In the fictional city called New Seig (inspired by New York City) we have our heroine Teuta who is a freelance journalist and has the power to go back in time in the body of another person. She tries to convince Limbo (known as a corrupted lawyer) in the body of someone else in the past that he's going to die and she witnessed it herself. This is in this same world as the game Sidekicks! and even has cameos here and there.
Flashback to hours earlier, Teuta is a broke reporter trying to figure out her moving situation. She has her childhood friend Luka (who's a police officer) and her other one Adam (who's a news reporter). One day, she tries to get in contact with Limbo in order to interview him but he continues to decline and he offers her his business card. After this, she speaks with a woman accused of murder in hopes of gathering coverage. Albeit, she ends up giving her some code and drawing a chess piece on her notebook before she has to leave.
After Teuta leaves the police department, she sees Limbo again but he falls to the ground and had been shot. She tries to save him but he ends up dying. So she uses her power to go back in time as someone else. When she opens her eyes, she's a suspect who's handcuffed in an interrogation room. A woman is trying to get info out of her while she's in this man's body. Teuta realizes she doesn't have time before Limbo is killed so she acts like she has a important info that she'll only share if she has a lawyer present and asks for Limbo. It's then she has the same conversation, trying to convince Limbo that he indeed dies and asks him to meet her at a cafe called Harry & Keith.
Shu is the first one to appear and greets Teuta first. He's a bounty hunter and already heard the situation from Limbo who comes in right after. And right off the bat they bombard her with the question of what her motive is and how she knows Ortega (the man who targeted and had Limbo killed). Teuta tells them she's not in cahoots with this guy and tries to prove it by telling Limbo what he showed in his pockets the time she was in other person's body. It's still not enough though and they both have their suspicions. When Teuta gets a call from her landlord about having to pay repair expenses for her apartment, she asks for Limbo's help to not pay the expenses I exchange she'll collaborate with them. She then goes with them to meet Helvetica, a popular cosmic surgeon.
Immediately this guy grabs Teuta and takes a good look at her before giving her a sort of rating which is apparently what he does when he sees women. He also tells her most first impressions are based on appearances alone. After meeting him, Mozu who works in forensics, appears as well. He's aquainted with Teuta's friend Luka who's an officer and met him while they were eating together. After gathering, they come up with a plan of faking Limbo's death in order to catch the culprit. However, they temporarily take Teuta's phone so she can't contact anyone. Teuta meets with Luka and Adam at a bar she often visits at least once a week. It's there a kid named Alex stays with the owner Carmen who treats him like family.
So after this, they go through the plan of faking Limbo's death. Once he "dies" the info is spread quick on a sort of SNS app called 'Full Circle' and Adam covers it on the news. In addition, their hacker and behind the scenes guy named 'Scarecrow' looked up about Teuta who's background came up with no suspicious results. All that's left is for them to expose Ortega and head to the meet up where there will be a money exchange for "killing" Limbo. They go to the meeting place and Helvetica pretends to be the woman who was supposed to kill Limbo. They then reveal themselves and catch Ortega on a Livestream. After exposing him, the police arrive and they escape on a helicopter and dump all the money out.
After this, Limbo tries to help Teuta with her apartment situation but that same night after having a party at Carmen's, Teuta finds out her apartment was burned down. Luka and Adam rush to meet Teuta whom they were worried about. She reassures them she's fine but tells them not to worry and she'll figure something out. But with no place to stay, Limbo makes arrangements for Teuta to stay at Scarecrows so called 'hideout' that is apparently like a mandion full of guest rooms. After taking Teuta there, they meet Scarecrow for the first time who's actually just an awkward nerd who tries to act cool 😂. He even has a "respect" jar so if anyone talks crap about him they have to pay up lmao. Apparently after their missions they receive pay for exposing corrupt people such as politicians, company workers, ect. So Teuta decides to join them and explains the reason she became a journalists was to uncover truths; especially the one regarding her brother's death.
Teuta wakes up in the mansion she's now staying at. Limbo's sister named Valerie appears after jokingly threatening Limbo with a gun lmao. She's an assistant district attorney and everyone is intimidated by her lol. So Valerie tells Limbo about a kid he's often helped out when he's gotten into bad situations. His name is Eddie and he stole a car that happened to be connected with a gang known to distributing drugs. Limbo and Teuta visit the police station to talk to pick Eddie up and Teuta ends up mentioning to Luka she's now staying with Limbo while renting a vacant room at his mansion. Meanwhile, Eddie is clearly being targeted after some guy tries to rob him, so Limbo and Shu escort him back to Blackhawk which is a district in New Seeg that is known for gangs and people living in poverty.
Meanwhile, Teuta visits the woman named Irina who is arrested for a murder charge. She explains that as a result of being trafficked she has had to work jobs such as prostitution or drug smuggling. In addition, she lived in dirty homes but did her best for the sake of her family. Before their time to talk runs out, she asks Teuta what she would do if she could change the world. After this, Teuta gets a call from a New Seeg Academia professor named Sauli for the chance to interview him. In greeting him, she finds out that he's Helvetica's legal guardian. After interviewing about his surgical work, he talks about a case in California and "how seeing the future" could be used in a police case.
After this, Helvetica escorts Teuta out and meets Mozu at the morgue where he does autopsies. Apparently he wears the same apron for when he cooks too so they go to a market to buy a new one. It's there Limbo calls to meet up at the bar they often visit. They meet Eddie there who tries to tell them he's not involved with the gang leader Rosco but is indeed connected in the sense they're targeting him and his father was killed by this gang apparently. Shu tells him he doesn't know what it means to kill so he shouldn't try to seek revenge. After this, they encounter someone from Rosco's gang who was hired to seek them out. The next day, Teuta finds out that Shuu killed him since he's a bounty hunter. Knowing this, she doesn't know exactly how she feels about it. Later, Teuta visits Sauli who gives Teuta a criminology psychological test.
Suddenly, Teuta gets a call from Carmine saying that Eddie is missing. They find him at the police station and find out that Rosco was shot by Eddie. He ends up dying so Eddie starts crying and realize he just killed a person. Limbo tries to tell him it was just self defense and so Teuta decides she'll go back in time as someone else to try and make sure Eddie doesn't kill Rosco. She comes back as some janitor and manages to convince someone to let her borrow their phone. She calls Shuu and convinces him that she's Teuta while telling her what Eddie is about to it. When returning back to her body, she finds herself witnessing Rosco being "shot" by Eddie. When actually Eddie had a fake gun and Shuu made a sound effect from his phone when he shot. So Rosco is then arrested. After this, Teuta shows Luka and Adam Scarecrow's place to show she's okay with her living arrangements. Luka managed to grab some of Teuta's belongings and a cat apparently slipped in. Teuta begs Scarecrow (who's terrified of cats) to let her keep it and he finally gives in.
Limbo and Shu come back after being apprehended by some crazy guy they were tailing on stealing drugs. He kept going on about getting a vaccine until he crashed the car and killed himself. Afterwords, Teuta meets with Mozu at the supermarket and they discuss what to name the cat they found. Mozu suggests "Anna" based off the character from the film Anastasia. He suddenly asks Teuta a personal question about her brother. She tells him she doesn't mind since it's been a while and while she is sad she may even feel hatred towards whomever killed him but knows she can't forgive them. Mozu mentions he had a younger sister that went missing a year ago and presumes she's likely dead. But Teuta believes he'll find her someday.
