VN of the Month October 1998 - Psyclone

Psyclone is the only masterpiece of the month.

1. Sakura Tsuushin 桜 通信 [981001] Media Gallop Dating sim adaptation of the manga and anime series of the same name. Touma Inaba, the protagonist, is trying to get into Keio University. On the day the exam scores are posted, he meets Mieko Yotsuba , a redhead he falls in love with at first sight. After he finds out she got in, but didn't, he decides to lie and say he passed the exam in order to impress her. He lives with Urara Kasuga, a girl of his same age who agrees to pretend he's in Keio University due to her crush on him. Dating SIM..

2. Efficus: Kono Omoi o Kimi ni... エフィカス この想いを君に… [981001] Genki 1 The protagonist gets suddenly transferred to a former all-girls school. Tired of hanging out with boys, he decides to get closer to the girls... And another dating SIM

3. Ecchi no Susume えっちのススメ [981002] Seal Staff 1 Our guy is asked by his sister to find a partner to test her two person virtual H machine. First girl is his neighbor/childhood friend, but a 2nd girl, his sister's boss' daughter joins the fun later. Anyway, this machine connects two person and let them play in one of four scenarios. How far she will go in a scenario will depend on her Love and Willingness, which increase after a successful completion. Well, virtual love is easy, but will he be able to win a girl in the real world? There's an English review.

4. Kiseki Maigo no Tenshi 奇跡 迷子の天使 [981002] E.G.O. London, 19th century. Hero is private detective investigating a series of women murders. The story starts when an angel falls on him on a deep foggy night. Command selection multi-ending ADV. There are three heroines and they all get three endings. There is also an ending for each sub-heroine. There are a lot of choices and they really hurt the tempo and the atmosphere. Angel's identity comes out pretty fast and there's little motivation to play afterwards. It continues quite as ordinary work.

5. Mania na Onna まにあなおんな [981002] Foster Heroine is a stalker girl. She bumps into a salary-man on the street and stuffs his house with spy tech to eavesdrop and and peep on him. And she's not going to give in to his lover girl that easily. System is inherited from Maigo no Kimochi and it's really comfortable to check city buildings on the map and trigger events. There are three branches determined by the first building of destination, but from then on it's a single road. It's an easygoing and bright H adventure with great Foster visuals.

6. Menkai Shazetsu 面会謝絶 [981002] Sirius 1 The player plays the role of an average high school student in Japan who has a beautiful girlfriend called Sayuri. The two of you walk to school chatting happily while suddenly a vehicle runs towards both of you and crash. You gain consciousness in a hospital. The nurse says you are recovering nicely and should be out of the hospital within a few days. However, you are really concerned about Sayuri because she is nowhere to be seen. You go to the nurse desk and overhear rumors about doctor conductor weird experiments. You need to find out what is happening in this hospital and rescue Sayuri. There is an English review of the game.

7. Shirobara no Namae 白薔薇のなまえ [981003] Glanz Masaki Yuu who works for the detective office is entrusted with training three new girls as detectives within a year time. Flow is divided by weeks with each turn taking a day. Every girl has parameters like trivia knowledge, investigation technique, body art etc etc Most of training is done by fulfilling commands "on-site investigation", "listening", "thinking". If they manage to grasp the clues, then we move on to next scene. Graphics are nice, but gameplay is really weak.

8. Believe in Heart [981008] Scramble House Takatsu Yusuke used to Hikojima every summer as a boy till his grandparents passed away. In five year's time he visits the island again in part to collect material on the mermaid legend for his movie club and in part to have a rest and reminiscent on the past days. At the beach he meets a mysterious girl who seems to know Yusuke. She passes him a flower asking if he could remember her by looking at the flower. He still can't remember her. And the moment he raises a head, the girl is gone. So started the journey to discover memories of the youth. A nostalgic pure love adventure. It's a finished and mysterious story to tickle the heart and with luck to discover the roots of the mermaid legend.

9. Kanojo wa Maid 彼女はメイド [981008] Bell-Da One day the main character becomes the owner of a mansion according to the will of deceased former owner. The old butler instructs the hero how to train the tree maids of the house. An insulting kusoge with graphics as the only selling point.

10. Ashita Sekai ga Owaru Yoru ni 明日世界が終わる夜に [981009] Sakura Soft When hero Shinpei goes to school on Friday a strange rumor of the end of the world the next day spreads. Everyone gets crazy and the school shuts down preventing anyone leaving. Shinpei does not believe in that rumor, but he has to await for the morning in this agitated atmosphere. Bad writing is usually described as doujin level, but this work does not even attain doujin level. It's one big H fest. It turns out that it's the student committee that hypnotized the students in believing in the end of the world and dominating their wills. Shinpei gets hypnotized at one point and in some way it's indeed the end of the world for students of one particular school. But the important aspect of the game is that it's the first "denpa" game after Leaf's Shizuku contributing to the creation of the genre.

11. Diamond wa Kizutsukanai ダイアモンドは傷つかない [981009] Excellents DD is back! Unfortunately his detective business gets closed. However, he finds a popular accessory in the luggage of the person he helped. Together with super assistant Namiko he is going to conquer the entertainment world!  There is no text info on the game, but it looks like it tries really hard to reproduce the system of the prequel while presenting richer H material.

