Now a review from me as well; I've spent happily quite some time with playing. ^^
As some random stuff at first, I totally love the soundtracks~ Especially "The Mistress and The Self-Proclaimed God" and "Morale Heartbeat". <3 Also, the art... sure, there were some anatomy-mistakes, but to think that you drew all of these pics by yourself.. holy cow. o.o
The character-development overall is great. ^^ It was getting onto me that actually everyone has such bad luck... the happy and nice picture I kind of had in the beginning of the people fell apart more and more. You built up the game bit by bit, with a strong plot that had quite a couple of twists. ;]
I'm glad you focused on the story so much and made it really interesting, instead of making it depend too much on getting it on with some of the boys (that would've ruined it, I guess..).
Off to the characters/paths now tho.. and I apologize in advance that I write too much. >3<''
Yuri & Jun:
-Gotta say here, the way you tell the story makes me feel with Yuri. Not only the problems coming with his condition, but also the person he could never forget from his past and that he's kind of trapped in this lie and fake self he had built up. Good thing he can break out of it and be happy with Jun~
It's though strange how natural it was between Lucia and Yuri that they had doppelgangers.. cause seriously, they have both killed someone (and Yuri even his brother..). Sure, the story couldn't go on with them just wailing about it, but I thought there should have been some more talk about it.
-It was a bit disappointing that Jun had not much important screentime, but that positively changed in the final path. Her character got more depth, I think, by confessing to Lucia and Yuri. It's cool that she's a strong person her friends can depend on, even tho she's in this situation with her dad and such. ^^
Anastasia & Rico:
-It surprised me that Anastasia opened the door and defenitely wasn't the really evil bully here. But right after seeing that she was actually a rather good person, Lucia's doppelganger gets her... >_< That makes the whole thing quite bitter. Her suicide came also shocking, as it was pretty unexpected to me.
-To Rico's personality I couldn't really say much until the last two paths actually, when I got to know more about his wish and his relationship with Anastasia. In fact, he is actually also a good guy... and a reliable one, to say the least. After all he protected the others and died for them. His scenes with Anastasia truly were sad. At least they got some sort of happiness in death. T_T
Zhuyuan:
What to say about him... he's a psycho. ^^; And even tho I like psychos usually, I detest him.
I just dislike on his character, how he seems so much like the nice guy and then again like someone with a really strong murderous and brutal intent. What I mean is, I can not really forgive him for behaving how he does -in a way he knows how to be "normal" and nice, but refuses to see his mistakes and keeps on doing horrible things... for various reasons.
His childhood is there no complete excuse, and I wonder if his father actually knows into what exactly he had turned his son into.. I don't think anyone deserves such treatment.
For some reason I really like the "Repayment"-ending btw.. it felt like a good one to me, even though Lucia was now in a wheelchair. ^^;
Raphael:
He has a couple of different sides, that's why I see him as one of the most interesting characters even though I dislike him quite a lot after the final path when he went greedy for power.
What's breaking the view of him as the idol and upbeat, friendly character, is that he's God Mode... and that even on his path, he was difficult to see through; cause basically... even though he was there the good guy (and his actions were kinda justified due to the threat of Zhuyuan and Neo), one could easily see that he has huge criminal energy. It surprised me on his path that Lucia just got along... I thought she would at least question it when Raph threathened to blow Neo's house up.
Raphael's 3rd ending was also quite disturbing, as it get's to the epilogue... made me wonder who's now the actual mastermind. Plus the scene where the image of the actually good and helping doppelgangers that was built up during that path, is destroyed again -like a little reminder of the true nature of doppelgangers.
It was cool though how they fought together. ^^
Clifford:
At first he kinda just annoyed me, cause he wouldn't really tell Lucia enough details, and he seemed to be a bit of a wimp.. until he was really supporting Lucia and the others and also fought with all his powers for Shuang. Their love was really sweet and it was sad for Shuang to lose her only light by Zhuang who she actually trusted. Clifford somehow became a character that I really liked. ^^
Blake:
He's seeming like a sidekick in the story, but his path was actually good to clear some of Neo's bad reputation he got in the other paths and also reveal some stuff about Rico~
Blake's a quite enjoyable character though, who cares and worries actually a lot about other people; it was pretty cute how he cared about Lucia. ^.^ And his misspelling of names is epic -I liked that this also had a reason, and wasn't just some random quirk. XD
Neo:
Somehow I didn't think of him to be obtainable at all or even as the true path character (thought it would be Raphael, even tho on his path a lot of things remained in the dark)... I dunno why actually. Guess it's cause he seemed like a mysterious and maybe also quite evil guy.
