Break Chance Memento

I bought this game quite a while ago, and just recently that I’ve finally played. And what can I say? I enjoyed this game more than I expected, even tho there are a few problems (at least in my opinion, I’m no “game expert”. But those were things that I’ve felt while playing it, so I want to talk about them as well). [b]The story:[/b] It was good, above average honestly. Ain’t no masterpiece, but I definitely enjoyed! The only thing that kinda disappointed me was the little twist in the end. [spoiler]If it was only Fuyuka’s doing, I’d have love it. But inserting the other guy was kinda… too much? I don’t know how to explain. It kinda broke the whole brotherly vibe somehow, at least for me)[/spoiler] I also enjoyed the multiple endings and how just one or two different choices can change everything. Also, I have an undying love for family stories, especially when they have to be more united than ever to face their difficulties. Break Chance Memento was perfect for me on that aspect. [b]The brothers:[/b] Shuuki was an okay MC. It’s weird because sometimes he says something but then he acts completely different from his “normal” behavior, especially on the two romantic routes. I understand that he’s changing, growing up. But sometimes I found hard to believe that he was “the man who could have anyone he wanted”. Overall, I liked him and I found myself feeling sad when I read about his true feelings towards the accident. His brothers, Natsume (special angel cake sent from the heavens by the way) and Masaharu were good characters too. I loved their relationship, the family love feeling was pretty intense. Those brothers just deserve to be happy. [b]Romantic routes:[/b] Well, to be totally honest, I only enjoyed one of them: Chiaki’s. He’s a good guy, and his relation with Shuuki was cute. They make a good couple. But Yukinari’s route made no sense to me. Yes, he’s cute, but… just that?? I don’t know, I couldn’t feel that Shuuki and him were close to the point of dating. It was actually awkward. No offense to the developers, but I felt like Yukinari was “thrown” in the story, with little personality development. [b]Gameplay:[/b] There’s actually some gameplay here! You need to find clues (more like the “mementos”) in order to keep going with the story. Since I enjoy hidden objects games, I liked this aspect of BCM. Also, there’s a lot of special scenes to unlock with each memento. A bit hard to achieve, but satisfying as hell once you do it. 8/10. Even with the problems I listed above, I still think this game was good. [b]If you enjoy family/brother stories like I do, you’re going to like it.[/b] But if you only came here for the BL, you might get disappointed.

To preface this review, I should mention that I was a beta tester for the game and have been able to follow it through its development. With that said, I can offer an honest review of the game. tl;dr The game is great. The amount of content, quality of writing and artwork, along with an engaging story makes it easily a great game to pick up if you enjoy the genre or a good story. [h1]Playtime/Length[/h1] There is so much content in this game that your first playthrough will take you about 5-6 hours to get through alone. And with several routes to choose from, getting through all the main content will be thoroughly engaging and get you so much value for what you put into the game. I think a good way I’ve heard a way to describe the amount of writing in BCM is that its total length is about 3.5 Great Gatsby’s long. The game is filled with content. [h1]Music[/h1] The music is open source, but it is used very well. The choice of song for any given situation is fitting and matches the ambiance of a scene. With a soundtrack of 33 songs, you will find a great amount of distinction between songs and it lends itself to framing a scene just right when you hear the fitting background music. [h1]Visuals[/h1] The artwork in the game is all stunning. From expressive character art to CG’s to backgrounds, the game certainly isn’t lacking when it comes to its visuals. BCM has gone through several visual updates during its development and the finished product shows how polished it is as a result. The user interface is sleek and appealing, fitting to the game itself. All art assets are incredibly done, deserving of high praise. [h1]Writing/Gameplay[/h1] I’m not very good with words myself, so I probably won’t do it justice when I say the writing is extremely well-done and high quality. The cast of the game avoids common archetypes and each person feels separate, yet complete in their characterization. You will undoubtedly find favorites and traits you love about each character since they reflect real people so well. The story flows fluidly and smoothly. Reading it is first and foremost, enjoyable. I could take my time to appreciate the details as well as things like the character development. Before you know it, it becomes engaging and gripping. Writing of this caliber is something more people should treat themselves to. An important part of a visual novel such as this are the choices that are presented to the reader. Immediately, you can tell that choices matter and they make sense. You won’t ever find something arbitrary as deciding to go left or right and that making the story change on its head. Your actions have very reasonable, realistic consequences, which is something I think more works in this genre could adapt. I’ll fill in more details later, but do yourself a favor and get the game. It really is well-done in every aspect and it’s one of the best stories I’ve had the pleasure to read.

