#virche

1 Year Old? ZAMMN

I’m not doing this guy first because of stupid “recommended route order,” I’m doing this because HE’S SO CUTE AND I WANT TO SEE HIM IN LOVE.

Okay the route starts when Ceres is roped into LARPing as a maid for Mathisu because plot. As the butler graciously informs us, Mathisu is sad and needs a friend. Ceres doesn’t realize how affected he’s been until then, thus forming the basis of her attachment to him. Things gets eyebrow raising for me writing wise when it’s time to write how Mathis gets attached to Ceres. So there’s the whole deal with his brother, which had me very apprehensive form the start because it looked like his brother had golden hair in his mementoes and he seemed to confuse Ceres with him in his daydreams. But in this route his relationship with Jean is highlighted too, and Jean is described as being like his brother multiple times, and we see in his past that Jean has always been with Mathis and his brother. Given all of this, it makes Mathis quickly getting attached to Ceres feel unnatural, because why hasn’t he shown that kind off attachment with Jean?

What cements this route as irreparable to be though, is the way the climax was handled. Now obviously Borreau was alive and well and this was 100% going to happen, but for Mathis to respond the way he did and call Ceres a fucking shinigami? And all of this is handwaved as him acting the way his parents did…. LMAOOOO. Shut up story, nowhere was this established ever. The only relevance his parents being abusive had to him thus far was cementing his attachment to his late brother.

…This is what I wrote, but holy shit. It’s revealed that Mathis is actually a homunculus and Jean is actually his brother killing prostitutes to bring back his dead lover and Mathis was the product of those experiments. This is an incredibly fucking stupid idea, but whatever, just because it’s stupid doesn’t mean it’s bad. But if they’re going to explain this later, they should have made things make sense earlier even if things weren’t true about the situation, otherwise it just pisses you off, because Ceres doesn’t question the weird shit that happens enough, and it makes you think that Mathis is genuinely just like that, not that there is any weird plot shenanigans going on. My opinion of Mathis on this route was a fucking rollercoaster lmao.

Even if I can somehow make sense of Mathis’s writing and all the plot shenanigans, I can’t buy his extreme attachment to Ceres because what about Jean (even if he was insane all along?) Most importantly, I couldn’t buy the romance, the development was entirely platonic. Ceres did not show any sign of being attracted to him physically. And as for Mathis, the only evidence I found of the feelings on his part was him freaking out over Ceres washing his clothes, but really this isn’t necessarily him being conscious of her as a woman, more so just basic respect.

Jean really put a damper on the route and really took me out of it. If he was so comically evil that he relished in their suffering then why did he hire Ceres as a maid in the first place? Wasn’t it to cheer Mathis up? Ugh I couldn’t take the route seriously after that reveal.

And then I’m forced into the bad ending, which I would usually skip because otome games write themselves for the good endings. But this isn’t a typical otome game, so I guess I’ll review this one too. Ok so Jean experiments on Mathis more by making him and Ceres speedrun a bunch of otome routes. That’s fine, but the ending made no sense because what benefit did it give Jean to have them marry in secret after threatening so much to discontinue uploading memories? His character is all over the place, he went from hating the two for their love to making them live his love story vicariously? Weird shit. If only Jean the way he was written wasn’t in this story.

Also you won’t see me complaining about the whole biological memory shenanigans, well first of all I went into the game expecting this to happen. Second, even if it’s an incredibly stupid idea, if it makes sense in the logic of the world what can I say? I can’t quite wrap my head around it but there’s nothing so far that makes me scream “That’s inconsistent!”

Art-wise, the sprites are kind of weird not because they’re inconsistent but they’re not good at conveying the unsettling range of emotion Mathis conveys with his insane personalities. Also I’m not quite a fan of the style as viewed from the side. Whatever, the art isn’t objectively bad, so that’s what matters.

Objective score: 4/10

Enjoyment score: 3/10

60 YEARS OLD? ZAMNNNN

Is this age gap realistic enough for the general population to reject or does his unrealistic appearance and setting seal the deal? The choice is thine own.

Ok this route starts out so good. The way Shinigami’s Maid Services becomes a permanent occupation at his lab is peak. And the way the two interact and understand each other is compelling as well. However, the rather Scien-focused CG’s thus far has got me raising my eyebrows a bit.

