LunaFlare
This review contains spoilers
I have a lot of thoughts on this one so I'm not quite sure where to start. Going in, I knew two things about Vanillaware: their visuals are gorgeous and their fanservice is skeevy. Both are true here in equal measure. I can't imagine how much effort drawing all of the backgrounds and character poses took, but god I wish one of those poses wasn't a 15-year-old's panty shot. People complain about Kotaro Uchikoshi being horny but at least his subjects are legal.
The plot was certainly interesting. It's already a Lot right out of the gate, so I was initially worried that its reputation was more about volume than anything else, but I was impressed by the development from that starting point. My mind had a lot to chew on in the middle stages, and there were some interesting late reveals. I put together some details before the game confirmed it, but in a way that felt intended and satisfying. It's pretty interesting how the big reframing twist isn't a sudden 11th hour thing, but a slow burn you get more and more context for over time. All this praise said, I don't think the narrative structure is quite as revolutionary as the most devoted fans say. It's basically just 428 Shibuya Scramble with some wonky chronology. And don't get me wrong, that's a good thing to be! When I first put the game down, I came away without any particular feeling of "wow", but after more than a week of my brain constantly chewing on the details of the plot I have to admit that I'm charmed.
I do have to mention that I have some conflicted feelings about queer representation in this game. The writing around Okino and Hijiyama constantly waffles between a great depiction of a confident and proud genderfluid person and their boyfriend who's coming to terms with his first gay feelings, and... "lol tr*ps are gay". On the WLW side of things we have a girl extremely devoted to her childhood friend... who turn out to be clones of a mother and daughter, and one single line between two characters already paired off with boys at that point. So that's a total bust.
On the gameplay side of things, I'm not quite sure how to feel. Going in I was very worried to hear that the game had mandatory RTS segments, and I was imagining something like Starcraft where you have to keep tabs on everything and work fast, which would overwhelm me easily. Thankfully, it's not like that, it's more like a active-time RPG. I found the combat enjoyable, shooting a hailstorm of bullets into a huge crowd of enemies and watching the fireworks is very fun.However, the frontloaded complexity of the upgrade system is what pushed me over the edge into setting the difficulty to "casual" and focusing on the story. As soon as the tutorial teaches you about upgrades, you have about 100 options and no idea how to prioritise them. I'm glad Casual difficulty is an option, but I feel like more could have been done to make actually engaging with the combat a more accessible option.
While I'm complaining, I do want to touch on the localisation a little bit. "Sub-style" translations using honourifics and untranslated terms like "yakisoba pan" are valid and in a vacuum I don't mind it here, but if you're going to do it alongside an English dub, please for the love of god train your actors to pronounce Japanese phonemes. "Tam-ow". Ow indeed.
Overall though I did very much enjoy my time with it and I got invested in it, I'm just not quite as high on it as some of the praise I've seen.
The plot was certainly interesting. It's already a Lot right out of the gate, so I was initially worried that its reputation was more about volume than anything else, but I was impressed by the development from that starting point. My mind had a lot to chew on in the middle stages, and there were some interesting late reveals. I put together some details before the game confirmed it, but in a way that felt intended and satisfying. It's pretty interesting how the big reframing twist isn't a sudden 11th hour thing, but a slow burn you get more and more context for over time. All this praise said, I don't think the narrative structure is quite as revolutionary as the most devoted fans say. It's basically just 428 Shibuya Scramble with some wonky chronology. And don't get me wrong, that's a good thing to be! When I first put the game down, I came away without any particular feeling of "wow", but after more than a week of my brain constantly chewing on the details of the plot I have to admit that I'm charmed.
I do have to mention that I have some conflicted feelings about queer representation in this game. The writing around Okino and Hijiyama constantly waffles between a great depiction of a confident and proud genderfluid person and their boyfriend who's coming to terms with his first gay feelings, and... "lol tr*ps are gay". On the WLW side of things we have a girl extremely devoted to her childhood friend... who turn out to be clones of a mother and daughter, and one single line between two characters already paired off with boys at that point. So that's a total bust.
On the gameplay side of things, I'm not quite sure how to feel. Going in I was very worried to hear that the game had mandatory RTS segments, and I was imagining something like Starcraft where you have to keep tabs on everything and work fast, which would overwhelm me easily. Thankfully, it's not like that, it's more like a active-time RPG. I found the combat enjoyable, shooting a hailstorm of bullets into a huge crowd of enemies and watching the fireworks is very fun.However, the frontloaded complexity of the upgrade system is what pushed me over the edge into setting the difficulty to "casual" and focusing on the story. As soon as the tutorial teaches you about upgrades, you have about 100 options and no idea how to prioritise them. I'm glad Casual difficulty is an option, but I feel like more could have been done to make actually engaging with the combat a more accessible option.
