Perri
Perri as a girl's name is pronounced PARE-ee. It is of English origin. Feminine variant of Peter and Pnina.
You are now forewarned that there are spoilers abound.
星色のおくりもの (Hoshiiro no Okurimono, A Star-Colored Present) is a girls-oriented romantic adventure game released by Takuyo for the PSP in 2008. It was originally released for the PS2 in 2007.
The protagonist is Yoshimoto Ai, a seventeen-year-old girl living in a small rural town. She has a good-hearted nature and simply can't leave people alone. Her friends are the other two people in town her age, Narutaki Seigo and Akito Shin, her childhood friends. All three of them are in their third year of high school and has to decide what they want to do in their future. As the only three students in the only school in town, it has been decided that the school will close after their graduation. Change is coming, and they must change with it, whatever they want to or not. The three of them, along with a newcomer, Inafuna Takashi, will come together and find their way to the future.
Contrary to many of Takuyo's previous games, Hoshiiro no Okurimono is a straight-up visual novel. There is no map roaming or stat-raising or mini-games, so I find this a good game to play if you have no patience for pointless, time-consuming features.
The only special feature in this game though, is the "fortune-telling" extra, which is tied to the direction of the route and expands with its progression. There is the General Fortune, Luck Fortune, Romance Fortune, Romantic Compatibility, Career Path, and The Lovers' Future, but all of this is only accessible from the route you're on. You can access part of the fortune telling extra from the title screen, but it is not tied to the game progression and only a slimmed down version that only includes Luck Fortune and Romantic Compatibility. I have little interest in this extra, so I always skipped it.
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Inafuna Takashi (CV: Mizushima Takahiro) is the transfer student, whose love of astronomy prompts Ai to start the Stargazing Club. He moved from the city to the village where his uncle is mayor and with whom he is staying with. He is open and friendly, preferring to ignore rude behavior than confront it. Yet under his affable exterior, he seems to have a melancholic side that shows from time to time.
The two of them, along with Seigo and Shin, grow close as friends through school, club activities, and outings by the local lake. As she goes through her career consultation, she slowly realizes that she wants to stay with Takashi.
Clues to his melancholy soon start piling up: his avoidance of strenuous physical activities, his weak eyesight, and the incident where Ai spies upon him talking to himself with a dejected air, "How long can I stay like this?" It cumulates to his sudden physical collapse, and his uncle tells them that Takashi has a degenerative eye disease since birth and has received countless surgeries, yet none has worked well. He spent a long time in the hospital where he passed the time by reading about stars and myths, sparking his love of astronomy and his desire to witness a shooting star. There is one final surgery that his doctors and family would like to try to save his eyesight, but as a precondition, he wants to live with his uncle in the little village where he can stargaze and live normally for a short time.
With his declining health, he undergoes the surgery and begins recovery with bandages over his eyes. The three of them decide to go visit Takashi in the city hospital and cheer him up, but due to the distance, they can only go once every two weeks. After their visit, they ask a nurse what his prognosis, but her answer is not good. Ai is devastated by the news, but after some soul-searching, she impulsively decides to go visit him after school. However, the trip takes all afternoon, and by the time she arrives, visiting hours are over. She sneaks in anyways, but finds Takashi crying in the dark. His bandages are off, but he can't see anything and painfully laments the loss of his sight. Shocked by his condition, Ai gives herself away and startles him, who thought he was alone in his heartbreak. The nurse catches her and kicks her out. The news of this incident reaches his uncle, who is furious with her for exasperating Takashi's condition. She ends up suspended from school for a week as punishment and forbidden from contacting him by his uncle. Nonetheless, she is ridiculously straight-forward and goes to apologize to his uncle every day, though he refuses to allow her to contact him.
