Misa gets into a traffic incident and looses memory. This is a drama and every actor in the love triangle has his circumstances. So the will to sympathize to main characters and dive into complex relations is to determine whether you like the game or not. Fortunately, Misa is very cute and - FINALLY - Technopolis shifted to 400-line graphics. Pure love dramas were still fresh at that time for VNs and setting of living with older brother and loving the same girl was really good. There were also multiple endings. There were other girls as well and many of them were older than protagonist, so can be also called an oneesan-ge. Story looks simplistic compared to nowadays nakige, but it was one of the first nakige and should be given credit for that.
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Nike is the VN of July 1991. I also value Cybernetic Hi-School Part 4 ~Ape Hunter J~ high, but in the end it's just a bakage with quiz mixes. 1. Nike ナイキ [910705] Cocktail Soft In 2526 pilot Nike (22) with co-pilot girl Miho (17) are participating in interstellar space race after winning the race the previous year. However the princess of the host planet Athena got kidnapped and Nike is going to search for Athena while participating in the race. Cocktail Soft new title! And again a great one. Fully story oriented work in SF setting. And my recollection of "Redline" anime with similar setting is still fresh so I got hooked right off the bat. The set of selection commands is not predefined bat varies according to the situation. Choice needs to be done within time limit and many choices lead to game over. All kind of adventures await - both planetary and space ones. Kindapping, evil cult, space monsters, ship arrest, planet destruction. Game has all of it and much more. Events change each other with a high pace and in-between we get to communicate with our two cute heroines. Athena is regarded as a pure princess while Miho is an attractive pal-racer and Nike gets sandwitched between the two of them. And this time it's played out in a more fun way than in Artemis. Sadly, there is a single ending for this game and there is no place for Miho in it. This game is a top class story and it's a real shame it never got released on newer machines. 2. Dragon Knight III ドラゴンナイトIII [910706] Elf 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Takeru had just finished the events of DKII when robbers took all of his possessions and clothes. The epic quest this time is to get some money. And while on it the mayor has an assignment for which he's willing to pay in gold. Game is localized and has enough information in English. 3. Pocky 2 ~Kaijin Aka Mantle no Chousen~ ポッキー2 ~怪人赤マントの挑戦~ [910710] Ponytail Soft 1 School newspaper club led by Miki investigates various cases of item disappearance and girls harassment and pranks that got frequent at school. Longer, cuter, simpler version of prequel. But while graphics were considered advanced in 1989, in 1991 8 colors with 200 horizontal lines was already archaic, so the impact is gone. Kumiko-chan is the main heroine but from time to time viewpoint changes to Miki-chan and Tomoko-chan. The mysterious Red cape had many opportunities to set pranks to school girls and to three main heroines, of course. It's not a big work and only takes 6 days in game time. 4. Tenshi-tachi no Gogo IV -Yuuko- 天使たちの午後IV -ゆう子- [910710] JAST 1 Strange events have started to happen at all-girl Sophia High School - strange sounds, strange smells and strange pupils appearance. The principal requested the new teacher to investigate. Yuko-chan from literature club will assist him in that. It's 4th part of the series. Now most of H scenes mean bad end. So plot line is relatively serious. We establish platonic relations by the end of the game with Yuuko which is totally new for the series. Yuuko admires the new teacher and their conversations is the major bright spot in the game. The atmosphere is actually different from previous three games. It's a valid mystery detective case and protagonist is a valid teacher (ok, using sex for interrogation was not really what teacher does). The resolution of the case was an aggressive and abrupt one, so satisfaction level remained low. But text rendering speed is a real torture and in 10 minutes I failed even to finish the first talk with the director... 5. Artemis アルテミス [910712] Birdy Soft 1 Notos and Ing were separated by an ambush of a giant woman-snake. Ing fled for his life and found shelter in a village. But soon all the village girls disappeared. Ing now has to find them and carry out plans for revenge on snake-woman. Birdie Soft in its blossom. Beautiful CG, different color lines, mouth and eyes animation. Although drawing is uneven, some faces and bodies look non-proportional and ugly. Game is based on a conflict of two heroines and the hero sandwiched in between. And since there is just one ending the hero is being torn apart between commoner Luna girl and mysterious adventurer Elutia girl. Another prominent feature is that the hero has a face and often is seen from the side, so player does not have to sympathize with him. But since game focuses on human relationships a lot, the plot gets lacking behind. And since the setting is as if taken from a fantasy RPG game, the overall impression suffers a lot. 6. Branmarker ブランマーカー [910712] D.O. 1 2 3 4 Island got infested with monsters kidnapping inhabitants. All kinds of warriors set to end monster infestation but noone returned back. Now it's time for your group of warriors to try luck. Quite an ordinary JRPG with turn-based fights, recovery at inn, armor gathering and of course grind. It's the third strategy game of D.O. already and they finally play it safe with just a fantasy setting, not entertainment park invasion or school fight for principal daughter. Shammy girl is main hero, she is both proficient in magic and light weapons. Vega boy joins later and he's full-scale warrior without any mp. The H-element is presented by finding princes and her multiple maids in peculiar situations. But the fact is that main hero is the girl cuts any H-scenes to the level of just nudity. But balance and graphics are good. And the atmosphere is somewhat relaxing compared to usual epic rpgs, so appearing of a sequel was not much of a surprise. 