After this, Teuta visits Irina again and she discusses how people were after Rosco and data regarding famous people which is valuable information enough to be dangerous to have. Teuta knows that Scarecrow is currently trying to decrypt the data he obtained from Rosco's safe and warns him that it may be dangerous to see what is on the memory stick. Meanwhile, Valerie tells Teuta that Luka is in suspicion of fraudulent actions such as manipulating evidence in the workplace. Teuta has no idea about this but promises Valerie she'll inform her of what she knows. Limbo and Shu investigate a sort of "virus" that's killing due to stolen anesthetic drugs. These people are desperately looking for a vaccine and while Teuta visits Mozu in the autopsy room, suddenly a man appears demanding a vaccine and dies on the floor while bleeding.
Mozu locks the door and keeps them quarantined just in case the virus is airborne. Mozu believes it's likely he's infected since he touched the man's blood ungloved with a finger he cut at the market. So Mozu decides to wait in the autopsy room while everyone tries to find the vaccine for the virus that was spread by a pharmaceutical. Eventually Luka appears and Teuta asks if she's hiding anything. She says she's not but when Teuta brings up she transfered departments, she told her it wasn't a.big deal so she didn't mention it. Albeit things stay somewhat awkward between them. Eventually, Limbo threatens a researcher to retrieve the vaccine by pretending he infected her. They're then able to give Mozu the vaccine so he's no longer infected.
After this, Teuta comes back to the police station to find Luka who has been shot in the archive room. She panics frantically and just when Luka dies, she goes back in time as a doctor in a medical room. She immediately goes to call Luka and convinces it's her it's Teuta. She manages to get her not to visit the archive room and meets up with her. Teuta starts crying and thankful to see Luka alive. Her and Adam meet up at the bar to see everyone and eat. Meanwhile, Luka discusses with Teuta in private that she is actually doing sketchy things for the sake of protecting a victim of a sex crime. She tells Teuta to trust her that even though she may be doing something slightly wrong that she's doing it for good reasons. After this, a name is given to the cat they keep (the name is dependent on who's route you do!).
Valarie, Carmine, Teuta and Luka all go out on an all girls shopping spree together. They visit a cafe and discuss love while Carmen goes on about her long distance lover lol. Valarie also teases the idea of Teuta buying a sexy swimsuit to make the guys horny for her LOL. After this, Teuta visits the hospital wondering about the surgeon she became when she went back in time. Apparently by taking a sudden phone call to warn Luka, she interrupted an urgent surgery and now the patient has an amputated leg. Teuta realizes her selfish actions had consequences and feels bad about it. She consults Adam and Luka about it (who already know of her power) but they tell her all choices have consequences and she just went with what she felt was right. Afterwords, Teuta decides to open a letter that would address whether or not she's won the journal rookie reward. She finds out that she did indeed win, and will have her article published in a book.
Teuta eventually finds out Limbo is working on Irina's murder case. He, Teuta, and the others decide to infiltrate a man named Georgina's room to find evidence he sold a d treated illegal immigrants like slaves when they were imported. Helvetica disguises as a woman and manages to keep him preoccupied while they steal data from his tablet. In the end, Irina pleads guilty in court saying that she did indeed murder her friend out of jealousy that she escaped the living hell she was forced to work in. The last time Irina speaks to Teuta, she tells her about the organization Louis Lopez started and how it was two brothers a young and older and the two tried to kill each other until the younger one killed the older one. She goes on to tell her to contact someone through Full Circle from the account "capablanca" and hopes Teuta can manage to stop this dangerous organization.
After this, Limbo and the others plan a surprise party for Teuta as congratulations for winning the New Seig rookie reward. In addition, when they get back to Scarecrow's place both Valarie and Carmine appear. They remind Teuta they still plan to make her wear a swimsuit for a pool party and change themselves into one while giving Teuta one they bought as well. (The fun part about this scene is that each swimsuit is different dependent on who's route you're doing. I found that to be a very interesting way to show who's route you're in).
[This was the swimsuit Mozu suggested]
Limbo Fitzgerald (CV: KENN) An infamous lawyer who's been known to have acquitted murder charges. He's cheerful and aloof but abides by the law in his own way and has his own sense of justice. He has an older sister who's the district attorney assistant. He can play the piano and is pretty rich.
Tueta and everyone plan a Thanksgiving dinner together since more than half of them don't have parents. One day, one of Limbo's old friends named Navid bumps into both Limbo and Teuta and asks to have dinner with them. Teuta finds it weird he invites her as well but he admits after Limbo leaves he wasn't on great terms with him and might make it less awkward if she's there. So she decides to go for a little bit and then meet up with Adam and Luka later. When she goes to the hotel to meet Limbo and Navid, the two of them are having dinner. Navid talks about his job a bit but also mentions he got his Lawyer license revoked but doesn't mention why. Teuta eventually leaves and goes to meet Adam and Luka at the bar. That night, Limbo comes home super drunk so he ends up falling on the couch and onto Teuta's lap as she and Scarecrow try to help him.
One day, Teuta runs into Navid again while interviewing Sauli at a cafe. She tells him she's seeing an opera play that he and Limbo are seeing as well. When going there, Teuta is sitting separate from Navid and Limbo. Navid then pretends he has a bomb and that he'll get Teuta killed, making Limbo beg for him to do whatever he wants for revenge to him but to keep his friends out of it. But Navid continues to tell him he's looking forward to seeing him suffer. Limbo doesn't tell Teuta he said this and acts like everything is fine when they all see each other again. Finally, all of them have a Thanksgiving dinner together and manage to save the turkey from a disaster since Mozu came home. Limbo manages to escape his family and asks Teuta if she's met with Navid recently. He explains that he's actually the reason his lawyer license got revoked because he crossed a line when dealing with rescuing human traffic victims.
Luka and Adam eventually arrive and they all eat together. While relaxing near the pool, Teuta hears Limbo playing the piano and he tells her he used to play when he was a kid because Valerie didn't want to when his parents bought a piano. One day, Teuta gets a call from a hospital that a child she met that was sick is close to dying. The child's parents are insistant on getting treatment at another hospital but the doctor's insists there's no time left for them. The child ends up passing away and Teuta feels sad in the car so Limbo let's her rest on his shoulder lol. After this, Limbo is suddenly arrested for killing a "Jenna Eckley". Valarie is hysterical when she hears Limbo wants to represent himself as his lawyer but he wants to follow through with it since he's already familiar with the case.
After Limbo's hearing, there's news about a bomb exploding in a car near Limbo's work office. Everyone is worried when Limbo gets back and he insinuates that Navid wants revenge but doesn't want to involve any of them. This pisses off Helvetica so they start arguing. They manage to smooth things over but Limbo admits he let someone die before he returns to his room. After this, Teuta decides to find Limbo and see if he's willing to talk to her. She finds him near the bridge and he suddenly hugs her but she doesn't say or ask anything. They stay in his car overnight and finally Limbo decides to talk about his past. He reveals he and Navid were in the same law school together and we're relatively close. But during one case, Navid decided to buy one of the trafficked women.
Limbo didn't approve of his involvement and ratted him out which resulted his license being revoked rather than facing charges since he wasn't directly involved with the trafficking. In the end, the woman was deported but her son died while she was held in the deportation facility. Because of this, she called up Limbo one day to meet him at a hotel. Limbo felt he could somehow make amends if he did meet her, but he ended up finding her dead body in a bathtub instead after she killed herself. He also found a note that said "now you'll never forget me" and put the guilt of her death onto him. This pisses off Teuta so she starts crying and saying it's not his fault. Limbo thanks her for getting so mad for his sake and he tells her he was really scared when Navid threatened to harm her.