One night, she returns home to find a letter from Takashi, telling her that she is very important and gave him the courage and determination to go forward. He asks her to meet him in their special place, and she runs up to their stargazing spot where he is waiting. His eyes have healed, and his sight has mostly returned. They confess their feelings for each other. Years later, they are living together in the village, where Takashi spends his time writing a very popular romance novel series and with Ai supporting him from the side.
I just don't buy their relationship. I can understand that with similar interests in astronomy and stargazing, they become close friends. But I see no good evidence of their developing romantic feelings for each other.
Narutaki Seigo (CV: Kishio Daisuke) is the first of Ai's childhood friends and a very amiable and level-headed person. He can get along with anyone, but he especially indulges and dotes on Ai. It's evident early on that Seigo likes her romantically, but he doesn't act on it, simply enjoying the present with her.
Seigo is an excellent high jumper and one of the best in the prefecture, despite living in a small village and practicing alone. He goes to compete in the city, and Ai, with Takashi and Shin, goes to support him. At the meet, they discover that Seigo is extremely popular and even have fangirls wanting to meet and shake his hand. They are introduced to Yoshida Matsuri, the manager of Machidagaura Academy's track team. She is a very pretty and very nice girl, but her invitation to Seigo to celebrate with her school is declined, as well as her request to speak to him alone. It's almost a little odd that in spite of his usual amiable and kind nature, he turns her down with a cold detachment. Weeks later, Matsuri ditches school and takes the bus all the way into their village to confess to Seigo. When he turns her down and Ai goes to comfort her, Matsuri tells Ai that she knew from previous knowledge that he has someone he likes and his unwelcoming behavior towards her was to discourage her affections. However, she still wanted to confess if only to put an end to her hopes.
Ai learns Seigo's good grades and athleticism has earned him a sports scholarship to an university in Kyushu, but has declined it. She goes to talk to him about it, and Seigo kisses her and says that he doesn't want to be without her. This sudden revelation puts a strain to their relationship, but he then asks her to forget about it, because he values their friendship.
Seigo reconsiders the scholarship in Kyushu and leaves for two weeks to view the facilities and practice. Ai is shocked and remembers a childhood memory when she got lost and he found her. She asked him why he is so kind to her, and he told her that he liked her. In the present, she realizes her feelings for him and wants to be with him. When he is expected back, she skips school and waits all day in the city to welcome him back. They have a lovely reunion where she confesses and he happily reciprocates.
Although finally together, Seigo has accepted Kyushu's offer and Ai decides to attend for Machidagaura College. They try to keep upbeat, despite their upcoming separation, with promises of visits and daily calls. But when he has to leave before graduation to prepare, Ai becomes terribly conflicted. She knows this is a great opportunity for him, but doesn't want to be separated from him. They say their farewells at the bus stop, but Ai starts crying immediately and Seigo gets off the bus and tells her he doesn't want to be without her. He wanted her to come to Kyushu with him, but feared that he would be taking away her future and freedom of choice. However, she chooses to go with him out of her own volition. In the epilogue, Ai has followed Seigo to Kyushu, and they're living together as he attends college and she works part-time and studies for the entrance exams next year at his college, all the while peppered with lovey-dovey moments.
I don't want to say that Seigo is my favorite character, but he is my favorite character in this game by the virtue that I like the rest of the guys a lot less. Anyway, I do enjoy how his route doesn't just end at the confession. We get to witness their first stumbling block and see how deep their affections are for each other.
Akito Shin (CV: Madono Mitsuaki) is the second of Ai's childhood friends and a brash young man who lives with his divorced mother and little sister. He is sometimes blunt and insensitive, even to his friends and family, but never cruel or ill-meaning.
Photography is his main passion, and he spends his free time photographing scenery. When Ai asks him if he takes pictures of people such as his little sister Miyu, he says he doesn't, muttering that he doesn't want to make any memories. Later, Takashi lends Shin a famous astronomy photo album, and the latter reciprocates by showing him his photos. Takashi thinks his work is amazing and suggests that it be submitted to a photography contest.
