Hanasaku Manimani – Review

I am so sorry for being lazy (lol). I know you guys wanted me to write a review for quite some time already, but I got distracted by Ken 8D

The video below is the ED song with CG (my own screenshots), take a look if you wanna check out the CG.

Ok first thing for this game, awesome system, but it’s a REALLY long game. Totally worth my moneh. The BGM, settings and design for the controls were really good, the best of any PSP game I’ve played so far. The opening and closing songs were also really good.

Second, the storyline was really good. The heroine is too courteous and lets people walk all over her but she has her harem to protect her from the bad guys so it’s fine. I waited damned long to play Kurama because I had to finish the other 4 characters first, but he opens up after playing any single character.

Third, the CGs pop up at good moments and made me ‘doki doki’. The art isn’t very fancy compared to stuff like Amnesia and blah, but I like this art style too, it fits the theme of the story really well.

Fourth (random point)  Ok. Tatsuyoshi = Sakyou? Shock. I didn’t check up on the CVs for Hanasaku so when I played Ken I was like “WHAAAATTTT”.

Fifth, the bits about what exercise to do to up your skills can be really confusing, really needed a guide.

Basic storyline: You got transported to old Edo after a colourful bird picked up your hairpin(mother’s momento). You arrive there lost and bewildered until this guy (Kurama) comes and saves you from anti-foreigner soldiers (old Edo, everyone wearing kimono and you? Sexy uniform showing your thighs) He brings you to the most famous and high-class house(for geishas etc) and leaves you in their care.

The head of the house is an old man Seijiro. The one under him is Wasuke Tani (red guy) and the boss of the place after Seijiro. A female-looking male-looking geisha-like guy is Haku (purple guy) The yellow guy Takara and the blue guy Tatsuyoshi are brothers, they are sons of Seijiro. Kurama the black guy is a merchant who does business with them. That’s all the characters you can play.

Your role is firstly helping Takara and Tatsuyoshi in the kitchen, but later you get promoted to being a Shinzou (like a beginner geisha) then later Furisode Shinzou (fledgling geisha) and finally depending on whoever routes you go on, you may become a full fledged Geisha.

They didn’t use the word geisha, but it’s the closest to explaining your role in the game. For the record, geishas are not prostitutes, but they do choose to give that service when they want to. This is the same as Kiyogiku and Haku in the game.

It’s really difficult to go on their individual routes without a guide, because whatever you up for your ‘geisha’ skills decides whose routes you are on. If you don’t mind wasting time, you can fiddle around, but I really don’t recommend that… It’s a pain and pretty annoying to be honest. (^_^ ;;;)

—————

Tani Wasuke

When you first meet him, he’s really unwilling to take you in even though it was the request of the merchant Kurama that his Geisha house works closely with. But since the top geisha Kiyogiku and Haku takes a liking to you somehow, he gives him. He’s the kind of reliable guy that overworks himself even when he’s sick (like Hijikata….) and has the charisma to make people follow him blindly lol. I didn’t really like him since it felt like he was just going with the flow when hanging out with the heroine rather than truly enjoying the time with her. Guys who are ‘there, but not there’ are not really my type. It’s not that he’s spacey, it’s just that his ambitions take up a big part of his heart, and it’s difficult to get close to him. His real identity…… play for yourself :p

 

Haku (Katsura Kogoro)

He’s the only onnagata of the geisha house, meaning a male who dresses up as a female and entertains female customers rather than male customers, and he’s so good at it no one can tell when he is the Rebel and when he is Haku (lol) the stupid heroine actually thought he was a woman. He’s the tsundere type who acts like he’s older despite being possessive and a year younger than the heroine. His disguises are good, being the Rebel he is and works closely with Wasuke.

 

Takara

Takara!!!!! He’s so cuteeeeee arghhhhhh. -Jyuuguchi dies drooling- When you were a teenager, you looked at those cool unapproachable guys who had some scar-in-their-past shit, but when you get past 20, you start noticing how cute some guys are, and that’s Takara. He’s the big bro of the three brothers, so he’s good at his work and looks after the other two, and is essentially the sunshine of the lot. He gets into accidents occasionally, especially when he gets embarrassed when he’s with the heroine, which causes him to get chewed out by Wasuke, whom he admires alot. When it’s revealed you’re Seishirou’s daughter, there’s the whole ‘ohmygawd im in love with my sister!’ thing but the writer of course makes us happy by giving us a very satisfactory ending. He also purposely dropped by a store to get hand cream for the heroine when she was still helping out in the kitchen, (omggg which guy does that. Let me glomp him nowwww) and also makes steamed buns for her often, and getting jealous when one of the Daijins (Bigshot customer) starts taking a liking to the heroine when she starts work as a fledgling. His jealousy is the quiet cute kind, and one day when they fall into the river, he just stares and stares at the heroine and when he finally kisses her, he gets shocked by himself. Also he’s a tennen, so one day during winter when everyone’s relaxing in the room, he puts his hands on your cheeks to warm himself and it pisses everyone off, so they kick him. Rofl. I can’t get enough of him.

 

Tatsuyoshi

The opposite of Takara: the quiet and rude guy who always disappears off to somewhere and doesn’t care about leaving his ork to everyone else. The heroine finds out he actually likes children and small animals, and begins to get close to him, but he’s always suspicious. I wouldn’t call him a yandere, because he did lock her up, but it was more kidnapping than love. He actually wants revenge against Seijiro, his adopted father. Tatsu’s father even though married, was in love with the legendary Oiran, the heroine’s mother and even wanted to divorce his wife just to marry her. But Seijiro and her were childhood friends and they loved each other, so Seijiro made her preggers, leaving Tatsu’s father to go crazy and burn down the entire Yoshiwara block. He was kinda 2D for a revenge character but it was still an interesting route because his story has important parts that linked to Takara and Kurama’s story.

 

Kurama Kaede

The final missing link. Woots! He’s the one who helped you right after you went to Edo, and brought you to the geisha house, and gave you sweets and kimonos and is really just there for you whenever you need him. But why? It’s always suspicious when a guy is so nice yet doesn’t make a move on you. You wonder whether he really likes you or keeping you as backup or has some other filthy motive. And Kurama’s motive is that he was a bird. A BIRD!? The bird who brought you from present world to Edo. And is actually a few hundred years old. And was actually in love with your mother. I$DF^@sdil#y^ye$@^,#%g&$%f*@!ghe#$

The more he uses his power to help the heroine, the more he gets sick and will eventually die. And the story goes that one day as a bird he got hurt and the heroine’s mother nursed him back to health, so when Tatsu’s dad burnt the building down, she had just given birth to the heroine not long and so she wished very hard that her daughter would be saved. Since Kaede was a god of the temple, he took the baby and despite his regret at leaving the mama behind, he flew to the present world and left the baby with an old man. But since the heroine went to pray at the temple everyday, wishing to see her parents, he heard the wish and brought her back to Edo when she was 16. His was a touching story, and in every other character’s route, he uses his power to save her. (In Takara’s, he disapeared, leaving only a feather ;__;) when Kaede finally comes to terms with his feelings that he loves the heroine and not the mother (despite being a perv that watched over her 16 years rofl) he does some pretty naughty things to her, and said it was payback for holding back too long. (I spilled my green tea when that scene came out on my psp)

 

An awesome game and storyline, a real must-play and don’t rush through it, its too good a game, so play slowly and enjoy 😀