Some eroge studios, to make their games’ themes clear, put together projects tied to the seasons. But sometimes those projects get a little ambitious, and they do a “four seasons series”… meaning four games, each set in a different season, each telling a different story. Wake up. Put away that kitchen knife and those razor blades you were about to mail to Japan—they didn’t even make it through customs. I’m not talking about Shinji Nii, I’m not talking about Natsuyume Nagisa, and I’m not talking about Hatsuyuki Sakura. I’m talking about the “Season Kana ABB” series put together by Watanabe Ryoichi and Kio Nachi.

I do have a soft spot for LASS — probably obvious from how much I shit on it. 11eyes was probably the first game I ever really grinded through back in the day. Honestly, a great experience. The part where 劫の眼 kicks in at the end still gets me hyped, and the protagonist’s cheat abilities are pretty damn sick — it blows away all the gloom from earlier and just feels good. Also, the 1v1 between Kusakabe-senpai and Kusakabe Misao — wait, I mean the Kusa… anyway, that was written really well. At least, I’d put it up there with the best battle writing I’ve played. And so, as you probably know, LASS fell straight into a slump after 11eyes. They put out Shoujo Shin’iki, which was way too far up its own ass, then came Mayoi no Futari, which was pretty badly written, and after that they started cranking out short nukige this year — one about getting married, one about ninja training… I figured the company was doomed, and then out of nowhere they announced Liber_7. Liber_7 was originally supposed to come out as a follow-up to the 11eyes series, but Shoujo Shin’iki bombed so hard that LASS ran out of money, so it got delayed, and delayed, and delayed again — and only now have they finally squeezed this thing out. The president of LASS (I think that’s who he is): the freshly married fatass Kenji Mana said, “Liber_7 shares the same worldview as 11eyes and 3days, and it will surpass them.” Of course nobody’s buying that bragging, right? Given what LASS can actually do these days, just telling one story properly would already be an achievement… And so Liber_7 got delayed, delayed, and delayed again. All of which was exactly what I expected, so it finally came out on the last game release day of 2016. Honestly, by the time I got to it I wasn’t really expecting this thing to surpass 11eyes anymore — I’d already played the trial version, and some of it was pretty cringe. So after playing the full release… it just felt even more awkward.

Everyone loves to flex, but almost nobody enjoys watching someone else flex in their face. There’s a very telling phrase for this: “flexing with actual skill.” Sure, it’s mostly used as a joke, but it gets at something real—when it comes to flexing, if you’ve got enough genuine chops to back it up, there’s not much anyone can do about it. Speaking of “skill,” I’m reminded of a conversation I once had with a friend about cooking. Back then I was being a total idiot, convinced that “a great chef has to make all these flashy, fancy dishes to be legit.” My friend just shook his head.

fortissimo EXS//Akkord:nächsten Phase is a visual novel developed by la’cryma… I’ve played la’cryma’s early games! I even own physical copies! I’m talking about this one! But then this company called la’cryma apparently took something weird, because they suddenly cranked out a game absolutely dripping with chuuni energy, and they’ve been milking that one game for years. I looked it up—this studio has ties to Circus… so of course they inherited the fine tradition… First came the all-ages fortissimo//Akkord:Bsusvier Then fortissimoEXA//Akkord:Bsusvier, which added two routes and a final boss fight Then fortissimo EXS//Akkord:nächsten Phase, which took the previous version and added 18+ content And recently there’s the PSV version, Kadenz fermata//Akkord:fortissimo, which throws in artificial science-magic and what’s probably new story content Pit after pit, and I should mention I’m the type who gets suckered in by game OPs. If an OP looks good, it’s love at first sight with a girl. So when I saw fortissimo’s absolutely banger OP, I jumped right into this pit.