Outside, the sun was beginning to set.
“What the hell? This game is beyond nightmare level. It’s like the devs don’t even want you to beat it!”
The words Game Over popped up on the television screen. I’d seen them so many times by now that I was getting sick of them. I kept getting bad ending after bad ending, over and over, on this utterly stupid otome game.
I knew it was nothing to be particularly proud of, but I was a squarely average gamer. Nothing amazing, but not complete garbage, either. I could clear just about anything you threw my way. So, of course, I’d figured something like this would be easy, especially if I pulled up a walkthrough. It wasn’t until hours in that I realized how screwed I was.
The game allowed you to skip the event scenes, but there was no way to bypass the adventures or battles—that was down to a manual completion every time. Most dating sims were easy to finish because you could just skim the text if you wanted. But not so here. The adventures and battles made the whole thing a huge time sink. Worst of all, the battles were absolutely awful. Garbage-tier, even.
I thumbed through the menu, reloaded, and found myself back on the battle map where I’d been hit with a dead end moments before.
The setting for this particular game was a fantasy world filled with magic and swordplay, but oddly enough, its lands floated in the sky. People relied on airships as their main method of transportation, and these came in all shapes and sizes. Some even had sails like the ships I knew in real life. As long as they’d been equipped with some kind of propulsion, their shape didn’t matter—they could still take to the skies and keep afloat.
The game’s battles consisted of airships blasting each other with their cannons, but they also had to be equipped with one more weapon before a sortie. I guess most people would call them mobile suits? In this game’s world, one of those mechs was called an Armor—a robot of about three to four meters in height that its pilot flew into the fray. The suits themselves were built to look pretty humanlike as well.
The male love interests each piloted their own suit. Honestly, I kinda liked that part. The issue was that said love interests were excruciatingly weak.
“Take this! My secret killing technique…” one of them cried. That was the crown prince, Julius Rapha Holfort. His cut-in image appeared on screen as he prepared to unleash his special attack.
Unfortunately, the enemy he was targeting countered the maneuver, defending themselves and annihilating the last of Julius’s hit points in the process.
“No, Prince Julius!” cried his allies on the battlefield.
The television screen faded to black, and I was greeted by those same loathsome words: Game Over.
My hands trembled, and I chucked the controller at my bed. The only reason I didn’t slam it to the floor was because I didn’t actually want to destroy my own belongings for this crap.
“What a load of bull! Stupid prince keeps biting the dust no matter what I do! I mean, c’mon. What’s with this battle formation to begin with, huh? How am I always surrounded? And how come my stupid units can’t hang in there until backup arrives?! There’s no freakin’ way to beat this stupid battle!”
I snatched up my phone and scoured the internet for tips on getting through this stage, but what I found was a serious lack of info on the battle mechanics—and that was on top of RNG playing a huge role in combat. The author of the article I clicked advised that, “If you want to win, just pray you get lucky.”
This game was such crap. I finally understood the review bombs.
I clung to the smidgen of rationality that remained amid my immense anger and racked my brain. How was I gonna clear this game?
“I don’t wanna spend days on this thing.” Especially since it was a game I didn’t actually want to play. This was a waste. I had half a mind to toss it aside and forget the whole thing—but I really, really needed my sister to clear up the misunderstanding with my parents.
As if on cue, a message from her arrived. “I’m having so much fun overseas!” it read. “If you’re good and manage a full clear of my game, I’ll buy you some souvenirs.”
“You scumbag.”
The photo she had attached was of the beach; in the background, the ocean reflected the sun, while she and her friends stood in the foreground, clad in their swimsuits. Seeing my sister in swimwear did nothing but annoy me even further.
“You’ve got some nerve dumping this stupid game on me while you run off to enjoy yourself!”
Fury coursed through me as I hurriedly typed out a similarly cutting message, only to receive a belated response: “You sure you want to take that attitude with me? Maybe when I come back, I won’t sort out that whole misunderstanding with Mom. Up to you.”
“Grrr!” I snarled.
Another message came in: “Good luck, Big Bro.”
As much as it vexed me, she had the upper hand. After further consideration, I left the game idle while I glanced through the DLC store.
“I’ve got a real job. My wallet can handle this. At least it’s nowhere near as exploitative as a gacha game. Won’t even put a dent in my budget if I buy a couple of—hmm?”
My eyes stopped on what I assumed was a typo. The store page had a selection of battleships for purchase, but this particular vessel was described as a “spaceship.” The design was definitely evocative of just such a thing, but still…
“C’mon, you can’t have a spaceship in a fantasy world. Let’s see. What’s this thing called…? Luxion, huh?”
It was the most expensive ship in the store, perhaps because it was the most powerful—being, you know, a spaceship. I added Luxion and one other item to my cart, paid for them, and then started the download.
“Much as it pains me to fork up 2,000 yen for my sister’s stupid game, at least this’ll get me through it quicker.”
Having solved my battle troubles by resorting to microtransactions, I focused on surviving the adventures—and the romance.