After Seigo's high jump competition in the city, Shin and Ai spend time together at a photography exhibition. Before the bus ride back to their village, Seigo gives her a present, making Shin a little awkward and jealous. When Shin walks her home, he also gives her a present, a postcard from the exhibition, a memento of their time together.
Soon, a phone call comes that upsets the Akito household and startles Shin into a near stupor. Taking note of his odd behavior, Ai realizes her feelings for him and tries her best to take care of him, even making lunch for him to improve his mood. She learns that the phone call came from his estranged father, whose gambling and drinking was the reason for the divorce and alienation from his children. His alcoholism resulted in liver damage, and he's dying and would like to see his family one last time. His mother left the decision to see their father to her children, and Shin has been conflicted ever since. He throws away his camera and photos, telling Ai that he got his love of photography from his father. Photography itself is so loaded with memories and his father, and through photograph, one can see how much someone has changed -- for the worse in his father's case. Ai and Shin's mother help him come to a revelation, and he decides to visit his father.
After his father passes, Shin takes her out to the lake, kisses her, confesses, and takes his first portrait of her.
UGGGHHHH. Besides the fact that I dislike Shin, his route plods along very slowly, and it's excruciating to get through.
Narutaki Souya (CV: Hirakawa Daisuke) is Seigo's 26 years old brother and their one and only teacher at school. He attended college in the city, came back after his graduation, and became their teacher. He's kind yet playful and loves to tease people.
Supportive of their astronomy club, Souya offers to buy a new telescope for them in the city, and Ai goes along with him. She comments on how many people there are and how busy they all look. In an surprise move, he bitterly comments that they are all lonely people and that he would be content if he had even just one person. After buying the telescope, a woman named Suzuna Ryouko recognizes Souya and berates him for becoming a teacher like her older brother. Shocked, he coldly tells Ai to go home while he has a conversation with the woman.
He is absent from school the next day, but returns the next day with a forbidding aura that is short-tempered and curt. She tries to talk to him afterschool and fails to get through his chilly behavior. She tries again the next day, but overhears him on the phone arguing that there is nothing but a student-teacher relationship between him and Ai. When he gets off the phone, he catches her eavesdropping and warns her not to do it again. On her way home, she witnesses Souya getting into a car with Ryouko, making her heart ache a bit.
Souya suddenly takes a week off, surprising everyone. Ai encounters Ryouko at the bus stop, and the woman accuses her of being a naive, thoughtless little girl who clings to Souya without considering his feelings and circumstances. She even tells Ai that she'll have him stay at her side.
Seigo reveals that when Souya attended college in the city, he was very happy and made lots of friends. He once brought Ryouko back to the village, whom he introduced as his best friend's younger sister. He truly thought of her as a sister, but she clearly didn't feel the same way. He was kind to everyone and might have unintentionally encouraged her romantic aspirations. One rainy night, Souya got a car ride from his friend, but when a child suddenly jumped into the road, his friend swerved and hit the breaks. The car hit the guardrails and was totaled, with Souya the only survivor in the car. Survivor's guilt hit him hard, and Ryouko accused him of being her brother's murderer. With his best friend dead and place to belong to gone, he returned the village.
Waiting for Souya to come back, Ai encounters Ryouko again, who offers to take her to him at the lake. Once there, Ryouko locks her in the car while she talks to Souya. She offers to forgive him for her brother's death if he loves her back. However, he tells her that even though he has many regrets and many people who he hurt, there is someone who he loves more and can't hurt any longer: Ai. Ryouko had confessed to Souya and was rejected just before the car accident that took her brother's life. Being rejected by Souya and losing her brother all in the same night, she lost it and accused Souya of being her brother's killer. And being rejected once again by him, Ryouko goes mental and jumps into her car and drives into the lake with Ai still inside. Souya manages to save the two of them, and Ryouko repents for all her actions and manipulation.
