To me, dating sims since Tokimeki are about a way to see high school life through the relationships formed in that period (romantic ones, yes, but isn't love important, even more so in those teen years?). It's interesting to see how Amagami reflects about that period in contrast to Tokimeki philosophy.
Though it would be easy to point out that Tokimeki is a strategy based game while Amagami gets rid of any numbers to focus on character events, it says very little to compare this premise. Comparing the results of the approach, however, reveals opposite views on the same topic.
Tokimeki view is interested in taking the whole 3 years of high school period and making most of the routine days as a build up transition toward the "greatest hits", special events where to make sure to leave a mark through exaggeration. This exaggeration with some fantasy touches can even be seen in the girls' designs, where you could even differentiate them by their hair color, which clashes with Amagami’s more down to earth black haired ones (brown at most). Amagami prefers to select a small period of the high school life, the last 6 weeks before exams and graduation take away any socialization possibility, and to put every single day under a magnifying glass. Every day is divided between the four class breaks in which the decision is not what aspect to improve or what club to join, but in what event to witness, or in similar terms, who to spend time with.
These events have two particularities. First, contrasting with the big hits of Tokimeki that usually happen outside of school or in special school events, the vast majority of Amagami scenes are presented within a normal routine context within the school. Not a great number of big events will happen in just six weeks, and even the most exceptional cases are treated with relative calmness. While in Tokimeki the school is then just a transitory tool to get somewhere else, via clubs or meeting other people casually, the school in Amagami is thought out as a net (or a grid in the literal game terms) to form and develop relationships. Amagami thinks that the school is where the magic really happened, not around it. That the memories slowly forged day by day. This is evidenced by the planning stage background, the room that was the headquarters of Tokimeki is just the place to recall the day in Amagami, a school background will be present when making the event decisions.
Secondly, by focusing on spending time during breaks and visually (and mechanically) representing those moments through a grid, a series of consequences can be seen. The grid ends up becoming a sort of mental map of memories, or better said, memories of opportunities. It’s easy to navigate the map by the end of the game and see who you decided to spend more time with. It's not only what you actually did, but the lost opportunities implicit in other dating sims here are made explicit. If some people had a lot of events completed, some others had just a few. If a new event being unlocked is important because it means new opportunities, closed events, be it by time limit or by exclusive choices, are just as, if not more, impactful. The mental map is not only defined by what was lived but by what was left behind because not even the most optimized run will see a 5% of the possibilities realized, and I'm giving a generous estimation. It paints a canvas where the memory is not a selection of highlights but a collage of seen and unseen events, the school as a more conceptual formational place through meetings rather than a concrete moments generator.
Likewise, those lost opportunities impact on the direct or indirect treatment of the main character and the girls. The girls who you spend the most time with will begin to rely on you whenever they are in conflict, while the ones you barely talked to can only be interacted through scenes where you hear some loose conversation about them or remember and wonder what they might be up to now, too late to form a bond. Again, there is a contrast between the confidence of who you kept close and the melancholy of seeing people you didn't even get to know well gaining distance.
At the end of Tokimeki one felt that everything happened too quickly, thanks to weeks passing in seconds and minor events lasting just a few lines of dialogue, questioning oneself if that unrepeatable formative time was really well spent. The transience of a life focused on getting a girlfriend will make you reflect if most of the time isn’t getting lost. Amagami reaches a similar conclusion, but by explicitly marking the lost roads and realizing that it was impossible to have it all. In this way, the desire to go back and repeat a fantasy until it gets fulfilled is substituted by a reality where, even if turning back, the same overbearing feeling would still persist. And that’s when the decisions taken casually gain a new weight. Seeing it like this, it's no mystery why 2009’s Amagami is set in the 90s.
Though it would be easy to point out that Tokimeki is a strategy based game while Amagami gets rid of any numbers to focus on character events, it says very little to compare this premise. Comparing the results of the approach, however, reveals opposite views on the same topic.
Tokimeki view is interested in taking the whole 3 years of high school period and making most of the routine days as a build up transition toward the "greatest hits", special events where to make sure to leave a mark through exaggeration. This exaggeration with some fantasy touches can even be seen in the girls' designs, where you could even differentiate them by their hair color, which clashes with Amagami’s more down to earth black haired ones (brown at most). Amagami prefers to select a small period of the high school life, the last 6 weeks before exams and graduation take away any socialization possibility, and to put every single day under a magnifying glass. Every day is divided between the four class breaks in which the decision is not what aspect to improve or what club to join, but in what event to witness, or in similar terms, who to spend time with.
These events have two particularities. First, contrasting with the big hits of Tokimeki that usually happen outside of school or in special school events, the vast majority of Amagami scenes are presented within a normal routine context within the school. Not a great number of big events will happen in just six weeks, and even the most exceptional cases are treated with relative calmness. While in Tokimeki the school is then just a transitory tool to get somewhere else, via clubs or meeting other people casually, the school in Amagami is thought out as a net (or a grid in the literal game terms) to form and develop relationships. Amagami thinks that the school is where the magic really happened, not around it. That the memories slowly forged day by day. This is evidenced by the planning stage background, the room that was the headquarters of Tokimeki is just the place to recall the day in Amagami, a school background will be present when making the event decisions.
Secondly, by focusing on spending time during breaks and visually (and mechanically) representing those moments through a grid, a series of consequences can be seen. The grid ends up becoming a sort of mental map of memories, or better said, memories of opportunities. It’s easy to navigate the map by the end of the game and see who you decided to spend more time with. It's not only what you actually did, but the lost opportunities implicit in other dating sims here are made explicit. If some people had a lot of events completed, some others had just a few. If a new event being unlocked is important because it means new opportunities, closed events, be it by time limit or by exclusive choices, are just as, if not more, impactful. The mental map is not only defined by what was lived but by what was left behind because not even the most optimized run will see a 5% of the possibilities realized, and I'm giving a generous estimation. It paints a canvas where the memory is not a selection of highlights but a collage of seen and unseen events, the school as a more conceptual formational place through meetings rather than a concrete moments generator.
Likewise, those lost opportunities impact on the direct or indirect treatment of the main character and the girls. The girls who you spend the most time with will begin to rely on you whenever they are in conflict, while the ones you barely talked to can only be interacted through scenes where you hear some loose conversation about them or remember and wonder what they might be up to now, too late to form a bond. Again, there is a contrast between the confidence of who you kept close and the melancholy of seeing people you didn't even get to know well gaining distance.
At the end of Tokimeki one felt that everything happened too quickly, thanks to weeks passing in seconds and minor events lasting just a few lines of dialogue, questioning oneself if that unrepeatable formative time was really well spent. The transience of a life focused on getting a girlfriend will make you reflect if most of the time isn’t getting lost. Amagami reaches a similar conclusion, but by explicitly marking the lost roads and realizing that it was impossible to have it all. In this way, the desire to go back and repeat a fantasy until it gets fulfilled is substituted by a reality where, even if turning back, the same overbearing feeling would still persist. And that’s when the decisions taken casually gain a new weight. Seeing it like this, it's no mystery why 2009’s Amagami is set in the 90s.