キラ☆キラ カーテンコール review
キラ☆キラ カーテンコール, Kira☆Kira Curtain Call (or, as I'll use, KKCC) is a spin-off/sequel to Overdrive's game キラ☆キラ (or, as I'll use, KK).
I first got into キラ☆キラ after viewing a Nico Nico Douga video (extremely similar to YouTube). This video caused me to seek out the original game, as the song (also called キラ☆キラ) was the opening theme to the game.
The game was your typical visual novel. Story about 4 high school seniors - protagonist Shikanosuke Maejima and 3 girls, Kirari Shiino, Sarina Kashikawa, and Chie Isurugi - deciding to do something for their club, 第二文芸部 (2nd Arts Club), slated for disband at the end of the school year. They ended up performing as an all-girls, punk rock band called 第二文芸部バンド (Dai2bungeibuBand, or d2b), at the annual school festival (and yes, the protagonist was made to cross-dress). Afterwards, they were invited to perform live at a live house, and then went on a tour during their summer vacation (the school year starts in April in Japan, for the record.) The story goes from how they formed the band and practiced to each heroine's personal struggles and conflicts. There are multiple endings to the game, and you really need to go through each of them to see the whole game (and truthfully, there is one ending that you cannot (and shouldn't) view until AFTER the other endings are viewed). This last path, the true end, directly ties into parts of KKCC.
There are 7 H scenes in the first game (2 for each heroine and 1 side/bad end), but I feel that the game can do very well without them (and slated for release on PS2 in Japan later this year!)
Regarding KKCC, it's a wonderful game. I liked KK's scenario much better, but that may just be due to the fact that in KKCC, as far as I know, there are no multiple endings (well, there is, but see below) and the fact that the protagonist has always maintained his love for the heroine in KKCC. There is ONE singular H scene, but it was well-placed in the first plot, and it would still be a good visual novel without it.
KKCC is divided into 2 parts; first part takes place 5 years after the beginning of KK's story. Protagonist "Souta Honda" is chosen to perform at the aforementioned school festival with his club, the Boys' Light Rock Club. His crush Yui is made to perform with her club, the Girls' Light Rock Club, as new members of d2b (due to the legacy of the original d2b members, the girls' club who performs at the festival is also called d2b). At the festival, Souta realized that his band performance wasn't up to what he wanted while Yui's band performed to an excited band. Souta decides to form a band called Super Rock'n'Rollers to compete with the new d2b.
Needless to say, there are a lot of things between Souta and Yui that happened prior to the beginning of the game, and their path, even towards their ending, wasn't smooth.
However, the second part of KKCC is much more enjoyable (due to the fact that I've played KK thoroughly?). Taking place shortly after the end of the first story (which places this around 6 years after the events in KK), it details about Murakami, buddy of Shikanosuke (protagonist of KK), as well as his trouble with his band called "Happy Cycle Mania" due to the departure of his vocalist Aki who went on to pursue a solo career. This part of the story is straight-through; there is no selections to make (nor is there any side path). Even though there's no choices to make, the story is extremely enjoyable (and the ending, OMG.... the ending is one of the funniest thing I've seen in my life). As someone that has played KK, the recurrence of familiar characters from the first game is a very nice change -- in the sense that while the characters have grown and aged, you can sense that deep inside, they are still them -- which reminds me: "Am I still me, or have I let others changed me too much?"
About the few things I did not like regarding KKCC? It was somewhat short - with no split endings like the first game, it's possible to finish the game in a few days (which is what I did). The characters aren't as well developed as they can be, the biggest difference being that at the beginning of KK, Shikanosuke was dumped in a relationship, where as Souta in KKCC always had the crush on Yui, which led to drastically different amount of character development. There are more girls in the first part of KKCC compared to KK (KK had 3 heroines, the 2nd d2b had 5 girl members), other than Yui, 2 of the 2nd d2b members had very minor roles, 1 was the sister of one of Souta's band members, and the last was the younger sister of Shikanosuke. It would've been nice for KKCC to have even a few split endings, being true to the original's spirit, but I guess due to the plot of the second part, it wasn't meant to be... And one more thing is that there wasn't a lot of songs (KK had a song for each different ending plus the ones used in the plot, but KKCC had dramatically fewer songs...) And there are much fewer CGs in KKCC too... ;_;
But after all that, I have to say... I want to live in Japan one of these days...
