Originally I wanted to write something poking fun at the straight-guy Twitter guy, Awen, but then I figured he’s already pitiful enough and I shouldn’t pile on, so I deleted that and went back to the original format. That said, this game is incredibly practical. I don’t mean that kind of practical. I mean the “teaches you how to fall in love” kind. HOOKSOFT and SMEE have always been solid at this, but unfortunately most otaku just use their games as joke-dispensers for rom-com sketches. Genuinely a shame. In recent years HOOKSOFT and SMEE seem to have pulled off a weird identity swap: the former started doing SMEE’s “love simulation” thing, while the latter leaned into fantasy settings. Most people don’t care, since both brands come from the same daddy and their art styles are converging at a frankly alarming rate anyway. Nobody cares about brand purity — honestly they could merge into one label someday. This time HOOKSOFT’s offering is Houkago Cinderella (放課後シンデレラ) — literally “After School Cinderella” — built on the premise of “romance through chance encounters depending on which route you pick on the way home after school.”