I feel like a lot of the negative aspects in these reviews fail to understand the true appeal of what makes the first White Album so special. There seems to be a lot of comparisons to White Album 2 which seems like an unfair comparison despite literally being called WA2. While that is a 70+ hour romance drama with more than enough time to develop the main love interest/conflicts, this is essentially a dating sim-esque game with short scenarios on the side. I've only ever watched the WA2 anime, which in turn got me interested in playing through this game in the first place. That and the fact that this is developed by industry legend Leaf, who's only exposure I have is the ToHeart 1999 TV anime (incredible anime). I went in expecting a similar tone considering the original White Album was developed only a year after ToHeart, and I can thankfully say that I got what I wished for.
Everyone wants to disregard the conversational aspects of the game when that happens to be mostly what the game has going for it. My first playthrough of this was an ethereal experience. You read through the prologue to get a glimpse at the cast you're about to spend maybe 6 hours interacting with and every day is spent talking and chatting. It's always the most mundane shit like "nice weather huh" and it's the most pleasant feeling in the world. The MC, Fuiji, is the most generic self-insert character that it's both pretty bad and also funny at the same time. A lot of events will go like "You read any books lately?" to where the other person will list like 6 authors and Fuiji will say something like "Who????" With these events, you get a feel for the characters you love and those you don't. I for one hated Mana's annoying little sister archetype so I stopped talking to her on my first playthrough and talked more to Akira. One of my friends really loves Mana so I guess who you like is all a matter of personal preference.
The combination of day-to-day convos and those highly animated sprites and the fantastic music and the late 90s setting sets for one of the comfiest experiences reading through a VN. I love the soundtrack so much, especially the original songs like "Sound of Destiny" and the aforementioned "White Album". The first time I hit christmas eve and you stand next to Yuki staring at a sakura tree with snow falling and the “Seiya” track plays really emits that ethereal tone that I mentioned before. There's a lot of moments similar to that completely absorb you into this snowy Japanese urban landscape.
Rina's route was the first character route I aimed towards, being the poster child next to the childhood friend Yuki. Her scenario shares a lot of the same pros and cons that other routes face. I really loved her as a character and she exemplifies a lot of what makes these scenarios great. Adult themes, selfish desires, and imperfect personalities which lead to a sense of dread considering our MC has been in a relationship with Yuki for years. Every route centers around a developing romance with Yuki at the center point. Yuki's route in particular is very interesting as there are many attempts of characters unintentionally trying to separate you from Yuki. A lot of cool themes are introduced, but unfortunately every route ends very prematurely. I mean it when I say that these routes are short. Skipping all the conversations leads to a route being completed in maybe less than 2 hours. Characters do not really develop much in these scenarios. I went into Misaki's route expecting my opinion of her to change, but she ended up still being a rather boring heroine (although the end of it was pretty cool).
Which leads to the second main flaw in that after maybe 2 playthroughs, you can probably see about 90% of the conversations in the game. I originally wanted to get the steam achievements to read all the conversation events, but it soon becomes clear that it's a tedious task. The normal player isn't intended to read every conversation event because there are so many events that are only available after a certain other event. For instance, after a random conversation with Rina about hang-gliding, you can mention it to Mana, who's a huge fan, and she becomes astonished. There's so many random topics and events to encounter that I entered an event with Yuki relating to a book by complete accident. After reading most events, all that's left is reading scenarios, so in turn there becomes a lot of text to skip. A lot of what makes the game magical is skipped because there's and urge to read the other heroine's routes to the end. This isn't a game that should be played through multiple times as nothing ever really compares to the first playthrough.
Sayako as a character gains a lot of praise for having the best scenario. Being the newly introduced character for the remake version of the game, a lot more time is focused on her events in the game rather than her conversation events. While others can give nothing but praise, I found her route to be completely out of place compared to the rest of the game. It focuses on her departure from an idol group and learning to cope with her own problems. It seemed like an extended therapy session with Sayako, which could have been great, if it didn't try so hard to depart from the romance aspects built into the game's core. Every route has the same story beats and events involved with Yuki since she is the central figure in this game. Sayako holds somewhat of a grudge against her for seemingly no reason which leads to Yuki not being present in the scenario. All the little beats you expect are just nonexistent. Other characters really don't exist in Sayako's route. A romance between Sayako and Fuiji is implied, but never really shown. The scenario itself reminded me a lot of Oshi no Ko, and I fucking hate Oshi no Ko. It was a drag to read through, although others definitely love it a lot, so I may have just missed the point.