After this, Helvetica makes Teuta contact Navid so they can lure him to Port New Seig. They essentially tell him to back off and leave Limbo alone or they'll retaliate. This doesn't scare Navid but he promises he'll leave and cut ties immediately as long as he can meet with Limbo one last time. They don't trust him but decide to agree. Teuta and Limbo both have a drink with Navid and he tells them everything is over and he'll be leaving tonight. But of course the next day, Navid appears again and kidnaps Teuta by threatening to kill Limbo. He brings her to a motel and tells her that he planted nanomachines into Limbo's wine he drank last night. So now he has the power to kill him whenever and threatens to do so unless Teuta kills herself the same way the immigrant woman he liked died.
Teuta manages to go back in time in the body of a child and uses a pay phone to call Ljmbo and everyone. Limbo reassures her everything will be fine and hangs up. Shu goes to pick up Teuta and Mozu comes up with the idea to stop Limbo's heart temporarily so that the nanomachine will deactivate. In doing so, Limbo confronts Navid who tries to kill him by activating the nanomachine. But it doesn't work and he goes on about how it's Limbo's fault the immigrant woman he loved died and then kills himself with the same nanomachines in his drink. Navid's death is made to look like a heartattack and Limbo gets the nanomachine in his body removed. After the surgery, Teuta meets him in the hospital room and holds his hand. The both of them start bawling and go on about how thankful they are neither of them died. After this, Teuta and Limbo finally acknowledge their feelings and make out on Limbo's car.
In the epilogue, Limbo has a fancy dinner with Teuta who's anxious about everything including what she wears. But Limbo surprises her with some deep kissing afterwords lol. After this, Teuta gets annoyed since Limbo is gone while she has plans for New Year's Eve. But big surprise for Teuta because Limbo goes all the way to Europe to get a special ring from his grandma to give to Teuta to greet the New Year's together. They then go to an expensive hotel and Limbo buys out someone's reservation and the two of them fall asleep together. When they wake up, Limbo makes sure Teuta stays in bed with her while she demands a nice big expensive breakfast.
Thoughts: Considering Limbo is the poster boy, I kind of expected a route with more… action? But nevertheless I liked Limbo's character and KENN does a really good job as him. I had the impression his route would be more about law or something but then maybe that would make things more boring LOL. Either way, it was still interesting enough and he got some good moments with Teuta. Generally I wished each route was longer. If I were to rank him based on personality type and well, who I like, he'd probably be my least favorite. But not because I don't like him though, he's just not my type. I think he was the only character that had more spicy scenes lol.
Shu Lynn O'Keefe (CV: Hosoya Yoshimasa) a bounty hunter who works alongside Limbo. He's a chain smoker who seemingly shows no motivation through his attitude. But, he's good at assassination and shooting skills which are his strong points.
Teuta sees Shu come back from one of his bounty hunting killings and sees a sort of "different" way about him. Later, he acts normal and even steals some of the ice cream she's eating. He pulls out a list of people to be killed and crosses one off. He asks if the fact he kills people scares her but she says it's more like she wants to know his reason for doing it. After this, Teuta goes shopping at Trader Joneses and picks up cigarettes for Shu. She talks to Shu later who gives Teuta a "pay you back" coupon on the back of her receipt. She brings up her job and wonders what he'll do after he finishes his bounty list. He believes he'll become nothing or perhaps die after he finishes his bounty list.
After this, Teuta visits Eddie who is now doing well for himself. They meet Carmine who brings up a place called Sunny Island which has an amusement park. She invites everyone to go and forces Shu with her special "pay her back" coupon. They go to the amusement park and Shu shows Teuta how to use a fake gun when playing one of the shooting games. She starts to talk about her brother more since she went with him often to this park and becomes nostalgic. She insists Shu talk about his family and so he tells her about his family. Although not blood related, his parent was a woman named Taira was his teacher that raised him to be a bounty hunter. Tyra had a son name Yang who he hadn't seen 5 years prior since his master Tyra had died.
Teuta and Shu ride the ferris wheel together and Teuta gets mad at Shu for constantly bringing up himself dying someday. He tells her that it's not that he believes he's going to die, but it's just been hard to deal with the death of his teacher. After this, Teuta is suddenly put at gun point by someone who tells Shu to meet him privately. Shu immediately knows it's Yang and leaves after that. Teuta follows him after and meets with Shu at the designated spot he's to meet Yang. The two of them are not on good terms but Yang wants to negotiate a job for Shu. He asks him to kill a sniper called "Closer" who is apparently on the missing page of Shu's bounty hunting list that Yang currently has. He wants the reward for killing him and claims he will use it to make an ID and leave the country.
Shu is left there unsure of what he wants to do and invites Teuta to go eat lunch. In doing so, he discusses his relationship with Yang. The two of them were like brothers and with Tyra, they were like a family. One day he found Trya dead with Yang stealing from the body. This is when he ran away and took the paper ripped out from the list Shu has. He ran away while Shu tried to help his former teacher and parent. Because of this, he doesn't know if he should trust him but decides to do it anyway. Shu and the others make plans to find "Closer" before he can shoot a politician. Unfortunately, while Shu is in position on the day the politician is to be shot, Yang set him up in a trap so Shu would be seen responsible for sniping down the politician and is arrested.
Teuta tries to go back in time as someone else to try and change the outcome of Shu's arrest. But when she tries, the outcome is the same and she comes back to the present unable to change anything. So the rest of them devise a plan to get Shu "killed" like Limbo so he can escape. Teuta goes back in time and is in the body of a police officer. She manages to find Shu in the interrogation room and tells him their plan. He tells her to stab him with a knife in her boot and in doing so, Teuta goes back to her body. The rest of them manage to set a bomb to make it look like an accident "killed" Shu and so he manages to escape back to their hideout. He rests and wakes up to Teuta getting ice cream and Teuta admits she felt somewhat helpless when she tried to help him since she couldn't help him the first time.
After this, Yang meets Teuta and forces her to speak with him. She tells her the politician was actually on the bounty list as well as the "closer" person who's actually involved in the online organization run by Louis Lopez. He even tells her that closer person killed their teacher Tyra. He tells her that the closer is now after Shu and wanted him imprisoned so he could distract the closer. Since they don't know about Yang, they wouldn't pay any mind to him. In other words, Yang didn't kill their teacher and is trying to protect Shu in his own way. After this, Shu decides to try and find Yang to speak with him about it. He ends up doing so and Yang admits he didn't kill Tyra which leaves Shu with mixed feelings since he had always thought he'd done it.
Tueta is suddenly kidnapped by Closer so Shu makes plans to rescue her after receiving a call from Closer. He tells Shu to kill himself or he'll kill Teuta but Shu manages to convince him not to kill Teuta by giving him money. He tells him to tell Teuta the keyword "Calamity Jane" which is his favorite movie and then pretends to I'll himself on video. After hearing Closer tell her this, she realize it may mean Shu is not actually dead. Shu ends up sniping Closer dead and saves Teuta who immediately hugs him and starts crying. After this, Yang gives Shu the last page of the list along with a photo of him and his teacher Tyra who was actually his real mother. Yang tells him it's his fault Tyra died because if he just hid like she told him too instead of intervening, she wouldn't have been killed when she died protecting him. Before Yang leaves, it's insinuated he's actually a woman (but doesn't confirm).
