ToHeart 2 X-Rated Review: A Little Rain, A Lot of Sunshine

A Personal Aside...

    My first foray into Aquaplus was, as I expect many Americans' to have been, Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception on the PSP in the mid-'00s. It left just the worst taste in my mouth, especially as I was looking for an SRPG, and was met with more visual novel with SRPG systems in play. Good lord, and the tutorials? You go 40 hours in and it's still introducing systems to you.

    It wouldn't be until 2011 with Aquapazza that I'd dip my feet back into the company, having all the context of both, "I like airdashers" and "I like Examu" to carry my interest. It also did not go well; the game felt too rigid, coming from Persona 4 Arena, BlazBlue, and Arcana Heart. Next was Dungeon Travelers 2, a game I really only feel like was tangentially related as "the sequel to a spin-off game that featured characters from some game you've never played," but I'm easy to please when it comes to dungeon crawling. I had finally found my first (very loosely related) Aquaplus game I liked.

    So White Album's remaster on Steam was released, and I pulled the trigger because I was very familiar with the song (my Spotify is a mess). Met with the an Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam, but a slew of negative reviews calling White Album "perfectly average" online, I really wasn't expecting a lot out of it. I'll get more into it as I do intend to write up its own review, but the best thing it did was get me in the mood to read White Album 2.

    My reading of White Album 2 was also with all the accompanying media proposed on the Fuwanovel walkthrough site, something I'd affectionately begin to refer to as the White Album 2 Cinematic Universe. It was astounding, resonated with me on several levels being an old person with a lot of regrets, seeking comfort in all the wrong places.

    So after my WA2 mourning period, I started The Shell Volume 1, and just wasn't into it. I needed more sappy shit. I needed...another dating sim. Very few people can admit to not liking White Album 2, and just as much, people can admit to not liking ToHeart 2, so...

ToHeart 2 X-Rated

Introduction

    ToHeart 2 is a dating sim developed by Leaf and published by Aquaplus in 2004. Just like White Album 2, there's a Cinematic Universe with light novels, drama CDs, mangas, and OVAs, but unlike White Album 2, it's not translated yet. ToHeart 2 also received an X-Rated patch that adds, well, additional parts to each route, as well as some additional routes altogether. 

    I'll be dropping the X-Rated portion of the tag, because I feel ridiculous putting that, but I played the most recent unofficial translation by Ittaku Subs, following the Fuwanovel walkthrough. You don't really need the walkthrough past a certain point, as playing it once will introduce you to almost the entire cast, and from there, you just follow whoever you want around on the map until she loves you.

    You play as Takaaki Kouno, first-year boy with an "uncomfortability around women." I think it just comes with that age. There are nine routes (with, technically, ten romantic interests), plus a bad route, and a lot of them follow some pretty safe tropes: innocent childhood friend, ojou-sama type, quiet bookworm, loud tomboy, etc. The route typically plays out with an initial conflict, clearing that up, and then comes up with a new conflict where Takaaki finds himself romantically intertwined with the other through the resolution. More on the individual scenarios later.

My Review

Non-Spoiler Thoughts 

    I bring up the personal aside initially because I was blaming why I wasn't as invested in this game on that I had just come from White Album 2, but after playing all the routes, I can comfortably say that this game shouldn't be passed on because it has a ton of charm. The heroines are true to their tropes where they need to be, but are prone to deviate in ways that add to their character without feeling out-of-place. Written as tropes, but they evolve into their own person as the game goes on.

    The main character will drive you nuts with some of his predilections against women, but he doesn't ever feel misogynistic. However, his "uncomfortability around women" tends to exist solely to drive the plot in circles, and when he finally gets his shit together, he typically resolves the conflict by showing any sort of resolve. Depending on the route and its length, this doesn't feel terrible, usually, but there was one route specifically where it felt just exhausting. He does have these nighttime musings, and they're...honestly some of my favorite parts in the game. Just thinking about the world and all that's in it, or craving various types of noodles.