Unfortunately the producers recognized this too. At this point Ceres has absolutely no romantic interest in Scien, but seems to like him a lot. Then. The scene written as an excuse to make an exciting CG with Ceres and Scien finally comes to pass, and the route disappoints me here. Scien asks Ceres if she is interested romantically in the other men, to which she replies no. Then he asks why she stays with him, and Ceres gives an answer that is no way necessarily romantic. Scien decides for some reason that her admiring him means she has romantic feelings for him, and Ceres conveniently decides that she is in love here while being pushed up against a wall. Nah sorry that’s not how it works. It would have been better if Ceres narrated earlier how she is conscious of Scien as a man and realized she liked him romantically before this scene, and during the interrogation she does a bunch of cute “Oh, umm… Scien-sama… uwu” Oh boy I hope this isn’t a trend that continues into other routes.

…And then. Jesus fucking Christ Lord almighty. Adolphe gets decapitated and all the children get absolutely slaughtered. Almost brought on the waterworks. Really the plot is just so good.

Scien himself is a great character. He has a very interesting philosophy that develops in a compelling way alongside the MC. The idea that he gave up fighting against the curse and was simply trying to buy time to buy more time was a good one. I also like the payoff to everyone in the beginning freaking out over Scien using Ceres as a guinea pig once he becomes interested in the curse, it’s “why would I kill my future wife.” Too bad that scene ended way too abruptly, which unfortunately also looks like will be a pattern with this game. I also loved the confession scene, Scien basically says “I am not and never will be in love with you… but with this new body I want you to be the one I fall in love with.” Peakkkk

Then of course everything goes to hell and Borreau fucks shit up, and all Scien gained in the end was depression. At least Dahut is alive. Speaking of him I love him, I love his design and characterization, I was weary of his writing because of Jean/Camille but Dahut didn’t disappoint. Everyone was great in this route. It’s just, I’m greedy and I want everything. I just wish the romance was properly developed on Ceres’s side and that whole conversation where Scien was trying to fish out her feelings didn’t happen. However, unlike last route, Scien’s attachment to her made sense, so even with that flaw, this route was in improvement in general in the relationship department.

Also, for all this time I was stumped on how Adolphe was a locked route but Scien isn’t, but Adolphe reveals that he knows a lot more than he lets on. I wonder if there was purpose to killing him off early.

Art-wise, I love Scien’s CG’s and sprites, including his boobs and butt pose. However, the times he appears with Ceres look strange. At least Ceres looks good. And I can’t get over her shy blushing face.

Objective score: 5.5/10

Enjoyment score: 7/10

THE CAGE

AKA disCount Saint Germain

Sigh. The only thing I know about this guy is that apparently everyone on Reddit hates him. He probably doesn’t treat Ceres all that well, and given my disappointment with Mathis’s route I guess I could get this one out of the way.

It starts off good. The two get along well and the work well as teacher and aide. Ceres grows naturally attached to Lucas. And then Lucas drops this line “I’m finally with my angel” or something like that. I’m disturbed, but intrigued. Am I on the fucking yandere route? Is this romantic attraction? It has to be, right?

We meet his sister, who is cute, and they have a cute relationship, and she obviously wants the two to get together lol.

Then she just straight up tells Ceres he likes her romantically, like damn. And Ceres is like like “I mean I’m interested but there’s no way he’s into me and I’m also Death” fair enough, and she ends up being right in the end because

Ankou on this route was very alluring and hyped me up for his route.

And then holy shit. Lucas is Borreau, and he’s been killing Relivers and gouging out their hearts in order to save his sister. Christ. And he’s been brainwashed to believe in God to use as a crutch in order to excuse his actions, and also there’s a drug that makes him go berserk.

…So? Is that what’s hateable about him? Like, the writing wasn’t bad. And I’m surprised that Lucas as a character actually makes sense to me. LI’s like him often have a hard time of making their normal selves and indoctrinated selves believable, like Shiraishi from collar x malice and Tyril from eiT. But Lucas to me, his contradictory way of living his life and how he pretends makes sense to me. First, people who bring up God every opportunity they get usually are a piece of fucking work, so I was surprised I didn’t consider his circumstances stupid. Because something really needed to have warped his view to the extent he relies on God so much, and that’s exactly what happened with him (yeah you can tell this struck a chord with me personally, that’s why I can say all of this). Second, he has this strong attachment to his teacher persona because he wanted to be gentle like his teacher mother and not fight like his father, a fact he resented.