After this, Shu confirms his feelings for Teuta and admits he's in love with her. She does as well and the two of them smooch in her room. In the extra story, Teuta feels like Shu doesn't really treat her like a girlfriend and ends up talking about it to Scarecrow. He then takes his own action to get Shu to talk with Teuta. In doing so, he reveals he's at risk of dying because there's a bullet stuck in his brain from years ago. Now with his list completed the only thing he has to live for is Teuta. Yang has contacted a good surgeon but it's just a matter of having the surgery and seeing if things go well. So the surgery is successful and because Shu will be alone on New Year's Eve, she decides to call Shu and build a snowman in front of his hospital room. After this, Shu calls Teuta's parents so he can get their approval.
Thoughts: I WAS SO SURE HE MAY BE MY FAVE CUZ OF HOSOYAN. But alas, he wasn't my fave after all. I think at first Shu was meh to me but he grew on me as I played each route. I really liked how he was so non-nonchalant and acted like he didn't give a shit when he actually did he was just bad at showing it lol. I would've liked to learn more about his past though and Yang as well. It was insinuated that Yang was actually a woman and while I'll usually take ambiguity as it is, I don't really get what the point of mentioning it in the first place was in this case?? Seemed weird to throw it out there.
Helvetica Olsted (CV: Yoshino Hiroyuki) A popular cosmetic surgeon in New Seig. He's good at disguise and gives off a flirty impression with how he rates women. Although he has a lot of confidence in his appearance, he has little memory of his past.
[LOOK AT THOSE NIPPLES!! THAT IS HOW YOU DRAW EM']
Helvetica is talking to a client who's face he'll be working on at his plastic surgeon clinic. With Teuta helping publish a page for an article about his work and the client, this'll help pay for the client's treatment. Teuta thinks it's nice he's so willing to help others but he believes it as "giving opportunity" rather than helping. He doesn't believe in helping people and believes they should work from the bottom to top and insinuates that's what he did. Later, he does admit he grew up in a harsh environment but was taken in by Sauli who changed his appearance completely when they first met to give him a fresh start at life. In addition, he'll be doing a nude photoshoot for the magazine and tells Teuta he suggested it since he likes showing off his body.
While having a Halloween party, Helvetica reveals he lived in the slums and doesn't have much memory of his past. He believes it's probably due to the drugs he was addicted to. He got into a fight and was basically half-dead beaten and cold on a pile of garbage thinking he was going to die. It's when Sauli found him things changed for the better for him. Afterwords, Teuta goes outside near the pool to lie down and Helvetica teases her and tries to kiss her. She puts her hand on his mouth and tells him to quit being an annoying flirt lol. The next day, Helvetica gets a call from Luka saying his patient died. They were killed by some drug seller who was arrested. Luka speaks to both Helvetica and Carmine who knew her.
Teuta has a bad taste in her mouth about her dying under these circumstances and doesn't want her case to be forgotten. So in order to give news of her death, she manages to get an article in the New Seig newspaper which Helvetica greatly appreciates. A few days later, Helvetica gets strange phone calls but tries to ignore them. One day, Helvetica gets a client named Magda who has a scar on her face that she says she wants treatment for. She went to prison and atoned for her crimes but finds it hard to make a living with the way she is now. Helvetica refuses to treat her though because it looks as through she's currently abusing drugs. She then suddenly snaps asking how he changed his face and past. She tells him she won't forgive him for throwing away his past before leaving.
After this, Helvetica is seemingly down and so Teuta tries to cheer him up. She tells him she was really pissed when that Magda woman was rude to him. Helvetica laughs at seeing Teuta so upset for him but admits he has no idea who he was in the past. Teuta comforts him by telling him the Helvetica she knows know is enough but may be interested to know who he was before. He thanks her but then pulls her into the pool as a joke and teases her lol. A few days later, Teuta gets a call from Helvetica's coworker saying he hasn't come to work in a few days. Teuta gets anxious so she checks in with Sauli who says he'll look for him. Later that night, Limbo and Shu bring home Helvetica who overdosed on drugs. They all immediately help him and take him into the shower.
Helvetica is throwing up over and over but begs them to let him tell them what happened. Apparently he remembered who he was in the past. He was an illegal immigrant that was trafficked to the states. He was involved in gangs, stole, threatened people, and sold and did drugs. One day, him and his gang friends went to a house to steal from and did drugs and alcohol there. They ended up lighting the place on fire and all escaped while the police chased after them. Helvetica abandoned his friends and got the shit beaten out of him for it which led to the day where he was left in the garbage dump. Apparently Magda was part of the gang and got caught by the police during that time and now wants Helvetica to come back and atone for his sins since being part of a gang means always being connected.
The next day while Helvetica is feeling better, both Teuta and Mozu decide to try and look for Magda. They end up in a car crash and are held captive by Magda herself who has a gun to them. Magda goes on about a person named "Nikola" who is actually Helvetica and that's what his real name was before. She goes on about how he's scum and how he should be with her and the friends he abandoned. Teuta gets pissed at her and literally grabs her. She yells at her saying that Helvetica is different now and isn't like her. She then threatens them with her gun so Teuta goes back in time as someone else to contact Helvetica and tell him where she and Mozu are. When her consciousness returns to her own body, Helvetica is there with Magda.
Magda immediately yells at him for being a traitor who believes he can change from who he really is. She also makes him feel guilty about the fact she got burn scares because of him and doesn't know how it feels. Helvetica then burns his own face to try and compensate for her pain but she kicks the shit out of him anyway saying it's not good enough. With Helvetica almost at the brink of death, Magda freaks out realizing she didn't want to kill him and ends up shooting herself. Mozu calls 911 and the both of them are taken to the hospital. Thankfully, Helvetica survived and Magda is currently in a coma. Teuta constantly visits Helvetica until he wakes up with Sauli and her beside him. He decides to take him outside where he talks to Helvetica asking if he wants to return to his old self. He asks why he's alive in the first place and Helvetica starts crying uncontrollably saying he wanted to live.
Months pass after this and finally Helvetica is ready to remove the bandages off of his face. After all his treatment and surgeries, his face is back to normal. Helvetica thanks Teuta and hugs her while telling himself that he's himself or rather–Helvetica. On the day he's to be discharged from the hospital, Teuta overhears him speaking Spanish on the phone. Apparently he was trying to find a surgeon to work on Magda since she suffered severe brain damage when she shot herself. After this, Helvetica goes to to pool to relax and admits he likes Teuta. Teuta admits she probably likes him too and wants to kiss him. She falls into the pool with him and the two of them share a passionate kiss.
After this, Helvetica and Teuta are now dating. He asks to watch some videos while he was in treatment with her and releases just how bad his addiction to drugs was. Later, they go to the park and Teuta asks Helvetica to teach her some Spanish phrases lol. He invites her to the movies but later they get into a fight because Teuta sees Helvetica hanging out with other girls. After this, Teuta realizes she's really just running away from her feelings cause she thinks Helvetica is special to her. They meet up at his office and make up by making out on the couch. Scarecrow calls Teuta to check up on her and meanwhile Helvetica is having a grand ol' time getting touchy feely while she's on the phone lmao. She then tells Helvetica to say she's special to him which he does. In the bad end, Helvetica decides to live as his old self "Nikola Ritz".
