Enjoy your summer by playing key’s Summer Pockets or just take it easy with your childhood friend in Argonaut’s Uchi no Kanojo. It seems like many protagonists lead double lives, including as a phantom thief in Confiture Soft’s Rhapsodic Holiday. For those looking for a game with a great seiyuu cast, look no further than ensemble’s Koi wa Sotto Saku Hana no You ni.
Like visiting an amusement park for the summer the month is filled with ups and downs. Wait, no that’s not quite right. The month is filled with downs and the occasional perfectly level plateau. So more mediocrity of varying degrees with some awkward and terrible thrown into the mix, so basically just another average month.
Making＊Lovers Geki Icha After Story Vol.02
Company: SMEE
Game site: Making＊Lovers 激イチャアフターストーリー Vol.02
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This is the second of two mini fandiscs for Making＊Lovers, with after stories for Reina and Mashiro. Any game with Reina is a good game.
Fandisk about twenty percent of the cast.
Forty percent. Close enough.
I find your math suspect. One heroine would be twenty percent.
Summer Pockets
Company: key
Game site: Summer Pockets
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This is an all-ages title from key. Hairi came to the island of Torishirojima during his summer vacation to help sort through the belongings of his late grandmother. He gradually grew accustomed to life on the island despite his initial worries, while meeting many new friends.
Shiroha, a girl who gazes at the ocean.
Ao, a girl who is searching for a mysterious butterfly.
Kamome, a girl who is looking for memories and a pirate ship.
Tsumugi, a girl who lives at the quiet lighthouse.
He thought to himself that it would be best if this enjoyable summer vacation will not end.
This game has been in the works for quite some time and even though Maeda Jun is not among the writers (Kai, Niijima Yuu and Hasama), he had a prominent impact on the game and its theme of nostalgia. Izumi Tsubasa is also on board as one of the illustrators, along with Na-Ga, Nagayama Yuunon and Engiyoshi (SD). Just like past key games, this is intended to make you cry. I really liked the trial – it had a nice pace to it and lots of funny moments (seemingly pointless choices are mentioned later on in the game). Of course, there’s a mini game and this time it’s ping pong. I have become the legendary ping pong master! There’s also many funny records if you’re a completionist. I’m looking forward to the full game!
I want to be happy and expectant for a new Key game. I really really do. Believe it or not there was a time I liked Key, as the majority of their characters and stories were well worth the read. Summer Pockets however feels more like they are way too into themselves and perhaps what they feel is expected of them now. To put it simply the high point of Key has always been the generic high school romance with a bit of wacky comedy thrown in to keep the reader amused and the mood light. Throw in a bit of drama that gradually built up towards the end in a reasonable way and you have yourself a good Key game. This is all anyone truly wants from Key. Sure they have made money off of whoring their name in other directions. And yes, people still buy things that are obviously terrible like rewrite. But what holds up the garbage like Angel Beats was always the comedy, characters, and their drama that would better serve a more… grounded game. Just take a moment if you are a fan of the company and give some thought to what is left after you remove those three factors. The story and setting left over tend to be really, really, painfully terrible whenever the supernatural or any kind of wishing deus ex machina are involved.
A good example of this would be the game that started it all, Kanon. The majority of it was just a touching drama as standard as could be. Truly only three routes deviated from this to varying degrees. With the most awful being the Mai route. Sure the fox girl, and the stupid backpack who wasn’t too clear on how gravity works and so decided to re-enact Newton’s epiphany… starring as the apple, were not exactly paragons of sensible story. Despite this they were within the realm of suspension of disbelief when compared to Mai, due to how their stories were handled. All the supernatural stuff off to the side, only sorta mentioned in passing, at the end, as part of a dramatic twist because wishes, miracles, and pixy dust. Fine. I don’t like it but deus ex machina resolutions that make no sense and are pulled out of the dramatic revelation for incompetent writers hat are nothing new. No matter how silly other routes may have been there was really no excuse for Mai’s incredibly pointless chuuni nonsense, nor Key’s obsession with recreating said nonsense as often as possible. Ever since Key has been on this weird quest to replicate the Mai route more and more. It is almost as though they felt insulted at the lack of appreciation people have for that side of their work and so are trying to drown us in sewage till there is nothing left to complain about.