    I had a thought about five routes in that this game is so bizarre in that my favorite character had one of my least favorite routes, and my favorite route came from a character I'd say is...maybe top 3? Not many other games have that sort of deviation for me (Aokana, for instance, my favorite route was my favorite girl, too, and my second favorite route was...my second favorite girl). ToHeart 2 feels like the characters interact with each other ways that don't betray their own emotions they contend with during their own routes. One character, for instance, knows she's in love with Takaaki, and in other routes, has her own "give him away" scene.

    Ultimately, of the full count of routes, I'd say there were 6 routes well worth reading (3 that were outstanding), 1 I didn't care for, and 2 that just fell flat (I admit, one falling flat was because the translation felt off the entire time). I found myself caring for almost every character, though, and it was a joy to see other girls pop up not in their route. Manaka would show up to hit me with "hey, remember to be responsible!" and I was always pleasantly surprised by her inclusion. The first route took me about 12 hours to get through (the common route is integrated into each account to varying degrees), while each other route typically took 4-6 hours.

    The other core elements around the game like its visuals, soundtrack, and additional sound effects, are all well done. The OST is a little skimpy, but I didn't find myself wishing for something else. It's unintrusive, with the additional sound effects (particularly in Ma-ryan's case) are well-placed and just campy enough.

Semi-Spoiler Thoughts

    The game itself opens itself up sort of as "core routes," "semi-core routes," and "zany routes." Core routes are pretty apparent while you're playing it: Konomi, your "little sister," and Tamaki, your "older sister," you interact with them regardless of which route you're in throughout the game. "Semi-core" consists of girls tangentially related, such as classmates or people you get caught up with in their clubs or student body (Manaka, you assist with her club, while Yuma is a classmate you accidentally make late by having her crash into the school gate swerving to avoid you). The "zany routes" are...well, zany. Without getting too into it, sometimes you just have to explore paranormal phenomena in your mid-'00s dating sims, and ToHeart 2 is no exception.

    Normally, I'm not huge into zany routes, but I think that all three categories have some really stand-out writing. Yuki, part of the zany bunch, is not only one of my favorite routes in the game, but it's one of my favorite routes to talk about, because the sheer amount of it you're just not expecting. Was I wine-drunk? Probably. Did I cry a lot? Absolutely. That extends to all of the sections, too. Yuma's route was so cute, with her staying true to her competitive nature in the very end in all the right ways, and Tamaki? Get outta' here. I love Tamaki.

    Ultimately, though, the further you get away from the core routes, the less the rest of the game really seems to matter, and I don't like that. In my least favorite route, so little of the rest of the cast and plot matter that it might as well be in an entirely separate game (it's also just so long). Likewise, in Yuki's route, I don't think you actually meaningfully interact with anyone else besides her for the bulk of it, and that's perfectly alright. It makes sense within the context, and it's also much shorter in comparison.

    As mentioned, there was a route that absolutely suffers from some translation errors, to the point where I honestly lost the plot (I'll get into it later). Aside from that, the translation was at least serviceable for the rest (with it on average being perfectly readable). It does, sometimes, take on a certain dialectic flair, with the words "arse" and "cunt," which caused a bit of whiplash.

    As far as the sex scenes, I'm not one to skip sex scenes typically because you can write some extremely fleshed-out sex scenes that progress the character. Otori Kanae, from Fullmetal Daemon Muramasa, had me bawling while laughing during hers, as she tried to keep this facade of a personality together, grappled with the circumstances she found herself in, and lost herself to the thralls of womanhood. ToHeart 2 is...not Fullmetal Daemon Muramasa, and I can't honestly think of much this game's sex scenes add. Feel free to skip them at your leisure.