Thoughts: Helvetica's route definitely went into a direction I didn't expect it to go. Not only was he originally an illegal immigrant, but he was also a drug addict too. Not to mention he looks completely different from how he used to look (the power of plastic surgery lol). But its because of this I really wish there was more to his route. The conflict in this route was actually solved fairly quickly. Magda didn't have as big as a role as I thought she was going to have and it ended up being more about Helvetica and how he came to be. This was definitely good for the sake of his development, and it definitely makes him more of a likable character. But surprisingly, we didn't learn too much about Sauli… I would've liked to know more about why he took in Helvetica…
Mozu Sheppard (CV: Jun Fukuyama) is a coroner who works at the forensic lab and serves as the chief of the autopsy department. He's usually reserved and misunderstood as apathetic due to his emotionless attitude (but really he's just bad at expressing his feelings in a normal way lol).
One day, Luka asks both Mozu and Teuta to come with her for a murder investigation. She wants Teuta to cover the story so the media doesn't get riled up for it and asks for Mozu's assistance in observing the body. They find out a student at the New Seig Academia was found hung on a tree. However, Mozu rules that it's a death meant to look like a suicide and he was already dead before he was hung on the tree. Teuta meets and interviews a teacher at the school names Troy who's very popular with the students. He tells Teuta about a prom event they have at the school and how he's disheartened by the fact a crime has happened there. After this, Teuta meets Mozu at the autopsy room and they decide to go back to the school.
[Mozu's sister who's been missing for about a year]
There, Teuta encounters a girl name Ivy who has a photo of a girl who went missing before. She says cases like these aren't unusual at the school and usually they're no longer talked about or forgotten and believes the same will happen again. When Mozu sees the picture, he tells Teuta it's his sister. After this, Teuta decides she wants to help investigate this case for the sake of Mozu's missing sister as well. Teuta and Mozu go back to the school but aren't able to find out anything aside from rumors about the school. In addition, the school and Troy don't want Teuta or the others to try and interview staff about it and prefer the students don't find out about the cases. Luka believes that the school is hiding something and looks into the matter. After meeting with both Luka and Adam, Teuta visits Mozu at the autopsy room while it's been raining. She finds him holding a dead puppy in his arms which unfortunately died while in the rain. Teuta runs out to find the mom's body as well and brings it to him. After cleaning up the bodies he thanks her for her help.
One day, Teuta finds out that someone posted information on the past cases of the missing and dead students on Full Circle. She tells the others and Mozu about it and they agree to cooperate in the case after finding out Mozu's sister might be involved. The school suspects Teuta and so she visits to tell them she wasn't involved. Troy in specific believes the culprit could be a student since there are some students that feel they can't confide in adults in situations like these. Regardless, they still don't have a lot to go on and hope to find more clues. One day, Mozu and Teuta spot Ivy at the school who is seemingly avoiding the two of them. Teuta finally runs up to her and suggests she skips class so they can talk. The three of them drive out to a field where Ivy finally reveals she knew Mozu's sister Yuzu and was actually close friends with her. But the two of them had a falling out when Ivy noticed Yuzu was getting too friendly with her teacher Troy.
She starts crying and feels bad because the last thing she said to her before she disappeared was hurtful. Mozu comforts her and tells her it's okay to worry or doubt yourself because that makes you who you are. After this, they return to the school and Ivy encourages both Mozu and Teuta to attend the "Jamgo" party they're having since it's similar to prom. Ivy likes to take pictures and says she'll be there to take them. Mozu then comes in and decides to tell her about why he became a coroner. Apparently his parents died when he was 11 years old and didn't understand what it meant back then. And because he wanted to understand it that's what led him to his career path as a coroner.
Teuta and Mozu go to the school to visit the Jamgo party they were invited to by Ivy. When getting there, Mozu seems anxious and suddenly kabe-dons Teuta making her startled. This throws off Teuta completely where she accidentally drops her phone, damaging it. Apparently he wanted to increase his sexual arousal in order to cheer up LOL. He can't stop thinking about his sister ending up like his parents so he gets depressed. Teuta tells him in times like that it's better to just hug or talk to someone and he thanks her and tells her he'll just hug her next time lol. After this, they enter the gym and Mozu leaves to help some drunk kids that fell. Teuta gets a phone call from Troy but can't properly hear him due to her phone malfunctioning.
Teuta eventually leaves and goes to the biology room to find Troy bleeding from a wound a fire starting. Troy insinuates it's Ivy's doing and she goes looking for her. With no luck, she goes back in time as a student and warns Mozu ahead of time to contact an ambulance and the fire department. In doing so, she comes back in the present to Mozu telling her the situation. But Teuta decides to go in the room with the fire and help Ivy. Mozu then covers them with a sheet and helps them escape the flames together. After this, a post looking as if it's trying to frame Ivy is posted on Full Circle even though she doesn't have her phone. Ivy tells Teuta and Mozu that Troy tried to strangle her which confuses Teuta since he seemed to be injured.
While Mozu and Teuta search for Troy, he manages to grab Teuta from behind and puts a gun to her head. He essentially reveals he a crazy sicko who loves killing and creating stories for himself. He also stole Ivy's phone and posted on her account trying to frame her. But while he goes on about his killings, he starts to lose his insanity and starts going on about a girl who he tortured but seemingly wouldn't die the way he wanted to. He reveals he's talking about Mozu's sister Yuzu, but won't say where she is or if she's alive. Mozu demands answers and threatens to shoot him with the gun he dropped but he continues to go on without making sense. Finally, the police arrive and Luka tells Mozu and Teuta to accompany her to where his sister might be located. Unfortunately, when reaching the cellar, they find a corpse instead. But Mozu hugs her sister's dead body and apologizes for taking so long to find her.
A day later, Mozu visits Teuta in her room and she hugs him to comfort him while he's in pain. He tells her statistically he just needs to endure the pain of losing a loved one for 3 days but Teuta tells him it's okay to cry if he needs to and so he thanks her as he starts to cry. 😭 After this, Mozu decides he wants to do his sister's autopsy so he can speak with her one last time. He does so while crying and says goodbye to his sister. After this, there's a court hearing for Troy's murder case and Mozu speaks as a witness. He tells the court while he'll never forgive Troy for what he did, he suggests he gets mentally examined for the sake of his mental health state. Mozu goes to his sister's funeral along with Teuta and they discuss how they don't believe death is really the end.
During the time of Yuzu's funeral, Mozu reveals he disposed of a body before just like Troy had after he killed his victims. He didn't know who's it was but suspects it could've been her brother's body. After being told this, the two of them keep their distance for a while. Until finally, Teuta realizes how lonely she is without Mozu and goes to him to tell him what she likes most about him is that she feels at place near him. Mozu apologizes I advance for making assumptions and possibly upsetting her since he feels at place when he's with her as well. So after essentially confessing their feelings for each other, Mozu prepares a surprise for Teuta on Valentine's day. He gives her a dress and puts a corsage on her to give her very own personal prom and share a sweet kiss. 🥰 In the bad end, Mozu ends up dying after Troy stabs him.
Thoughts: Mozu is such a precious boy!! He cried so much in this route and I didn't expect that at all considering how kuudere he is. He was actually the first route I did when I started playing. I had no idea he'd even be my favorite but it seems like I always know which one will end up being my favorite regardless and end up doing them first lol. Its funny Mozu is my fave though cause he's quiet & the complete opposite of Chika (who was really loud). I felt like Mozu's route was the only route to have a mystery to be solved and had the most detective aspect to it. Its weird though cause Mozu's route was very isolated from the other characters in the sense that none of the other main cast really appeared in his route at all. It was all more focused on Mozu and Teuta finding the mystery related to the school and his sister. I think I had different expectations for other routes because of this. But damn, I definitely felt the most sad playing his route. Especially when he found his sister's corpse after having a slight hope she was alive. That was heartbreaking. But Mozu himself is such a sweetheart and romantic! I love that he made his own personal prom for Teuta. It was so sweet.