So then, will Key learn a valuable lesson from their previous works or ignore all sense while building a shrine to the most embarrassingly poorly written chunni gods? Well we won’t know for absolute sure till the game is released. Sure it probably won’t be as bad as everything they have recently come up with, especially Rewrite. Still appears to be too much focus on things that don’t matter and the reader will probably not care about. So I am wary of how things will turn out. Wary enough that I won’t even consider the game till I am advised by others on how best to proceed through this potential minefield.
Maoten
Company: CandySoft
Game site: まおてん
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
It was said that in July 1999, the chains binding the despicable demon king in the depths of Hell will come loose and 666 demons will spill out into the human world, wrecking chaos upon mankind. However, when the date arrived and the gates of Hell opened, the demons quickly decided that it was impossible to rule over 7 million humans when they themselves did not number more than 700, and chose instead to assimilate into human society.
Ten years later, most people enjoy a peaceful life without knowing the events of the past. The demons settled in the small town of Misaki near the Kanto Sea and lived happily away from the public eye… until a girl who called herself the ‘demon king’ transferred into their school.
There’s angels, demons and humans (including the plain protagonist Rentarou). You could say it’s just like another Tsuyokiss, a wacky love story with a school setting, albeit with a supernatural element and plenty of fighting. It’s a formula that works for them and their sub-brands, so it should be well received.
I can only find myself heaving a wearily resigned sigh at Maoten. Reason being there is absolutely no purpose to the setting aside from looking for some arbitrary rationale behind placing characters in a high school. I am fine with the inclusion of demons and whatever else the fevered dreams or nightmares of the writers come up with, such things only add spice when done well. But! And this is a gigantic but, that all hinges on the creators being able to match the round peg to the round hole, and not stubbornly try to force the square where it doesn’t belong. In other words, just change the damn setting to match your characters. While cosmologists may not know everything about the universe we can be sure it does not revolve around a friggin high school. Unless all mythologies were wrong, and it turns out the pearly gates are the entrance to said high school and saint Peter is just the annoyed gym teacher scowling while threateningly holding his shinai at the late comers. In which case, well done Japan for finding the meaning of life we have been searching for these few thousand years.
Cute Resort ~Shiyou yo Ecchi na Activity~
Company: Digital Cute
Game site: キュートリゾート ～しようよエッチなアクティビティ～
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This is Digital Cute’s 10th anniversary work and also their first fandisc, covering Musumaker, Otome Switch and Tincle★Twinkle Festival!. Cute Resort is a premium luxury resort where guests can openly enjoy both ero and leisure. However, nowadays it is only visited by virtuous guests and the important ‘ero’ is nowhere to be seen. It had become just like any other resort.
Aiming to accomplish its original goal of being an ecchi resort, the ‘Ero Cute’ management group decided to invite three full-fledged perverts who would not hesitate to do erotic things in front of others to enjoy the facilities. Their two-night stay with their sex partners will be the most perverted and erotic time that the resort has ever witnessed.
Fandiscs usually are all about the H and you can bet that Digital Cute is going all out on this one.
While not my type of game I appreciate them being direct and honest about what they made. Here’s a brothel for our established characters, go have fun.
Digital Cute heroines are pretty high on the perversion scale.
Curio Dealer
Company: AXL
Game site: キュリオディーラー
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
Rajasthan is a town that sits at the foot of a huge tower that is said to have been built by an ancient civilization and is so tall that it appears it can reach the heavens. There are many unknown machines and objects found in the tower which can be sold for large sums of money, but it is guarded by robots which seek to exterminate all intruders. It is up to adventurers to complete this dangerous job of obtaining these treasures.
Rowan is a young man who runs a used goods shop, mainly repairing and identifying treasures which adventurers retrieve from the tower. However, every day he wondered if he should be following in the footsteps of his late grandfather, who was one of the best treasure hunters the town had ever seen.
That’s when a girl carrying a huge sword visited his shop. It was one of the most prized treasures which belonged to an adventurer who had once reached the pinnacle of the tower but did not ultimately return. She told him that she wished to know why her father did not come back and aspired to be an adventurer to see the same views as him. He decided to help her attain her unrealistic dream.