I first got into キラ☆キラ after viewing a Nico Nico Douga video (extremely similar to YouTube). This video caused me to seek out the original game, as the song (also called キラ☆キラ) was the opening theme to the game.
The game was your typical visual novel. Story about 4 high school seniors - protagonist Shikanosuke Maejima and 3 girls, Kirari Shiino, Sarina Kashikawa, and Chie Isurugi - deciding to do something for their club, 第二文芸部 (2nd Arts Club), slated for disband at the end of the school year. They ended up performing as an all-girls, punk rock band called 第二文芸部バンド (Dai2bungeibuBand, or d2b), at the annual school festival (and yes, the protagonist was made to cross-dress). Afterwards, they were invited to perform live at a live house, and then went on a tour during their summer vacation (the school year starts in April in Japan, for the record.) The story goes from how they formed the band and practiced to each heroine's personal struggles and conflicts. There are multiple endings to the game, and you really need to go through each of them to see the whole game (and truthfully, there is one ending that you cannot (and shouldn't) view until AFTER the other endings are viewed). This last path, the true end, directly ties into parts of KKCC.
There are 7 H scenes in the first game (2 for each heroine and 1 side/bad end), but I feel that the game can do very well without them (and slated for release on PS2 in Japan later this year!)
Regarding KKCC, it's a wonderful game. I liked KK's scenario much better, but that may just be due to the fact that in KKCC, as far as I know, there are no multiple endings (well, there is, but see below) and the fact that the protagonist has always maintained his love for the heroine in KKCC. There is ONE singular H scene, but it was well-placed in the first plot, and it would still be a good visual novel without it.
KKCC is divided into 2 parts; first part takes place 5 years after the beginning of KK's story. Protagonist "Souta Honda" is chosen to perform at the aforementioned school festival with his club, the Boys' Light Rock Club. His crush Yui is made to perform with her club, the Girls' Light Rock Club, as new members of d2b (due to the legacy of the original d2b members, the girls' club who performs at the festival is also called d2b). At the festival, Souta realized that his band performance wasn't up to what he wanted while Yui's band performed to an excited band. Souta decides to form a band called Super Rock'n'Rollers to compete with the new d2b.
Needless to say, there are a lot of things between Souta and Yui that happened prior to the beginning of the game, and their path, even towards their ending, wasn't smooth.
However, the second part of KKCC is much more enjoyable (due to the fact that I've played KK thoroughly?). Taking place shortly after the end of the first story (which places this around 6 years after the events in KK), it details about Murakami, buddy of Shikanosuke (protagonist of KK), as well as his trouble with his band called "Happy Cycle Mania" due to the departure of his vocalist Aki who went on to pursue a solo career. This part of the story is straight-through; there is no selections to make (nor is there any side path). Even though there's no choices to make, the story is extremely enjoyable (and the ending, OMG.... the ending is one of the funniest thing I've seen in my life). As someone that has played KK, the recurrence of familiar characters from the first game is a very nice change -- in the sense that while the characters have grown and aged, you can sense that deep inside, they are still them -- which reminds me: "Am I still me, or have I let others changed me too much?"
About the few things I did not like regarding KKCC? It was somewhat short - with no split endings like the first game, it's possible to finish the game in a few days (which is what I did). The characters aren't as well developed as they can be, the biggest difference being that at the beginning of KK, Shikanosuke was dumped in a relationship, where as Souta in KKCC always had the crush on Yui, which led to drastically different amount of character development. There are more girls in the first part of KKCC compared to KK (KK had 3 heroines, the 2nd d2b had 5 girl members), other than Yui, 2 of the 2nd d2b members had very minor roles, 1 was the sister of one of Souta's band members, and the last was the younger sister of Shikanosuke. It would've been nice for KKCC to have even a few split endings, being true to the original's spirit, but I guess due to the plot of the second part, it wasn't meant to be... And one more thing is that there wasn't a lot of songs (KK had a song for each different ending plus the ones used in the plot, but KKCC had dramatically fewer songs...) And there are much fewer CGs in KKCC too... ;_;
But after all that, I have to say... I want to live in Japan one of these days...