Scarecrow (CV: Shirai Yuusuke) is a cybergeek who is famous on the internet. He's good at hacking and finding info through various connections. Although he puts on a front of being frivolous he's actually really childish and shy a lot of the times.
Scarecrow brings up a mission to uncover the truths of a sketchy organization but no one except Teuta is interested. Scarecrow brings up his past and how his mother died when he was really young and his dad took care of him. His dad showed him how to use technology and even built Anima (his high tech AI at home). However, 6 years later his dad died and he's been alone ever since and never got to have a family Christmas. So Teuta and Scarecrow go to a cafe where they discuss with someone on the phone about where they can get an access key of information on the organization. In doing so, they find out they need to go to the New Seig Academia and everyone else eventually decides to help. out in infiltrating the headmaster's office. So when they get there and find the data they were looking for, a man appears to try and stop them. He pushes Scarecrow into an aquarium tank so Scarecrow gets soaked with water.
For some reason this triggers something and Scarecrow goes completely crazy and starts strangling the man which helps distract Teuta and the others to escape. Thanks to this they're able to escape with the data and Scarecrow works on deciphering the code. When they mention Scarecrow went batshit on the guy, he tells them he doesn't really remember it. So after this they hold a special Christmas party for Scarecrow since he never properly celebrated it before. So they surprise Scarecrow when he comes home and they have a fun Christmas party. Afterwords, Scarecrow and Teuta play the piano together and Scarecrow kisses Teuta on the cheek. Teuta is confused and embarrassed why he did that but then Scarecrow tries to use the mistletoe as an excuse while he fumbles in embarrassment lol
Unfortunately, the night ends on bad terms when Shu finds out Scarecrow was part of a massive cyber terrorism attack that caused people to die. 6 years ago, there was a massive power outage in Chicago, Illinois that he who had "died" was a suspect of. Scarecrow explains he graduated high school at 13 years old and went to college at 14 years old but then dropped out. It was then he became a hacking criminal that did things such as money laundering and tampering with data. It was then a private military company called "Constantine" hired him and did a sort of back out that was a test but ended up killing people in the process. Thanks to this, Scarecrow decided he'd quit being a hacker and quit Constantine as well. However, the company threatened him and essentially told him he couldn't quit now that he knew their secrets and forced him to stay and tortured him as well.
Thanks to this, Scarecrow currently has PTSD and he figured if he endured the torture, he could eventually escape. However, they eventually killed his father and showed a video of it to him saying he'll end up like this too if he leaves. Scarecrow was eventually trapped in a corner at this point with no way out until a hacker helped Scarecrow out and faked his death for him so he could escape. Scarecrow apologizes for not telling them all this and also apologizes to Teuta for lying about how his father died. Later that night, Scarecrow reveals that the one thing that was the worst was the waterboarding torture which caused him to have a fear of water (hence why he flipped the hell out when he got wet). And so they decide to make plans to find the hacker who helped him out the following day.
The next day, Scarecrow, Shu, and Teuta go to the hideout where the 'hacker' is which is an underwater lair. They find a man there and also the guy who they encountered at the school before. Scarecrow is in shock to find the hacker who helped him who's name is "Kyle" was his father all along. The guy forces Kyle to escape with him and the 3 of them are trapped in there. So while looking for an escape, an alarm to self destruct the base goes on and the entire place blows up. The three of them are thrown underwater but because of Scarecrow's PTSD of water he just stops moving completely and Teuta has to force air into his lungs until she can get him out. Eventually she does and they go back to their home. Later, Teuta tries to check on Scarecrow and he ends up blacking out and trying to choke her.
The others stop him in time and Mozu slaps some sense into him (literally). Scarecrow starts to flip out and ask what he did to Teuta. Shu and Helvetica take Teuta to her room where she rests for a while. When she wakes up, she asks to see Scarecrow immediately and they tell her to leave him be for now since he literally just tried to kill her. They figure whatever happened it was a sort of defense mechanism rather than multiple personalities. After this, Teuta eventually speaks with Scarecrow who feels terrible about what he did. Teuta reassures him that he's still himself no matter what and he won't let this change their friendship. Albeit, later she tells Helvetica privately she wasn't able to admit she's actually scared that Scarecrow may try to kill her again but could never tell him this.
Scarecrow decides to speak with Sauli on his personal feelings and basically admits he doesn't want to be alone and wants to stay with his everyone he considers family. After this, he gets a call from the man from before who was with his dad. He asks if he wants to see his father and Scarecrow begs him to leave him alone unharmed. Scarecrow offers to give his access key back as well as his anima program and the man on the phone agrees to these conditions. However, Scarecrow ends up falling into a trap when he's knocked out by a taser and put into a train car with his father that is set to crash. He tells them that keeping his secrets is more important than their hacking abilities and bids them farewell. Scarecrow's father then tells him they can probably send a short message to someone since they'll have a brief period where they have a connection on their phone.
So Scarecrow decides to send a message to Teuta that only he would understand. Teuta then realizes she can go back in time and tell Scarecrow this code so he can decipher it for her and let her know what to do. So she does so and tells Scarecrow the code through the phone. He tells her that Anima has a code where she can temporarily control it (since only he can) and stop the train in time. So Teuta does this and they stop the train from reaching its destination (albeit it still crashes lol). Scarecrow and his dad come out alive and Teuta immediately runs to Scarecrow's side and is relieved to see he's okay. Scarecrow basically confesses he loves Teuta but she overwrites it by saying everyone loves him too lmao. So after this, they leak all of Constantine's secrets online. Scarecrow then invites Teuta to Sunny Island where they both confess their feelings for each other.
In the epilogue story, Teuta and Scarecrow go on a date together while Scarecrow is anxious to see his dad later since they haven't had time to catch up yet. Scarecrow tells Teuta he's been sending money anonymously to hospitals and places that were affected by the blackout he caused. Afterwords, they go to the town square to meet with Scarecrow's dad Kyle. Scarecrow thinks he probably isn't going to show up but he eventually does meet up with them and they go to Carmen's bar. After catching up a bit, Kyle decides he wants to let Scarecrow and Teuta spend New Year's Eve together as boyfriend and girlfriend. So Kyle goes back to the hotel and both Teuta and Scarecrow get ready for the New Year's countdown. Scarecrow decides he wants to kiss Teuta and when they try the first time, they mess up completely. Albeit, once the fireworks go off they finally manage to kiss. One day, they manage to go on a date and have a picnic but it ends up raining and causing the car to get stuck in mud. While trying to move the car, Teuta splashes mud all over Scarecrow so they end up having a mud fight lmao. They then get home with Mozu angry about the mess.
Thoughts: Scarecrow was so totally my type in the sense he was a bumbling shy mess but Mozu won my heart. I didn't expect to find out he went through so much trauma. I would've liked to see more about his past in that regard, but maybe it would've been too dark in that sense?? Well, at the very least they should've explained how his father was alive. I mean, they showed him footage of them killing him but I don't think they explained why he was actually alive (I guess it was fake). He was super cute though and such an adorable awkward mess at times lol. Although, with a PTSD of water, I wonder why he was so chill about being around the pool?? Or why did he even have a pool… huh.