I chose to play this for Pride Month, as it has queer characters and romances. I was pleased with it. Pros: - Bisexual male protagonist - Two (platonic) paths with the protagonist's brothers and romantic paths with two guys. One guy seems like he might be gay (but still ambiguous), while the other sounds like he's pansexual based on his description, mentioning that gender is not a factor when he wants to be with someone. - Romantic paths elicited romantic emotions. - Interesting story concept of time traveling. - Decent CG art. Cons: - Many plot holes, but since this is a time traveling story, that's expected. Even the best time traveling stories have plot holes, simply because time travel is impossible and there's no way to ensure there aren't any plot holes unless you keep the story ridiculously simple. - The standard, non-CG art was kind of bland and not particularly appealing. - Only one character (and his siblings) had darker skin, and that was only by a shade or two. That's called tokenism. - Only two romance paths; I would've liked a few more. Overall, I really enjoyed the VN though. It was nice to see cute, romantic, same-gender guy love.

I ... I can't say that I fully understand every minor detail of what's going on in this game, even after playing through the whole thing multiple times. Might be tiny plot holes, might be my own stupidity, but nevertheless I'm not bothered by it in any way. The story, the characters and the art style are brilliant. And while it might not be a romance focused game (although there's a lot of that too), it's definitely relationship and character developement focused. It's supported by a great story, but what ultimately got me hooked for hours were the relationships between the various characters. Every single character feels like a real person you can easily get attached to. My first playthrough took me around 6 hours, but it left me wanting to see everything the game has to offer. And yes, it got me to spend 4 hours trying to get Yuki's ending. Yes, I can see that by looking at the time of my achievements. 4 hours. I can only recommend this to everyone, and especially if you're into Visual Novels and / or relationship focused stories. Get it, seriously. It's so amazing.

=[ WHAT a let down! Annoying dialogue, a mediocre half-assed story and only two characters you can romance (who are by the way much less appealing than the main character's two brothers). What a waste of 20 dollars! This visual novel suffers from what a lot of Western and English-translated visual novels are prone to; that is, pseudo-Japanese style dialogue. I understand why things are kept relatively close to their translation for visual novels that are originally Japanese, but is there any reason to choose to incorporate the Japanese style of speaking in a completely Western game? It just looks dumb. Real dumb. It bothered me throughout the whole game. Also, there were soooo many instances where the main character found himself overhearing other characters speaking to themselves about conveniently crucial things. Nobody speaks to themselves out loud that much nor in such detail. It's so stupid! Those were my main issues with the dialogue in the game. The plot is a different story. Time travel as a plot device is extremely tricky, it has to be done just right or else the plot ends up being too convoluted to believe or follow. This was the case with Break Chance Memento. There was just too much going on for any of it to really matter; just one big ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. The only death that really mattered was the first, because it was such a shock and so unexpected. But once you realize you can circumvent any bad situation that arises, the rest of plot complications are just meh. The relationship with your brothers is pretty touching but you can't even romance either of them so who cares. The two non-brotherly routes were two missable characters with unappealing personalities and designs. I kind of wish the main character's brothers were like, step-brothers or something so you could actually romance them. I feel pretty jipped.

