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Review of Tasogare

SubjectTasogare
Tasogare
ByHelpfulness: 0
Vote: 7.5
treetape on 2020-11-04
ReviewI got extremely curious for this game since it seemed so unique but I was disappointed when I saw the EGS reviews. Nonetheless, my curiosity still stood strong so I caved and tried it and I actually did enjoy it, even with all its flaws. I'm gonna put that out there, this is absolutely my subjective enjoyment, and so I would only recommend it to others who somehow get the same strange yearning to play this game out of nowhere. But I thought it had a good amount of solid scenes, like most flashbacks and the True ending, even if it also had some stuff that's not so much. One thing I can say for sure though, is that I never once got bored reading this. It's unique and tries something totally different, and I respect that, even if it's not perfect at all, it's what drew me in.
0 points
#1 by empoleon434
2020-11-04 at 17:18
< report >From what I barely remember of the game, I do remember liking the flashbacks (and the original Kiyomi for some reason). While there are a lot of interesting bits of the setting, pretty much all of it is underutilized because of how short the scenes are and how the game is unfinished (kind of laughed at the end when Reiko just... left). Definitely something where there's more questions than answers.

Personally I wouldn't recommend it unless you have a really, really, I mean REALLY strong desire to play it and/or curious about older Leaf games (although this is probably the worst of them with regards to VNs).
It is probably short enough that people interested can finish it without too much of an investment (probably).

At least the OP is still a banger.
#2 by treetape
2020-11-05 at 10:28
< report >Yeah I agree that I wouldn't recommend it to just anyone either. Right now it's kind of a guilty pleasure I guess you could say? It doesn't feel entirely right cause I do think the parts I liked were actually good. In general though, I'm someone that can enjoy stuff for its potential and what it could have been, cause I still find that pretty enjoyable. As such, I can totally understand people not getting satisfied at all with this game. It just holds kind of a special place for me in the games I've enjoyed so far.

Btw, I just uploaded the OP and the rest of the OST on Youtube if you're interested, here's the OP: linkLast modified on 2020-11-05 at 12:26
#3 by anonymous
2021-05-23 at 19:06
< report >Thank you for this review, I was actually really interested in this game, will give it a shot.
#4 by treetape
2021-05-24 at 16:24
< report >Haha, you're welcome. Just don't expect something amazing, my enjoyment of this game was extremely subjective, if that makes sense. Most of the game is weird early Leaf jank, so if you like that, you'll probably at the very least have fun while reading it, even if it's a lot of jank writing. It's just too short, "underutilized" like empoleon put it is a great way to put it. The thing is that the game has scenes where the author suddenly becomes incredibly competent and you start seeing exactly what he's going for and it's actually really cool. Sadly, most of the game isn't like that, and there's an equal amount of moments where the author seemingly shrinks his brain to the size of a pea (不老不死 end is the game at its dumbest possible point).
But if you say that you were really interested in this game, then I believe that you'll probably actually overall enjoy your time with it, even despite how ridiculously flawed it is. Even if you hate it, it's pretty short so it's not a big deal. I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on it either way, as there aren't exactly many people I can discuss this novelty of a VN with.
#5 by anonymous
2021-05-24 at 18:00
< report >While older Leaf titles sure had their own flaws, I was immediately drawn to this studio's peculiar yet fascinating settings and I've been waiting to try Tasogare despite vndb's low average score. The synopsis seemed pretty interesting and after knowing that this novel tries to tell something unique, even though the author might not have been consistent in his writing, I find it easier to forgive than a consistent yet boring scenario. I really like authors who try to do something new, or try to tell the audience some of their thoughts through the story.

I'll make sure to keep you updated when I'll actually read it, no worries!Last modified on 2021-05-24 at 18:24
#6 by hylii
2022-10-15 at 23:54
< report >Hello there, this is probably a long shot but as I was not even expecting to see any posts in English about this game, may I ask how/where you played this game? On Windows 10 when I try to play it it works until the part where the OP plays, then it says Indeo 5 is required which of course you can't install on to Windows 10. I suppose a virtual machine is a must then? Thanks
#7 by treetape
2022-10-16 at 00:53
< report >Yes, this happened to me too when I tried playing it on my Windows 10 PC. So I tried it on my spare Windows 7 laptop, and it worked on that, but it wasn't optimal since this is one of those games that plays the soundtrack off the CD, a feature unsupported after Windows XP (it makes the BGM unable to loop after playing once). There's fixes for that as you may know if you've already played old games that play their music off the CD, but since you're gonna be going with a virtual machine, just use Windows XP, since that OS supports games like that.

Honestly, if you're planning on exploring a lot of early 2000s visual novels, it could even be a good idea to just get a Windows XP computer outright. That's what I ended up doing, since virtual machines can still have some issues (or maybe I'm just bad at VMs), and it's been golden ever since. It's a brilliant experience, playing these old games on a 2003 laptop, and I don't only mean that for compatibility.

Anyway. I wish you luck if you're really gonna go ahead and play this game. Make no mistake, while I enjoyed it, I have absolutely no objections to people calling it a kusoge. Just look at the EGS reviews, it BOMBED like hell at the time. Probably the term (and tag) that comes up the most often on the EGS page for it is very simply "なりそこね", it could have been great. Every once in a while, it seemingly wakes up for only a few seconds to be absolutely transcendent, and then goes back to sleep. It's a mess. You most likely won't like it at all, because it's quite simply a kusoge. But I fucking love it, I'm still passionate about this stupid fucking kusoge two years later. It's seriously like no other visual novel I've ever read. So cheers if you end up appreciating the very rare glimpses of genius behind the huge mess like I did, and I told you so if you just thought it sucked.
#8 by hylii
2022-10-16 at 01:34
< report >Wow that was a fast response, I really respect the passion.
I love these sorts of older VNs, but I have very limited time so I play like one of them a year. That's good advice though, I guess I'll get a Windows XP computer eventually if the VM ends up not working out.
This was only a random thing I wanted to check out but I'm gonna check it out soon for sure, the way you describe it makes it sound awesome to me lol. I'm just in love with its concept and visuals (from what I have seen at least). It reminds me a lot of Odeon, which I feel the way you feel about Tasogare in more than one ways. It's mostly shit and it's totally unknown, but I thought it was really cool cause there's nothing else like it (which is funny to say because it's a very clear rip-off; and I do not say this in a bad way of two other very popular anime)
Anyway yeah, huge respect dude. I'm gonna check this out very soon.