Is the other part that’s hateable is that he’s focused on his sister? Sure his primary motivation is Nadia but he still cares for Ceres’s opinion. And I wasn’t going into this route expecting him to have a deep understanding of her, and a romantic relationship doesn’t have to be his more important one. Or maybe how he fell for Ceres? I guessed it ever since the “my angel” line, but yep, it was religious devotion at first since he was like 16 years old and she was 11, and after spending time with her, he actually fell in love. So the sister was wrong that he was romantically attracted to her, poor her. That would have been fine, but… Lucas didn’t really show that he saw her as a woman when he did allegedly fall in love. So this time around I couldn’t buy the romance from his part. Poor Ceres, just as the romantic feelings from her part were finally buyable… As for how the two get attached to each other… While I could buy Lucas being able to hide his religious cult side to his teacher side due to his strong family drama, I couldn’t buy him being so objective about teaching both sides of the issue, because that point made him seem like a wise, nuanced person, not…. Whatever he is now.

Anyway, we’re in the fucking cage. Ceres at this point is just resigned. “This is fine,” is her vibe. “Why do I get all the crazy ones.” Her thought process is very compelling and makes sense, she’s just so done. She doesn’t make excuses for him in her mind. She’s just like “why.”

And will they shut up about being teacher and student? Correct me if I’m wrong but she wasn’t even his student anymore when the story began right? No idea what the purpose was. God it’s like his entire personality when he has his “normal civilian” persona.

The bad end is very typical. Ceres is like “welp Ankou I have to go kill myself so that I can make a solid excuse for a bad end CG” and he’s like “sigh okay see you in 3 routes” THAT’S TOO LONG NOOOO

The doctor guy has a very stupid motivation that makes absolutely no fucking sense even for a story like this, what the fuck do you mean he sees genes and finds them pretty, what the fuck makes him like one gene over the other, how the fuck can he tell the difference. And he just barely beats the lolicon allegations by grafting a bunch of woman’s body parts onto Nadia’s wedding-dress-donning amalgamation lmao.

Also Dahut is best side character once again, with his bond with Nadia and his introspection. Holy shit I miss you Scien, ugh why couldn’t your route’s romance be satisfactory? Why can’t I have everything? Scien in this route was really distracting.

In the end I didn’t dislike the route in the same way most people did. My primary concern was how the romance was written and Ceres’s thought process and I was focused on that to the point that I didn’t really consider how Nadia would be used to make me suffer or that Lucas was actually fucking Bourreau. The only thing I did guess at was the Doc being evil, and that’s solely due to his stupid haircut and his stupid robes, which were clearly evil, not meta analysis on how he will be used to hurt me.

In the end… I just didn’t really feel anything in particular. Anything I would have objected to, like Ceres presumably being okay with Lucas killing all these people for his sister and not telling her despite know she wouldn’t like it, is just conveniently sidelined because the plot happens too fast.

Objective score: 4/10

Enjoyment score: 4/10

VIRCHE EVERMORE: HEAVEN’S FEEL

Not Ceres thinking nothing of the townspeople thinking she and Yves are a couple 💀 Oh boy it really does look like this is going to be a recurring sentiment huh. The romance in this game just might be doomed writing wise.

But hold up. The rumors and teasing continue, and Adolphe straight up asks her if they’re lovers. Ceres does her cute blush again and is like “it’s not true, plus he’s out of my league.”

…You know, this is also a common sentiment from her every time it’s time for romantic development. Maybe I should be more lenient with Ceres after all. Maybe it has never occurred to her to be attracted to any of the guys because she just automatically categorizes them as “too good for her,” after all she is Death, so why bother. Then again, I thought she was on her way to resolving those feelings in the common route. It’s one thing to still be cautious about your identity after the fact, it’s another thing to keep hating yourself.

Anyway she continues to get rizzed up by Yves, finally actual believable romantic feelings on her part! Great job, route!

