Roommates

I thoroughly enjoyed this quirky dating sim! I'll break down what I consider to be the pros and cons of the game (seriously though, the pros definitely outweigh the cons.) Pros: + Sometimes visual novels/dating sims suffer from an excess of boring, mononous text. Thankfully, this one does NOT! The writing is fun and engaging, and the scenes aren't unnecessarily long. + The characters are unique and pretty realistic, each with their positive and negative traits. I thought they all added flavor to the story. + Options for queer romance!!! <3 For my first playthrough, I played as Anne and romanced Isabella... the storyline was simultaneously adorable and sultry. + Playing on normal difficulty, the game felt well-balanced. The stats DO matter and you definitely have to think about how you plan your week. The choices make a huge difference too. However, I never felt completely overwhelmed. Basically, the game is not *that* hard, but it isn't a cakewalk, either. + The animation is very cute and the game is aesthetically-pleasing overall. + Replay value definitely is there, since there are two characters to play and four romance paths for each. Cons: - Sometimes that guitar theme song that plays in the background gets really annoying. I think it's a song that's too loud/overwhelming to be playing on loop during some of the scenes. - I would have liked more art. The only scenes you see drawn out are the two BIG romance scenes you earn (one during spring break and one at the end of the game). There are plenty of other romantic/funny scenes during the game that would have been amazing to actually see instead of just imagine. - I wish there were more queer romance options (No Anne x Sally!?!?! *pouts*) If you like dating sims, I encourage you to give this game a whirl! It is sure to entertain!

As a visual novel dating simulation with a $25.00 price tag, Roommates had high expectations to live up to when I started it. There are definitely a couple of things it does right: the diversity of the cast of characters (in terms of ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender) is well done. It's also nice to see a dating game where players have a choice between playing as a male or female protagonist (each of which can romance both male and female love interests). However, I found it to be severely lacking for the following reasons: - I only found two of the characters (Dominic and Isabella) worth pursuing. The others were either boring or downright unappealing to me (particularly Rakesh, who constantly seemed out to get the straight-laced protagonist in trouble). - The male protagonist is so outlandishly obnoxious that after playing as the female main character (during which you're able to romance him), I had absolutely no interest in playing as him. - The romances end with the characters going their separate ways. The only way to get a happy ending is to achieve a set of frustratingly hidden goals in addition to successfully wooing your character of choice. This was intriguingly realistic, but also severely disappointing. I found myself losing interest in it after completing only a couple of playthroughs and then struggling my way (via a guide) to one of the happy endings. The thought of going back to play it again fills me with a sense of exhausted boredom—which is exactly how you shouldn't feel when you're thinking about a good dating sim.

Ok so here goes nothing. I bought this game mostly for some fun and nothing serious, but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ this game is actually good. So where to start, When i first started playing it i wasent taking choices serious but after a while u realize that the choices actually matter. There is also alot of choices which makes it feel like its your journey . I got drawn into the story and really enjoyed it. Another plus is that there are some funny jokes here and there. Ive gotten every ending with both of the characters and i love all the endings. I just hope another game like Roommates comes out. I would say this game is a 9/10 if u like visual novels and dating sims.

Pros: + Funny/silly dialog + Rather clever story (like working in a murder mystery and a prisoner's dilemma) + Balancing immediate feedback with delayed results + Nice drawing, decend sound + Hetero- and homosexual pairings Cons: - Somewhat immature at times - All girls are huge breasted creatures - Some choices are unintuitive (You would never expect the ensuing dialog from the selection label) - Most choices are beyond obvious (Choose X if you want X to like you) - "Victory Conditions" and some gameplay dependencies are not particularly well explained. But overall I enjoyed my time with the game. I might even return to it one day and try to get some of the other pairings. If you decide to give the game a try keep these things in mind and you'll have an even better experience. They are not story spoilers, just gameplay clarifications that I would have appreciated. But in case you want to figure everything out yourself I've put them in spoiler tags anyway: [spoiler]Most activities give you bonus points when more than 75% rested. You can't romance more than one character per playthrough. Focus on them. To romance a character you need 100 romance points as well as the necessary stat points as described in game BEFORE spring break. To get a characters true ending, there's an additional criteria. You really have to focus to get that.[/spoiler]