Ai recovers from her ordeal and passes her university exams. As Souya helps her pack her things for her move to the city, he tells her that while he's flattered she wants to be a teacher like him, she shouldn't mimic his behavior with her future students. He then kisses her, and they have some lovey-dovey moments.
I have a love/hate relationship with any of Hirakawa Daisuke's characters. He's a top-notch voice actor, but he's so ubiquitous in every form of otome media that I find him a bit boring. Anyway, as for Souya's route, I liked the soap opera aspect, but there wasn't any build-up to Souya and Ai's relationship. Neither person's feelings seem to evolve or change to romantic affection, and I find it difficult to believe their relationship is anything beyond childhood friends.
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I didn't have super high hopes for Hoshiiro no Okurimono, and I'm glad I didn't, because it was pretty damn tedious.
As much as I dislke Suzuna Ryouko's character, I too find the protagonist, Yoshimoto Ai, to be naive and thoughtless. She's smart and kind and well-meaning and always trying to cheer the guys up from their depression, but she's unable to see beyond their depression and revolve what causes that depression. She seems to lack the higher thinking and calculation that would allow her to be one step ahead and settle the issue quicker. I've played a lot of otome games, and I'm really tired of female protagonists who are perfectly nice people, but aren't more street-smart and strategic. (Though one must give some leniency as this game was first published in 2007.)
Surprisingly, this game only has four male character and five endings (one romantic ending for each guy and one normal ending). Most stand-alone otome games by established companies feature at least five guys, unless it's part of a series (think Tokyo Yamanote Boys, Starry Sky, Dot Kareshi -We're 8bit Lovers!-). Personally though, I'm alright with a smaller number of characters. If faced with the decision between a larger cast or more fleshed-out characters, I'd pick the latter. However, the game lacks both a large cast and interesting characters. Neither the characters or their stories are engrossing. There's a sick girlboy who touches the heart ; a smart, reserved, cool guy; a brash, misunderstood misfit who is soft on the inside; and an older man combined with a dark past. I'm not against these stereotypes -- in fact, I like these clichés -- but I feel that Takuyo depended too much on the stereotypes instead of using it as a basis to flesh out the characters.
As for the stories in the game, I have two major issues. First, the story introduction talks about how Ai is at a crossroads in her life and is searching for her future. However, in all of the routes, they put priority on the guys and the romantic aspects, without giving equal weight to Ai's own personal development. In fact, although her future is discussed a few time, it is almost immediately pushed aside for the guys and their problems. One could argue that this is intentional to keep the player character a blank canvas to keep the attention on the guys, but when the player character is so bland and we have to experience everything through her character, everything turns out duller than intended. You could almost argue that her own story is solely dependent on the guy. For a game that is more slice-of-life than anything else, the protagonist needs to have an evolving story herself. Otherwise, they shouldn't have had a protagonist in the first place.
The other issue is the pacing of the game itself. About sixty percent of the game goes through a common route, but you start focusing on a specific guy halfway through. But as the individual route starts, the pacing of the story is very staggered. I would have expected it to be faster paced, but instead the game gives you important events interspersed with stupid trivial moments that should have been left out. I just couldn't play this game without having a movie or show playing on my computer to keep me awake.
The art was done by Touma Rei, also the author and artist of the recently completed manga Reimei no Arcana. It's clean and neat, but lacks the polished aspect that makes me swoon. Her art has much improved as you can see in Reimei no Arcana. She also drew the manga adaptation one-shot, also titled Hoshiiro no Okurimono, the art of which I actually found to be prettier. (Then again, I ambiased towards manga art over cel-shaded art.)
Overall, Hoshiiro no Okurimono is not a game I would spend time nor money on. None of the characters and none of their stories were able to entertain me, which is perhaps the greatest let-down. I read the manga adaptation a couple years back, which did give me hope that this game would be fairly good. The manga adapted Seigo's route, so if you want to know the jist of his story, you can save a lot of time reading the manga instead of playing the game.
