Lightning Warrior Raidy I and II Review

Game: Lightning Warrior Raidy

Manufacturer: Zyx

Released by: Jast USA

Language: english subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: rpg, lesbian, sex-romp, fantasy

A note before we begin: Lightning Warrior Raidy was the first attempt at the release of a translated rpg visual novel. It surprisingly succeeded to the visual novel community despite being severely flawed in many ways.

The Plot: The visual novel starts out with a travelling warrior named Raidy (who gets no backstory till the second game) arriving in a village known as Saad. Raidy finds out that monsters in a nearby tower have kidnpped the women of the village and the men who attempted to rescue them never actually return.

Raidy's job now is to attempt to rescue the girls and return them to their village. In the course of the game Raidy must travel six floors, defeat the bosses on each floor and defeat the Final Boss who resides at the top. That's it. There is no real plot to speak of in this game. The only backstory that you get on the main character is that she can wield Lightning. The villains are laughable and lack story and well if you want to play any visual novel most will have at least some time type of story regardless of how bad it is.

The most this game has in regards to plot is Raidy Rescuing women and fighting the slavers. That is it. Don't go buying this game expecting a lot (or any) of plot.

...Well okay fine I will explain a bit more of the plot. Each floor of the six floor tower is controlled by a head monster who is in charge of a different type of sexual torture. These head monsters are trying to break all the women that come to them (sometimes using the brainwashed captured men) in order to eventually give them to the Demon that lives at the top of the tower. This Demon is a tentacle monster...so you can understand a bit why they are capturing women for it.

The story has 2 main issues with it (besides the lack of real development):

1. The main issue in my opinion is how the story focuses entirely on a bad ending and a good ending. Raidy has possible chances to lose with each boss fight and is then inflicted the sexual tortures of that floor upon herself. They actually delve into this a bit too much and it kind of loses the appeal of trying to win when you also get something for losing.

2. The Good Ending is way too short. In fact the entire story is short if not non-existent. I will say this though the way Raidy beats the Demon is sheer awesome and to be honest hilarious. It's too bad the game did not focus more on that possibility for humor as there were plenty of chances for bad puns and jokes.

I also noticed that the old English way Raidy spoke during boss battles was kind of out of place. Apparently they tried to make her humble but I'm not sure it worked all that well.

Characters: This is nearly as bad as the story. There are however characters and since some of the characters do make a return in the sequel I might as well go ahead and describe them a bit.

Raidy: Sexually promiscuous, a warrior wanderer, tries to help girls, lesbian, talks in old english at certain points in game, scantily clad for no reason, believes in an eye for an eye mentality, and that sums up her character. Doesn't tell you much because I'll be honest there is not anything to tell. They left out her entire back story.

FonFon: The werewolf monster in the game and you find out she likes whipping women. Yeah she also seems to be a sadist and possibly a tsundere as well. She has no character beyond that.

Foless: My least favorite of the characters. She is a dark elf with a love for enemas. needless to say this was my least favorite aspect in both games. Her character though seemed to be a bit shy in nature and looking back on it she had a more innocent character...despite giving people enemas.

Tiss: A horned and horny demon with a love for bondage and candles. She seemed to be the natural nymphomaniac of the group. no further character traits to develop as they don't have much of a role to play.

Others: The other bosses are a one trick pony and you will never see them again.

Cubix (the Tentacle Demon): Mainly whispered about till the final floor and then you either electricum him to death or get turned into his sex slave. He's a tentacle monster...that's all you need to know to understand his motive for doing what he does. I do have to say that this was expected and not original at all. I was rather sad that despite all the effort put into the game all they could manage is a tentacle monster.

Monsters: Apparently this is what happened to some of the girls that were sexually tortured...although this plot device is thrown out the window in the second game. I will say one thing about these monsters in that this is quite possibly the best thing about the game. The designs are cute when not gorgeous and the names themselves are brilliant. The game takes everything one knows about preconceived notions of monsters and turns them into girls; often with some puns added for measure.

Gamplay: Where to begin? This game is a dungeon crawler pure and simple. Raidy goes around to different corridors and rooms looking for treasure, maps, more doors, or fighting random encounters.

The random encounters were set up so 1-3 monsters could appear randomly while walking on a floor. There 3 different monsters for each floor visited for a total of 18 or so monsters (seems low for some reason). I will talk more about these monsters in the artwork category.

Once arriving at a floor the first thing that needed to be done was to try and find a map. This is more difficult than it sounds as you do not have an inclination whatsoever of where you are when you begin a floor as there is no map anywhere until you find it. I noticed that the map would often be located near the end of a floor.

Each floor visited would have various curves of difficulty and at least one of them is completely insane for people as the map is in the middle of nowhere, the enemies are stronger than you are, and without getting proper info or weapon winning the boss battle is unobtainable.

combat: The game is supposed to have rpg elements and in combat these range from physical attacks, a magical attack, defending, potion drinking, and being a coward (running away...a lot less cowardly in this game). Raidy also has a magical attack

called thunderslash which uses MP, does damage of about half the points used and is auto-hit (which becomes vitally important at points in the game where you may barely ever hit an enemy. Raidy has a special attack but so do monsters and unlike Raidy their damage is fixed and don't decrease with use (which does for Raidy). Raidy may get potions from treasure and item drops for beating enemies but with their abilities they are usually always needed.

These special attacks are quite possibly the game breaker as it increases the difficulty curve beyond reason. The hardest part of Lightning Warrior Raidy I is level 3. Anyone who has played the game will tell you the same. The floor is huge compared to all the other levels and every monster has a special attack and you will have to grind your ass off to even get through it. The experience earned at floor 3 will take a while and it is not even until floor 5 that grinding becomes possible/easy.