Although here is where the route goes downhill. First off, the plot starts getting really fucking stupid AND nonsensical, with Resident Gene Fetishist cheating on Nadia and doing his wack routine of obsessing over Ceres’s “warped chromosomes” lmaooo. Imagine he tries to rizz her up and he’s like “Hey girl, am I a chromosome? Cause you’re missing one and there’s no way you can function without me” Coupled with the Reliver couples killing themselves, Ceres’s character just stagnates. Unlike in Scien’s route, where she gathers her resolve and acts to protect Scien and uses her understanding of him to empower herself, she continues feeling sorry for herself, even though Yves keeps telling her nothing is her fault (poor Yves I’ve been there), and even while she was “comforting” Yves over Hugo’s death, she calls herself a murderer, and the scene just ends there lmao. It’s pathetic, and this isn’t really addressed, so it certainly doesn’t make for compelling writing. I guess now I can see where Hugo was coming from with hating her, because even Yves says that when he first found her she was apologizing to nothing and waiting to die, and it doesn’t seem like this changed at all. Granted Hugo hated her for different reasons, such as her ability to cause misfortune and her impact in Yves’s backstory, but when she’s like this, how is she a positive impact on Yves’s life? And speaking of Hugo, I really did like him. He looks out for his bro, advocates for him, has some nice conversations with Ceres, and even outright hates her, which is a refreshing detail. Given Yves’s whole fixation on finding romantic love so that a woman (yes he said “woman,” he specified that one time he said “josei”) would love him despite his face, I was hoping there would be a plot detail about Yves relying on platonic relationships, too, especially with Hugo’s presence. But in the end I guess he just really wants pussy, or maybe he conflates getting pussy with an actual deep connection with someone, because Hugo demonstrates he doesn’t understand Yves well, as she told Ceres that he tells him to stop being the Lycoris Guardian, and that he even screamed and called him a monster when he first saw his face. So conveniently, the person he can get said pussy from just happens to be the person he connects with the most, but this is never acknowledged. And since the plot deteriorates more, as it is about Reliver couples killing themselves because of some stupid bug in the system, we find out that Hugo dies in the same way, and it can be inferred that he died due to… unrequited romantic love… for Yves…?

Oh my god you’ve got to be kidding me.

Is romantic love the ultimate form of love here? After all he said about him being like his brother? After he showed no signs of attraction or wanting to be his mate? After all the narrative drilled into us about how dysfunctional Yves’s pursuit of “love” is? Really? I just wanted an LI to have an actual bro who looks out for him. I wanted Hugo’s platonic form of love to be acknowledged. I wanted Yves to stop chasing pussy and find God or something, Jesus Christ.

Scien is the best part of the route every time he appears, I don’t care if what he says makes no sense and I just end up skipping his explanations about the stupid lore. I miss him

Alright so Yves goes to dig up his family’s ashes, finds the botany book, and discovers that the black flowers are causing everyone native to the island to die early by killing a pair of chromosomes every year. Hence why they live until 23!

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Okay I really just don’t care anymore. I can accept emotions being stored in the heart, as we knew this from the beginning. But if the writers are going to take every liberty with biology and genetics for the sake of le plot it makes me stop caring, because they can just say literally anything at this point and you can’t say anything because “um ackshually maybe that’s just how it works in that world.” In other words, whatever liberties you take with biology isn’t good substrate for plot. Especially since we had Ankou at the beginning establishing that she was indeed Death, and he’s involved in all sorts of supernatural mumbo jumbo. Hell, speaking of him, why didn’t he appear? Why didn’t Ceres tell Yves about him when she told Lucas in the previous route? Ughhhhh Ceres you’re such a fucking non character on this route.

In the end, even though I could buy Yves’s attachment to Ceres due to the flower field scene, I couldn’t buy his little character arc or the contribution to the themes that resulted from it, as the way he sorted all these feelings out made no sense. He ends up calling all of his love he showed to others “meaningless” and will from now on love only Ceres. Bull fucking shit. Are you a playboy who just found the woman he wants to commit to? Were you fucking hooking up with everyone up to this point? What about Adolphe and Hugo? What about the drunkard you cared for and persevered to understand until you gained his trust and how he literally fucking died for you? Is that not love from both parties? Why is romantic love still the ultimate form of love to you? Just because you have passion? I mean that would have been a good character developing point if the only form of love that truly matters to Yves is love that is meaningful to him personally, such as his own personal friends and romantic partners, but this route makes it clear over and over that “love” (ai) without emotion is meaningless love, which is a lot different from him saying he prefers the selfish love that makes him personally happy to the selfless love that is objectively good and utilitarian. Guess we should all stop fighting for causes greater than ourselves because we’re not always personally emotionally involved with them lol.