You are now forewarned that there are spoilers abound.
星色のおくりもの (Hoshiiro no Okurimono, A Star-Colored Present) is a girls-oriented romantic adventure game released by Takuyo for the PSP in 2008. It was originally released for the PS2 in 2007.
The protagonist is Yoshimoto Ai, a seventeen-year-old girl living in a small rural town. She has a good-hearted nature and simply can't leave people alone. Her friends are the other two people in town her age, Narutaki Seigo and Akito Shin, her childhood friends. All three of them are in their third year of high school and has to decide what they want to do in their future. As the only three students in the only school in town, it has been decided that the school will close after their graduation. Change is coming, and they must change with it, whatever they want to or not. The three of them, along with a newcomer, Inafuna Takashi, will come together and find their way to the future.
Contrary to many of Takuyo's previous games, Hoshiiro no Okurimono is a straight-up visual novel. There is no map roaming or stat-raising or mini-games, so I find this a good game to play if you have no patience for pointless, time-consuming features.
The only special feature in this game though, is the "fortune-telling" extra, which is tied to the direction of the route and expands with its progression. There is the General Fortune, Luck Fortune, Romance Fortune, Romantic Compatibility, Career Path, and The Lovers' Future, but all of this is only accessible from the route you're on. You can access part of the fortune telling extra from the title screen, but it is not tied to the game progression and only a slimmed down version that only includes Luck Fortune and Romantic Compatibility. I have little interest in this extra, so I always skipped it.
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Inafuna Takashi (CV: Mizushima Takahiro) is the transfer student, whose love of astronomy prompts Ai to start the Stargazing Club. He moved from the city to the village where his uncle is mayor and with whom he is staying with. He is open and friendly, preferring to ignore rude behavior than confront it. Yet under his affable exterior, he seems to have a melancholic side that shows from time to time.
The two of them, along with Seigo and Shin, grow close as friends through school, club activities, and outings by the local lake. As she goes through her career consultation, she slowly realizes that she wants to stay with Takashi.
Clues to his melancholy soon start piling up: his avoidance of strenuous physical activities, his weak eyesight, and the incident where Ai spies upon him talking to himself with a dejected air, "How long can I stay like this?" It cumulates to his sudden physical collapse, and his uncle tells them that Takashi has a degenerative eye disease since birth and has received countless surgeries, yet none has worked well. He spent a long time in the hospital where he passed the time by reading about stars and myths, sparking his love of astronomy and his desire to witness a shooting star. There is one final surgery that his doctors and family would like to try to save his eyesight, but as a precondition, he wants to live with his uncle in the little village where he can stargaze and live normally for a short time.
With his declining health, he undergoes the surgery and begins recovery with bandages over his eyes. The three of them decide to go visit Takashi in the city hospital and cheer him up, but due to the distance, they can only go once every two weeks. After their visit, they ask a nurse what his prognosis, but her answer is not good. Ai is devastated by the news, but after some soul-searching, she impulsively decides to go visit him after school. However, the trip takes all afternoon, and by the time she arrives, visiting hours are over. She sneaks in anyways, but finds Takashi crying in the dark. His bandages are off, but he can't see anything and painfully laments the loss of his sight. Shocked by his condition, Ai gives herself away and startles him, who thought he was alone in his heartbreak. The nurse catches her and kicks her out. The news of this incident reaches his uncle, who is furious with her for exasperating Takashi's condition. She ends up suspended from school for a week as punishment and forbidden from contacting him by his uncle. Nonetheless, she is ridiculously straight-forward and goes to apologize to his uncle every day, though he refuses to allow her to contact him.
One night, she returns home to find a letter from Takashi, telling her that she is very important and gave him the courage and determination to go forward. He asks her to meet him in their special place, and she runs up to their stargazing spot where he is waiting. His eyes have healed, and his sight has mostly returned. They confess their feelings for each other. Years later, they are living together in the village, where Takashi spends his time writing a very popular romance novel series and with Ai supporting him from the side.