The non-combat portion of the gameplay is extremely simple in design but well executed (sort of). The floor layout becomes progressively more difficult as you advance and i becomes a challenge to figure it out. The game also had puzzles which involved items and movement traps which could be a hassle even after managing to obtain a map of the floor

(invisible doors/walls with no indicators). There are also circumstances in the game where Raidy is given visual novel style choices and must ask characters, rescued girls, etc... about a number of different issues and if you do not repeatedly ask for a while you may not get a response. This is particularly annoying as sometimes the only way to beat a boss is heard from these.

Graphics: I have to give this series serious credit that despite all its flaws it can still manage to have one area in it that is stunning in every detail. The artwork is rather good. The game focuses on the monster characters and considering they are female and often in skimpy outfits it should not surprise anyone when the reward for defeating the monster is not to kill but rather to make it take sexy nude poses. You can say what you will but most of the people that end up buying this game buy it specifically for these moe monsters. The creatures range from minotaurs, skeletons, undine, and even a dragon; all in the form of sexy women. It is not a stretch to say that many of the monsters fought were more artistically appealing than the actual boss characters.

The design of the dungeon on the other hand was not fun to look out. Same empty hallway after empty hallway with a door occasionally. It's not that it had no real art to it (except for the boring ventures into the same passage over and over again) but rather it makes no sense. Why would anything actually live in this dungeon? How would they live there? There is no food, water, storage space, etc... it just seems to be monster filled passages for all but the torture chambers and the jail cells. The game is far superior to many dungeon crawlers of a similar nature and it does give the sense of foreboding and doom so I would say it succeeds in the art department in the very least.

Music and Sound: The background music in the game is good and tolerable. There are a few pretty good pieces and the rest manage to keep from being annoying (although the battle music comes close). I say this but the music really is just mediocre at best. It's not bad by any standard but it is forgettable. I'm personally a fan of the title song which is the only song I think is above the mediocre category.

Ero: Well the game is high in the non-consensual girl-on-girl sex and torture category. An emphasis on the torture aspect. Oddly enough for everything the game actually is it is not nearly as extreme as one might think the game would turn out to be. The majority of the game is just dungeon crawling and stripping the monster girls. Once you get to the boss for each level it ranges from whipping, candles, enemas (needless to say but this is shit), bondage, and other S&M tendencies and then of course we have the tentacle demon at the end. There is maybe one instance (possibly two) in the entire game in which men come into the picture...sadly it is unavoidable as it is plot oriented.

Extras: The game in order to thank you for playing does give you an extra menu which prior to its release was relatively rare in visual novels. It has the CG, scenario, and music files option. This way you can listen to the title song over and over again...or stay on the title menu.

Overall: I will admit that the game is not for everyone and a lot of people will actually hate it. However if you can manage dealing with a frustratingly difficult dungeon crawler with cute monster girls and fetish sex scenes then you may want to pick up this game. It's a sex-romp game minus a lot of the heterosexuality. It's one of the first games to feature dungeon crawling so despite being a mediocre game you have to give it credit for at least trying.

Recommended to: people who like monster girls (best feature in the game), S&M, girls raping girls, and dungeon crawling.

Not Recommended to: Anyone who likes plot in their games, anyone with a squeamish side for S&M or enemas.

Overall Rating: 5 out of 10

scroll down for a review of the sequel.

Game: Lightning Warrior Raidy II

Manufacturer: Zyx

Released by: Jast USA

Language: english subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: rpg, lesbian, sex-romp, fantasy

Lightning Warrior Raidy 2: Temple of Desire has a title that sounds like it belongs in an Indiana Jones film rather than a hentai game. The sequel to the "acclaimed" first game and is just as much a sexy dungeon crawler as the previous.

The Plot: Lightning Warrior Raidy II takes place after the events of Lightning Warrior Raidy I. Raidy is traveling across the desert and while traveling stumbles across the desert town/city (?) of Lake Blue. Upon arriving in the little town she witnesses bandits trying to kidnap a girl. Raidy steps in and finds out that bandits are kidnapping hosts for an unknown reason. She quickly finds out that most of the villagers being kidnapped are being made into sex slaves. Raidy being Raidy decides to help them out and must deal with new boss enemies, the return of old foes, and something that might actually give us her background.

I have to say that the plot of this game is slightly better than the previous. In the last we got hardly any info other than she went into a dungeon to save people and defeat the demon. In this one we are actually given more details on the people she's helping and even begins to create a background story for Raidy.

Changes: there is a number of new content and since the majority of the game besides that listed below is more or less the same from the first here's what's new.

Characters: The characters in this game are more or less the same as the last. We have some characters making a return and we have some new characters that have some odd fetishes. The villains are the same sort and mainly acting under the guise of bandits or monsters. There really is no reason to go more into the characters as they have little character to begin with...unless you count lesbian maid, S&M girl, a thief, and girl who likes being gang-raped as personalities. It does however introduce Junk the only male Raidy willingly has sex with. I got visions of Rance when reading Junk's lines for some reason but whatever.

Shops/Town: In Raidy II we finally get a town to venture into and as mentioned above the

townsfolk are a perverted lot. The shops in town include an Inn where you can masturbate, dream of perverted scenes, chat up with the female (lesbian) innkeeper, and finally you can "rest". Free healing is always a plus and there is a less of an emphasis on the use of potions in order to stay alive in this game as opposed to the first. The second shop is the bar where Raidy can get her information and talk with both the thief girl, the bar maid (with an interesting hobby), and Junk. The third shop is the armour and weapons shop and like the rest of the townsfolk the owner has some odd habits. The armor/weapon shop though drastically increases the ability to succeed at this game if you wish to buy anything but for the most part everything of necessity can be found in dungeon. The fourth and final shop is the potions shop which means you no longer need to grind monsters to death in order to acquire potions to heal health and mana.

Maps: The second noticeable difference is the map seen in the beginning of the game. It is a world map and now rather than just having the one dungeon in a tower of druaga manner there are 3 dungeons. The lack of other areas and more than 3 dungeons is one of the games flaws though.

