Genuinely a very good FMV dating game thanks to the story, admirers, and endings, although sadly the audio and technical issues take it down a notch. The story begins with the player-character, Li Tao, getting hit by a truck after working at his corporate job. His cat, XiaoXue, is a sort of feline deity who can take control of people and somehow manages to give Li Tao another chance at life. Li Tao is sent back to 2017, when he was 18 and in college. He has 30 days to find love, or he will die. No pressure. XiaoXue occasionally possesses humans to remind Li Tao of the stakes.

The narrative explores some deeper themes than others in the genre. The first is predictably regret about missing out on love during the school years. It also touches on how becoming an adult can drive out joy. Other themes include trust, communication, relationship experience, age differences, and social status. None are forced and instead are nice undercurrents. There are quite a few funny scenes too, including when four admirers come to your room one-by-one.

A total of five great admirers enter Li Tao’s life. Three are classmates, including an energetic cheerleader, a wealthy student, and a younger friend. Two of the admirers are older, with a motherly teacher and a domineering boss. Their distinct personalities are good and most have their own internal struggles and core principles. The actresses do a fantastic job, which is no surprise given two have been in these games before. The actress for Chu Yao was in Exclusive Memory and the one for Lu Yue Ru was in Secrets of the Heartbeat. Both arguably do a better job this time but probably because of the writing. The acting is up to Knowledge or Know Lady level, which means it is top tier.

It will take just under 4 hours to reach the finale, which is longer than average. And there is another 6 hours to view everything else, so although this is priced higher it is worth it. The branching paths are done well and the endings are probably the best in the genre. After picking an admirer, there is approximately 30 minutes of end content per admirer. That includes happy and sad endings. A few of the sad endings are phenomenal and blow other games out of the water. Many perfect ones are fantastic too, with wholesome slice of life scenes, so the conclusions are a huge positive. One great feature is that you can highlight the paths which give affinity, which helps when replaying. The video quality is good too, although it could be crisper in some scenes.

Sadly the biggest issue is that the game uses ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) for everything. The sound team have added footsteps, traffic, etc. but even the best ADR will never be as good as decent live audio, in my opinion. And the lip syncing is sometimes out so this is not the best case. There are some translation issues too, including short scenes with no subtitles. Bizarrely there were a few crashes and black screens, which required replaying segments. It even had some long delays when picking choices (5+ seconds) which may be due to communicating with an overloaded server. Despite these obvious problems, it is nearly a must play for genre fans.

Check my profile for my current ranking of FMV dating games

Genuinely a very good FMV dating game thanks to the story, admirers, and endings, although sadly the audio and technical issues take it down a notch. The story begins with the player-character, Li Tao, getting hit by a truck after working at his corporate job. His cat, XiaoXue, is a sort of feline deity who can take control of people and somehow manages to give Li Tao another chance at life. Li Tao is sent back to 2017, when he was 18 and in college. He has 30 days to find love, or he will die. No pressure. XiaoXue occasionally possesses humans to remind Li Tao of the stakes. The narrative explores some deeper themes than others in the genre. The first is predictably regret about missing out on love during the school years. It also touches on how becoming an adult can drive out joy. Other themes include trust, communication, relationship experience, age differences, and social status. None are forced and instead are nice undercurrents. There are quite a few funny scenes too, including when four admirers come to your room one-by-one. A total of five great admirers enter Li Tao’s life. Three are classmates, including an energetic cheerleader, a wealthy student, and a younger friend. Two of the admirers are older, with a motherly teacher and a domineering boss. Their distinct personalities are good and most have their own internal struggles and core principles. The actresses do a fantastic job, which is no surprise given two have been in these games before. The actress for Chu Yao was in Exclusive Memory and the one for Lu Yue Ru was in Secrets of the Heartbeat. Both arguably do a better job this time but probably because of the writing. The acting is up to Knowledge or Know Lady level, which means it is top tier. It will take just under 4 hours to reach the finale, which is longer than average. And there is another 6 hours to view everything else, so although this is priced higher it is worth it. The branching paths are done well and the endings are probably the best in the genre. After picking an admirer, there is approximately 30 minutes of end content [i]per admirer[/i]. That includes happy and sad endings. A few of the sad endings are phenomenal and blow other games out of the water. Many perfect ones are fantastic too, with wholesome slice of life scenes, so the conclusions are a huge positive. One great feature is that you can highlight the paths which give affinity, which helps when replaying. The video quality is good too, although it could be crisper in some scenes. Sadly the biggest issue is that the game uses ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) for everything. The sound team have added footsteps, traffic, etc. but even the [i]best[/i] ADR will never be as good as decent live audio, in my opinion. And the lip syncing is sometimes out so this is not the best case. There are some translation issues too, including short scenes with no subtitles. Bizarrely there were a few crashes and black screens, which required replaying segments. It even had some long delays when picking choices (5+ seconds) which may be due to communicating with an overloaded server. Despite these obvious problems, it is nearly a must play for genre fans. [url=https://steamcommunity.com/id/nutcrackr/]Check my profile for my current ranking of FMV dating games[/url]