does little to subvert the medium and is content to slip into the same pitfalls of those it mocks. in one hand From Madness chides the pathetic dating sim reader while providing genre-typical suggestive CGs with surface level character arcs in the other; the extent of infantilistic Marshmallow's sexualisation is abject considering his route is best enjoyed last and sunken cost has long since passed. the only semblance of shock i experienced was the distasteful sexual assault and extortion ending which goes without a specific trigger warning.
i actually did enjoy how the concept of language and the difficulty of communication while navigating romance is explored across the cast. a lot is easily understandable if one knows how to engage with the text, though i wish people would stop throwing around the insipid term "schizo" to refer to absurdist dialogue.
anticipation vs experience can be really disappointing. Aorta is cute i guess🙄

I absolutely adored how simultaneously confusing and clear this game's plot was. I played every route and had a field day going through them all. My only complaint is that I couldn't really figure out how to stop fast-forwarding when I was replaying, but that was probably a me problem.

For those going in blind, I 100% recommend doing Marshmallow's route last. The impact his route leaves, after you put everything together, is incredibly painful but worth the wait.

Don't go in expecting to understand everything from the first playthrough, that's the point! There were many times where I thought back to certain scenes and realized why they did actions that, at the time, made no sense to me. You'll go through that a lot!

If you end up giving this lovely VN a shot, be prepared for anything!

I didn't expect how much I'd ADORE this game. This thing is like a hilarious fever dream with really good pixel art, until it suddenly pivots into tugging at your heartstrings at the end of every route. Think Hatoful Boyfriend with less worldbuilding and on 10x the crack.

It's obvious where some liberties were taken with the translation- there're some very obviously Western-exclusive references inserted- but the game itself is already such a fever dream that said translations never feel out-of-place, and are always hilarious.

Went for Marshmallow first but ended up converting to thinking Saeki Best Boi.

My biggest criticisms:
1) It was too short. Maybe it only makes sense for an absurd comedy game to keep it short so it doesn't overstay its welcome, but I became so attached to the characters that I lament I couldn't spend more time with them.

2) It's a bit broken. Specifically the text box. With most visual novels, you have the option when replaying the game to skip through text you've already read, and stop when it gets to something you haven't seen yet. This game does have that function, but it annoyingly will either not work, or work after you finagle with it by checking the "History", but not actually stop when you get to something new and just keep speeding through text.

That said: please, give this game more attention, if you can. There's a lot to, if not love, appreciate.

i never cackled so loud playing an otome game before this. the comedic timing was very good and saeki's voice being so purposefully loud it clips is just so funny to me. i have a particular sense of humor and it's usually hard to make me laugh but this game's utter stupidity matched mine to a T. i work in localization for otome games, so i can imagine how much fun it must have been to write the english script for this.

however, i did feel like the endings were not at all satisfying and could have been more developed. they had the potential to be really deep or meaningful. perhaps with a bit more effort on the story, this could have become a cult favourite, but the game is still good for what it is.