Full Spoiler Thoughts

    Individual reviews follow. If I had to summarize my experience with each route, it'd be thusly:

• Konomi's route was a very sweet story about coming into your own emotions, and understanding that the way forward is sometimes using your own strength and willpower. Excellent route.
• Tamaki's route explains so much about the game, and Takaaki's own canon event. Tamaki herself shows so much strength throughout the rest of the game, so it's so refreshing to see her go to pieces here.
• Manaka's route is the one I was talking about with the weird translation problems. It's great until the last 10%, then there's a part that's like, "this will take place 3 days from now," but it's actually 3 hours from now, and you both decide, "hm, instead of checking in on them, why don't we just go home?" I'll touch on it during the section. I love Manaka, though.
• Yuma's route starts with you and her becoming rivals because you keep accidentally ruining each other's lives, but you then find out that you're the only person she's like that with. I love Yuma, and her route is pretty good.
• Karin's route...I describe her route less of two people going through their lives, more of two characters playing through a plot. There's a lot here that the reader just has to accept at face value. It's one of my least favorites.
• Yuki's route, as I touched on earlier, is just so great. It's like Sparknotes SeaBed. You really don't know what's happening until the very end, and it ends flawlessly.
• Lucy's route is probably my least favorite Aquaplus thing I've ever read. It's so long, so little matters, she's so one-note, no one grows, you read the same stagnation for like 6 hours before anything happens, and what does happen is just...so eyerollingly vapid. Honestly, you'd be doing yourself a favor by just reading a summary of it.
• The twins' route can be hit-or-miss, depending on your penchant for enjoying fluffy fantasy. It reminds me of a Yuzusoft game, where the stakes never get particularly high, but one character is just absolutely going nuts. I found that I liked Ruri a little more than Sango by the end, but my wife, who had to listen from the other room, almost dropkicked my Steam Deck out the window after several lines from her.
• Sasara's route starts out pretty rough. I almost DNF'd it (especially after Lucy's route) because the first half is just so unbelievable, I couldn't figure out if it was personal taste or a problem with translation. The second half bangs, though, and proves itself a slower burn than a lot of the game.

    I normally play visual novels with a suggested read order, but there wasn't really one provided. If I had to say, mine would be something like: Konomi > Tamaki > Manaka (rip) > Yuma > Sasara > Yuki > Twins > Karin >  Lucy/DNF. That should ensure you have context for small events that take place in other routes, and ultimately, towards the end, well, you've...read everything you really need to if you do want to DNF a route or two.

Yuzuhara Konomi

     Konomi and Takaaki grew up next door to each other, and maintain a healthy relationship as childhood friends. Being separated by grade levels and schools, they wake up to walk partway to school together every day, and after her school lets out, she meets up with him to walk home. It causes confusion between his schoolmates about if she's his girlfriend or little sister. It also causes her to get teased by her close friends, and they snoop about your love life about if you like pigtails or long hair, or small boobs or large. Stuff like that. You know.

    When Tamaki shows up, Konomi and her hit it off like a pair of sisters, but it also pulls her into a situation where she starts to realize that it's no longer just Konomi and Takaaki. She begins to put more moves out there, such as sleeping over and in his same bed, trying to seduce him with curry (it'd work for me), and (have her mom) make his lunches. The entire time, Takaaki eventually realizes, "oh, hey, Konomi is a g-g-g-g-...a GIRL!!!" and starts to lose his mind.

I, too, wish to pat the cat tummy.

    Takaaki, as expected, closes himself off from Konomi, who partly is like, "yeah, I mean, I like him," but also, "why would me changing ever so slightly have any impact on our relationship at all?" And I'm sure in some other more well-adjusted visual novel, it really wouldn't, but Takaaki begins to not be able to look at her, avoid her after school, leave extra early, and eat elsewhere. Real pathetic type behavior. This hurts Konomi, who in turn gets Tamaki and Yuuji upset at Takaaki, and leads to Takaaki isolating himself.