-Full Circle-
Teuta and Luka visit Carmen's bar to find that she's closed for the day. They find out that Carmen's lover came back and is sick in the hospital. Luka, Teuta, and Adam decide to accompany Carmine to the hospital while she visits her lover named Theo. She decides to introduce him to them and tells them he came from overseas back to the New Seig Hospital. She doesn't know much about his younger brother but apparently he attempted to kill him and now he's close to death. Teuta goes back to Carmine's bar and overhears Vonda (the prosecutor who's Valerie's boss) and Alex speaking to each other. She then receives an email from Scarecrow revealing that Alex is actually Carmen's lover's younger brother named Alexey Spencer. In other words, Alex is the younger brother that attempted to kill his older brother, Theo.
Vonda shoots Teuta now that she found out their secret, shocking Alex that he would do this. Teuta then goes back in time as another person before she dies, and manages to call Alex and tells him not to go to Carmen's bar. She meets up with Alex who asks what she knows. She admits she knows the truth about him and his brother and how they're the brothers of Louis Lopez. She tries to ask who exactly Alex is but he uses a stun gun on her to knock her out. The others find her and they go to Carmen's bar. Teuta shows her the photo of her lover Theo and Alex who was his younger brother that tried to kill him. Carmen was invited to join Louis Lopez by Theo and always hoped to find his younger brother that betrayed him. Yet she never would've guessed she was housing him all along and becomes angry with herself.
Teuta tells Carmen that Vonda was the one who was pulling the strings and lied to Alex so that the two brothers would betray each other. In doing so, Vonda would the kill Alex and take over the organization. Regardless, Carmen is adamant on finding Alex and killing him for revenge. However, suddenly Pepe gets a call from that hospital that Theo no longer has much time left so she goes to the hospital instead while the others track down Alex and Vonda. They go to a hotel where they finally track down Alex who's being chased by Vonda's men. He manages to escape by shooting himself until finally Vonda and the others catch up to him. Vonda essentially admits he wants power and reveals Alex changed his appearance and age but now intends to kill him knowing people won't believe in someone like him.
But, little did Vonda know, Carmen was recording the entire thing the whole time and is the creator of Full Circle. Shu then pins down Vonda who's in despair over the fact he was revealed. Carmen then confronts Alex and tells him she wants to kill him. She tells him she made Full Circle for the purpose of finding him and aims her gun at him. However, she doesn't shoot at him and instead starts crying after telling him that the last thing Theo said was his name and not hers. A few days later, Alex is hospitalized and Carmen continues to visit while paying for his medical bills. Teuta visits Alex and he tells her that the organization was originally built to help those who couldn't trust the police or anyone else. Instead they built trust with each other through keeping secrets. He heard of Carmen through his brother and after he almost killed him, he decided to stay close to Carmen to ease his own guilt. After this, they find out Carmen decided to adopt Alex because she believes it's what Theo would've wanted since his family is her family.
Thoughts: I don't know if I considered this surprising, but rather, random?? Well, the Alex bit certainly was (I didn't expect him to be actually an adult). Although making Vonda the villian was really random and honestly I think you only see this guy like two times in the common route and he doesn't appear in any other routes. This made his reveal of being "evil" seem really random and lessened the shock factor imo. They really didn't go into detail about how he manipulated Alex and his brother either. It was hard to feel bad for these character when you really didn't know much about them in the first place (which sucks cause I did like them). I would've at least liked to see more about Alex's brother and Carmen. Obviously Carmen loved him, but we didn't see any history between them and there wasn't a whole lot of backstory on Carmen either (aside from the fact she created Full Circle).
-Auld Lang Syne-
Adam leaves work to meet up with Teuta and Luka like usual. But afterwords, Adam starts hearing a voice and ends up near a construction site. He sees Teuta's brother Zora even though he should be dead because of him (his vision becomes vary hazy in his point of view too. On Adam's 24th birthday, he meets with Teuta and Luka and they celebrate together. Adam apparently grew up in Russia and came to America when he was 7. When he met both Luka and Teuta, they helped him learn English. After reminiscing, they get a gift from Teuta's parents which is 3 tickets to a baseball game that they plan to see together. After this, Adam makes a weird comment about picking up Teuta for prom (lol what). Adam then privately talks with Luka and tells her he saw Zora. Luka flips out when she hears this and wonders what there going to do.
The next day, Adam literally starts to lose his mind and is actually seeing Zora through hallucinations. He starts seeing him at a cafe and keeps asking what he wants and for him to stop. He ends up at the central core and collapses there after running away from this ghost. He wakes up in the hospital and finds Sauli next to him. Sauli tells him he should remember he has a brain tumor and basically reveals he knows that Adam killed Zora. Adam then starts to see Zora in his visions again and runs out of the hospital. He then steals a car and speeds it out into the outskirts until it crashes. When he gets out of the car he sees Luka and Teuta calling out to him. He finally reveals to Teuta and Luka that he killed Zora but in order to protect Luka from him since he apparently sexually assaulted (she said "assault" but Luka did show noticable empathy to sex crimes) her and was worried he'd do the same to Teuta.
Adam doesn't act like it was for self-defense and admits he wanted to do it but seemingly Zora egged him on and knew Adam loved Teuta but didn't want to allow him to have her (in the flashback he said "he's hers" which was weird…). Apparently Sauli knew everything all along and just wanted to see how it would all play out because apparently he sees broken things as beautiful (lol wtf). After this, Adam isn't charged for his crime in court since there's literally no evidence. Teuta tells Sauli he's the broken one and he tells her he's rather be an observer than a hypocrite. Adam decides to go back to Russia and takes a break from his news program Zero Hour. He still has hallucinations though and sees Teuta while he's in his car heading to the airport.
Final Thoughts: I just… I don't know what the heck to think. First of all, I liked Adam a lot and I thought his friendship with Luka and Teuta was adorable and fun. This game managed to introduce these characters in a very charming way and I love that. But… wow… I mean… wow. I felt like they threw this sudden backstory out of nowhere and there wasn't a lot of build up towards it. It was definitely believable and well written but I feel like it was poorly executed. There's just no closure at all. You learn Adam killed Zora, but barely learned anything about Zora in the first place. There was like… a weird vague insinuation of him maybe wanting incest relations but… uh… I don't know? The flashback w/ him saying "she's mine" was weird. I don't know why her brother would say that unless he was just being over protective but uh… I don't know. It was too vague. Like, how do I feel bad for her brother or Teuta when I have no idea how he was in the first place? But regardless, poor Luka… to be attacked by her best friend's brother? That's intense.
Now the problem with this is that at the start of the game, Teuta made it sound like her "goal" was to find out more about her brother and his death. But there was no built up about this. I mean, why not have her slowly reach this conclusion through her own research? As a journalist, you'd think she was going to find this out through other people or find clues, I mean, anything! It was so strange to me that they literally gave no info about her brother whatsoever until literally the very end. Even then you barely find out squat. It was just kind of thrown at you suddenly. And it didn't give Luka much of a viewpoint either which was surprising considering she was a victim to Teuta's brother. Not to mention the episode itself was severely short. I remember SideKicks! had a much better build up in their true end and I remember I kept wondering "Oh, who's the culprit?" but in this game there isn't a set "who did it?" plot or anything. It just insinuates there's truths to be uncovered, but it doesn't delve as deep as it could. Truthfully, I felt like the impact and build up of shock was so much better when I played Sidekicks.
