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alias_sqbrI enjoyed both of these well enough, and they're kinda similar. Our Two Bedroom Story: Kagetora is free for the next few days.
The MC and LI are coworker writers who are thrown together personally and professionally. The guy is driven and talented but a bit of a cold jerk, and Very Clear about not being into her or even liking her that much. But they work together well and he encourages and respects her professionally, and she realises that he's actually a decent guy who likes her a lot more than he's willing to admit, he just has Romantic Trauma. And then they live happily ever after etc.
This is also the plot of Our Two Bedroom Story: Tsumugu. Which I also liked, but does make me wonder how samey they'd get played back to back if you bought the switch version with 5 routes.
Still, the Voltage writers tend to do better at making working as a writer feel real than they do with like...astronomers and maids.
Irresistible Mistakes: Kiriya Toma: They fell into bed, both drunk, after a work party where they bonded about thinking their boss is super talented(*). Toma says it was a mistake they should both forget. The rest of the route made very little impression, but was nice enough. There was a bit of a double standard where MC was made to feel slutty but at least some of it was Romantic Misunderstanding. I have trouble getting into advertising as Creative Expression that Moves People but the characters bonding over it was still sweet.
Our Two Bedroom Story: Oji Kagetora: Fake dating in a shared house! Kagetora is a tsundere who is so obsessive about germs he never touches anyone and insists on doing all the cooking and cleaning, and is explicitly described as mentally ill...because of romantic trauma which is handled weirdly(**), and he markedly improves once he falls for MC. Still, she respects his boundaries until he chooses to cross them, and they have a moderately cute bantery relationship, with him as the cold but quietly charmed tsundere and her stubbornly bouncy. Also him being so touch averse meant that like...the first time he doesn't use hand sanitiser after taking documents from her at work was weirdly hot(***).
I like the general dynamic at the workplace in Our Two Bedroom Story, there's a mixture of friends and friendly acquaintances and friendly-but-kinda-distant bosses, whose attitude towards MC is on a continuum from "cute, fun girl to flirt with" to "nice enough" to "mild dislike". Seeing Tsumugu in work mode for the whole route was amusing, kinda wish I hadn't played him first so his real self would be more of a contrast.
(*)Their boss being Shunichiro with the harem of advertising copywriters.
(**)It's rare for me to feel like an otome game is too sympathetic to a female love rival, but here we are. Still, he is effectively woobified.
(***)I vaguely remember one of you posted about how this reads differently in a post-Covid world haha.
The MC and LI are coworker writers who are thrown together personally and professionally. The guy is driven and talented but a bit of a cold jerk, and Very Clear about not being into her or even liking her that much. But they work together well and he encourages and respects her professionally, and she realises that he's actually a decent guy who likes her a lot more than he's willing to admit, he just has Romantic Trauma. And then they live happily ever after etc.
This is also the plot of Our Two Bedroom Story: Tsumugu. Which I also liked, but does make me wonder how samey they'd get played back to back if you bought the switch version with 5 routes.
Still, the Voltage writers tend to do better at making working as a writer feel real than they do with like...astronomers and maids.
Irresistible Mistakes: Kiriya Toma: They fell into bed, both drunk, after a work party where they bonded about thinking their boss is super talented(*). Toma says it was a mistake they should both forget. The rest of the route made very little impression, but was nice enough. There was a bit of a double standard where MC was made to feel slutty but at least some of it was Romantic Misunderstanding. I have trouble getting into advertising as Creative Expression that Moves People but the characters bonding over it was still sweet.
Our Two Bedroom Story: Oji Kagetora: Fake dating in a shared house! Kagetora is a tsundere who is so obsessive about germs he never touches anyone and insists on doing all the cooking and cleaning, and is explicitly described as mentally ill...because of romantic trauma which is handled weirdly(**), and he markedly improves once he falls for MC. Still, she respects his boundaries until he chooses to cross them, and they have a moderately cute bantery relationship, with him as the cold but quietly charmed tsundere and her stubbornly bouncy. Also him being so touch averse meant that like...the first time he doesn't use hand sanitiser after taking documents from her at work was weirdly hot(***).
I like the general dynamic at the workplace in Our Two Bedroom Story, there's a mixture of friends and friendly acquaintances and friendly-but-kinda-distant bosses, whose attitude towards MC is on a continuum from "cute, fun girl to flirt with" to "nice enough" to "mild dislike". Seeing Tsumugu in work mode for the whole route was amusing, kinda wish I hadn't played him first so his real self would be more of a contrast.
(*)Their boss being Shunichiro with the harem of advertising copywriters.
(**)It's rare for me to feel like an otome game is too sympathetic to a female love rival, but here we are. Still, he is effectively woobified.