    It takes intervening from his friends for Takaaki to understand that time and their emotions are changing, and that if he's going to try to stay in his own world, merely pretending there isn't an issue is going to result in everyone getting hurt.

    In the end, you can accept Konomi's affections and date her, or remain as a friend. The cast reacts kindly to either one, and Takaaki realizes if he accepts her feelings that she hasn't changed away from the same girl he's always known. It's a cute realization that doesn't ever come up in any other routes.

    Both of them are worth reading for their unique explorations of events you'll see a bunch of times in your other playthroughs. Konomi's a great character who sees most of her growth through the eyes of Takaaki; he sees her actions and begins to understand that she's changing, and his actions prompt her to realize what matters more to her. It's a cute back-and-forth, and it reads (this is gonna sound weird since I did bash Aquaplus in the intro) great, like two organic people just stumbling through their emotions, in a way that only Aquaplus can really provide.

Kosaka Tamaki

Moments before Disaster

    Sorry ahead of time: Tamaki and Takaaki are both very similar in names. Tamaki is the girl, Takaaki is the boy. An easy way to remember this is that TaMaki has an M which is short for Male, but she's not a male. She's a female. I hope this helps.

    Tamaki is touted as a bit of a hellion from the get-go. Her brother, Yuuji, is Takaaki's best friend (of sorts), and the four of them (together with Tamaki and Konomi) were sort of the Gang back in the day, with Tamaki at the helm. She, sometime during her childhood, gets sent to an all-girl's boarding school, and news of her imminent arrival begins to circulate for the upcoming semester, as she's transferring to something more local.

    That "something more local," of course, is Takaaki's school. She strikes like a meteor, and begins to act as his older sister again (albeit, a very violent older sister, evidently capable of squeezing your head like a vice with a single hand), and acts almost maternally to Konomi. As he reacquaints himself with her, emotions begin to resurface, and memories once lost and misunderstood begin to resurface.

     So, with no real explanation, Tamaki comes back to her hometown. With her, she brought some groupies from her old school that try to get between the two, with bullying and whatnot, until finally she says that she came back because she loves him. At this point, there isn't exactly a romantic inkling towards her in Takaaki, but he goes along with it. The girls force them to enact on their love in the most visual novel way possible: go on a date with each other that will prove their love.

    It doesn't go well because they planned it out against him, with him not being able to pay for everything, closed attractions, etc., and the groupies don't give up pursuit. Eventually, after the groupies give chase, Tamaki winds up exhausted, and you carry her home. You set her down in her room, and she's acting like everything's fine, so Takaaki leaves her place, before realizing that there's no way that she'd not walk you to the doorstep, so he goes back and finds her sick. And also kind of horny.

Shown here: me looking at my wife's leftovers when she leaves for work.

    So it comes out that the reason she came back is because, once upon a time, she confessed her love to Takaaki, and he said (rather noncommittally) that he loved her, too. Knowing that she was being shipped to boarding school, she promised that she'd come back to find him and they'd live happily ever after. This promise is, also, subconsciously why Takaaki sucks shit with women; every time he turns towards another woman, he's turning away from his true love, Tamaki.

    After the confession, they defeat the groupies with the power of love, and then with her telling him that the only way forward for them is to force him to go to the all-girls boarding school's neighboring college, that only allows men in on a nearly-never basis, with an announcement that they'll be living together for now on, and she's going to take care of him so he can focus on studying. It's a very Tamaki ending.

    Canon event aside, this is one of my favorite routes in the game, for reasons I mentioned above. She shows weakness and runs out of strength at a certain point, and shows that she can rely on you. I can't really say that she "grows" during the route because she's like a fireball that explodes onto the scene and just EXISTS in her final form, causing everything else to move and bend around her. Tamaki's always a bit of a catalyst for Takaaki, but in her route, she's absolutely there in fine form. Cool character. Cool route. She's also like, top 2 in Aquapazza.