While I'm complaining, I do want to touch on the localisation a little bit. "Sub-style" translations using honourifics and untranslated terms like "yakisoba pan" are valid and in a vacuum I don't mind it here, but if you're going to do it alongside an English dub, please for the love of god train your actors to pronounce Japanese phonemes. "Tam-ow". Ow indeed.
Overall though I did very much enjoy my time with it and I got invested in it, I'm just not quite as high on it as some of the praise I've seen.
Pacing-wise, the balance of "interesting sci-fi mystery" to "slice of life dating sim" is more evenly distributed than the infamously backloaded Ever 17, but on the whole there's a lot more focus on the latter than most of Uchikoshi's other work. From the perspective of "an Uchikoshi VN" it's mostly a curiosity, as the origin of some elements referenced in the other Infinity games - though it's certainly not without some interesting aspects. The Never 7 Eternal Edition fan remake is an amazing work of preservation though, lined up against a host of ports with inconsistent content and bugs galore.
E: OK, honestly, every time I think about this game I give it more credit for its interesting ideas. I need to do a replay with the intent of meeting it on its own terms.
E: OK, honestly, every time I think about this game I give it more credit for its interesting ideas. I need to do a replay with the intent of meeting it on its own terms.
2022
This was billed to me by both friends and Steam as "Mirror's Edge meets The Witness", and both comparisons are... a bit generous, I think. The platforming is pretty finicky, and the puzzles are disappointing. A bit short for the price too. The story seems philosophical and introspective and is probably the game's high point, but going in expecting refined quality from the gameplay I wasn't in the headspace to be receptive to it.
Look, I'm sure there are dedicated Rhythm games out there that are way better at being That. But I can't imagine any of them officially have Yoko Shimomura's legendary work on the Kingdom Hearts series, and the battle aesthetic of the charts is extremely stylish. I'm deep in the modding scene and have done a fair bit of score chasing, with a Platinum III rank on the community Discord's system.
2017
man ending e gets me good every time
2019
Complicated feelings on this game. Much discourse. The cleanest way to put it is that, partially because it shaped my tastes, KH2 gives me more of what I'm personally looking for. KH3 is still a very fine game, but trying to replay it I find that it contains many segments that make it difficult because you'd rather just skip them, and they don't interact with any challenges or mods that the replay was for.
2021
As a veteran of many Four Job Fiestas on the Advance version, this is a largely agreeable version of my favourite Final Fantasy game. However I did ultimately burn out and get distracted on my on my inaugural playthrough.
A unique detective game that well deserves its high regard. I'm desperate for more like it so that I can experience the same concept with fresh knowledge. Some mechanical decisions are frustrating for seemingly little reason, though.
2016
While Johnathon Blow may be a pretentious twat, this game is still beautiful and ingenious.
2019
I hardly need to add my voice to the chorus praising this game, but it sure is up my alley. It's hard though! I don't have the patience to grind out runs long enough to get good at ascension runs.
I very much enjoyed this Sound Novel. It's kind of a fun shlocky action flick plot, but it's elevated by the real photography, the soundtrack, and the gameplay system of routes that interlock through your choices. It also, strangely for a visual novel, has quite the extensive postgame, which I experienced all of, and that adds quite a lot of breadth to the experience. There are some interface issues though, like a slow text speed, bad skipping capability, and no mouse support.
2019
This game kind of came out of nowhere for me, I just discovered it one day, gave it a chance, and was delighted to discover that it's gay as hell, as well as just a little bit trans! The added voice work really elevates it, and my ADHD brain appreciates that it's more than just a slow burn romance, with some dramatic fantasy elements included too.
2018
trams gender
Completed all C-Sides and Farewell with Moon Berry but no chance in hell I'm ever going for Golden Berries.
Completed all C-Sides and Farewell with Moon Berry but no chance in hell I'm ever going for Golden Berries.
I'm incapable of seriously assessing how I feel about this game as the conclusion to a trilogy I love, because all I can think about are the memes.
999 and VLR are both absolute classics, I love Uchikoshi's work. The VLR port is stellar, but 999 really really kind of relied on the DS, and the transition isn't pretty, especially with arbitrary and unnecessary script changes.