If you played the first game in this series then you probably remember the map finding difficulty in the first game. Located near the end of each floor (making it useless) and needing to be found before able to use? Well this time around the map system actually fills in for you as you move around. This means you will do a lot less backtracking...or not. There is still a ton of backtracking as certain items may be found in completely different locations...and you are not given an option to leave until you get to the 5th floor. Thankfully though you can leave by walking the long way back or by waiting till the 5th floor which will transport you outside. Everything else though is the same.

Combat: Combat has changed only a little since the first game. In order to consume MP you now must use the charge option and wait to use a special attack on your next turn. Charging introduces a feature called the power bar. The longer you charge the more damage you can do. The bosses in this game are extremely easy because of this mechanism. Charge enough and then attack. If you want to make it a bit more difficult though you could always limit yourself to how much you can charge at once...but most people probably won't do this.

Bosses: In some boss battles you will have been required to find a special item to proceed. If you decide to go against a boss and do not have the item you get a game over scene and must reload. Not all the bosses though require a special item so it becomes tedious to figure out which one do and which ones do not have to have a special item. Word to the wise fill out the entire map and save the boss battle till you do.

Talking: At certain points in the game you will be required to speak to people. Often times the magical number is 3. Be sure to talk to everyone 3 times or as often as you can to make sure you get all the info (and in some cases items) necessary to continue on.

Armor/Weapons System: A new addition to the series is the armor/weapon system. In this game there are a lot more items that in the past game. Some of the items will have different powers. The sexcalibur even has sex scenes attached to it if you know where to go. Equipping items has changed a bit. You are now given a choice between a 1 hand weapon (and often a shield for defense) or a 2 hand weapon and strength/defense will change depending on what you take. The magic items have a slot of their own and slightly boost an attribute. Choosing speed makes Raidy more likely to attack first or in succession.

Animation: This is often considered a highlight among the visual novel community but I honestly could care less. The animated scenes added in Raidy 2 are for the most part circular and even by the end of the game the animated scenes become far less frequent. I also think the art suffers a bit when entering the scenes but for some this will probably wonderful for them. The majority of the game is still CG and that's the way I like it.

Dungeons: I mentioned that there are now 3 or so dungeons but some of them have more than 5 floors and all of them have more monster girls to fight and strip. I did however notice that the game was a bit more tame (odd I know) or possibly reluctant to show the nether-regions of all the girls shown. To be honest I kinda preferred a varying mix although it did make me wonder why they weren't being show when the game itself was a hentai game full of sex and the like. They also reused a few of the creatures...although I believe most of the monsters reused had new scenes.

Audio: The music is a lot more varied this time around and a bit better than before but still mediocre...although the Opening song is probably the best. I like that they gave you more options (the music changes depending on dungeon/town) for battles and the like. It prevents you from bashing your head in at least.

Voicework: I purposely did not mention much of the voicework in the last game because it's decent enough and the only real thing of mention was Raidy's schoolgirl voice. She has yet to lose the schoolgirl voice in the second game. The other cast of characters all seem to have slightly better voices (or at least voices suited for their roles). The last game had full audio track but this one is only voiced in some locations. To make matters worse the voicetrack seems slightly off. The voice recordings sound like they were taken on an old tape recorder, and then replayed from the tape recorder by holding it up to the microphone and voila. Instant voices. I actually recommend playing the game without voices as they are so random in their use and scratchy that they aren't really needed.

Money: I feel as if this is one of the few areas of the game that excelled. It is not a major attribute by a long shot...not for this game anyway, but it never fell into the tired old mechanism of most RPG games released of late. Money never becomes "no object" until the last dungeon. I am saddened by the loss of monsters dropping random items though...thankfully they now drop gold instead.

Enemy Combat: One of the most annoying things in the early stages of the game for people playing is the fact that enemies have special attacks just like Raidy does. In the beginning of the game they are limited mainly to nothing or stealing gold (which in the beginning of the game is terribly irritating). Later in the game though their attacks may take MP or charge an extremely powerful attack that you should probably run from. The enemies also always attack first. Regardless of the level Raidy is at or the speed they will nearly always attack first.

Difficulty: The first Raidy game had the difficulty on the high end of the hard spectrum whereas this game seems to be the opposite. It's quite difficult for the first few floors in the first dungeon but then spikes to ridiculously easy and depending on how one plays may only barely rub out to normal by the end game. So not as difficult as its predecessor but not as tedious either.

Length: Raidy II is by no means a full length RPG game of the modern form of the word. If anything I would say it takes a day total of non-stop playing)...around 20 hours.

Ero: The game continues to be high in the non-consensual girl-on-girl/monster/Junk sex category and torture is definitely returning. The return of the 4 boss characters from the first game though means that those particular fetishes are back as well. It does have a few new additions in the fetish category like snake/spider bestiality, pseudo-furry, more tentacles, lots of S&M, masturbation (Raidy by herself and Raidy with clone), bondage, whipping, candles, enemas, enemas, master/servant, something close to loli-ish, yuri, plant sex?, and just a bunch of other odd sexual fetishes. The majority of these are not avoidable either...unless you skip through which is always an option. So the ero level has raised greatly in this game.

Overall: Raidy II is not for everyone and many people will hate it because of the content but if you can manage to deal with it the art is pretty good. The dungeons have been made bigger and in many cases easier, the amount of content is nearly triple the first game, the combat is more evolved, and overall the game is just better than its predecessor...if you can mange dealing with the weird fetishes. The game does better in nearly every category and before when we had a difficult game we are now given an easier (and larger) game. Lightning Warrior Raidy II is decent dungeon crawler but with Jast USA's upcoming lineup you might be able to find something a bit less fetish heavy. If these type of fetishes are your thing though Raidy will not disappoint.

Recommended to: people who like monster girls (best feature in the game), S&M, girls raping girls, weird fetishes, and dungeon crawling.