All of this culminates in the stupid, intellectually one-sided Scien vs Yves fight that does Scien dirty. Especially given that we’re all literally forced to play Scien before Yves, so all of this isn’t really working in Yves’s favor. And even then he continues his discount Jesus schtick of him asking for help, even though what could Scien possibly need help with. Granted Scien mentioned this in his own route when realizing he did need to utilize human emotions in his pursuit for the truth, but given the context, quite literally using Ceres is the answer to saving the world, and Yves was just saying “Nice point, Unfortunately I have portrayed you as the soy wojak.” Speaking of which why couldn’t he just clone Ceres first and then use the clones of the clone to save the world? Why does the original have to die? What a stupid and contrived conflict.

And then, finally, everyone dies in a flammable flower fire and Ceres goes insane. Why does the only other Ceres focused CG happen in a bad end.

Speaking of the CG’s, art-wise, the CG’s are genuinely terrible. Even though these routes just have so few CG’s in general, moments that warranted CG’s (like playing with the lambs) didn’t get any, and the moments that had CG’ were so bland and uninspired. The most notable offender of this was the scene where Ceres comforts Yves after seeing his face. I thought the CG we’d get was her visibly hugging him, and him crying at first but then smiling as he professes his love for her, not him cowering in the corner like a fucking Variable Barricade character and crying the whole time even while he’s supposedly smiling and confessing his love. Hey at least Ceres does visibly give him a kiss but it’s at such an awkward angle given the weird close-ups this game likes to do, something which happens again when Adolphe dies again lol. I don’t want the 5th closeup of Yves’s face, show me the other damn characters, especially if it’s a tragic goodbye!

In the end, I didn’t even enjoy the tropes presented here even if I hadn’t seen them in otome because a galge does it better, from the tropes of agonizing over protecting someone who is a danger to the world to the final fight with the antagonist, to the themes of selfishness vs. selflessness and relationships with others contributing to said themes, hence the witty title for this section. And since I compare works with each other often I am extra harsh on this route for not living up to that standard. How disappointing.

Objective score: 4/10

Enjoyment score: 0/10

VIRCHE/STAY NIGHT: UNLIMITED BLADE WORKS

After the utter disappointment that was Yves’s route and the revelation that the next route was both Adolphe and Ankou’s routes I was very hesitant to play this one, but after a few days I came around to doing it.

So we start off by speed running the common route. What I liked about this is that we actually get to see why Adolphe is called her foster brother. Most importantly, we don’t do the whole Code-realize team up schtick that sidelines Ceres and makes a big deal out of cutting her hair which is really contradictory to the LI’s designs, and we don’t meet Mathis who was hyped up to be his and her first friend but promptly forgotten about in non-Mathis routes.

Holy shit do things develop quickly. There’s a lot of tension, awkwardness, and nervousness between Ceres and Adolphe, and damn he pretty much confesses his feelings.

Alright so Ankou joins the Adolphe Household and lol. Shenanigans ensue.

Then the common route plot beats happen here again, but better. None of the useless stuff that only serves to introduce the reader to the LI’s happens.

Apparently Ceres is indeed Lucas’s first love and it wasn’t religious obsession? Okay. Didn’t really show that beyond obsession. That makes me think of Lucas’s route less lol.

Why is it that a notable decrease in the quality of the plot appears every time Gene Fetishist appears? So Gene Fetishist Borderline Lolicon captures Adolphe and reveals that Adolphe is a normal human with all 23 pairs of chromosomes intact lol, saying that researchers didn’t know the island’s chromosomes were abnormal because they didn’t have a normal person to compare to, which makes no sense because they should see the deteriorated chromosomes if they compared by age group. And Adolphe gets freaked out because Ceres now knows this

The thing I can’t believe about Adolphe and Ceres’s relationship is their past. They referenced this earlier in the route, but Adolphe once got mad at Ceres and called her “Death.” And ceres wasn’t hurt by this because she used copium and said “well he didn’t seem like himself lol,” the same poorly written thing that happened in Mathis’s route. If her weird convenient copium was actually a part of her character then you’d think the narrative would make that more clear. Also she says that being called Death didn’t hurt coming from Adolphe but wouldn’t it hurt less if a stranger said it as opposed to literally someone you know and love well? What the hell is this logic?

