Sunday, March 17, 2013

Glass Heart Princess: Review



Title: Glass Heart Princess

Simple Synopsis: The heroine, Himeno Kyoko, is an ojousama who suddenly finds out towards the end of her high school third year summer vacation that she is diagnosed with "Glass Heart Syndrome" where basically if she doki doki's (in other words overexerts her heart) too much her heart will break. Thanks to her brilliant otaku maid, Satsuki, it’s decided with doctor’s approval that Kyoko has to fall in love to rehabilitate her heart, and thus love saves all. Kyoko is told to just go find some guy and confess so she has the options of her butler, Masaki Shinnosuke the militant fanatic, Karasuma Yukito, the rare cliche delinquent in the school, Asahina Tenma, the brilliant childish-looking school doctor, Hoshino Kanata, the spaced-out ditzy airhead 'student', and lastly a secret character that isn't so secretive. And note all the guys have some ‘other’ side to themselves.


For about 2/3 of the game is stat-raising and going on dates. Training involves choosing an activity for Kyoko such as exercising and reading manga, watching anime, and playing otoges to build resistance to heart-thumping situations. On Saturdays it's going on dates with the guys, afterwards choosing the next date and the cycle repeats for about 5 months 4 weeks each 3 training days and 1 date. The only common events are the school festival, where the guys work together to perform as a pop boys group, the Christmas date, and the first dream of the new year, where Kyoko has a parody dream about a guy.




My first impression was very cliche and silly, I mean it doesn’t get any worse than she'll die by doki doki-ing. Even so, it was fun imagining that kind of scenario so I was excited for the game when it was first announced. Also the art is pretty, the character sprites have a lot of different expressions and really interesting faces that really brings them to life, and the CGs are really colorful with some nice eye-candy. In my opinion, Otomate did well this time, GHP was a really enjoyable game, full of parodies for fans, fun characters, silly moments, full of fun choices for Kyoko, and full of little details that just made the game great. The system gets a little redundant after a while but the game’s short and they throw in something fun every now and then, keeping it interesting like Shinnosuke inviting his ‘teachers’ (characters from other games) so it’s not too bad. Personally I would have enjoyed maybe 1 or 2 more common events just to see all the characters act silly together especially with Satsuki but that’s just a minor personal feeling. Honestly at first, I thought Kyoko would have been a boring innocent ojousama but even though she kind of is, she still has enough personality to retort at others’ silliness, like when she puts Shinnosuke and Satsuki in their places when things get out of hand, and most importantly when it's important she takes action. But for me, Satsuki was what was really appealing. Seriously, every game needs a Satsuki! Because she's an otaku! a maid! and comments on things that happen, breaks the fourth wall, and teases Kyoko for various things. How can you not like her, she’s us!

Satsuki: My best record is 5 guys in 1 week.

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