Personally this game isn't for me; I didn't like the art style, the writing didn't keep me engaged and I found myself just wanting to get it over and done with. It just really seemed like the minimal amount of effort possible went into the story and I found myself cringing at how bad it was at times. This game also includes you picking what you do during the week regarding studying and extra-curricular acitivities to make sure you have the right skills for whoever you're wanting to romance, during the week events also happen which you can skip or take part in depending on whether it'll get the right person to like you more or not. Be warned though, there is [u]a lot[/u] of reading and as I didn't find it engaging it made the game have a very slow pace to it. Also if you're looking for a game featuring nudity this isn't for you, and when the naughtier scenes do start happening there is only ~2 risque images with nsfw text which does the whole fade to black/30 minutes later thing before anything really happens. This isn't a downside for myself but I bet it would be for others. [b]However there are some things I did like about it.[/b] [u][b]PROS:[/b][/u] - being able to play as female or male - being able to romance female or male - diversity of characters - diversity of sexual orientations (♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ pansexual is actually used!)

Pretty good, lighthearted VN. It has pretty cliche characters, but each one has a different side to them if you get to know them better. It's nothing mindblowing, you won't find a lot of earthshaking literature here but it's entertaining and stays entertaining. There's two playable characters, one male and one female with four romance paths each for a total of eight paths. Two of those paths are same-sex paths. The stat system and picking your schedule is very gamey and doesn't do much except artificially close off the "good" endings if you do it wrong. Basically you pick out a character you want to romance and only pick activities that are associated with the stats they apparently like. There's no consequences for never raising any of the other stats except the two you need. I guess you can care about grades too, but you can just study in the time blocks where your chosen stat activities aren't available. The so-called bad boy I played that wanted to drop out of college was a top student, while still getting the girl and finding time between the sexual tension to front a band. It's a neat little story, but like I said it's not going to be an intellectual roller-coaster and it's not meant to be. Roommates is a VN about light comedy, light romance and sweet character interaction. You won't find a lot of philosophy, but you'll find some nifty references, a few laughs and enough sweet/cute scenes to give you diabetes.

Roommates is a dating sim/visual novel where you play as either a guy or a girl who starts at college. Like other games in the genre you decide for each part of the day what you want to do, which increases or decreases certain statistics. A great feature in this game is that you can schedule the week planner ahead of time, rather than needing to decide each day (part) again what you want to do next. And you can also change this at any time. The daily routine is interrupted by events throughout the week, which mainly serve to advance the story and your relationship with the other characters. The writing is hilarious at points and Roommates has a good rock soundtrack. Some minor gripes I have are that there is very little animation other than characters sliding in and out, and that it isn't always clear what your chosen response will lead to. At times I picked what I thought was a flirting response only to have my character say something completely inappropriate, destroying their relationship with the character I was pursuing at the time. Very unique to the genre, Roommates has both girl chasing boy, boy chasing boy, and homosexual relationships included. Because of this there are multiple endings and many choices in this game really matter. Overall this is a highly impressive VN.

I got this game in a bundle with a few other similar games. I wouldn't have sought it out on its own and I'm glad I didn't pay anywhere near full price for it, because it wasn't a fun experience for me. None of the characters are very appealing, and some of them rely on weird, cartoony racial stereotypes that the game very clumsily attempts to lampshade without success. The art is pretty poor, which might have been ignorable if it had at least been consistently poor, but half of the cast looks like it was drawn by different artists because the style and quality vary so wildly. The LGB aspect of this game was particularly disappointing to me, as that's usually the type of content I look for in a dating sim. I first tried to play as the guy character to pursue the one bisexual male romance option (somehow the most unappealing character of the lot because they wrote him like he's some kind of wacky space alien), but the main character kept no-homoing himself at every turn. No matter what choices I made, he had to leer at the girls and act weird about the mere possibility of being interested in a guy. I tried playing as a girl to pursue the other bi character, which wasn't much more fun, but at least it seemed like more effort was put into that path, presumably because they were counting on straight men being the primary audience for the game. I managed not to land a good ending either time but I don't care enough about the game or its characters to ever bother trying again.

