Haganai PSP

Boku WaTomodachi Ga Sukunai is a visual novel adaptation of the anime of the same name and was developed by Guyzware and published by Bandai.  I watched the anime beforehand so I could have a better understanding of the game but this is not necessary as the game is accessible to those who haven’t seen the anime.

(One of the many endings that you could find in this game and this is exactly what my ex-classmates are now today.)

The Neighbors Club is a group of social outcasts and misfits whose main goal is to make friends and teach each other proper social skills. The group takes a vacation on a private tropical resort owned by Kashiwazki family. The story focuses on the day to day lives of the members while on vacation. You play as Kodaka, the main character and leader of The Neighbours Club. The aim is to basically fall in love with any one of the members of the club and nobody else. 

(Yep this your typical slice of life ladies and gentlemen)

The control system was very easy to learn and the stickman like user interface was an interesting choice. You have up to 50 save slots in the game which is very useful for the amount of replay available. The overworld map is pretty easy to understand and you can change the location of the map to choose which character with whom you would like to interact.There is a feature called the neighbors system where all of the characters talk all at once. You have to choose which character you would like to interact with or abstain from interacting all together.

(And this is exactly what my classmates are doing now and i'm not even joking)

The dialogue is entirely in Japanese but beyond that, gameplay is typical of a visual novel with minimum interaction, and you choose which dialogue fits the situation. However, in some instances, there will be these sections where all the characters are talking all at once and you have to decide which character you would like to interact with. You can save anywhere at any time and there's a lot of save slots from which to choose.

(NOW I SEE DESTINY PUSHING ME AWAY!)

The biggest problem of the game I would say is that it could be sluggish at times due use of 3D elements. It is also really silly that they established what Kodaka looks like, yet they obscure his face. You have to play the game multiple times to reach certain endings and sometimes it's not clear what you have to do and this isn’t because of the Japanese language. Strangely, some of the characters have more endings than others.

(SONY SAVE US!! THEY HAVE NO ORGANS!!!-Blue checkmark)

The art style is ok like the anime. The live 2Dsystem that Guyzwear has worked on has been improved and now blinks and small movements have been added. The musical score was ok but too repetitive.The characters are the same as in the anime and the voice cast from the anime reprises their roles and are on point. There is a fair amount of replay value since there are multiple endings. You can play minigames as well but there’s a steep learning curve and it will take time to master each one of them. The game is very laggy and sluggish due to the 3D elements.

From time to time you receive tips after interacting with certain characters but sometimes these tips appear to be trivial and cryptic. The flowchart system isn’t that well refined, and it only uses the route you took in your previous playthrough and not the other ones. Another technical issue is that sometimes if you start the game and want to go on quick save, your quick saves simply disappear.

(Yep just another day in slice of life world)

There is one special bonus scenario that you could get once you do a data installation. You can look at the cg art and listen to soundtrack. Audio commentary from the cast was also included which makes things more interesting. Overall, the game is a good visual novel adaptation from a mediocre show.

It gets 3 out of 5 stars.

If you are a fan of this series, you’ll be quite interested in this import which is not too expensive.