Not Recommended to: Anyone who likes plot in their games, anyone with a squeamish side for any of the previously mentioned fetishes.

Overall Rating: 6 out of 10

Kira Kira and Curtain Call

Game: Kira Kira

Manufacturer: Overdrive

Language: english subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: Slice of Life, School, Music

The Plot: The main character Shikanosuke Meajima an ex-tennis star is the main character in this rock'n roll based visual novel. Without warning his girl dumps him and he loses the drive to succeed in just about everything. Enter a heroine named Kirari who starts getting involved in his life whether he wants her to or not. Thus this heavily music oriented game gets a start when for the last school festival Shikanosuke, kirari, and the other members of the second literature club decide to have a band performance. The game attempts to give great respect and call forth great respect for independent musicians who struggle to make a name for themselves.

Within the tale of Kira Kira there are several stories as to be expected with a visual novel and each heroine has their own route which goes in completely different directions to the other characters. Some of the routes are pretty obvious while others may take you by surprise. The game may have three heroines but there can be no doubt that the main heroine is Kirari. I'm not going to spoil anything but her route is probably my favorite. The problem lies in the two sub-routes which despite the fantastical music aspect this game is situated around they drop completely for the other two routes. It is anti-climatic after such a long buildup of music related events. It seems as if two different people were writing the script for this game as the music aspect is dropped for 2/3 of the routes without a proper explanation. Now mind you the alternate routes are still way beyond average for a visual novel but considering the game is so long (over 50 hours easily) it should be.

Characters:

Shikanosuke Meajima a.k.a. Shikako: The main male character in Kira Kira and a lazy unambitious protagonist. He is the all girls band bassist.

Kirari is the main heroine as the fact she has two routes obviously proves beyond the fact the game is name Kira Kira that she is the main character. She meets Shikano and finds out they work at the same place. Her family is poor so she has to work when able. She is energetic and often spontaneous. She is a very likable heroine and is the bands vocalist.

Sarina Kashiwara: Her route is cute but one must go in knowing she is a member of a wealthy family. She is not like most rich girl stereotypes found in anime and visual novels and is actually very polite and the complete opposite of a bitch. She plays guitar.

Chie Isurugi: An adorable character although a tad tsundere-like at times as she tries to be strong but is actually quite frail and weak but actually does not get bitchy. She is Shikano's childhood friend and is also the voice of reason among the band. She is the drummer.

Graphics: The art is more cute than beautiful. I will say that this style of artwork common of Overdrive does seem to portray more emotions than some other brands.

Music and Sound: The music is not punk rock like they say it is but all the music beginning, end, middle are all wonderful. Each character also has a different ending song. The jukebox extras after beating the game just go to show how well done they did on this game. The music was good, the live performances that were done in the game had a good feel to them and overall a good experience.

Ero: Considering this game focuses mainly on story with most of the main characters getting at most 2 h-scenes it surprisingly worked well in a few instances and not at all in others. The scenes were cute enough, the voice acting was superb, and the pictures were good but this is not a sex-romp so don't expect much H out of this game. Kirari does have the most h-scenes though out of all the characters.

Overall: This is a superb visual novel with a brilliant story and even better music. The game is well rounded in all categories (except maybe ero) and the characters are wonderful. The game is recommended to people who like drama, romance, slice of life, rock, j-pop, and cute art.

Game not recommended to: people who only want ero or are depressed easily.

Overall Rating: 9 out of 10

Game: Kira Kira

Manufacturer: Overdrive

Language: english subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: Slice of Life, School, Music

Kira Kira Curtain Call is a fan disk (pretty long fan disk) sequel of Kira Kira. The first half of the game deals with a new character and some familiar faces. The second half of the game attempts to get the entire cast of both games together but run into lots of complications in the process. A note on this game it is completely linear with no choices at all. You will get the same ending every time.

Plot/Story: This fan-disk takes place a number of years after the events of the original game and is a one route pony the entire trip. It tells its story in parts and the first part is arguably the worse of the two halves but is decent regardless.

The first part introduces a new character named Souta Honda who loves rock and his childhood friend Yui Hoshimoto. In an attempt to impress his love he forms a band in order to become "brighter than the sun". This arc falls rather flat in comparison to the drama of the original and this cast of characters is generally unappealing specifically because you grow to dislike the lead character. Oddly enough the creators completely ruined this story by not having Yuko (Shikano's sister) be the leading lady. Yui was kind of boring and not all that interesting whereas Yuko is one of the better characters and tolerable unlike the others. There is adult situations in this arc though so people who want ero will be happy (although they should probably check out a different game).

However there is a silver lining as this first part is actually not bad. it isn't as good as the original game but it is surely on part with some other games if not better. The story is in no way bad it's just most people have been spoiled by Kira Kira and won't find the fan-disk up to quality they expect...even if it is.

The second part of the game is the meat and potatoes of the fan-disk and the only real reason to play it. Sadly it does not last nearly as long as the first part but it is a direct sequel to the original. A band made by Murakami (Shikano's best male friend) formed a band and now after five years the members are beginning to drift apart from one another. This arc brings in the concept of humanity and how frail our relationships with one another may be and that when goals change both old and new return for one last hurrah.

The music/sound/graphics are the same and just as good as the original.

Overall: The ability to enjoy this game roughly depends on how much you like Souta. Souta is not a bad character but is not up to par with shikono. Still the game was quite well done but the price was a little too high to make the game worth it to anyone but die hard Kira Kira fans.

Overall Rating: 7.5 out of 10

G-Senjou No Maou Review

The Devil on G-string:

Game: G-Senjou no Maou (The Devil on G-string)

Manufacturer: Akabeisoft2

Language: english subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: Yes

Genre: mystery, suspense, slice-of-life (little) pure awesome

How to explain a game that is simply awesome?Do you like mind games, plot twists, an unbelievably cute heroine, classical music, an awesome main plot, revenge, redemption, and everlasting love? Then G-Senjou No Maou is for you.