I loved my experience reading through White Album. It was a very relaxing game with a lot of interesting themes going for it, but every route ultimately ended too soon for anything drastic to develop. I read somewhere that the scenario writer for WA2 loved this game and wanted to explore the themes more which is very apparent from my little exposure to WA2. It's nothing to write home about in terms of writing, but the essence of the game itself is something magical. It's worth playing through at least once to experience the wonder of White Album, and then maybe playing it a few more times to read through the scenarios of characters you may like. I really loved Rina, Yuki, and Haruka's routes while the others were just fine. Treating this game as a full narrative experience, I'm sure a lot of people were disappointed reading through this for the first time, but I thought it was pretty neat.
Everyone wants to disregard the conversational aspects of the game when that happens to be mostly what the game has going for it. My first playthrough of this was an ethereal experience. You read through the prologue to get a glimpse at the cast you're about to spend maybe 6 hours interacting with and every day is spent talking and chatting. It's always the most mundane shit like "nice weather huh" and it's the most pleasant feeling in the world. The MC, Fuiji, is the most generic self-insert character that it's both pretty bad and also funny at the same time. A lot of events will go like "You read any books lately?" to where the other person will list like 6 authors and Fuiji will say something like "Who????" With these events, you get a feel for the characters you love and those you don't. I for one hated Mana's annoying little sister archetype so I stopped talking to her on my first playthrough and talked more to Akira. One of my friends really loves Mana so I guess who you like is all a matter of personal preference.
The combination of day-to-day convos and those highly animated sprites and the fantastic music and the late 90s setting sets for one of the comfiest experiences reading through a VN. I love the soundtrack so much, especially the original songs like "Sound of Destiny" and the aforementioned "White Album". The first time I hit christmas eve and you stand next to Yuki staring at a sakura tree with snow falling and the “Seiya” track plays really emits that ethereal tone that I mentioned before. There's a lot of moments similar to that completely absorb you into this snowy Japanese urban landscape.
Rina's route was the first character route I aimed towards, being the poster child next to the childhood friend Yuki. Her scenario shares a lot of the same pros and cons that other routes face. I really loved her as a character and she exemplifies a lot of what makes these scenarios great. Adult themes, selfish desires, and imperfect personalities which lead to a sense of dread considering our MC has been in a relationship with Yuki for years. Every route centers around a developing romance with Yuki at the center point. Yuki's route in particular is very interesting as there are many attempts of characters unintentionally trying to separate you from Yuki. A lot of cool themes are introduced, but unfortunately every route ends very prematurely. I mean it when I say that these routes are short. Skipping all the conversations leads to a route being completed in maybe less than 2 hours. Characters do not really develop much in these scenarios. I went into Misaki's route expecting my opinion of her to change, but she ended up still being a rather boring heroine (although the end of it was pretty cool).
Which leads to the second main flaw in that after maybe 2 playthroughs, you can probably see about 90% of the conversations in the game. I originally wanted to get the steam achievements to read all the conversation events, but it soon becomes clear that it's a tedious task. The normal player isn't intended to read every conversation event because there are so many events that are only available after a certain other event. For instance, after a random conversation with Rina about hang-gliding, you can mention it to Mana, who's a huge fan, and she becomes astonished. There's so many random topics and events to encounter that I entered an event with Yuki relating to a book by complete accident. After reading most events, all that's left is reading scenarios, so in turn there becomes a lot of text to skip. A lot of what makes the game magical is skipped because there's and urge to read the other heroine's routes to the end. This isn't a game that should be played through multiple times as nothing ever really compares to the first playthrough.
Sayako as a character gains a lot of praise for having the best scenario. Being the newly introduced character for the remake version of the game, a lot more time is focused on her events in the game rather than her conversation events. While others can give nothing but praise, I found her route to be completely out of place compared to the rest of the game. It focuses on her departure from an idol group and learning to cope with her own problems. It seemed like an extended therapy session with Sayako, which could have been great, if it didn't try so hard to depart from the romance aspects built into the game's core. Every route has the same story beats and events involved with Yuki since she is the central figure in this game. Sayako holds somewhat of a grudge against her for seemingly no reason which leads to Yuki not being present in the scenario. All the little beats you expect are just nonexistent. Other characters really don't exist in Sayako's route. A romance between Sayako and Fuiji is implied, but never really shown. The scenario itself reminded me a lot of Oshi no Ko, and I fucking hate Oshi no Ko. It was a drag to read through, although others definitely love it a lot, so I may have just missed the point.
I loved my experience reading through White Album. It was a very relaxing game with a lot of interesting themes going for it, but every route ultimately ended too soon for anything drastic to develop. I read somewhere that the scenario writer for WA2 loved this game and wanted to explore the themes more which is very apparent from my little exposure to WA2. It's nothing to write home about in terms of writing, but the essence of the game itself is something magical. It's worth playing through at least once to experience the wonder of White Album, and then maybe playing it a few more times to read through the scenarios of characters you may like. I really loved Rina, Yuki, and Haruka's routes while the others were just fine. Treating this game as a full narrative experience, I'm sure a lot of people were disappointed reading through this for the first time, but I thought it was pretty neat.