Review: Hakuouki ~ Demon of the Fleeting Blossom (PSP) Firstplay

THIS REVIEW HAD SOME MINOR & MAJOR SPOILERS, BE WARY.

NOTIMPORTANT Notes: Okay, to put it frankly, I still have to say a lot of thank you-s for my friends at #bakagroup. You know guys, I feel bad. ;-; I don't know. To be honest. I will definitely get my revenge gift back next year. Promised!

Game description:

Title: Hakuouki ~ Demon of the Fleeting Blossom 
Ratings: 17+ - M-RATED (RATED BY ESRB)
Comments: I think what made this different from other standard edition is because the limited edition is granted with Collectible Artbook & Hakuouki Soundtrack CD.
Recommendation: Teenagers who love bishounen and visual novel, of course, duh.

This game is the very first game that I could BEAT in only four and half hours. Well, that is my very first record on beating the game so fast, but what could you expect? This is a visual-novel game-like, so what you could do is to pay attention to the routes and options and save as many as you can.

Well, I will review this game since I have played and pulled all nighter since 26 of April, the very first day where I got this game till today, the morning of 27th of April. I have beaten Souji Okita's Route and to be honest, I am not quite satisfied. Seemed that the flow of the story in Souji's Route gone meh. I need moar of this SoujiChizuru pairing but I guess the officials supported Hijitaka more. Never mind me ranting! D: But of course dearies, that didn't make me less love my friends and Souji, I am just not a fan of the plot. Updates will be said in related links. Click read-more.


REVIEW:

A scene of Okita Souji in the Route

Let's start from reviewing Chapter 01. Okay, this game started by the narrator introduced our main character. But firstly, we will need to set up the name for the MC. The default last name will always be Yukimura (since it will be crucial to your progress later) and the first name is set to Chizuru. If you haven't watched the adaptation, you might change the name to your real name or anything. But for me, I am more comfortable by using the character's given name. And so, Chizuru Yukimura is the female protagonist that I need to run through on gaining the loves of bishounens in this game. Well, so far the bishounen that attracted me much is Okita Souji. But it might not suit your cup of tea. But I will review this game in general, so okay.


Well, the narrative texts will tell you that there is a young woman who lived with his father in Edo named as Chizuru (later I will continue on calling her MC). She is the daughter of Kodo Yukimura, a Dutch-educated (Yes, Dutch, oh lovely I am afraid that it could relate to the situation that Japan had in this timeline) doctor that went to Kyoto for months. They promised to exchange mails every day, but the father eventually stopped and made the daughter worried about him. Thus, the MC decided to go to Kyoto and sarched for Doctor Matsumoto who is actually said-acquintance of his father and needed to find him if she wanted to know what happened to her father.

So, the young Yukimura dressed herself as a man and traveled to Kyoto alone. Too bad though, in her very first night she had gotten in trouble with some ronins and finally something that shouldn't be unseen. Thus, she was captured by the Shinsengumi because she practically saw everything. That everything is the warriors of Shinsengumi were mercilessly slaughtered all the ronins and had a pair of red eyes and lustful need of blood. That lead to the captains, Hijikata Toushiro, Okita Souji and Saitou Hajime to finally meet with the MC that hid accidentally from the ronins. From there on, the MC will live her life finding his father with the help of the Shinsengumi, although there are many dark secrets in the organisation that we eventually find out.

So far, this prologue chapter gives you two options that could lead to the bishounen routes. This prologue is so far so good because the flow of the explanation is well-explained. Even though the very first explanation about the MC is quite face-paced.The game would decide whether you get bad and good ending by paying attention on the status of the bishounens you wanted to live with. There are Romance and Corruption bar in which, you need to pay dear attention to it, because whether Bad Ends and True End are related to these bars. So pay close attention.

There are no other features that you will actually use at your gameplay, reminded that this is only a visual novel game, and the only thing you do is to see the game through choose up your choices. Don't be fooled by good-looking opinions, or it might totally stray you from your original path.

My own impression about Souji is as expected. He is quite the sadist and he is not seldom said to the MC that he is going to kill her if she is in his way. He said that so many times and eventually became a very cute point for both Souji and the MC in the later chapters! My gaming experience on playing Souji's Route is less pleasant than the prologue. Souji's Route for me is very (not very, but very very /shot) fast-paced, and the story is somewhat quite ... straying. And Souji himself is one and only bishounen that will die fast eventually because of his tuberculosis. But that doesn't make Souji less sweeter. <3 The good ending (the one that I get) is ... well, couldn't approve my logic and expectation. But I guess it is quite normal for some people, I guess I can't complain more.

Further next to the progression. We could see tha this game really far-fetched from the real history. However, you must know that even though it is far-fetched, those bishounen would not let you disappointed!

I know right. I have loved this pairing even before I started playing Hakuouki. D:

Don't worry guys. I have a batch of images to upload. I will get this time later.

UPDATES:

2012.
04/26: Gotten the game. Played Chapter 01 - Chapter 06.
04/27: Played Chapter 07 - Chapter 08. Souji's Route GET. Three missing CGs in Okita Souji's Gallery. Found 31/100 CGs in one gameplay.