The most recent visual novel that I have been playing and damn is it a good one.The Devil on G-string is a game released by one of the better visual novel companies Akabeisoft2 in the year 2008. This game was made after Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo (one of the best visual novels released to date) and is easily one of the most unique visual novels out there. The game has a combination of suspenseful criminal schemes, detectives, mind games, drama, and an awesome and well developed core cast with one of the greatest endings for a visual novel ever. The game was translated and a patch was released a few days before Christmas in 2010 and is a definite must play and is on my list of top 12 visual novels (and is in the top 5). It's a mystery thriller and a wonderful romance/drama all rolled into one.

You play the role of Asai Kyosuke, the son of a legendary gangster infamous in the underworld. You spend your time listening to Bach, playing God at school and covertly working for your stepfather, a ruthless financial heavyweight. This idyllic existence is broken when two individuals appear in the city - a beautiful girl from your past named Usami Haru with hair you could get lost in for days, and a powerful international gangster known only as Maou. Almost without delay, the two begin a deadly cat-and-mouse game, bringing you and your friends into the crossfire. Plotting, political intrigue and layer upon layer of interlocking traps are the weapons in this epic battle of wits.

Characters:

Azai Kyousuke is the com­plete oppo­site of your typ­i­cal visual novel pro­tag­o­nist. Kyousuke is the heir of a major Yakuza crime lord and has a cover identity as a student. He is very smart and resilient and believes that money is everything and emotional bonds are worthless. What does this mean for his character? It means he is a ruthless bastard in the early game. His character though also probably has the best character development. You really can't help but like this guy near the end. He is also a hardcore classical music otaku.

Maou: extremely intelligent and completely heartless. He is the antagonist of the story and seems to have met Usami Haru before.

Usami Haru: Maou's nemesis and the heroine of the story. She is filled with both moe and GAR and has a frightening sense of deduction. She is also quite possibly one of the weirdest heroine's in a visual novel. She is also the coolest of the heroines and easily has the best story surrounding her.

Miwa Tsub­aki: 100% naive. 100% caring. She would give Satan compassion if he asked for it. She also has one of the most disappointing side routes although her character is fun at times.

Azai Kanon: not actually related little sister to Kyousuke. She dreams of going to the Olympics and is on her way there when her part in the story begins. Her route was touching if not a bit confusing.

Shi­ra­tori Mizuha: Again her route has nothing to do with the main story and her role in the entirety of chapter 4 is probably better than her side route altogether. She is the tsundere rich girl.

Tokita Yuki: Haru’s ded­i­cated old friend and a prodigy at read­ing peo­ple. She spe­cial­izes in crim­i­nal psychology/negotiation and has a great role in the main story, even though she doesn’t actu­ally have her own path. She has no H scene or path either...it was sad to say the least because she was probably better than all the other side characters.

Aizawa Eiichi: A lot of people hate this two-faced character simply because he can be annoying. It is true but considering this is the best friend of Kyousuke we can give him a little leeway. He is a follower of God (snicker).

Azai Gonzou: Heartless "father" of Kyousuke. A simply awesome ruthless character.

Visuals: The visuals are quite solid and I actually really enjoyed the backgrounds for the majority of the locations. They give the story its gritty feel and it worked well, a number of people will complain that the backgrounds are lacking but in my opinion this helps develop the feel for the arena in which the game is played. The characters have a ton of sprites and a variety of expressions. For the most part everything visually is awesome.

Music: This is just one part about where the game really shines. The music in the game tend to be remixes of classical music and considering the plot of this epic visual novel it fits a lot better than one would expect. The final vocal song though for this game is simply amazing and there will be at least three either songs bgms that will be simply awesome.

Voices/Seiyuu: here's the two that people "may" know.

Usami Haru ............. Kawashima Rino (she is known for doing voices in 4 currently translated and released visual novels including koihime and kira kira. she is also doing the voice for clarissa in the current anime infinite stratos.

Maou ................ Jun Fukuyama (he uses his Lelouch voice for this character).

They were for the most part quite good Usami Haru and Maou both seem to steal the show as far as the voice acting is concerned.

System/Gameplay: Surprisingly the system is quite well done in this game and has a number of modes one can enter from the title page (such as sound mode (the music), cg mode (the cgs), hscene mode (the hscenes), and a chapter jump. Once you beat a chapter you get the option of starting from the start of said chapter so quite useful. The game has about 100 save slots (no lie) and has the option of showing the BGM titles when the music changes. It was slightly better than most visual novels as far as the system goes.

The side-routes are nowhere near as good as the main route but the game makes it easy for one to branch onto one of the other routes if they wish. They are decent but nowhere near the same epic quality as the main route (Usami).

Ero: Oddly enough for such a story driven game the ero (the few that it has) is surprisingly good. The scenes are more moe than anything else and each girl only has about 2 scenes but the story is the reason you play visual novels (for me anyways) not the ero.

Story: The story of G-Senjou follows a game of cat and mouse with the obviously main female character Usami and the antagonist Maou. Kyousuke finds himself in between the two. The game focuses areound the themes of revenge and forgiveness and after the first chapter exposition chapters 2-4 feature a major scheme from Maou which revolves around the side-heroines. The trouble in this goes in whether you want the yogurt and pudding or the cake, icing, and strawberries for your first go. The side-routes again are not nearly as good as the main route but since the side-routes diverge from the main story it might be best to go with those first...I didn't and it made me play the game again with the side-routes followed by the epic ending again. Haru's path is not until chapter 5 so you will have to ignore the others if you wish to do her route first.

Each chapter has its share of slower, slice-of-life scenes that help develop the characters and the scenes are for the most part short and nicely distributed. The story is addictive as hell though once Maou's challenge hits the heroes and leaves them to their journey. Akb2's script is amazing and well written. A few plot holes can be found and a few things were just too convenient but it is easy to accept 'as is'.