At some point, AXL is gonna run out of flowers to name their characters. In the meantime, we’ll get to enjoy more adventure-style games. This one seems kinda normal, with the stereotypical protagonist with a hidden past partnering with a heroine who wants to attain something in an ‘endless tower’. I almost feel like making it a roguelike RPG would be interesting, but that’s not AXL’s forte.
Envisioning the giant tower openly and defiantly scaling the heavens in anticipation of the eroge heroines strenuous scaling forces me to somewhat agree with Micchi’s roguelike comment. After all when the driving force behind Axl’s babeling ero tower is “Let’s get next stage” as said stage, as we can all figure out at this point in time “It’s higher”. Such brilliant logic does a good job in summing up a roguelike style of gameplay. Though I for one would prefer a bit more motivation, my fears were put to rest by the prospect of “come together”. With the assurance of harem route being the goal behind the grind I can only “Don’t be afraid” to get behind such a brilliant idea. Good job Micchi, now if you could only convince Axl we would have an award winner on our hands.
In all seriousness though story is just generic contrived reason to throw some heroines in a typical rpg dungeon with a protagonist in the hopes something interesting, and probably ero happens. My only real gripe besides the general aspirations towards mediocrity and an apparent lack of an english dictionary among the staff, is how little effort was put into establishing the setting and the world built around it. Especially when we are expected to read about said world for a few hours on end given the central nature of the whole magical ero tower. I wouldn’t go into Curio Dealer expecting much besides contrived reasons for protagonist to explode out the tip of the tower at the climax of glorious H scene routes.
At least they’ll be sure to be alone up there.
Unless there is some creepy demon lord or god up there being a voyeur.
Shamrock no Hanakotoba
Company: DOLCE
Game site: シャムロックの花言葉
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
New release date after being pushed back from May. Kouko heard an unbelievable rumour that her friend Nanaka was doing compensated dating and questioned her about it, but Nanaka brushed her off and run away. Worried about her friend, she started to search for her and ended up participating in the same activity as well. She hated it at first, but it was difficult to obtain information about this shady community unless she had first-hand experience. What she found inside was that Nanaka had become obsessed with the man who had also defiled her, and she decided to sell her own body to save her friend. It would be a negative cycle that would also entangle friends Matsuri and Aki…
Sounds like a dark nukige. That is the worst plan ever.
Well… that’s dark. Not terribly believable either. Can’t imagine someone sitting there and thinking “Well since my friend is a prostitute I’ll become one too.” as most people realize that is not a good thing. I mean sure kids are dumb, and can be convinced to do a lot of things through peer pressure, but I think if this seemed like a good idea to someone they would have been darwin’d by forgetting how to breathe at a much earlier point in time.
Hatarakanai Honey Life
Company: LimeCat
Game site: ハタラカナイはにーらいふ
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This is the first title by LimeCat. The protagonist is proud of being completely ordinary, but this summer his life has been turned upside-down. This was because his four childhood friends had shut themselves in his home!
After two years of being hikikomoris, their parents finally had enough and gave them the choice of finding a part-time job or being sent off to do manual labour for distant relatives. Of course, they chose the former, which was a government program to help hikikomoris return to normal. He was entrusted with helping them for the duration of the summer vacation. He hoped to fulfill their parents’ requests and to help them return to how they were before. At the same time, they all came to him since they held secret feelings for him. Thus begins their summer days together breaking free from NEET.
Neither the art nor synopsis suggests that this will be worth my time. Pass.
A first game is important for a company. It is what establishes their name, giving all potential customers a means to evaluate future products. Thus I can only find thinking Limecat would have any future products an extremely optimistic assessment. Sure, anyone can understand addressing your target audience with something easily relatable, but overdoing it with added arbitrary excuses for H to happen is not a good way to start things off. So should a miracle happen and Limecat survive long enough to publish another game in the future I would suggest they simplify their subject matter, while limiting any character traits to singular heroines.
