天下制覇

Good thing we even waffled on that in the end.

Impressions:

Well, that certainly was a bad ending, but I don't think that's the definition of bad they were going for. Nor does it fill be with a great deal of hope for the future. I guess given how much Japan (and the US recently for that matter) creams itself over stories that look light and bubbly but go dark (no matter how clumsily, badly, or superficial they are) I can sort of see why people like it, and the magic world stuff was at least a little more compelling than the filler crap that made up basically the first 80% of the game, but that wasn't exactly well-written either, and all the lack of CGs on what seemed like important moments really kept it from actually achieving that.

Also, the whole light/dark stuff is corny, dumb, and it's obnoxious how the entire cast persists in total ignorance because they're incapable of thinking about anything at anything other than the most superficial level, something that's been irking me more and more lately due to certain games I've been playing and translating. There's just something so weirdly patronizing, or perhaps naive, in a lot of Japanese writing that I don't see in Western nearly as much; characters unable to process things on anything but the most absolutely superficial level and then throw themselves a party when they reveal that they don't like eating pie because it's pie, but because they eat it with friends. Or worse, acting shocked when what someone was saying would happen for the last 10 hours, happens. Or pretending like that was a twist. And it gets really obnoxious when they spend long periods of time agonizing and narrating over it, especially when you have to translate that crap, rolling your eyes and wondering just how stupid the characters are supposed to be and how the author expected the audience to swallow that kind of crap. Then again, it's even worse when they try to go deeper, because then they display that they really do have the understanding of a 13 year old who just learned that WW2 had some economic upticks, so let's angst about whether or not war's a good thing for a few hours.

Anyway, taking a week or two off from this to do winter season preview and other holiday stuff before resetting time and going into the shocking reveals about how the dark being persecuted and locked away, and never allowing witches to feel pain all through the end of this route, are somehow bad things in some way that I could never possibly imagine.

Our Story Thus Far:

Our non-story picks up with us pretending we can use magic to sexually harass girls, same as how the game began. We feel like we're waiting for somebody, but know nobody's going to come. The bell rings. It's the first day of class for the new term. Sidekick is mad at us for not grabbing us to gawk at girls' underwear. Ringo's late again, so we rush off to go wake her up. We find her already up and on her way to class. She hits us when we declare she ruined our plan to assault her in her sleep. She's mad that we didn't wake her up, but we say she's not our girlfriend, so suck it up. She gets flustered.

Later, we get berated some more. The teacher warns us about rumors of perverts around the school lately and to hurry home at night. We get pissy at the class rep for not doing his job right. We try to hit on Ringo and her friends, but get rebuffed. Ringo's fired up because they're in the semis. She says we're allowed to go into the girls dorm ONLY to wake her up, but Sidekick pops up and tries to take that invitation for himself. He gets denied.

We go off to practice kendo, but are depressed since there's only Sidekick and he's awful. At night, we feel like we're missing something. Our day should've been more fun and exciting. We go eat dinner with Ringo and Sidekick. Sidekick tries to talk about jerking off. Thanks. The talk turns to the pervert rumors. Ringo's not afraid because she'll just beat him up. Sidekick says that whoever catching the pervert will be the hero of the school. Ringo smacks him, but it's too late.

We go into a delusion about being a hero. They tell us there are no heroes in this day and age and to give it up. They ignore us. Afterward, we wonder what it is we're missing that'd let us become a hero. So we go home, thinking about jerking off, but instead take out Masamune, our key to becoming a hero, and head out on patrol. We immediately run into Ringo, who accuses us from going to pervert to murderer. She tries to stop us and says we don't need to keep our promise to be a hero anymore. We yell that she doesn't get us and run away.

She gloomily says that we're the one who doesn't understand HER FEELINGS, and how THOSE DAYS CAN NEVER COME BACK. Come midnight, we find someone lurking and attack them. It's Sidekick. He's carrying bags of garbage, so we buy his plea of innocence. He yells at us for being irresponsible and a dick, how if it was someone else, we'd be in deep crap right now, and that it's time to grow up. We lose our temper, throw Masamune away, and grab Sidekick to punch him. He asks if that's what a hero would do. We let him go and ask him to leave us alone for a while.

We look up at the stars and wonder why we keep chasing our dream. We realize we threw Masamune away and search for it in a panic. We think it's in the fountain, so we climb in. Time and whatnot stops, and a light appears. We reach for it, and when we grab the handle, we have a brief vision of another world and a blonde girl. We hear her call our name, but have no idea who she is. It makes us happy, sad, nostalgic, etc. We convince ourself it's a ghost created by Masamune. We rush out of the fountain to the place we know the 'ghost' is waiting for us.

But there's nobody there. We just hear a bell jingle. We start crying without understanding why. We don't know why we always feel so sad and lonely. We vow to ourselves to not cry anymore, and since we have Masamune, to keep chasing our dream forever, for the girl we don't know, the promise we don't know, and the dream that the two of us had. MYSTERIOUS GIRL narrates a letter, asking if everything's okay in the human world. She's going to be queen soon. She wanted to invite everyone, but couldn't convince people to let her. She's going to work hard so witches can get along with humans, so stay well until the day we can meet again. To us in particular, she wanted to be with us, but can't. She asks if we still love her, and says she loves us, and will even more once she becomes queen. She tells us to get along with Ringo and Sidekick, and she'll get along with Wet Towel. The end.