Then once all is done and over we get Usami's ending which is amazing and indescribable without spoiling the game but it is by far one of the best finales in a visual novel ever. Overall Rating: 7 out of 10 (except for Usami Haru's Route which receives + 2.5 making that route 9.5 out 10)

Sengoku Rance

Well just found out that the sequel to Rance Quest has been announced by Alicesoft. I figured I might as well upload a Sengoku Rance Review in celebration.

Game: Sengoku Rance

Manufacturer: AliceSoft

Language: English Subtitles

Censored/Mosaics: Yes

Genre: Comedy, Fantasy, Tactical, Turn Based, Action

Sengoku Rance was first released under AliceSoft in 2006 and is the seventh game in the Rance Series. Despite this, one can play this game without any prior knowledge of any of the other games. Sengoku Rance has been fan translated by Yandere Translations and did a damn good job...so good that they have sword to never do another Rance game.

Story: The game takes place during the Sengoku era in Japan and is a complete parody of the real Japan during this time. A war had just finished up and Oda house had lost most of its territory and thus enters Rance who decides to help them.

The game has a ton of stories all wrapped in the guise of one game. Each and every character seen in the game seems to have a story of their own and the few routes that are in the game are completely different and just as long lasting if not longer than the first. The majority of the routes (but not all) lack emotional satisfaction but once you find out more about Rance you will easily see why.

Sengoku Rance is a game unlike any other I've played. Not one character in this series fails to play their role to the fullest potential. The main character Rance is a complete nympho and pervert. He has a slave named Sill who despite the fact he treats her like shit, one can actually see her does care for her. Rance will do anything for sex. He becomes the pseudo ruler of a country and starts attacking the other countries in order to unite Japan for the better. Along the way he fucks just about anything he sees. Whether they want him to or not. Rance may at first glance seem to be driven only by his sex drive and this first glance never changes. He rapes most of the women in the country and yet despite being a rapist with a hyper weapon which will pierce the heavens one can see that does care about women even if it is a bit twisted in its logic.

In the process of conquering the surrounding territories an evil force awakens seeking revenge upon Japan and its people. This idea may not be all that original but the execution is flawless and the typical ending one would expect with this sort of story is not actually present. The main characters in the series are named and based off of real people. Most of these people have side stories of their own dealing with death, love, loss, friendship, etc... The majority of these side stories are well done and enjoyable to watch and not all of them will lead to an h-scene (although many do). There is a large amount of humor in the game and the likelihood is that anyone will be able to find at least something they find funny.

Characters: The characters in this game are many and all of them are unique. Rance himself is one of the most unsuspecting protagonists you might ever play as in a visual novel now or ever. The game really shines though on the aspect that there are hundreds of characters. After playing the game two or three times the likelihood of acquiring and finishing all of these characters stories is highly unlikely. Even if you did there is also a ton of other characters that have some minor dialog and level up just like more central characters.

No matter what you may be into or what characters you like best you will most likely find something to enjoy in this game simply based on the size of the game. There are way too many characters to bother doing a full character review but the characters make this game.

Gameplay: Without a doubt this is the best aspect of this game. The closest way to categorize Sengoku Rance is as a strategy/rpg with some risk thrown into it. Each turn you are given war-fans that determine how many actions you have that turn. The actions consist of anything to fortifying locations, recruiting new officers, exploring, conquering, satisfaction, declaring war, and more. This is a ton of fun on its own but then you get to the actual battling and it rises again.

Usually the battles consist of troops fighting six on six usually with a large number of soldiers stationed with each of the six main commanders. Near the end of my first game my average number of soldiers per person was 2000 (so 12000 total for just six of my 30 commanders). This is also where the rpg element comes into play in which you get to level each of these characters up or if you wish you can dismiss and sell them. They have typical attributes seen in rpg games such as strength, speed, intelligence, defense, but then it also has categories called actions (number of times you can attack during battle), search (cost for finding treasure or dungeons), negotiation (cost for recruiting officers), construction (cost to build something), and all of these categories hit max at level 9.

The majority of these characters can also learn special abilities; be it earning more money per turn or learning special attacks, it is ultimately up to the player to decide how to best use each one of these characters. The game becomes more difficult later on as it begins to put a limit on how much time you have to beat it (this is the same throughout the game but near the end enemies can actually lower the time it takes to finish). The characters level up as the relationships between them grows. The game is not all that easy to learn but once you figure it out it is as fun and addicting as you might imagine.

Graphics: The art work is surprisingly well done and has a bit of an odd look to it. The sprites for example are decent but one cannot see much animation occurring within the scenes. The game does have a nice shade of colors though and seems to know what colors work for certain characters and situations.

Sound: The music in this game although good is a bit repetitive. Variety is lacking and the battle sound will get annoying after a while but even then the music throughout the game is well done...nay awesome. The sound effects are also decently used.

This game may have one slight problem for people though; no voices. For a game released in 2006 one would expect this game to include voices. There is actually a simple reason for this problem; the link effect. All of the games in the Rance series have been left unvoiced and developers in interviews have mentioned that they are giving homage to Nintendo's style of gaming and how they do their Zelda series. A series stops being immortal when the voices die. This way they do not have to worry about the consequences of possibly losing their voice for Rance. To be honest though the voices do not really matter and one is not likely to notice they are gone in the first place. If they did have voices ever the company would go bankrupt. They have a huge number of characters in the game and to get talented seiyuu for all the characters would run them out of money quick.

Ero: As far as ero content goes Sengoku Rance is full of it. Most minor characters only get 1 maybe 2 scenes apiece but there are around 104 different Hscenes throughout the game. They range in variety as well although many of them include reward rape which is what Rance believes he should be rewarded for helping people. I'm not a fan of rape but since there was so much comedy (even in the rape scenes) the game really balances out. Nearly every female character in this game has an Hscene (or an ecchi scene) so no one is left out of Rance's Right.