As a character in general, he's well developed cause he seems just so authentic, kinda. Maybe that impression also comes up cause Lucia spends much time with him and lots of random things come up...so you get a lot to know about him -pity it's not with all characters that way ...but I think that would take way too much time off the story~
Anyway; despite him being cool, I really didn't think I would like Neo that much.. but was in fangirl-mode when he hugged Lucia all of sudden on the lake~ ^w^;
Lucia:
Well, her character is mostly defined by the action the player choses, I'd guess.
I just can say that I feel sorry for Lucia, having to hear people say stuff like it might had been better for her parents if she had died instead of her sister. When her father is helping her with shooting, she luckily learns that her parents love her for being herself and that she doesn't need to be like her sister... that was so emotional~ She's a cool heroine. ^^
I'm btw wondering, what key it is that Lucia is wearing around her neck?
Ignatius:
It's too sad that there's no way to save him from getting blown up. >.< But that leads me to another thing: I'm not really familiar with what stuff students have to do with... but what the heck does Ignatius with a labor that even has a self-destruct mechanism?! O.o
Chunxiang, Shuang, Zhuang:
Actually, I liked these three as the good trio fighting against Zhuyuan and his family. But you twisted the plot a lot more~ It just was too good to be true, ne. ;_;
-I'm totally a fan of Chunxiang as cute but crazy axe-swinging lolita~ But at the point when she also revealed to be the evil one siding up Zhuang, I kinda thought "Screw what I said about her being cute, she's hella creepy". XD
Well, I got a weakness for insane characters... and after all; she indeed does have a reason to be a bit insane -thanks to a certain Zhuyuan~
Also, I liked the Yin And Yang-ending where these two killed eachother somehow better (even tho poor Neo got traumatized and it's a tad of a bad end). I think it's rather giving them peace when they're dead -or I just like such endings, who knows.
-It feel's a bit fishy to me, that Shuang didn't know anything about how doppelgangers work -after all she is part of the Lee-family ...I would think that she somehow got a bit to know about that. Also, she seems quite okay with people being killed by Raphael for example..
That doesn't fit the picture of the really purehearted girl.. but, everyone makes mistakes; no matter for what reasons. After all she's even ready to sacrifice herself to kill Zhuang and save the everyone. So, she was someone I wished a good ending together with her beloved the most, though. She surely deserves finally some happiness. ^^
-Zhuang and Chunxiang were actually quite a cute and pure couple, until it was revealed that they're both evil (he more than her). ^^' Guess I saw that pretty late coming that he really is evil, even though Raph's path made him already very suspicious (insane looking face etc. XD)... but my focus of the villain was more on Shuang then. But coming to Clifford's path, Zhuang obviously changes and it's clear that he defenitely isn't the nice guy (T.T). You made him even into an extreme opposite of being the sweet boy; cause he isn't just the sinister true doppelganger, he also has a really rotten character... sadistic and sick.
Too bad I like such characters as well. XD Guess I'm just weird like that, but I wondered what exactly he could have done to the others if he had won in the final ending~ ...yes, I am defenitely weird. Forgive me. x3
Zhuang is somehow really my favourite character here~ Loved the laughter you put in for him in the end btw... pity that the sounds in general were quite repitive tho...
Uff... @.@ I
tried to keep it short. Sorry. XD (I cut a couple of things I wrote out and it still is so much...orz)
Some "technical" stuff now tho..
-All of the three videos wouldn't play in the game (what's sad cause I'd like to see them~), they would freeze after a few secods... I tried in fullscreen and window, but it didn't help. :/
-You said depending on the ending, the title screen will change. But why's the screen for Raphael's endings there when I've been on Blake's paths? ^^;
-After I got the ending Sister's Chains, the game didn't return to the title screen but jumped on the point where Raphael just ran away with his doppelganger after Shuang appeared on the scene when they used Clifford as bait...
Sooo.. to kinda make it short (comin' late with this, ne~), I really love this game. First I thought it might get boring at some point, but it didn't. ^^ You know how to do storytelling and I can't wait to see how you will improve to your next VN/story (cause I think your writing style did improve from the Fantasia series... then again, this VN was more focused on the storytelling than the others, I guess).
Thanks for making that game, I'd say~ ;D
Again, I'm so sorry for writing so much and taking space away. >.< Might apologize with some fanart of Zhuang maybe, haha~
Sorry for the late reviews and comments. I've been studying for exams and.. I'm not allowed to use the internet. XD Well.. Here's my comments:
This is the cutest path for me! Especially the Path 3!
