Sakura no Toki was my most anticipated release this year, and when it came out at the end of Feburary, I half expected myself to devote all my time to it until it was done. Unfortunately, that didn’t end up happening.

I was on something of a good clip until I reached Chapter 5, and from here we’re going to get into spoilers so don’t read if you have interest in ever playing this game

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So I really enjoyed chapters 1-3. Chapter 1 I especially really liked the dynamic between Shizuru and Reika. Chapter 2 was mostly Naoya and his students hijinx (Suzuna is my favorite of that bunch) Chapter 3 being the routes much like Uta

I was surprised to find that the only routes were Misuzu and Makoto. They’re both great (with Misuzu being the better of the two) but compared to Uta, it was pretty lacking. Though I’m guessing they didn’t want a bunch of high school heroines given Naoya’s position (as the only other females are mostly his students at this point)

Chapter 4 was excellent. It made me appreciate Kei a whole lot more than what the first game did.

Then chapter 5 happened and I started to lose some of my interest.

A main contributor to that is Naoya’s relationship to Ai in this chapter. While Ai was my favorite character in Uta, something about it doesn’t feel right. Maybe it’s the situation in which they find themselves in that makes it feel wrong? I don’t know. I just feel like her h-scenes could have been a route in itself.

This being the part where Rin shows up again also doesn’t help this chapter. For those not aware, Rin is my least favorite character. In the beginning of Uta she comes off as being too dumb, and then later on she comes off as being kind of a bitch? I might have read more into some things (or misread stuff) but I just didn’t like the tonal shift she went under once she gets her painting skills back.

I don’t know. Not much was doing it for me this chapter until Nagayama Kana showed up.

Maybe it was my dislike of Rin, but despite Kana bullying her, I never felt really that negatively towards her as Naoya did. I also wasn’t upset with what she tried to do with the mural with her performance art group (even though I hate Thomas with the heat of a thousand suns) I gathered there was something more to her

Though I didn’t really put together everything until Naoya meets her again twice in Toki. Once looking at the mural and again at the bar. It’s there I started getting annoyed at Naoya’s suspicious/thickheaded nature

Her presence in this route has been part of what’s kept me reading. I actually just got done reading the part where she faces Naoya in the semifinals.. Man I hope if there’s ever a third game (or a fan-disc) that she gets a route, because I honestly think she’s perfect for Naoya. Even moreso than Misuzu (as much as I love her)

Though now that the semifinal match is over, I’m a bit worried that my enthusiasm is going to die back down a bit. I’d really like to finish this game so I can move onto something else for a bit..

It’d be nice if I knew how much was left of 5 and how long 6 will be.. I used a Youtube playthrough when I played Uta to gauge how far I was, but there doesn’t seem to be any existing ones for toki sadly

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