12. Ichou no Mau Koro いちょうの舞う頃 [981009] Types Yusuke Akiyama is a mediocre person. His childhood friend Yoshizawa Makoto is like a sister to him as she takes care of him for a long time. One day Yusuke receives a love letter from a lower grade student. What kind of story awaits Yusuke upon this magnificent autumn season? Games in 1998 often started to have such synopsis that there is a love triangle and choosing one would inevitably dump the other girl. Game is one of the major titles of 1998 and it even got a sequel the following year. The strange drawing and the passive protagonist are the main shortcomings of the game.

13. Kuroi Hamon 黒い波紋 [981009] Cherry Blossom Soft Main character hears some sounds at night and comes out. There is an anxious girl at the street. She is worried about something happening at school. Explore the place to reveal its mystery. Macromedia flash game with four exploration commands always present. New scenario branches open up only upon seeing new bad endings like in Leaf's Shizuku.

14. Private Garden 2 プライベートガーデン2 [981009] Tetratech 1 A puzzle game, focused on sliding tiles around. Basic gameplay involves placing tiles featuring girls together, then moving a "male" tile in to make them disappear. Later mechanics include ice floors, collapsing floors, and so on. After every few puzzles there's a short scene, eventually leading to H. There is an English review.

15. Find Love 2: Rhapsody ファインドラブ２ ラプソディ [981010] Lyceen Main is a high school student who aspires to become a professional musician. One day he is asked by his father to substitute him as apartment manager for the summer. The building appears to be inhabited only by school girls. This summer promises to be hot. First of all it's 18+ work for Saturn, might be even the first of the kind. While talking with girls it's possible to speak in wild, normal or calm manner and that is important for capture. There are as many as 10 girls available. There's also such a system as "crossroad ending" which basically means that hero gets to choose what life he will lead with the chosen heroine. So it gets to be another "choose your story" kusoge that gives out any ending you like and also lots of H events to please everyone, but fails to have memorably stories.

16. Eye's ~Anata no Hitomi ni Utsuru Mono~ Eye’s ～あなたの瞳にうつるもの～ [981013] Escu:de 1 It's ordinary and boring school life. There is Asami teacher and three girls to fight for attention and each of girls has her own rival the number of characters increases to 6! Game has an English review

17. Sampaguita サンパギータ [981015] SCEI 1 2 3 4 5 Autumn. One rainy autumn evening, I was walking back home from a drinking party. I bump into a girl sitting in the rain, completely drenched in water. I notice a cut on her forehead - bleeding. I take her home with me. Her name is Maria, and she is from somewhere in the South East Asia, but she does not remember her identity. I search through her bag and find a photo, some cash, make-up set... and a hand gun.... Yarudora vol.3 arrived. It has an English review and enough English information.

18. Gone ~Sugisarishi Hibi~ GONE～過ぎ去りし日々～ [981016] Active Yuji Takeda is an unpopular actor who can not sell. During the shooting of a historical drama, he is struck by lightning and he find himself in a parallel world similar to the drama that was shot - Sengoku period full of ninja and samurai. Story divides into two large scenarios - one in real world and the other one in warfare world. Warfare one does not contribute much to the story apart of fatal choices. The real world scenario is also thin and falling into comedy mostly. Characters are quite charming so game's best be described as charage. There are over 20 endings.

19. Sekai no Hate no Monogatari 世界の果ての物語 [981016] Purple Kou is a girl who believes in her sword and she sets off to the capital city. However, she is caught by the enemy country army on the way, and is imprisoned in the Gallsberde fortress. She was offered to gather bail in 30 days time or die. Unnatural events start to happen around her. Now she needs to discover the truth about those events and make it in 30 days time. It's a SIM aimed at to produce destruction work at various castle parts and also discover the mystery. There are 28 days with each day consisting of 5 turns. There are three usual commands "destroy!", "move" and "sleep". Character has many stats and destruction works is done faster with higher stats. It starts as a serious dark story, but then atmosphere gets light and story pretty much goes to hell.

20. Shinma Kourin 神魔降臨 [981016] Arkham Products The world of conflict between light and darkness. A young man gained the divine power of the darkness and is pursued by light forces. His aim is to dominate the temple of four lights in a year's time. Following the maid, with the power of the gods of darkness he needs to eat corpses of light and absorb the girls. Tactical combat format SIM. Battle is done on a quarter view up with control over all your characters. Defeating an opponent is followed by absorbing girl scene. Your maid is your means of regaining HP each morning. It's notable that game uses terrain for amplifying strength from high spots and decreasing when attacking from low spots.

21. Hoshi no Oka Gakuen Monogatari: Gakuensai 星の丘学園物語 学園祭 [981022] MediaWorks 1 Our hero Kanata Muriya (name changeable) has just transferred to a new school and he has one month to prepare for the school festival. During that time, he'll have to make sure the festival is a success, while interacting and developing new relationships with his classmates. Romance raising SIM. There's no story so charm is determined by the girl characters. Since it's a game for PS, there's a lot of animation. Game feels good and quite unique thanks to lots of events outdoors. A good title to check for galge enthusiasts.

