First glance commands powerful first impressions. The cute art alone already reminds me of two anime titles, Tenshi ni Narumon (I’m Gonna Be An Angel) and Card Captor Sakura—both of which I hold very close to my heart for the fond memories they bring. The interface makes you think that this could very well be good for TV. I mean, look at it! SD modes, psychotic females, hilarious Ranma ½ situations…
But it all goes downhill from there. What can I say? Characters are bleh: two-dimensional and bordering on annoying. There’s nothing you haven’t seen in past anime shows, especially if you’re one who has been watching japanimation since the 70s. Yusuke is a sissy boy (read: effeminate), who, by some sort of twisted luck, gets to choose among a bevy of fuckable girls. I am not even sure if it’s women he should be boinking at all! Or maybe he won’t be coming out of the closet until he’s about 25 or so. The girls…Asumi is unreasonable, violent, and does, in fact, mirror Akane of Ranma and Narusegawa of Love Hina—the two brainless nitwits that punch first and ask later. Faint-hearted Tomoe is, for lack of a better word, dull. All she does is sigh and be nice and pretty and helpless. Boy, do men with knight-in-shining-armor complex love that! Nonchalant Marumu, who delivers her comical lines with a deadpan expression, is probably the only saving grace among the three main ladies. And even then, she doesn’t get much exposure. Thank gawd, there’s still Toshibo, the cat. It’s ironic that someone who couldn’t speak anything more than “meow” should be the one bringing some semblance of sanity into this package.
You mix a few more girls into the fray, have them fawn over our cakeboy and there you have it! Heart de Roommmate’s basic recipe. Good Lord, can we just drop the Love Hina scenarios already? Frankly, they’re getting old.
I could sum up the story and the hentai scenes in one word: juvenile. Well, at least, for my tastes they are. Their problems are overrated. The characters make mountains out of molehills. The solutions to dilemmas are too convenient. And they look like twelve-year-olds, which make me think that they shouldn’t even be having sex in the first place. Not that there’s anything spectacular in the hentai sequences. It’s the usual stuff, though they’re a bit milder than the more adventurous bgame h-scenes. You’d think the secret routes would at least bring a little excitement, but no. I was just too immersed in ennui to care. To illustrate how bored I was, imagine me setting Heart de Roommate on auto-forwarding mode while I do my thing in the john. Heck, I even went out for a walk so that my gray matter could get the much needed oxygen that this game deprived me of.
Game features include auto-forwarding (Hallelujah!), voice and sound settings, message speed settings, options to skip previously read messages (Gloria! Gloria! Gloria!), CG gallery, an album listing that lets you relive your favorite scenes, and full screen window modes. Gameplay’s the usual clickathon, but thank heavens they don’t make you choose which floors or classroom or whatever area of the campus you wanna go to, only to find that there’s nothing to do in the place of your choice…and then be promptly shown the same selection. Those kinds of dead-end paths are so damn irritating and I’m grateful I didn’t find them here.
If you’re an avid fan of bishoujo games, knock yourself out. You just might enjoy Heart de Roommate. But if you want a real bgame challenge, go and play Brave Soul.
Individual Rating: Art/Animation: 8 Story/Plot: 5 Characters: 5 Sounds: 7 Gameplay: 6 Ecchi Level: 8