Rhapsodic Holiday
Company: コンフィチュールソフト (Confiture Soft)
Game site: ラプソディック・ホリデイ
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
Asuma is an amnesiac who was guided by the talking owl Poritan to the town of Hisuigaoka, which was rife with phantom thieves. After many twists and turns, he ended up joining a group of phantom thieves who were normal students by day, but operated during the night.
One day, the school principal Uta, who was also one of their clients, asked them to steal the emotional energy (FCP – Fragment Component Partes) which was being used for evil deeds. He had the feeling that excitement lies ahead in his future, but also felt a tinge of nostalgia.
“It’ll be the key to regaining your memories.”
This game is all over the place, with magicians, androids, thieves, ninjas… and a talking owl that loves whisky and pistachios. I guess every phantom thief needs a classy sidekick. Game’s probably quite a hoot, but I’ll be looking elsewhere.
There have been many games over the years with chaotic stories which make little to no sense. This time however I am just in awe at their fevered devotion to Confiture’s lord and savior, chaotic insanity. Normally many eroge seem to choose their plot from a random strip of paper chosen out of the director’s hat. Rhapsodic Holiday feels as though they made the hat, were all fired up and ready to choose when someone brilliantly suggested throwing the hat in the air and using all of the plot suggestions at once to cover all bases. This apparently somehow seeming like a good idea to the rest of the staff whereby they went ahead and made it happen. Much to the chagrin of the rest of the thinking world who happen to gaze upon this dark bible of madness. One can only assume if anyone reads and or tries to make sense of Rhapsodic Holiday they will themselves lose all sanity.
Yamizome Revenger -Ochita Maou to Ochiru Senki-
Company: エスクード (Escu:de)
Game site: 闇染Revenger -墜ちた魔王と堕ちる戦姫-
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
Kazunori is an extremely normal student. However, his soul became linked with the demon king Criveherz, who had committed all kinds of impudent acts in another world and was being chased by the Goddess Fein. Determined to vanquish the demon king once and for all, she sent heroines from the other world to continue chasing them.
Even though Kazunori was worried about his future, the demon king reassured him that their pursuers are also weakened in this world and that he will use his powers to make them into his own harem. Kazunori was attracted by the prospect of having a harem, but his life has surely been turned upside-down!
The story is a bit darker than usual from Escu:de, but the main part of their games is the gameplay. You have to gather intel in the day and fight the heroines at night, choosing areas of the city where you have an advantage. The battle itself is semi-automated, where you choose from a deck of skills. The objective is to taint their heart gems with darkness and corrupt them, making them your servants. Seems more simplistic than usual. I guess it’ll appeal more to those that like corruption games (like dualtail’s VenusBlood series).
I can only speak for myself when I say the logic of sending a tarted up power ranger harem at ye olde rascally demon lord is not the best idea one could make if the intent is not to stab him in the back after he has been sexually exhausted. Personally I would have found this a lot more amusing should they have made the power ranger harem men. Would have been funny to have a gay demon king trying to rape those heroines while the protagonist must resist his inner demon. Sure it needs some heroines so just place the usual five all over randomly and turn it into some karmic system where if you are a good boy you can fight off the evil yaoi. While should you make bad boy choices, even if its just something silly like your stereotypical sexual harassment or lucky pervert scenes you end up giving into the evil. At least then I would feel invested in making the right choices and resisting any short term temptations.
The main problem I have always had with any eroge that includes some form of actual gameplay is how tedious it becomes. This is especially brought into relief when replaying for another route where you have to repeat the same actions over and over where all that gameplay gimmickry becomes a time waster that prevents me from caring about finishing the game. So on that level I am hoping a simplified system that’s not too intrusive or time wasting can make things easier on multiple playthroughs. Or someone will just have a “Skip stupid repetitive so called “Gameplay”” button for successive playthrough on such eroge. Now if this turns out to be the case and they adopted my above scenario I would be very interested in the game. At least there would have been plenty to laugh at. As is not much here other than an excuse for demonic h scenes to happen so take that as you will.
Uchi no Kanojo
Company: Argonauts
Game site: 家の彼女
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This is the first title by Argonauts, a sister company of MOONSTONE. Keisuke started working this year and is satisfied with his life, since he found a job in his desired field, even though it’s for a small company. However, despite the motivation and satisfaction of living alone for the first time, he did feel a bit tired from it and wondered if he should find a girlfriend.
