Holy Moley Batman, welcome to one of the longest, if not the longest, Voltage games around. You’re in for a big one on this game, 18 chapters and an epilogue all in one package. Voltage spared no expense, releasing 5 characters at once and giving a huge variety in order to market this story.
I’m impressed, usually I wait on every Voltage game because there’s no guy I like- but they pretty much cover all of their bases for that problem in their new release: Sakura Amidst the Chaos. I love Japanese history and historical fiction, the first game I ever reviewed in terms of romance games was actually ‘Hakuoki: Demon of the Fleeting Blossom’, so naturally I am completely excited by this game. To start it off, I picked the most notable choice: Oda Nobunaga.
The interesting thing about Oda Nobunaga in history is that while his name is synonymous with ‘powerful’ and usually a sword beyond reason and unmatchable skill, indeed I only ever looked him up because his name was used for powerful swords or students or masters and the like, he has a complicated history that actually involves a lot of infighting with his family. So while Voltage has a history of unanimously happy stories, this one is one that to a degree I know they couldn’t.
Namely the story begins with you impoverished and living with your aunt, and your abusive borderline rapist cousin. The entire concept is you’re saved by Nobunaga who basically repays you with a gift way beyond your paygrade, then invites you to work for him. Nobunaga is refreshing in that he is so dorkishly in love with you and it fits into his history:
Nobunaga was kind of deemed unworthy of ruling his family and this caused in fighting basically for the rest of his life. It makes sense for him to be selfish and self righteous, and I admire that Voltage do that.
I admire a lot of this route. It takes such interesting history that I don’t actually want to take away from it, but the nature of your romance feels very important. It’s clear very quickly that Nobunaga is in love with you and it goes to the extent of him shunning his other love interests. . .his intended fiance. In history he actually does marry her and his sister makes a point to note that a wife is something you have to expect but not what he would actually care about.
The way this route progresses is almost naive, but I love it. Everything about it is fun and culturally interesting, and the art is slightly different than normal and gives something boyish to the. . .blodstained warlord. But isn’t that what we’re kind of here for? All the same, I highly recommend this route. The romance is top notch and Voltage delivers on trying to both juggle romance and enlighten players on Japanese history.
Giving this an OH DAMN HE’S COVERED IN WATER out of 10.
Oki