Replayability: One playthrough of Rance took me about 20-30 hours and this tends to be typical for the first time through. I say the first time because unlike nearly all other visual novels and video games in general; this game has an enormous value in replayability. After beating the game once you have an option of starting a new game with bonuses which you can buy with your last score. The score is not all that easy to do well in and on your first play through it is impossible I believe to get higher than a 36. I got a 5 on my first play through and a 13 on my second. The score is the points and most bonuses tend to be 2-5 points with special ones being much more expensive. The bonuses range from things like starting the game with an additional 10,000 gold, bonus in troop abilities, keeping a previously found item, new captains or characters, special characters from other AliceSoft games, adding an additional action fan right at the beginning, and more. That was only for the bonuses though. It is impossible to unlock all things on the first or second play through; which gives a slightly different ending and allows the use of characters not seen or used in the first play through. If that were not enough there are an additional 4 IF paths that one can follow instead of the usual story. An example of this is Uesugi Kenshin's route where instead of following the usual storyline you must fight all the other captains and territories in a race to become Emperor of Japan (this is just one example). Even without these new routes though many of the events and scenes in the game on the second playthrough are random and you may find a recruit or items never seen before or may find one of the secret uber-bosses (of which there are I believe three).

I'm not done there, the game unlike most others also has the option of allowing you to pick your difficulty. The rewards for playing on a higher difficulty (besides being a lot harder) is that you start with a higher score (mind you nothing can be done with it until the game is beaten but you are likely to keep more points by the end by doing this and by getting bonuses that raise the score. There are 4 alternate difficulty levels besides the normal one for 5 total.

Another bonus feature is free-for-all mode which lets you pick any of the territories in the game and fight the other territories using the troops from the territory picked. All the countries will be at war with one another and can attack any nearby. Each location has different advantages and disadvantages. For example if you pick one of the strongest in the game you will be attacked by one of the other strongest as soon as you conquer one territory. If you decide to play as one of the hardest you will be completely surrounded by enemies and you may have a disadvantage that you can only recruit a certain amount of soldiers per turn. Each location and territory will be different. There is a reason for doing all this and that is you get a score in this type of game as well...not to mention it is damn addicting.

There is one final bonus feature and that is the Alice Room. Two of Alice Soft's mascot characters talk to you about the game and then you get to read some interviews by everyone major involved in the creation of the game (nearly 20 or so people). There is also an option to look at scenarios that never made it in the game and hear people's opinions on different random topics.

End Result: This is easily one of the best hgames that I've ever played. It has great gameplay, story, and artwork and it only gets docked because of repetitive and lackluster background music. I thus give it a score of;

Score: 9.2 out of 10

Edelweiss and Eiden Fantasia

Game: Edelweiss

Manufacturer: Overdrive

Language: Japanese with English Translation

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: Adventure/Fantasy

Edelweiss is a mangagamer release and one of the first translated visual novels to appear after the fall of hirameki (translators of ever 17 and phantom inferno). Jast USA was already in business at this time but the majority of their games consisted of sex romps and visual novel enthusiasts longed for something with more story. Hence the arrival of Mangagamer and their

first two games Da Capo and Edelweiss.

While playing Edelweiss one has to take in account that this was one of mangagamer's first actual releases that said the first in initial release was completely horrible. Translation and dialogue were all over the place little organization and entire scenes were missing at times. They re-released the product some time later and gave it free to everyone who bought the release copy. The second release was in effect much much better but also had its share of problems. Typical problems occurred in the area of grammar and punctuation. Of course usual present/past participles were misplaced and on occasion they misused quotations. None of this made the game unplayable however. Considering this was one of the companies first releases this is somewhat excusable. They seem to actually get an editor with later games. I make mention of it below but Mangagamr eventually redid this game and it turned out much better with a proper translation and editor. I played it with the un-edited version though so that is what I review.

By now most people are probably wondering what the game I'm reviewing actually is and they will be surprised at my answer. The game is drama-comedy coming-of-age plot with hardcore teen humor and a bit fullmetal alchemist-like elements thrown in for the core of the story. The game is nowhere near as dramatic as say Kanon or Clannad but regardless there are still several rather unexpected turns and twists in the game.

The main character is called Kazushi and focuses on Kazushi and his friends passing an entrance exam in order to attend a former all-girls school. The boys themselves went an all guys school so you can kind of see where teen humor probably comes in. The school in question is located on an isolated island and it is because of this that the boys believe they have a chance of "scoring" with a girl. They have quite a few misadventures in which they discover that the school focuses on teaching alchemy to its students along with the ethics and principles that are needed for alchemy as well as almost get thrown out because of a few of these misadventures.

The primary problem with the game aside from translation/grammar is from the plot. The plot itself is perfectly fine but the middle of the story often is rather boring and aloof compared to the endings and almost seems as if the author didn't know what he was doing.

The essential information about the game does not even come into the picture until around the last two hours or so. I also noticed that because of this each ending seemed rather similar and each arc seemed to be a bit rushed. I did a little research and apparently it was too rushed. Hence the reason they eventually released the expansion/sequel which further expanded on both this game and its characters and even gave better story lines. Or so I've heard. I won't know anything until that eventual release.

The girls too do not really stand out at all we have the ignorant, the professor, the mysterious girl, the money lover, and the athletic stereotypes. Mind you there are slight quirks unique to each and although there all pretty common they were decently developed characters.

Aozora Haruka: Haruka was raised in the natural

environment of Eiden Island. She is energetic and has a natural innocence of her character easily seen through the course of the visual novel. She is both clumsy and intelligent and has recently taken an interest in the newly transferred boys.