Then one day, his younger childhood friend Ayame came to his place. Her parents had to leave overseas for work and were worried about leaving her alone just before the important examination period, so they told her to stay with him as he was quite close with their family. Living together under the same roof, they soon began to view each other as more than just childhood friends.
This is planned to be the first of three titles, followed by Uchi no Imouto (Riho, CV: Kanau) and Uchi no Koibito (Chika, CV: Ayumi Sara). It’s a similar strategy as the one taken by feng, where they focus on one heroine and your time together with her. Ayame is voiced by Yuina. If she’s your type and you want a break from reading longer games like Summer Pockets, feel free to do so. It only costs under 3000 yen after all.
Not much to say here as it is what it is. Well other than questioning the competence of Ayame’s parents. As unless their goal was to feed their daughter to Mr. Protagonist I find their choice of action rather suspect.
What I got out of it was that you should befriend as many childhood friends (and their parents) as possible and good things will happen in your future.
Well that’s advice as good as any if you think you may be an eroge protagonist.
If that means a long-lost imouto will show up one day, yes I am.
Miagete Goran, Yozora no Hoshi o Interstellar Focus
Company: PULLTOP
Game site: 見上げてごらん、夜空の星を Interstellar Focus
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
This variety pack contains a mini ‘if’ story, a comical astronomy quiz, a binaural drama CD, a duet by Hikari and Saya of the opening song, and a BGM soundtrack. Pretty much a mini fandisc with a bunch of goods. It might be worth it if you’re already invested in the series.
A fandisk for a game that I cannot even recall existing.
Koi wa Sotto Saku Hana no You ni
Company: ensemble
Game site: 恋はそっと咲く花のように
Release date: June 29, 2018
Comments:
Even though he’s just a student, Rei is also the cook at his family’s Western restaurant Trattoria Felice. It’s hard work for him and his mother, but they are loved by the townspeople.
One day when he left home early, he met a girl at the station platform whose radiance captivated him. His meeting with Iori, a third-year student who transferred into his school Shisuikan Gakuen, was the beginning of many other encounters and the start of a budding romance that will lead to marriage.
There’s no trap protagonist this time, but other than that, it seems to be a solid chara-ge with another stellar cast (Kusuhara Yui, Shimizu Ai, Akino Hana, Ayumi Sara, Kitami Rikka and Fujisaki Usa). Osananajimi Misato and younger cousin Nazuna are my picks, unsurprisingly. Hau~ omochikaeri~!
Now I am going to end up feeling paranoid as I can only regard this as a trap by Ensemble. Where something will happen after the introductory part of the common route and the protagonist will find some contrived reason to play his trap card revealing it really was an Ensemble game all along. Yes I know they have done non trap protagonists before, but it sure is rare.
Perhaps aside from the lack of trap the most surprising thing is that the plot is rather down to earth for Ensemble. Usually the story would go something like protagonist must cross dress for the sake of feeding the goldfish in the girls only aquarium that doubles as a high school because only he is the destined fish whisper who can truly shake a can of fish food above their tank. When something just a touch simpler would have served the plot and characters better. Especially as their writing has not exactly been stellar. The high point probably being the painting game while everything since has been a long ride down a steep hill. Thus my surprise at a game where simplicity may result in something worth a second look. Perhaps Ensemble finally realized that their batshit insanity was no longer cutting it as justification for littering their office in traps. It will be nice if they just focus on making some appealing characters with a nice story for each. Then one day when we least expect it they can get us to fall for a fresh pitfall. Till then I’ll give them another chance by wading into another potential minefield.
Micchi’s Top 3 for This Month
- Summer Pockets
- Making＊Lovers Geki Icha After Story Vol.02
- Koi wa Sotto Saku Hana no You ni
Zen’s Top 3 for This Month
- Koi wa Sotto Saku Hana no You ni
- Uchi no Kanojo
- Making＊Lovers Geki Icha After Story Vol.02
I lead a double life too. I play mobage during the day and eroge at night.
My double life is blending into society during the day as a cover for my alter ego; the masked sleeper at night.