(***)I vaguely remember one of you posted about how this reads differently in a post-Covid world haha.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-25 04:58 am (UTC)I have Enchanted in the Moonlight and I only managed to finish two routes for it, so maybe! I wonder if it also works against the game that there aren't really lingering mysteries, either.
Still, the Voltage writers tend to do better at making working as a writer feel real than they do with like...astronomers and maids.
Ha.
I remember liking Toma's route when I played; I think it's still my favorite Love365 route (though I haven't played all that many). It did feel very corporate to me, though, to the point where I felt a little weird about the office romance. This might be a conflict of interest, MC. :/
Thinking about the writers, it seems like the pitch that MC ends up giving for the sake (the career woman in her thirties who also has a vulnerable side, but is strong because she keeps going despite them)...is basically what they tried to write for MC.
I have trouble getting into advertising as Creative Expression that Moves People but the characters bonding over it was still sweet.
Heh, yes.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-25 10:13 am (UTC)it seems like the pitch that MC ends up giving for the sake (the career woman in her thirties who also has a vulnerable side, but is strong because she keeps going despite them)...is basically what they tried to write for MC
Yes it felt a bit like being in the writer's room at Voltage as they tried to appeal to me, the assumed consumer.
By the time I played Toma I'd already done the starts of the routes for MC's boss and work doctor, so by comparison the ethics were fine! >.>
Which Enchanted in the Moonlight routes did you play?
no subject
Date: 2020-06-25 04:37 pm (UTC)By the time I played Toma I'd already done the starts of the routes for MC's boss and work doctor, so by comparison the ethics were fine! >.>
Ha! I need to go reread your recap for the work doctor, that sounds...relatively innocuous at first glance? At least they're in different teams, and one is not in a position of authority over the other!
Oh, wait, not Enchanted in the Moonlight! I played Star-Crossed Myth instead (the Aquarius guy, who was blue-haired and cold but secretly pining, and Leon, who was a surprisingly enjoyable asshole).
For Enchanted in the Moonlight, I played the prologue and then the first chapter of the dragon route there, because first of all, DRAGON! and second, I kind of hated everyone after the intro so when he showed up to interrupt the party I was just kind of like "OKAY. GOOD JOB STEALING EVERYONE'S THUNDER. I CHOOSE YOU". But I noped out because then he started to be mean and dubconny toward the MC (instead of just being mean to everyone else)...and I chose Kiryu's route to have a slowly-melting dragon boyfriend who spites everyone else, not the MC. :P
I think EitM might not be for me, despite the dragon and the fox and the angsty snow spirit and all those other things designed to appeal to me. :P I wish there was an ayakashi otome game that leaned more into the lore and cross-species understanding and romance and maybe had a tinge of the atmosphericness and magic of Spirited Away.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 07:32 am (UTC)I didn't play much of the doctor, he was too slimy for me. Though one thing I did like about him and the boss is they seem to genuinely support women having one night stands in general if it makes them happy, and not just because it gives them more women to sleep with. A lot of LIs who have one night stands seem hypocritically judgemental towards the women they sleep with.
Ah, Star Crossed Myth! I liked Dui from that but didn't click with the others I've tried when they came up as free.
EitM isn't for me either, too much dubcon assholery from what I saw. Which was a pity because I also like the idea of mythical creature LIs. I keep meaning to play the Lovestruck game with a butch werewolf girl LI, it doesn't look very well written but at least would be a different sort of not-for-me.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 05:50 pm (UTC)Though one thing I did like about him and the boss is they seem to genuinely support women having one night stands in general if it makes them happy, and not just because it gives them more women to sleep with. A lot of LIs who have one night stands seem hypocritically judgemental towards the women they sleep with.
Yeah! In general, I thought Irresistible Mistakes was good about that (iirc in Toma's route, you get to talk him out of his attitude toward one night stands?)
Which was a pity because I also like the idea of mythical creature LIs.
Same. ;_____;
What is the Lovestruck game? o.o
I haven't played this but I may, but Choice of Games also has Never Date Werewolves (which I think is supposed to be free to play?), in which you play as a human with six werewolf pups. The romance options are a cute next door neighbor who is a human (and maybe anti-werewolf), and "the teacher who manages the summer school, always smiling, full of energy and ideas for the kids to try out. Although there might be more to them than meets the eye…After all, everyone has their secrets, and they’ve managed never to be overwhelmed by your brood of werewolves."
I feel like they're a vampire or something.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-26 10:12 pm (UTC)...now if it was only also good about the ethics of sleeping with drunk people/your direct employees etc...
The game is "Havenfall is for Lovers" which has like...vampires and demons etc including men, women and even a non-binary character. https://lovestruckvoltage.fandom.com/wiki/Havenfall_is_For_Lovers
Alas I am not much good with purely text based games, so many Choice of Games sound interesting :( But I get in the mood for one very occasionally, I should take note, thanks.