A game where the protagonist is Bi but romance isn't the focus of the story lol besides only 2 out of 4 character routes are romance routes where the other 2 are sibling routes. You can still get a normal end if you don't specifically pursue someone. Anyway the whole time travel gameplay is pretty unique and kind of like a hidden object game but an overly easy one at that. Some of the places to search were pretty pointless or simply red herrings where nothing shows up...ever. I liked the story but due to my paranoia of causing a butterfly effect on my first playthrough I only used time travel for things that are necessary and got the true bad ending XD Note: Feel free to mess around with the time machine

<3 This game was great! Very good story! A bit complicated though, which is nice. Though it feels there are small, super tiny plot holes. But barely visible, if you do not focus on them, are they invisible. But it was something that gnawed in my mind, not much since everything else was dazzeling. The story as whole was amazing, and well thougt anyway!! I really liked it, it was awesome and intressting! Its a bit tricky to get all the endings, but its still easy to solve too in the end. Also that there is a lot one can experience in it! To look around to find and see! A lot of scenes to get between Shuuki and the others, due to different requirements and mementos. That makes it replayable, though, the beginning gets a little bit tiring if you want a specific endig and fail, and then you have to go throug it again. Luckly there is a skip button, and it stops when a new scene occour, so you wont miss anything. The writing is easy to follow and do not use many difficult words, and it still manage to sound clever and pretty in the language, as it paints the situation in a simple, understandable way. But some sentences could have some rephrasing, but they are very, very few. And some things gets repeated, its not often, and does not stand that much in the way either. Since the overall text is, as mentioned, well written. The art is very pretty!!!! The shading is nice and smoot, and the lightning really highligts their details in a gorgeous way, like Shuukis hair. <3 And Shuuki is almost irritating pretty (in a good way), since my brain could almost not comprehend it, haha ,long wonderful hair <3 and I just stared at how pretty drawn he was. The colouring is beautiful everywhere! From the characters to their surrounding! The bakgrounds are also well drawn! I really like the style the artist have! The characters are deep in personality, and nice <3 I like all of them <3. And they speak in a natural way, not forced or anything. And they can say really funny things to one other. xD And act in different ways, yet very caring. Also following Shuuki's personal change is nice! The music is good, but I did not always pay attetion to it, it does not stuck in my mind or anything. It just nice for the moment. At times I listened, then it vanish from my thoughts, even if the music is still played in the game, it lost is grip. ( Can also be that I was mesmerized by Shuuki... haha. ) Best of all ( In my opinion ), its boy x boy!!!! I have not seen this sort of VN on steam before! I have only seen Girl x Girl, and wondered, is there some VN with BL here on steam? Well here is one! And its awesome! They do not show anything, except for kiss scenes. And the relationships goes in a good pace. And can be very cute. If that is not your suit, then you do not need to pursue anyone! ( But you wont get all the endings if you avoid it. ) 10/10, is my say in this. I do recommend this! For its story, art, and .. BL, heee. <3

It was really easy to obtain the incestuous gay brother route, but not a good ending with the other characters. Weird and frustrating.

Bizarrely written. Felt like the game couldn't decide whether it wanted to be Japanese or not. The writing is comparable to what one might find on a fanfiction website from 2009. I feel it might have been better if they just went with a western setting. HOWEVER! I am completely willing to acknowledge the serious effort that was put into this game. It must have taken a long time to make. I almost feel bad for wanting to critique it but I really want the devs to know where they can improve. Even with the bizarre style choices as well as the somewhat...clunky...menu, I cannot deny these devs are on to somethig and I wish them luck wholeheartedly with their next projects. This particular game just wasn't for me.

I ABSOLUTELY loved this game! Most visual novels cause you to feel like a bystander, but Break Chance Memento makes it seem like you have an active role. I actually started to emphathize and like nearly all of the characters. I enjoyed the music and atmosphere of Break Chance Memento as well. In my view, it is well worth the money and deserves more attention. Five stars from me! I look forward to more games by these developers.