Komaki Manaka

     Bear with me here, because again, this route starts great and just flies off the translation rails. Manaka's the vice class representative for the student body before the class representative, proper, gets injured and taken out of duties, and it all lands on her. Takaaki begins assisting with her duties, until she tells him about her secret agenda: to save some post-war era books in the archives of the library from destruction.

I would kill for this smug ass gremlin face.

    While they both begin to work on implementation of a barcode system to save them, Manaka realizes that she sucks at men just like Takaaki sucks at women, and the two should work together to overcome their fear of the opposite gender (it should be mentioned that the canon event never extends outside Tamaki's route). It begins with walking home, holding hands, and as it escalates, Takaaki finds himself misunderstanding if these feelings are real or just them playing pretend.

    So what comes next is where it gets sort of weird. Manaka discloses to him that there's someone else in her life--a little sister, Ikuno, with an autoimmune illness that's robbed her of her sight (among other things). Manaka's entire school life revolves around making her seem like the best version of herself for her little sister, who sees through Manaka's facade. Her illness has made her extremely cynical, and she pushes a lot of it on Takaaki, as her sister's suitor who (I think) she doesn't like because he's so unreliable that he seems like he's just playing the same mindgames as Manaka.

    Around the same time, news is delivered that Manaka's project has been upended, and in place, they'll be removing the books for modern forms of media like movies and CDs. In order to defend her project, she tries to find a valuable book to represent the value of the entire collection. She, with his help, finds a book to do so. Put a pin in this.

    Well, regardless of how Ikuno feels towards Takaaki, she then begins to prepare to undergo a risky surgery that restores her eyesight, and in the Most Visual Novel Thing In This Visual Novel To Happen, Manaka asks Ikuno if she wants to see anything when she comes out of surgery in three hours. Ikuno replies that she wants to see the cherry blossoms, and Manaka agrees. She then freaks out because the cherry blossoms...don't blossom for another month.

    So they run about, trying to find some cherry blossoms, and stumble on a branch with what looks like a white cherry blossom. Manaka and Takaaki take that to the hospital, before she has a bit of a breakdown and goes home. Ikuno is still recovering, so he leaves as well.

    The following day, Manaka begins to prowl again for cherry blossoms, with you in tow (against her wishes), and after another breakdown, he realizes that a girl as helpful as she is must actually have the adoration of her classmates, and it turns out that all of them have pink(ish) ribbons, so he go to each person she may have helped to have them cut off a small portion of their ribbon, to act as "pink cherry blossoms." When Ikuno wakes up, she awakens to it raining blossoms outside her window with Manaka confessing they're not actually, because they're out of season. Ikuno turns, sees the white cherry blossom, and divulges that it is an actual cherry blossom (it's just from up north), and she loves it.

 

Shown here: me after I eat my wife's leftovers when she leaves for work.

    This concludes the Most Visual Novel Thing In This Visual Novel To Happen.

    So, Ikuno wrapped up, Manaka and Takaaki realize that it IS love, and they begin seeing each other. Remember the pin you put in it? Well, that's about all there really is. There's a bit about how the collection may be "classified" by a nearby university, but the ending CG is of an old book with a barcode on it. If it doesn't make a ton of sense to you, I had to do a lot of mental gymnastics to summarize the plot.

    Like, for instance, in one scene, Ikuno tells Manaka that the surgery will be in 3 days, the day of the surgery, and Manaka reacts much like the surgery is in 3 hours (I'm starting to suspect...). Another confusing plot point is the resolution of her barcoding project, as it doesn't feel like she actually saves anything and, instead, has it all ripped from her grasp, but...she seems alright with it?

    The route is really a shame, because Manaka is absolutely my favorite character in the game. In routes she isn't the star of, she shows up to give you either timely advice, or acts as comic relief to what you're doing. She catches you stealing magnets from the blackboard and chastises you, but you tell her, "electromagnetic therapy! My back hurts, you know, I'm at that age." You leave and she's like, "we're...the same age?" She's probably the third most connected heroine in the game, so you see her a lot, and it was always a small victory when she showed up.