This game is a comedy visual novel. I say comedy, because the thing is filled with funny moments, and even the few serious moments are tinged with some snark. You can choose to play as Max, a rebellious sort that is in college to make a name for his band and break out into the world, or as Anne, a sheltered bookish girl looking to break out of her shell. Besides being able to pursue a romance with the other potential PC, there are four other potential partners. Domenic is exclusive to Anne, while Sally is only available to Max, while Rakeesh and Isabella are available to both. Truthfully, the relationships that feel the most likely are the pairings between Max and Anne, with Domenic-Anne and Sally-Max close behind. There is an interesting system in place to gather relationship points as well as money and grades (you are at college and your parents might want a return on their investment!).

Once again, I wish Steam used star ratings or something instead of "Do you recommend this, Y/N?" This is one of those I'd maybe give 3 stars out of 5, at best. I got it dirt cheap in a bundle and thought it was worthwhile as part of that. I wouldn't recommend it at full price. Both the CG artwork and sprites looked great. The characters and story were okay - not bad, but not great either. I should mention that I've haven't completed the full game: I've played all possible routes as Anne, but I only got through part of one route as Max before losing interest. More on that in a bit. Each playable character had different goals, although you could still get each route's "best" ending without fully completing those goals (at least with Anne). Unfortunately, gameplay included the thing I most hate seeing in visual novels: stat building. I always played at the easiest difficulty setting, so it wasn't too hard to build up the right stats once I figured out the basics, and the game was mostly very clear about the stats you needed to build up to achieve certain routes. I disliked that the stat requirements increased partway through the game, but this only caused problems during my first playthrough. That said, the stat building aspect was more annoying than fun, a chore I completed in order to do what I really wanted to do, which was get to know the characters and see their relationships unfold. The various routes you could play as Anne were okay. Not anything amazing, but not bad. The same basic school year events happened during each route, but sometimes you had to either skip or do a particular activity to have a better chance in a particular character's route. That helped make things a little more interesting. Playing as Anne, I liked Dominic's route best, although Rakesh's route was also nice and I was surprised at how much I ended up enjoying Isabella's. I'd gladly have traded Anne's Max route for one with Sally. I wasn't really a fan of Max, and I didn't think he and Anne worked well together as a couple. Max wasn't a bad guy, but it irked me that his goal of becoming a rockstar eclipsed everything else. [i]Some[/i] genuine interest in his college courses would have been nice. When I switched to playing as him, I quickly realized that his attitude meshed extremely badly with [i]Roommates[/i]'s gameplay. It was hard to believe that the Max I got to know when I played as Anne would carefully plan out his week so that it was packed with various courses, random on-campus jobs, and activities that didn't have anything to do with practicing with his band. I also much preferred Anne's shyness to Max's arrogance. I only got through part of an attempt at Sally's route before I lost interest and started playing other games. Pros: + Good sprite and CG art. + Most of the characters were fun to get to know. + The stat-building aspect was fairly easy to figure out. + It wasn't too frustrating to achieve the various endings, at least when playing with the easiest difficulty setting. + Several events that were at least a little entertaining the first time through, like the murder mystery party. + I felt that there was plenty of gameplay time, even after skipping out on Max's portion of the game. Cons: - The stat-building aspect. I want visual novels that ask me to make dialogue and action decisions and that's it. - Although I wasn't fond of Max's route when I played as Anne, I quickly realized I couldn't stand him enough to play as him, which meant that I ended up skipping half the game. - Considering how ridiculous and fluffy several of the events during the various routes were, the epilogues had a surprisingly realistic feel (meaning that the romantic routes didn't necessarily lead to "and things were happy and wonderful forever"). Unfortunately, I didn't actually [i]want[/i] realism. I was relatively okay with how things went during Anne and [spoiler]Isabella's[/spoiler] ending, but even [spoiler]Rakesh's[/spoiler] "best" ending with Anne disappointed me. - I disliked any of the music tracks that had vocals.