Then the most jarring, shitty, face palm worthy plot development happens. It’s revealed that the supporter who’s behind all these experiments across the routes and is inciting the royal family is none other that Salome, which makes sense due to her burning hatred of the royal family, the disconnect between her ideals and treating Adolphe and Ceres as her children, how she’s hinted to be the queen who got assassinated, the fact that she set up the Society of Exorcists to find a way to fight against the curse, and the fighting prowess she had shown earlier when the team was chasing the Borreau clones, so never mind, there is absolutely nothing wrong with this reveal— SIKE IT’S ACTUALLY DAHUT LOLOLOLOLOLOL you’ve got to be fucking kidding me. After all the nuance he had shown in earlier routes? After the distaste for Scien’s cruel experiments? Really? I was so happy that the game spared him the “comically evil” treatment in Scien’s route, but nope! His thinking has always been black and white and he wants to kill literally everyone except Nadia and Adolphe for some reason even though people like them can easily be found and expects the common people to fight against the curse which is, for all intents and purposes, a natural phenomenon to them while living paycheck to paycheck and saving up for a chance for more life. Typical privileged king thinking. Also why didn’t he hate Scien if he hates people who give up on fighting the curse so much when Scien was just buying time?

Oh my how this game is really set on ruining literally everything. During the Code-realize team-up Adolphe confronts Ankou about being a normal human. And Ankou gets all surprised and flustered and “h-how do you know that???” Fuck. So he really is the chuuni that Adolphe thought he was. And while hilarious, the stupid reveal that him dramatically disappearing in a gust of lycoris was him throwing shit and deploying smoke bombs was all part of that act to trick Ceres into thinking he had some kind of mythical role? Literally anyone would notice that what the fuck. This VN feels so retconned within itself, how do you even manage to accomplish that.

 Oh my god I hate this stupid fucking game. Everything has to have a shitty scientific explanation that is still ironically akin to magic in the end because how the fuck do 22 year olds function with one pair of chromosomes.

And my suffering continues. Salome gets neg diffed by Dahut, making a shit conclusion to Salome’s arc, and after they die… it’s revealed that Ankou is Adolphe from the futurrrrre, hence why they share a route, and Ankou being chuuni was all part of the Drifter’s keikaku (why the hell would he sacrifice his bloodline to be hated just for some guy? What a convenient plot device, a poor excuse for a believable character. Imagine being his wife). Lol. God this story is so poorly written.

Then everyone finally dies in a flammable flower fire and I’m forced to play the rest of this route’s poorly written endings to unlock the Salvation ends and return to my beloved God, Scien Brofiise. This includes an inexplicably yandere Adolphe and Ankou and Adolphe becoming Ankou again by somehow finding a way to leave the unleavable country and steal a fucking Time Machine as an “ordinary human.” I can’t

The romance was believable, but Ceres took way too long to determine she had romantic feelings while in other routes like Scien’s she suddenly agreed she had romantic feelings. In the fucking salvation end it took FIVE FUCKING YEARS for her to tell him. What the fuck.

Artwise, the CG’s are pretty good, but Ceres is just drawn so inconsistently, she looks nothing like her sprite.

Objective score: 2/10

Enjoyment score: 0.8/10

Salvation endings

Mathis: Okay we finally reach the Salvation end and this route still makes no sense. We learn in Yves’s route that Reliver’s hearts essplode cause romantic love is too strong but now Mathis claims he’ll fall in love with her over and over as a reliver. They’re so cooked. At least Jean is dead

Scien: I finally get to the Salvation end, and it’s great because it’s the best ending in the game because Scien is the best route, with a very swoon worthy romantic scene. However Dahut gets killed off suddenly, presumably so he doesn’t try to essplode the country, so I’m pretty sure he’s unfortunately supposed to be secretly comically evil still. And in the end, I unfortunately could not buy the romance from Ceres, hell, even Scien’s reasoning for thinking she’s in love with him was just because she liked being with him, which is just so against my definitions of romance and romantic feelings. I will never appreciate her just agreeing that she must be in love, nope.

You’ve reached the end of the route commentary.

Pre salut side character ranking:

Dahut>Salome>>>>>Nadia>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Hugo>>>>>>>>Jean

Post-salut:

Nadia>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Everyone else

Other thoughts:

It was really silly how they made a big deal over Ceres’s hair getting cut from a stray dagger in Act 1. I was snickering at that dramatic description of her stands of golden hair fluttering in the wind lmaooooo. She didn’t have much hair to begin with, as her hair is the second shortest of all the main characters (if you’re counting rat tails). I would have outed this as a small worldbuilding issue, as the LI’s have rather long hair and they are obviously taking care of it given their appearances, so why would the women in particular of this world care so much about hair? However, the most likely explanation for this is a Doylist one, as in the end, all of this came across as the writers wanting to establish Ceres being treated in more “traditionally” feminine ways, such as placing great importance on her hair, while also eating their cake of having beautiful ethereal male LI’s with long hair. That was disappointing to see because I loved seeing all the LI’s have much, much longer hair than her. Come on ladies let’s be honest, men should be the ones who should take more pride in their hair, like lions and their manes. As Nature and God intended. So shut up Mathis, you’re the one who should “take great importance” on your hair and not Ceres, let my short haired queen rock her style without worry over trivial matters.

