Genre: Otome/VN.
Developer/publisher: Takuyo.Platform: Switch.
Official Site: http://www.takuyo.co.jp/products/himehibi_wb/index.html
VNDB: https://vndb.org/v26906
Release date: 10/12/20.
Good old Takuyo is still around and released a new entry in the hime hibi series!
of which I have only played the first entry, I did buy the second one but never
played actualy managed to make time for it.😅 I did pass on their other new game
Hanasaku and maybe i'm glad I did as reviews weren't exactly doing it any favors.
Who is Takuyo? that's a long story but they've been around for a long time.
Enough about that and more about Himehibi 3! which in terms of being of an otome game
was a little more simple than the other Takuyo game I recently played!
Pro's
- Mostly light-hearted but there seemed to be more to it all but not too deep.
- Pretty art, love the soft colours! most of the backgrounds are nice to look at as well.
Grey area
- Music manages to fit the mood most of the time but its nothing special.
Con's
- Kinda on the short side, but on the flip side it knows where to end.
- Not all route are well-rounded better not come her for a deep plot.
- They should have used a different ending theme for the black lily route, too upbeat.😓
The OP is decent I guess, catchy enough.
Kisakino Emi is invited to enrolls at sumeragi gakuen, a high-class all boy school that is
undergoing an experiment of letting girls enter, all the boys are princes and the girls princesses...
Its is all a project/test held by the sumeragi group and she has been chosen to be a model student
like some of the guys have. There's a ranking system like Masamune for example is the rook
and Kazumi is a self-proclaimed unicorn(knight) wait why unicorn?! well there surely
was a good sense of humor around as well basically every romanceable guy is named
after a chesspiece and Emi's the queen she joins their commitee and with them prepares
for the festival, each route does this differently and you get closer to him.
Emi also has to deal with being a model student... Other than that a relative of Chiharu
typically tries to make things difficult for everyone involved, gotta have some bad guy I guess.
Depending on your choices you can get different type of route such as: white lily or black lily
there's four endings total, the former is happier than the other but what I liked about this
they explored different sides to the character and different kinds of love which kept things
interesting, for some this is for better others for worse basicallly black route is spicier.
Other than that the general system of the game was smooth and I had no real issues
on my journey to full-complete!
This game is set in a rich kids school thats fancy high-class but more up to date with current times
kind of reminded me of zettai kaikyuu but without the harsh class system.
Hmm... maybe the setting was too fancy for me atleast there were no annoying minigames
and was still pretty relaxing it also didn't feel like it took forever to get interesting
otome-wise like shinigami to shoujo this game was much shorter and to the point.
The common route served its purpose well enough to introduce and explain things.
There are many cg which is only the guy(s) some were good others meh.
The protagonist even comments how just staring at pretty boys is happiness enough
well atleast there are cg's with the two of them together so I can't complain much.😌
Himehibi1 also had this problem... but I guess its just a thing this series has
but this 3rd installment does it a little better than the first.
Also its ceroB(12+) so its probably better to not expect it to be that raunchy
because what was there was very tame which might be a blessing cuz there
are maybe two endings were the game was pushing this rating.
Emi is a good girl she might be more likable than the protag of himehibi1 but I did think Emi
is a bit too forgiving. Most of the guys are likable and the only one who pissed me off
was Yumeji and paperbag-kun turned out to be worse than I expected.😓
There was definitely enough going on with the character(s) to keep me interested also the game
seems to know its cliches but actually not giving 2fucks about it and still rolls with it
characters like Kazumi would actually be boring were it not for their quirk
and I found his character to be very interesting! though the humor was odd
and a bit corney I feel you're either gonna love or hate it. Atleast every route was unique
and focused on that character which was a plus, some endings might feel lacking
but if you do all you will truly know everything about the guy (for better or worse).
This game was overall pretty simple in what it tried to do, I think I can recommend
this game if you want something light-hearted and character focused while not minding
having to look past the surface of a pretty face, cuz there are some ~problems~ some more obvious
than others. Romance wise... it depends for some it only gets good at the end
others are more well-rounded overall it was still open ended, I think this new himehibi
does kind of retain the old spirit its also not too bloated in length it ends when it should.
I think this game was alright... Kazumi's route while corny was fun😅 it might not
be my cup of tea but it wasn't bad! Masamune's route was very enjoyable
and he's definitely my husbando, the only route I didn't really like was Yumeji
but that was mostly because the guy lost his last shred of dignity in the black route
atleast his white route was still somewhat enjoyable but yea watch yourself with him and Paperbag because as much as I like to say there were no bad ends these two are like uhuh riiight?
Ah well otome games are always like that, one route that just rubs you the wrong way
you can't like everything but this game does a good job of finding paths that you could like.
Chiharu was the most well-rounded route and I also really liked him, he's so wholesome it hurts.ðŸ˜
Overall I think this was a pretty good otome game some parts might be a bit cliche
but that's not necessarily a bad thing if it doesn't try to be something its not and
the plot was okay too, for what it was worth this was mostly enjoyable.
I don't know what else to say but if you want to try a more classic
yet modern(for today's standard) this game is a good bet! that is if you don't mind it being simple.
7,6/10
My playorder was:
Kazumi > Masamune > Yumeji > Chiharu > Paperbag.
Idk if there was some recommended order but none are locked nor was there a story that had
to be played out in specific order so you can do whoever you fancy in whatever order you want!
This is the end of non-spoiler section, more ramblings about routes after the jump.
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