22. Daite... 抱いて… [981023] Noise A girl approaches the hero one day with words "Please embrace me". Hero invites her to a hotel only knowing her name Igarashi Ai. Game is one of worst examples of 3D visual novels. There's little text and it's basically one big H event. The rushed actions result in game over and girl fleeing in tears.

23. Gensou Jan Yuuki 幻想雀遊記 [981023] Altair Yuichi loves girls and mahjong, but he's on his loosing spree for some time. While thinking that it's high time to retire from mahjong he suddenly appears in a place he never saw before. And new strange experiences await him.Strip mahjong with eleven fantasy girls. There's no real development beyond that.

24. Main no Utage 魔淫の宴 [981023] Black Package Try Main hero is jealous of his colleague who managed to get a promotion and also married their common acquaintance. Hero kidnaps that wife's younger sister and blackmails them into intimate relations. NTR type with abundance of insult scenes.

25. Modae 悶～もだえ～ [981029] WEAPON Main character shows affection for his classmate for a long time and finally starts dating her.  But she has a secret. Her twin brother lives inside her from birth. During day she can fully control herself, but at night brother's will dominates. As of late, she starts doing strange things at night including having forced sex. Her control periods start to shorten as well. Protagonist vows to make an effort to restore her integrity. However... Game is of SIM genre and quite light besides that. Raising love level is needed and then happy ending with a girl is possible. But if raise sexual traits values rather than love there's slave training ending for each trait.

26. Dungeon Burai 迷宮無頼漢 [981030] Speed One day a huge hole that appears in the house. It is a secret entrance of a secret organization "Jyuuichi Kuchuuru" that aims for world domination. The house owner accused them of land fraud and organized a party to throw them out of there. It's an RPG bakage. Classes include all kind of stuff like samurai, magical girl, dog, dry weed... You need to take care of your light and food in order to walk at all. There are nine random rooms on each floor and the ladder to next level. There are events happening from time to time with a good chunk of them being H. Operation is mouse only and thus very painful.

27. Eien no Miyako 永遠の都 [981030] Cherry Soft Hero is a college student who attends university in Tokyo. He lost father at young age and now lives with mother, father-in-law and sister-in-law Mariko. A strange letter arrived from Mariko's pen friend Keiko who spends summer vacation on a "September Island (Ku Tsutou)". "Strange events have been happening, please come quickly. I'm scared". Hero used to visit this island together with his deceased father and together with Mariko they set off to help Keiko. Keiko was supposed to work as maid in a western mansion, but only three mansion owner daughters are found there. Suspense romance story. Story is very long compared to usual works. After clearing one route, the next one appears. Suspense gradually turns into romance. Live-action backgrounds ruin the atmosphere. Scenario is written by female writer and it's really difficult to associate yourself with the protagonist, his pattern of though is really different. Game lacks balance and thus does not leave good impression.

28. Gizen 偽善 [981030] D-XX A new health teacher turns out to be hypocrite who catches and abuses students. Ero-focused content only. There are six female students, three female teachers and even two female students' mothers to capture.

29. Nariyuki Romance なりゆきROMANCE [981030] Pias Hero likes watching B movies. But the girlfriend who accompanies him does not mind. It's the spirit of inexperienced youths romance that this story conveys to you. Game tries to be realistic. The development is hasty. There are multiple branches and endings.

30. Physical Lesson Otome-tachi no Rhapsody PHYSICAL LESSON 乙女たちのラプソディ [981030] Logg Hero is a new P.E. teacher. He is trusted to give full-time training to five problem students. Zapping system is the feature of this work, so story can be seen from both teacher's and characters' eyes. Girls are likable and have distinct personalities. It's also possible to go in love with the president. If one of six heroines reaches love level it's automatically happy ending with her.

31. Pia Caro Toybox ぴあきゃろ TOYBOX [981030] Cocktail Soft 1 Toybox is an assembly of a series of Pia Carrot-based mini games. It's a internet browser interface where you can explore various places or "virtual sites" and play games or look at CGs. There is an English review.

32. Psyclone Psyclone サイクロン [981030] Vanilla 1 Psyclone is a cyber-reality city accessed by using bio-interface. Recently it has been under attack of crackers causing anomalies and hurting people, so its inventor "Postman" along with his comrades "Bee", "Peepin Sam" and one of the crackers "Saiko" try to find the source of attacks. At the same time in the real world many young girls get missing in the slums. How can these cases be connected? I've prepared a full review.

32. Shunpuu Shoujo 春風少女 [981030] Aquarium 1 Takuma Takuma is a college student. One day a girl Sari from another world appears before him. She said that she appeared to purify the conscious body possessed by Takuma and the should live together till that time. Takuma friends and girl classmates aren't really happy about that. Where shall the future take him? Story is light and lacks the depth. For 11 chapters it's assumed that Takuma and Sari are lovers and it's all the hustle about it. Only in 12th final chapter there is development and resolution with you staying with the girl you've developed the most intimate relations. Gags are mixed well with the serious parts so at least you won't get tired in the mids of it.

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