7. Legend of Killcool Legend of Killcool [910712] Soft Plan During the ancient war of humans vs demons the goddess descended and erected mountains to protect the humans. But demons kept living beyond the mountains. The black demon built a black tower threaten the human kingdom. Main hero is a warrior who receives a task to rescue human princess confined in the black tower. To open the seal he must find red, yellow, blue, green and black orbs. A doujin exploration game. There are buttons for moving N, S, E, W, but no map or any means of direction, so a manual map is supposed to be drawn. There are occasional battles. The game resembles Eiyuu Densetsu Saga the most. There are tiny bits of animation at times. 8. Manami no Doko made Iku no? まなみのどこまでイクの? [910713] Wendy Magazine 1 2 3 In the beginning of summer school girl Manami received a letter saying that she was chosen to stop a criminal syndicate in her town. After that she meets a masked man Black Pack who guides her to the underground activities. There is an English review. 9. Quintia Road クィンティアロード [910719] Communication Group Plum 1 2 3 In 1944 German pilot got into air vortex and appeared in parallel magical world of Quintia. He was greeted as god and was requested to use his aircraft to defeat monsters. Plot is not the strongest side of this work. But Quintia Road does not get boring. There are all kind of monsters to take care of and there are also 5 princess in this kingdom to harass. So it's really fun and fresh work that does not stop to thrill. Commands are simple, there are almost no puzzles, graphics are great. Battles seem difficult since they afford an abundance of commands, but actually battles are scripted and so whatever you do they will proceed in its own way. The feature of this game is full-mouse control. And this control is so full, that no keyboard control allowed. Naturally, it's not too convenient. 10. Cybernetic Hi-School Part 4 ~Ape Hunter J~ 電脳学園4 ~エイプハンターJ~ [910720] Gainax In 2006 the people had just one anxiety - "Monkey". Elimination of ozone layer by ultraviolet rays after 1980s caused ape mutation evolution. Mutants were intelligent and since they started to look like humans they secretly infiltrated human society. Thus appeared ape hunters - specialists in identification and "processing" of monkeys. You are such ape hunter and you've just received a request from school director to reveal monkeys in the school. The only way to check it is undress the subject and find evidence of his red ass and tail. Oh my, that's the whole point of Gainax. Take a laughingly crazy setting and make it even crazier, totally surreal. Oh and don't forget fanservice. Few Gainax works had none of it since creators were otaku themselves. First three parts were very short and simple quiz+adv+strip games. So is the 4th part as well, it's just longer and has more fancy setting. It's not Adv with quiz elements, not vice versa. Quizes were hard for that time and nowadays they seem even harder even though there are just three variants. Game was sold with a booklet describing the fake history since the end of 80s till 2006 and many questions based on that fake history, naturally. Game is full of stupid characters and yet it's crazy fun, or should I say funny craze. Such is this work in the zenith of Gainax power that it can be considered a masterpiece. 11. Sweet Emotion スウィートエモーション [910720] Discovery There are five scenarios presented from different viewpoints and connected with each other. Together they let us approach the truth about Slan murder. Debut work of Discovery which is actually a new division of Birdie Soft so graphics is the best of the best. Partial animation makes it shine even more. I tend to block short multi-story VNs, but in this case every episode is connected and they all lead to a logical end. We also have to change protagonists all the time - we get to be a victim, a witness and a detective. So in Part 1 we play as a victim to be killed. In Part 2 we are students who found Slan corpse in Part 1. Part 3 is when we step up as a detective. Part 4 is journey to the land of the dead to get to know circumstances of death from Slan himself. Part 5 is resolution of the case by the detective. The work loses its charm when we get to know murder circumstances by the middle of the story. So story is not particularly good and H scenes are kind of too frequent. So quite a typical Birdy Soft work. 12. Kounai Shasei Vol.1 - Yonimo H na Monogatari 校内写生 第1巻 世にもHな物語 [910726] Fairytale X-Shitei 1 "Kounai Shasei 1" opens with a text introduction that describes a miraculous Girls' High School that can be accessed by sailing through the Indian Ocean or walking along the Silk Road - a school that even the famous Marco Polo allegedly describes in his memoirs. This establishes the humorous tone of subsequent narrative, which has little to do with history and a lot to do with pretty high school girls. The game has no real story, being instead composed of five unrelated vignettes, short episodes that feature a sexy high school girl, a male protagonist (named "God" by default), and various comical and erotic situations under different circumstances: meeting in a school, haunted house, crowded train station, etc. The series is the face of Fairytale X-Shitei. Dumb, but cute and occasionally fun. 13. Kounai Shasei 2 校内写生2 [910726] Fairytale X-Shitei As hero returns the fee to the town chief he hears a story about a masked girl who attacks men at night. He is promissed 50,000 yen if he brings the chief the mask taken from the girl. And so the hunt starts. Based on manga. Being a part of Kounai Shasei series there's no doubt it falls into another bakage H plotline. But at least it's an attempt to put up a coherent story and not just throw in a bunch of mini-stories. 14. Kounai Shasei 3 校内写生3 [910726] Fairytale X-Shitei The confrontation between Sailor suit warrior Akko vs. Pretty masked girl on the school grounds where the hero studies as a student. The part with the most original content ... to the point that hardly anything makes sense. Well, this series is not here for making sense, but rather for invoking reflexes.