I just don't buy their relationship. I can understand that with similar interests in astronomy and stargazing, they become close friends. But I see no good evidence of their developing romantic feelings for each other.
Narutaki Seigo (CV: Kishio Daisuke) is the first of Ai's childhood friends and a very amiable and level-headed person. He can get along with anyone, but he especially indulges and dotes on Ai. It's evident early on that Seigo likes her romantically, but he doesn't act on it, simply enjoying the present with her.
Seigo is an excellent high jumper and one of the best in the prefecture, despite living in a small village and practicing alone. He goes to compete in the city, and Ai, with Takashi and Shin, goes to support him. At the meet, they discover that Seigo is extremely popular and even have fangirls wanting to meet and shake his hand. They are introduced to Yoshida Matsuri, the manager of Machidagaura Academy's track team. She is a very pretty and very nice girl, but her invitation to Seigo to celebrate with her school is declined, as well as her request to speak to him alone. It's almost a little odd that in spite of his usual amiable and kind nature, he turns her down with a cold detachment. Weeks later, Matsuri ditches school and takes the bus all the way into their village to confess to Seigo. When he turns her down and Ai goes to comfort her, Matsuri tells Ai that she knew from previous knowledge that he has someone he likes and his unwelcoming behavior towards her was to discourage her affections. However, she still wanted to confess if only to put an end to her hopes.
Ai learns Seigo's good grades and athleticism has earned him a sports scholarship to an university in Kyushu, but has declined it. She goes to talk to him about it, and Seigo kisses her and says that he doesn't want to be without her. This sudden revelation puts a strain to their relationship, but he then asks her to forget about it, because he values their friendship.
Seigo reconsiders the scholarship in Kyushu and leaves for two weeks to view the facilities and practice. Ai is shocked and remembers a childhood memory when she got lost and he found her. She asked him why he is so kind to her, and he told her that he liked her. In the present, she realizes her feelings for him and wants to be with him. When he is expected back, she skips school and waits all day in the city to welcome him back. They have a lovely reunion where she confesses and he happily reciprocates.
Although finally together, Seigo has accepted Kyushu's offer and Ai decides to attend for Machidagaura College. They try to keep upbeat, despite their upcoming separation, with promises of visits and daily calls. But when he has to leave before graduation to prepare, Ai becomes terribly conflicted. She knows this is a great opportunity for him, but doesn't want to be separated from him. They say their farewells at the bus stop, but Ai starts crying immediately and Seigo gets off the bus and tells her he doesn't want to be without her. He wanted her to come to Kyushu with him, but feared that he would be taking away her future and freedom of choice. However, she chooses to go with him out of her own volition. In the epilogue, Ai has followed Seigo to Kyushu, and they're living together as he attends college and she works part-time and studies for the entrance exams next year at his college, all the while peppered with lovey-dovey moments.
I don't want to say that Seigo is my favorite character, but he is my favorite character in this game by the virtue that I like the rest of the guys a lot less. Anyway, I do enjoy how his route doesn't just end at the confession. We get to witness their first stumbling block and see how deep their affections are for each other.
Akito Shin (CV: Madono Mitsuaki) is the second of Ai's childhood friends and a brash young man who lives with his divorced mother and little sister. He is sometimes blunt and insensitive, even to his friends and family, but never cruel or ill-meaning.
Photography is his main passion, and he spends his free time photographing scenery. When Ai asks him if he takes pictures of people such as his little sister Miyu, he says he doesn't, muttering that he doesn't want to make any memories. Later, Takashi lends Shin a famous astronomy photo album, and the latter reciprocates by showing him his photos. Takashi thinks his work is amazing and suggests that it be submitted to a photography contest.
