My Best Friends: St. Andrew Jogakuen Hen is a Puzzle game, developed by ISCO and published by Atlus, which was released in Japan in 1996.
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it's a fun little platforming arcade rhythm game, but it is very wonky. Difficult to move the character onto the platforms to be able to collect the orbs, but it works well despite the fundamental flaw.
it's a fun little platforming arcade rhythm game, but it is very wonky. Difficult to move the character onto the platforms to be able to collect the orbs, but it works well despite the fundamental flaw.
Ah Atlus, a company that's long been the king of demon fusing and weird teens running around Tokyo. Their Shin Megami Tensei franchise being their one sole IP, it's understandable that their games would use common themes to span multiple genres. From the main series of RPGs, to puzzlers, like Catherine, and even the surgery simulation series, Trauma Center, there's a whole lot of SMT! Enter My Best Friends: St. Andrew Jogakuin Hen, a game they released on the Sega Saturn that unsurprisingly also suffers from an Atlus tax affliction on the secondhand market. No wonder though, as it tasks with you with one of the most Atlus tasks of all.
Saving young women from jigsaw puzzle demons.
This game places you into the role of a rather weak individual. With no demon summoning powers of your own, you meet a girl of your choice from St. Andrew Girl's College in a rather well-produced anime introduction. You're given a few moments to get to know said girl before they are captured by demons and turned into a jigsaw puzzle, perhaps as additional incentive to save them since you've certainly become fond of them within that brief period. With only a couple minutes to work, you are obligated to put the damsel back together before time runs out.
The game makes use of the Saturn's Shuttle Mouse if you like, though I used the normal Controller Pad. The latter working surprisingly well, as there's a button to speed up your cursor's movement, one to throw away a piece, and another to place one down. You're given four pieces to choose from at any one time, and though these are random, the shuffling places priority on the outermost pieces. Very clever design in all honesty, and there are a few other small little touches that give the player a variety of ways to complete the puzzle as fast as possible. Take, for example, the faded outline of the puzzle that you can also use to quickly suss out the proper resting place of a piece.
The key to advancing through this rather short game (took me about an hour to finish it I think) is to finish a stage before you run out of half of your total time. A goal which will often have you beating the stage with only seconds to spare. Saving a girl at that speed also prompts them to reward you with a generous display of themselves, many going so far as to expose their breasts. I thought this was kind of a weird way for these anime waifus to thank me, but hey, maybe it's common practice at that school. What a strange one these girls go to. Only in Japan! If you like this sort of bonus, that should give you extra incentive to hone your snappy puzzle-solving skills. Though, I just played this because I'm a hardcore Atlus fan.
Beating a stage also results in you getting a chick's phone number, which you can use to see the aforementioned showcases again. There are also little image galleries and bios, the latter of which are also present in the game's manual. Finishing all eight stages lets you see the credits and wraps up your short female-rescuing adventure nicely. Atlus was quite horny in this era, so they had a few other SMT games with some 18+ content in there. These are all surprisingly well-made considering the dismal quality such games usually have. Hence, my score. I probably won't play it again, but it's very well made for what it is. So, it's definitely an intriguing romp if you like historical finds like me, or if you're naughty. With that being said, I think the dumb joke baked into this review has been beaten to enough of a pulp, so I will stop now.
Saving young women from jigsaw puzzle demons.
This game places you into the role of a rather weak individual. With no demon summoning powers of your own, you meet a girl of your choice from St. Andrew Girl's College in a rather well-produced anime introduction. You're given a few moments to get to know said girl before they are captured by demons and turned into a jigsaw puzzle, perhaps as additional incentive to save them since you've certainly become fond of them within that brief period. With only a couple minutes to work, you are obligated to put the damsel back together before time runs out.
The game makes use of the Saturn's Shuttle Mouse if you like, though I used the normal Controller Pad. The latter working surprisingly well, as there's a button to speed up your cursor's movement, one to throw away a piece, and another to place one down. You're given four pieces to choose from at any one time, and though these are random, the shuffling places priority on the outermost pieces. Very clever design in all honesty, and there are a few other small little touches that give the player a variety of ways to complete the puzzle as fast as possible. Take, for example, the faded outline of the puzzle that you can also use to quickly suss out the proper resting place of a piece.
The key to advancing through this rather short game (took me about an hour to finish it I think) is to finish a stage before you run out of half of your total time. A goal which will often have you beating the stage with only seconds to spare. Saving a girl at that speed also prompts them to reward you with a generous display of themselves, many going so far as to expose their breasts. I thought this was kind of a weird way for these anime waifus to thank me, but hey, maybe it's common practice at that school. What a strange one these girls go to. Only in Japan! If you like this sort of bonus, that should give you extra incentive to hone your snappy puzzle-solving skills. Though, I just played this because I'm a hardcore Atlus fan.
Beating a stage also results in you getting a chick's phone number, which you can use to see the aforementioned showcases again. There are also little image galleries and bios, the latter of which are also present in the game's manual. Finishing all eight stages lets you see the credits and wraps up your short female-rescuing adventure nicely. Atlus was quite horny in this era, so they had a few other SMT games with some 18+ content in there. These are all surprisingly well-made considering the dismal quality such games usually have. Hence, my score. I probably won't play it again, but it's very well made for what it is. So, it's definitely an intriguing romp if you like historical finds like me, or if you're naughty. With that being said, I think the dumb joke baked into this review has been beaten to enough of a pulp, so I will stop now.