Even if the game tried to have their cake and eat it too in terms of GNC and subscribing to the usual gender norms, I still loved the long, beautiful hair with braids and long, flowy outfits on the males, while Ceres just had short hair and a plain dress.

I LOVE MY MAID CERES. SHE DOESN’T HAVE TO DO ANYTHING SPECIAL. I LOVE HER EXACTLY THE WAY SHE IS. BOW DOWN YOU PEASANTS AND WORSHIP OUR TRUE QUEEN.

“I was a bit on edge seeing people complain about the whole “emotions are stored in the balls heart” thing. But seeing how technological this society is in the life sciences and the amount of thought put into the world it makes me think there was a valid creative decision to do that.” – is what I wrote… but…

“Why are the younger guy routes always the worst ones?” Is what I wrote, but… it did indeed get worse…

Why are there common route bad endings?!??!

Whatever the track is that commonly appears in tense conflict scenes… it sounds strangely upbeat and slice of life. Who composed for this game?!?!?

I really like how the men’s lips aren’t invisible. They are so wonderfully detailed.

I wasn’t a fan of how Ceres was barely involved in the group dynamic when the LI’s Code-realize-style teamed up in the common route. Why doesn’t she drink? She’s 18 and Yves is 18 so why not??? Because she’s a pure maiden or whatever? Jesus drank wine!!! Yamato Nadeshiko standards imposed once more on the heroine to her detriment. More interesting characters, trope-wise, are created when you make them more real while retaining those “Yamato nadehsiko” qualities, as they aren’t what you’d stereotype them to be in every situation. Ugh.

So apparently it was supposed to be obvious that Lucas was Bourreau? Well fuck me.

Aaannd of course the Drifter is Japanese.

Aaaaand of course Yves is ¼ Japanese. Of course he is.

Me learning Japanese

Scien did nothing wrong.

How does Ankou know whose route we’re on? It’s very annoying when he senses “ah yes she has chosen him as her paaatnaaah.” Fucker I CHOSE THE ROUTE YOU DO NOT GET TO KNOW THAT.

-it’s details like this that do not make you suspect that Ankou is anything other than supernatural, that he was fucking cosplaying the whole time.

Lmao a character could come in contact with a drop of blood and their entire sprite will be covered it it. It comes across as the producers trying to be edgy and shocking which makes me take the game less seriously.

If I had a penny for every time an otome side character named “Hugo” disappointed me for his role in the intense plot I’d have two. Which isn’t much but it’s weird that it happened twice.

Why do people treat death as nothing just because of Reliver technology? Wouldn’t they fear it because of the lost emotions that include familial and romantic love? It’s a poorly written world building issue that appears over and over.

VERDICT

After all of this, well, you probably saw it coming. I didn't like the game at all. Even if I liked Scien’s route the most, the game is not worth it at all just for him, and his route wasn’t even good in the first place.

First, Dahut was thoroughly ruined, and this reflects in Scien’s route by conveniently killing him off so he doesn’t essplode the island. Second, while Scien’s philosophy on the surface seems well developed, there are too many glaring inconsistencies as a scientist that he shows, such as ignoring the fuckign plant book and thinking everyone should do without emotions in Reliver bodies like him, and he coul have prevented most of the game from happening which he didn’t for really no good reason; moreover all the qualities I like him for, such as his swoon worthy voice acting, are all dime-a-dozen and I can find elsewhere. Finally, while Ceres is only a good character on that route, the romance I couldn’t buy in the end from her side, no matter how much copium I used. Therefore, this game earns a title, not of “Virche Evermore: PeaK Salvation,” but that of Virche Evermid, meaning the game is indeed overrated and glazed like other people’s eyes reading this (I shed zero tears at the events that transpired), and is not worth playing even for Scien. What an unfortunate sentence, after all I waited a year after release and still wanted to play it, with an upcoming fandisk, only to be this badly disappointed. 3/10 game.

This would make a great reaction image. And it’s fitting it comes from *this* game.