After Seigo's high jump competition in the city, Shin and Ai spend time together at a photography exhibition. Before the bus ride back to their village, Seigo gives her a present, making Shin a little awkward and jealous. When Shin walks her home, he also gives her a present, a postcard from the exhibition, a memento of their time together.
Soon, a phone call comes that upsets the Akito household and startles Shin into a near stupor. Taking note of his odd behavior, Ai realizes her feelings for him and tries her best to take care of him, even making lunch for him to improve his mood. She learns that the phone call came from his estranged father, whose gambling and drinking was the reason for the divorce and alienation from his children. His alcoholism resulted in liver damage, and he's dying and would like to see his family one last time. His mother left the decision to see their father to her children, and Shin has been conflicted ever since. He throws away his camera and photos, telling Ai that he got his love of photography from his father. Photography itself is so loaded with memories and his father, and through photograph, one can see how much someone has changed -- for the worse in his father's case. Ai and Shin's mother help him come to a revelation, and he decides to visit his father.
After his father passes, Shin takes her out to the lake, kisses her, confesses, and takes his first portrait of her.
UGGGHHHH. Besides the fact that I dislike Shin, his route plods along very slowly, and it's excruciating to get through.
Narutaki Souya (CV: Hirakawa Daisuke) is Seigo's 26 years old brother and their one and only teacher at school. He attended college in the city, came back after his graduation, and became their teacher. He's kind yet playful and loves to tease people.
Supportive of their astronomy club, Souya offers to buy a new telescope for them in the city, and Ai goes along with him. She comments on how many people there are and how busy they all look. In an surprise move, he bitterly comments that they are all lonely people and that he would be content if he had even just one person. After buying the telescope, a woman named Suzuna Ryouko recognizes Souya and berates him for becoming a teacher like her older brother. Shocked, he coldly tells Ai to go home while he has a conversation with the woman.
He is absent from school the next day, but returns the next day with a forbidding aura that is short-tempered and curt. She tries to talk to him afterschool and fails to get through his chilly behavior. She tries again the next day, but overhears him on the phone arguing that there is nothing but a student-teacher relationship between him and Ai. When he gets off the phone, he catches her eavesdropping and warns her not to do it again. On her way home, she witnesses Souya getting into a car with Ryouko, making her heart ache a bit.
Souya suddenly takes a week off, surprising everyone. Ai encounters Ryouko at the bus stop, and the woman accuses her of being a naive, thoughtless little girl who clings to Souya without considering his feelings and circumstances. She even tells Ai that she'll have him stay at her side.
Seigo reveals that when Souya attended college in the city, he was very happy and made lots of friends. He once brought Ryouko back to the village, whom he introduced as his best friend's younger sister. He truly thought of her as a sister, but she clearly didn't feel the same way. He was kind to everyone and might have unintentionally encouraged her romantic aspirations. One rainy night, Souya got a car ride from his friend, but when a child suddenly jumped into the road, his friend swerved and hit the breaks. The car hit the guardrails and was totaled, with Souya the only survivor in the car. Survivor's guilt hit him hard, and Ryouko accused him of being her brother's murderer. With his best friend dead and place to belong to gone, he returned the village.
Waiting for Souya to come back, Ai encounters Ryouko again, who offers to take her to him at the lake. Once there, Ryouko locks her in the car while she talks to Souya. She offers to forgive him for her brother's death if he loves her back. However, he tells her that even though he has many regrets and many people who he hurt, there is someone who he loves more and can't hurt any longer: Ai. Ryouko had confessed to Souya and was rejected just before the car accident that took her brother's life. Being rejected by Souya and losing her brother all in the same night, she lost it and accused Souya of being her brother's killer. And being rejected once again by him, Ryouko goes mental and jumps into her car and drives into the lake with Ai still inside. Souya manages to save the two of them, and Ryouko repents for all her actions and manipulation.