Hinata Mizuki: Her love of swimming is the reason she enrolled at Eiden and if it weren't for her unfortunate run-in with the transferring boys she would still be swimming naked in the soft currents and warm waters of the ocean. She is an athlete and somewhat boyish in nature and although she lacks experience in behaving around boys she proves to be just like any other girl that loves accessories and love. In the game she is the very essence of Tsundere.

Kamoike Ran: She is a money lover and will not hesitate to swindle the boys out of their money by offering them false advice on how to be popular among girls, giving them supposed naked pictures of women, and is a treasure hunter at heart. She is actually quite shy though and is uncomfortable being in a group. She has an active role to play in almost all the routes but hers is possibly the most disappointing of all the routes.

Amamiya Natsume: A mysterious girl who rarely talks and seems to have no friends. She is also the nearly loli character in the game but has one of the most amusing personalities if you do not count the two girls with no route (unless you count the fandisc Fantasia...well worth playing).

Ibuki Mei: The main character's professor and she will not hesitate to use her charm to get people to follow directions. She is very popular amongst the female students as well as the male students. She has a habit of drinking and will bawl for seemingly no reason when drunk. She has some amusing events and is one of the better characters in the game route wise.

Edelweiss is the typical branching type of visual novel. There are five different paths the player can choose from and each of the paths has a girl with a personal problem and its up to Kazushi (main character) to help her resolve this problem. Plot choices are few and in between. There are only a few main areas of plot choices and if one were to save at the right moments the player can run through all the endings relatively quickly...by skipping what they've already seen and read with a handy skip button.

For all its faults Overdrive's game is rather unique from many of the games currently translated (not all mind you there are definitely better games). The game is high quality and the game had a high budget presentation. One of the best things about the game is that the characters mouths are actually in sync with the dialogue. Although this feature is not unique for visual novels now days back when it was first released a large majority of the games lacked this feature and made the games hard to play. Edelweiss was one of the first translated games that didn't.

Music is a big factor in visual novels and there have been so many memorable songs or background music from titles like kanon, clannad, fate/stay, etc... One of the the things I personally liked about the game is that each path had its own unique credit music. This may not seem like a big deal but trust me when I say it is. The vocal tracks are not all that wonderful but the background music is done in a way to fit the mood although isn't astounding by any means. The only real memorable song is the opening theme Ashberry.

Graphic wise the game is rather well done. It has a good usage of green, yellow, and orange hues. The line art is absolutely amazing while the backgrounds are interesting and do not lead the player to boredom. The CGs (non-h) were well done and entertaining to look at. The game is an H game though so hentai cgs were included as well. They were not bad. For the most part the h scenes were in either room or beach. I did notice that there were quite a few places that they could have easily put in other scenes. I'm kinda glad it didn't though because it was nice to play a game that was not all about the sex. There were about two sex or h-scenes for each character so the actual h-scenes did not take away from the story.

Voice actors/actresses can make or break a game or anime and Edelweiss is no exception. Thankfully the game's voice actresses/actors do a pretty good job of conveying the necessary emotions. Now there may have been one or two voices that bordered on annoying but I believe that was the intention so its not really a disadvantage.

Overall Mangagamer released a pretty well done game for its first release and it was nice to see a teenage drama-comedy as opposed to the usual sex-romp that Jast USA usually releases. The game is not perfect and although a lot of this has to do with the grammar in the translation and a somewhat weak middle I would still have to say the game is pretty well done. It's not the best game by far but as far as official english translations go this is one of the better games.

Re-Release: Mangagamer actually did go back and fix most of the translation and grammar and made it much better game as a result. So don't be worried that the game was previously grammatically flawed. It is now much better than it was before and most of the grammar errors were caught. It has a few things here or there but the new translator working for Mangagamer is quite good at what he/she does.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Game: Edelweiss Eiden Fantasia

Manufacturer: Overdrive

Language: Japanese with English Translation

Censored/Mosaics: No

Genre: Adventure/Fantasy/Comedy

A number of years after the release of Edelweiss Mangagamer licensed the two route fan disc which dealt with the characters Rin and Sakura often considered to be some of the most entertaining characters in the vanilla game.

The game picks up where Edelweiss ends should you not get any route. The heroines of the story are Takase Sakura and Fujisaki Rin two background characters that ended up dominating popularity polls when the vanilla game was released. They actually ended up beating the vanilla heroines. This fan-disk presents two all new stories to the Edelweiss story as well as a special mushroom ending.

The stories of this fan-disk are quite odd. In the Sakura route the main character and Sakura become good friends and end up making a bet whether Sakura can make Kazushi fall for her. Outsiders begin to complicate things and and sabotage and gambling is occuring throughout the school. The plot in the Sakura route is not the greatest and to be honest she loses a lot of her character which made her awesome in the original Edelweiss.

The Rin route on the other hand is amazingly bizarre it almost hurts to write about. This does not make it bad but is actually one of the more entertaining routes in both games. In this route Kazushi and Rin both become class representatives and when a statue breaks and the two begin having feelings for one another something horrible happens to Kazushi's crotch. His Johnny grows a face and begins to speak. I honestly could not make this up if I tried.

I will say one thing though as I could very easily see either hints for an Edelweiss sequel or laziness on the creators as the Rin route looked like it could go in multiple directions. Both games really did not seem to fully finish and it seems like something was missing in both this and the vanilla game. If you play the game you will understand what I mean.

The plots for this game are surprisingly not all that bad despite how "out there" they may seem. It is entertaining and worth playing through. A special ending is also unlocked after playing both routes in which mushrooms are greatly involved.

The voices are the same as in the last game and this works to its advantage some of the music is downright weird but surprisingly fits (and well).

The art maintained quality of the original so nothing to talk about.

Overall in terms of this and the original if one were to add both the new translation of the original and the fan disk then the game would have received a solid 8 but considering the two were split up and you are required to buy both the vanilla game and the fan-disk, and the fact that it seemed as if not all the stories were actually explored or fully finished, both games get the following rating:

7 out 10.