There's just so many unanswered questions. What happened to Adam after this? Apparently he had a brain tumor and went back to Russia. But then what? Did Teuta, Adam, and Luka's relationship fall apart? And what the actual fuck was Sauli's purpose because it almost made it seem like he was the mastermind in some aspects (how he watched the chaos unfold or whatever). We didn't get much backstory on him in the first place though. Not to mention Mozu said he may have disposed of Teuta's brother's body but it was never confirmed. They gave a small glimpse of a flashback but never showed us how Adam killed Zora. But, don't get me wrong. This is a really good game. The only reason I'm ranting really passionately about this is because of how much potential this game had to be amazing but fell flat because of how rushed and poorly executed the endings were. At the very least, the characters were well-written and I loved all of them. I can only hope that maybe because this game felt short and unfinished, they would consider making a sequel that ties up lose knots. However, Sidekicks had some plot holes as well, and it wasn't perfectly concluded either (albeit it was better concluded than this game). I liked seeing the Sidekicks crossover though! I missed Chika and it makes me want to replay Sidekicks again, haha.
I'm kind of sad I didn't get the animate tokuten though. I think I was more likely to buy it if it was a fabric poster or something. I wasn't sure who my favorite character was going to be but I love Mozu and I want more of him. (´;ω;`); Seeing him break down in sadness was so heartbreaking. And that CG with his sister almost made me cry. But, oh my gosh, he cried a lot in this route. There was so many tears in this route. It's so funny he ended up being my favorite. He's so quiet compared to everyone else and Chika was so loud in Sidekicks! Ah, but I love Mozu. I can definitely see myself buying Mozu pins and such when I go back to Japan.
Story – BUSTAFELLOWS is certainly filled with action and surprises that keeps you engaged with the characters and the story. That being said, it does have a good balance of light-hearted moments and isn't always completely on the serious side. While each character route uncovers different truths more relevant to the character, there are truths to be uncovered after you complete each route. Unfortunately, the execution of the final truth could have definitely been handled better. Regardless, don't expect a whole lot of romance since this game is very plot-focused and will hold out on the romance until the end. But if you're one who likes romance more than story, then this game probably isn't for you. As for me, I love plot-focused stories so it was a win for me.
Characters – I can easily say that the best part about this game is the characters and the interactions they have with each other. First of all, Teuta is a huge upgrade from Iori in SideKicks. She's much more outspoken and has a bigger personality (especially due to the fact she's voiced). None of the characters had traits that made them unappealing in my eyes. They all have a charm about them and I think anyone who plays will be able to find a character that they like best. Teuta showed chemistry with all of them and I loved her interactions with each and every one of them. I will say one thing I love about Extend's games is that they have really likeable side characters as well. I loved seeing Luka and Adam's relationship with Teuta.
Visuals/System – I had absolutely no qualms about the visuals of this game. While I do always think certain scenes could warrant better CGs, I think the art and aesthetic of this game is visually pleasing in so many ways. The fact that this game takes place in America means a lot of western inspired art and visuals. A lot of the graphic designed logos and photos were all in English to give it a more Western/American feel. They even brought back the animated backgrounds which was really neat (albeit, they only seemed to have one animated cutscene unfortunately). The system itself was easy to navigate and use but a bit wonky and broken in some ways. The skip system was too slow and it took literally 30 minutes to skip through the common route and I don't think the skip to next choice function worked properly. I also noticed a weird glitch when looking at CGs (it turns white fro some reason). And lastly, the auto-mode has a weird pause after each voice. Albeit, they did fix quite a few glitches that had already been present through a patch so its not as bad as it could be.
Music – If I'm to be completely honest here, I'm not a fan of the OP song. Aside from that, I think the soundtrack was pretty nice but I remember liking some of SideKicks! tracks a bit more. I half expected a song to play during a serious scene but we didn't really get that this time around. There wasn't a vocal song for the character's endings (sounded like a action movie track or something). As for the last vocal song that played, I could not for the life of me tell if it was even in English because I couldn't understand it at all (I know it wasn't Japanese though).
Final Thoughts: While I definitely enjoyed this game immensely, I have mixed feelings about the way it was handled. Overall, it was a well-written game with fantastic characters but it fell victim to a poorly executed plot twist at the end. And the only reason I can think of as to why this is, is that it wasn't long enough. Even in some routes, I felt like more could've happened or more could have been elaborated on. The common route felt like it had a decent length until I reached the end of chapter 4. It definitely felt like it needed one more chapter before it split into the individual character routes. Mainly because the routes themselves were fairly short. It only took me a few hours to finish each route. They weren't really long at all and I was surprised by how short it felt in comparison to Sidekicks (which was definitely longer). I feel like the only way they could have balanced the length of the routes in comparison to the true routes was if they made the true routes longer and made a better effort to tie lose ends. I don't know if it had to do with them releasing it on mobile as well, but it certainly felt like this game was much shorter than usual.
On that same note, I think it would be such a good idea to make a sequel or fandisc. This game would definitely benefit from having more content (especially because the characters themselves are really good). There was just so many questions that needed answers. Regardless of my nitpicks regarding length and what not, I really loved this game and I'm really glad they went with a voiced heroine. I was super stoked for this game when it was first announced because I really enjoyed SideKicks. I checked the sales for this game not long ago and its doing pretty well considering it only released like 3 weeks ago. I don't know if they're just going to continue the trend of making a game based on the Sidekicks/Bustafellows world but if they do, I am excited to see what else is in store. I intend to write feedback to them regarding this and hope that it'll at least let them know that while they have great ideas, it needs better execution.
Lastly, I feel like they could've utilized Teuta's power more in other ways. I wasn't surprised when they didn't (it was the same in Sidekicks) but it would be interesting to see if there was a bigger backstory about it (or at the very least if they expanded upon it more). Also, I always had the questions as to what exactly happens to Teuta's body when she becomes someone else? Why does she never try to contact herself (I mean isn't that technically possible)? And does the person who's body she takes over remember what happened? I don't think they ever mentioned these details. Even so, if I were to compare this game to Sidekicks, I think I like the characters in this game more but I think Sidekicks handled its overall execution of plot better. In some ways, this game felt slightly rushed and felt liked it needed tweaking and polishing in certain areas. If I recall correctly, Sidekicks actually revealed smaller truths in each route so the route order mattered until you reached the true end. In this game, the route order didn't matter at all since you don't learn more than you already did in each route.
So, because I always have so much to say, I'll give a pros and cons on this game to give a better idea of how I feel in a shorter way.
– The characters are well-written and have likable personalities
– Heroine being voiced gives her character life and she has actual good chemistry with the love interests
– The plot keeps you engaged regardless of the outcome
– The CGs, backgrounds, and UI are nice to look at and there's a lot of western influence
– The boys have nipples (nipples are real in this game and you can thank the eroge artist for that)
– Unfortunately, some routes leave more to be desired and could have benefited from being longer.
– The truth endings left some shocking truths, but it also left more to be desired and was poorly executed (lack of build up led to lack of shock)
– Lots of unanswered questions that may never be answered unless there's a sequel or FD
Bustafellows, Hosoya Yoshimasa, Jun Fukuyama, Kaito Ishikawa, KENN, Review, Shirai Yuusuke, Summary, Switch, Yoshino Hiroyuki	1 Comment
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