First up, i mainly gave this game a shot because the reviews here were all incredibly positive. Positive to the point where i felt "it can't be that good, but let's try it."
It was actually quite good.
Not the "best game on f95", not the "funniest game i've ever played", nor did i see a "5/5 story" anywhere. But it was pretty good. I'd advise you to give it a shot too see for yourself. Just remember to keep your expectations a little lower than "best game i've ever played."
Starting with a short synopsis:
You're a dude from a poor background, with no mom and a poor single dad, and enroll in a college where apparently a lot of drama is happening. All the time. The kind of drama teenagers think of, when they picture what college or university or whatever is like.
This has its own charm, and does have some fun aspects to it, but story wise, it doesn't offer that much we haven't seen already at least a couple times in a teen movie. It offers comedic relief characters galore, it offers the obvious bad boy antagonists and peer pressure, but not that many great characters.
Let's talk about the side characters first. There aren't all that many, and in general, the game likes to generalize. There's the nerds and the rich kids respectively, and their own little Fraternities. Represented by one (!) character each (Love interests are not counted.). Then there are the jocks, where i recall the names of 2 characters (!), and only one of them has any relevance story wise. Yeah, that's three of the five big factions on the campus. Furthermore, pretty much all of those characters i just mentioned seem to come straight out of a mediocre Teen Drama. I can describe each of the characters above with 2 to 3 words each, and you know nearly all which is to know about them already.
Frankly, even when the other 2 factions get those numbers back up again (which of course are your own faction and the hot girls), it shows how the game does not care about its surroundings, or worldbuilding, if you will, all that much.
Which isn't totally required, but yeah, the "best game on f95" with the "great characters" should be above that. Way above that.
Moving on, to the main characters. Which are mainly you, the cliché stupid best friend character we've all seen so many times, and the love interests. Which look great, to be fair. Renders are top notch. And most of them have some inner conflicts or deeper thematics to explore. Sadly, and i really mean that, the story apparently needs them all (except one, so far ?) to be in some sort of drama again. The teen drama again. Where everyone is lying, has secrets they can't ever tell anyone, and has to have a dark and secret past.
This is, i think, what i dislike most about this game. The story forces so much unnecessary or straight up stupid conflict upon you to keep you interested. Without dropping any kinds of hints first, on what's about to happen.
Maybe that's also why i am referencing teen movies so much in this review. All the characters do not seem to act rationally or in their best interests, but simply and solely with the end goal of creating drama and tension for the story.
Last, but not least, bring a walkthrough. You really need one to find even half of the bonus content, which is hidden pretty damn well throughout the game. And you also need the walkthrough for some of the minigames, which in my opinion, aren't really great. But since there is bonus content hidden behind beating them, i buckled up and went through the chore of going through them anyways.
TL;DR:
+great renders !
-Meh characters, mostly ruined by the story.
+quite a lot of content, to be honest.
-walkthrough required.
-meh minigames.
Edit: I didn't talk about one key feature of the game, which is the DIK/CHICK-System, or the "bad boy / good boy" - points, so to speak.
They do have some impact on making your player act differently according to your previous decisions, which is pretty cool for any kind of role-playing game.
It was actually quite good.
Not the "best game on f95", not the "funniest game i've ever played", nor did i see a "5/5 story" anywhere. But it was pretty good. I'd advise you to give it a shot too see for yourself. Just remember to keep your expectations a little lower than "best game i've ever played."
Starting with a short synopsis:
You're a dude from a poor background, with no mom and a poor single dad, and enroll in a college where apparently a lot of drama is happening. All the time. The kind of drama teenagers think of, when they picture what college or university or whatever is like.
This has its own charm, and does have some fun aspects to it, but story wise, it doesn't offer that much we haven't seen already at least a couple times in a teen movie. It offers comedic relief characters galore, it offers the obvious bad boy antagonists and peer pressure, but not that many great characters.
Let's talk about the side characters first. There aren't all that many, and in general, the game likes to generalize. There's the nerds and the rich kids respectively, and their own little Fraternities. Represented by one (!) character each (Love interests are not counted.). Then there are the jocks, where i recall the names of 2 characters (!), and only one of them has any relevance story wise. Yeah, that's three of the five big factions on the campus. Furthermore, pretty much all of those characters i just mentioned seem to come straight out of a mediocre Teen Drama. I can describe each of the characters above with 2 to 3 words each, and you know nearly all which is to know about them already.
Frankly, even when the other 2 factions get those numbers back up again (which of course are your own faction and the hot girls), it shows how the game does not care about its surroundings, or worldbuilding, if you will, all that much.
Which isn't totally required, but yeah, the "best game on f95" with the "great characters" should be above that. Way above that.
Moving on, to the main characters. Which are mainly you, the cliché stupid best friend character we've all seen so many times, and the love interests. Which look great, to be fair. Renders are top notch. And most of them have some inner conflicts or deeper thematics to explore. Sadly, and i really mean that, the story apparently needs them all (except one, so far ?) to be in some sort of drama again. The teen drama again. Where everyone is lying, has secrets they can't ever tell anyone, and has to have a dark and secret past.
This is, i think, what i dislike most about this game. The story forces so much unnecessary or straight up stupid conflict upon you to keep you interested. Without dropping any kinds of hints first, on what's about to happen.
Maybe that's also why i am referencing teen movies so much in this review. All the characters do not seem to act rationally or in their best interests, but simply and solely with the end goal of creating drama and tension for the story.
Last, but not least, bring a walkthrough. You really need one to find even half of the bonus content, which is hidden pretty damn well throughout the game. And you also need the walkthrough for some of the minigames, which in my opinion, aren't really great. But since there is bonus content hidden behind beating them, i buckled up and went through the chore of going through them anyways.
TL;DR:
+great renders !
-Meh characters, mostly ruined by the story.
+quite a lot of content, to be honest.
-walkthrough required.
-meh minigames.
Edit: I didn't talk about one key feature of the game, which is the DIK/CHICK-System, or the "bad boy / good boy" - points, so to speak.
They do have some impact on making your player act differently according to your previous decisions, which is pretty cool for any kind of role-playing game.