Ai recovers from her ordeal and passes her university exams. As Souya helps her pack her things for her move to the city, he tells her that while he's flattered she wants to be a teacher like him, she shouldn't mimic his behavior with her future students. He then kisses her, and they have some lovey-dovey moments.
I have a love/hate relationship with any of Hirakawa Daisuke's characters. He's a top-notch voice actor, but he's so ubiquitous in every form of otome media that I find him a bit boring. Anyway, as for Souya's route, I liked the soap opera aspect, but there wasn't any build-up to Souya and Ai's relationship. Neither person's feelings seem to evolve or change to romantic affection, and I find it difficult to believe their relationship is anything beyond childhood friends.
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I didn't have super high hopes for Hoshiiro no Okurimono, and I'm glad I didn't, because it was pretty damn tedious.
As much as I dislke Suzuna Ryouko's character, I too find the protagonist, Yoshimoto Ai, to be naive and thoughtless. She's smart and kind and well-meaning and always trying to cheer the guys up from their depression, but she's unable to see beyond their depression and revolve what causes that depression. She seems to lack the higher thinking and calculation that would allow her to be one step ahead and settle the issue quicker. I've played a lot of otome games, and I'm really tired of female protagonists who are perfectly nice people, but aren't more street-smart and strategic. (Though one must give some leniency as this game was first published in 2007.)
Surprisingly, this game only has four male character and five endings (one romantic ending for each guy and one normal ending). Most stand-alone otome games by established companies feature at least five guys, unless it's part of a series (think Tokyo Yamanote Boys, Starry Sky, Dot Kareshi -We're 8bit Lovers!-). Personally though, I'm alright with a smaller number of characters. If faced with the decision between a larger cast or more fleshed-out characters, I'd pick the latter. However, the game lacks both a large cast and interesting characters. Neither the characters or their stories are engrossing. There's a sick girlboy who touches the heart ; a smart, reserved, cool guy; a brash, misunderstood misfit who is soft on the inside; and an older man combined with a dark past. I'm not against these stereotypes -- in fact, I like these clichés -- but I feel that Takuyo depended too much on the stereotypes instead of using it as a basis to flesh out the characters.
As for the stories in the game, I have two major issues. First, the story introduction talks about how Ai is at a crossroads in her life and is searching for her future. However, in all of the routes, they put priority on the guys and the romantic aspects, without giving equal weight to Ai's own personal development. In fact, although her future is discussed a few time, it is almost immediately pushed aside for the guys and their problems. One could argue that this is intentional to keep the player character a blank canvas to keep the attention on the guys, but when the player character is so bland and we have to experience everything through her character, everything turns out duller than intended. You could almost argue that her own story is solely dependent on the guy. For a game that is more slice-of-life than anything else, the protagonist needs to have an evolving story herself. Otherwise, they shouldn't have had a protagonist in the first place.
The other issue is the pacing of the game itself. About sixty percent of the game goes through a common route, but you start focusing on a specific guy halfway through. But as the individual route starts, the pacing of the story is very staggered. I would have expected it to be faster paced, but instead the game gives you important events interspersed with stupid trivial moments that should have been left out. I just couldn't play this game without having a movie or show playing on my computer to keep me awake.
The art was done by Touma Rei, also the author and artist of the recently completed manga Reimei no Arcana. It's clean and neat, but lacks the polished aspect that makes me swoon. Her art has much improved as you can see in Reimei no Arcana. She also drew the manga adaptation one-shot, also titled Hoshiiro no Okurimono, the art of which I actually found to be prettier. (Then again, I ambiased towards manga art over cel-shaded art.)
Overall, Hoshiiro no Okurimono is not a game I would spend time nor money on. None of the characters and none of their stories were able to entertain me, which is perhaps the greatest let-down. I read the manga adaptation a couple years back, which did give me hope that this game would be fairly good. The manga adapted Seigo's route, so if you want to know the jist of his story, you can save a lot of time reading the manga instead of playing the game.