A magnificent return to 御雲島, this did not disappoint!
The game’s released onto Steam providing much easier access for people outside of Japan. The game was also published and also translated into Chinese by Hikari Field.
Let’s get the good out of the way first, AMAZING graphics and music just like the last game.
The amount of CGs are incredible, so many things packed into one single experience. One of the scenes near the end had 3 CGs in the span of 30 lines or so.
Though stylistically it was a departure from Re:LieF. (See below: Left: Re:LieF, Right: TrymenT)
The game’s actually not R18, it’s much more story-focused. The game does not provide any type of indication of who’s speaking (The name only shows in the backlog), there aren’t even any text boxes or controls on the screen. The game plays through like a kinetic novel, no choices, one straight story.
As it was made clear in the official activity policy, Bishoujo games are on a downturn, in face they have been since many years, they therefore decided to make a true “visual novel”. It is an attempt to create a new possibility for the industry, many people who are used to playing the usual Bishoujo ADV could see this as a type of betrayal, but I would agree with them that this is definitely something that the industry desperately needs.
So I’m very happy to see this, but how good is the story, really?
The story picks up from right after the prologue of the previous game. Exploring a new “Mhlia route” that wasn’t present in the previous game.
A lot of the moments lose some punch due to the fact that I have played Re:LieF, but I really doubt anyone would understand certain settings of this universe if they had not played the previous game since a lot of events in the previous game are not given why they happened, but are explained why in this game without showing what the event that took place is. Paradoxical.
The chronology is not very well managed, it is very hard to follow the time jumps: you’re just in the summer of 2036 and 5 minutes later we’re talking in 2034, another five minutes later we’re in 2037. It takes quite a bit of thinking to put things into perspective.
The game also introduces a whole different storyline that takes place one year before the original storyline of Re:LieF, though there definitely are some connections between the two, the convergence of the two is yet to be shown. I like the approach, they must have some big balls to try and pull this off as it is already very confusing.
It is still a tremendous improvement from the last game, however, perhaps now a little well known for its bad scenario and plot. Mhlia route > Hinako route > Ai route > Momo route > Ruka route
In reality, many unexplained things in Re:LieF only started to make sense midway through TrymenT, this is definitely not their intention and shows how much the scenario has improved.
As only the first half of the experience, more questions are posed than the questions that are answered leftover from the previous game, we’ll really need to see -Omega- to get the rest answered.
That is not to say that there aren’t any moments that game me the “WOW DAMN” feeling, there are a couple.
The new characters are much better developed than the ones from Re:LieF, they’re all given much more complete background stories and distinct traits. I still do not understand why Ruka had to be a main character.
Looks like they were also trying to patch up holes from the previous game intentionally, they probably know they fucked up last time in that department.
That’s about all I feel like saying for the plot.
The game uses the Artemis engine of which I have honestly never heard before. Compared to last time’s janky-patchy KRKR, it’s much better this time around, the game uses parallax scrolling and scaling extensively, it’s essentially a scripted compositor.
Remember my ramblings about the origins of <<Traumend>> and 甘利紗陽 in the last review? Both names are re-purposed AGAIN for different things. For some reasons Ayame was referred to as Sayou by Kakeru when they meet in real life (how and when still unrevealed).
Looking forward to TrymenT -Omega-.
Lacrima 
nba
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