Tonami Yuma

 

    The school announces that they'll be observing a week where they crack down on tardiness and truancy by having stricter time limits on arriving at school. If the gate closes and you're not inside, you'll be stuck walking home and explaining it to your parents (I guess? If this happened to me in high school, I'd simply not go home). Takaaki wakes up late and sprints to school, stopping just inside the gate, where a bicyclist swerves to avoid him, crashing, and not making it into the gate before it closes.

    This begets the rivalry between Yuma and Takaaki. From here, it simply just gets worse, mostly by a series of incidences: getting sprayed with water during gym, being blamed for throwing a mop on a roof, beating her in exams, etc. This yields to romantic interest developing, with a few dates, and you eventually wind up with stuffed animals that look like yourselves.

    It isn't long until a black car begins making an appearance at school, and after some run-ins with her about it, it appears that an elderly butler gentleman is looking out for her.

    As you get closer, you find out that he's her grandfather, and he's coming to get her to pursue the family tradition of acting as "Daniel," the personal servant to one of the most powerful families in Japan (the Kurusugawa family, mentioned in the twins' route and also a reference to the first ToHeart). She, as a child, wanted nothing more to do so, but as she got older, she realized that it was no longer her goal. Yuma goes through some emotional turmoil about it.

    Part of the turmoil is that she has been putting on a separate persona from how she normally acts, trying to have a normal high school experience before she is carted off to her fate, and you were pivotal to it. Normally quiet, standoffish, and cold, she's become loud and boisterous, reliant on your banter to continue that existence. Takaaki tells her to think about it, not every child has such a fantastic opportunity, and it sets Yuma off.

Yuma actually torture-racks Manaka in this scene. It ends with her passing the fuck out. Like me after I come back to finish off my wife's leftovers.

    Takaaki seeks the advice of Daniel, and they discuss that Daniel understands the change of heart. Yuma finds out about their clandestine meeting, to which Daniel defends Takaaki, saying it was Daniel who did it. For his transgression, he imparts upon them a legend told across several generations about how when two lovers confess to each other in a certain venue in town (a newly built twin-set of skyscrapers, with a connecting bridge), it's supposed to bind them together by fate. Yuma is still upset.

    Her initial personality comes back as she begins to come to school with glasses, and after investigation into the matter, Takaaki realizes that she's changed back, and she no longer wishes to interact with Takaaki in the same manner, as she's tried to "accept her fate." Bothered by her sudden change, Takaaki questions her, and she runs away, to the bridge. He pursues her, not knowing her intentions initially, until he sees the skyscrapers. He goes up on, running to the still under-construction connecting bridge, and he sees her on it, separated by a glass pane that's to be removed during the opening ceremony. Unable to touch her, and incredibly awkward, she pulls out her stuffed animal, and you pull out yours, and they kiss.

    She returns to the ground level and returns with Daniel, having found a seeming new appreciation for the role to be bequeathed, but her heart wavers. More turmoil happens, she disappears from everyone, Daniel and you give chase, and you find yourself (albeit like an hour later) back in that skyscraper, again, choosing the wrong side, and instead of the stuffed animals, you break the glass with a nearby fire extinguisher, and pull her through. You share a kiss, and return to Daniel, where she turns down the position for a final time.

I secretly think Aquaplus only knows how to draw two type of guys: old guys and whatever Hakuowlo counts as. 

    Daniel understands, as that skyscraper is in the same lot in town where his own child (Yuma's mother, except instead of a skyscraper, it was a radio tower) turned him down, and where he, too, tried to turn his position down (except instead of a radio tower, it was a...brothel). He vows to not hold it against her, and Takaaki and her begin their romance in full bloom.

     A lot happens in this route, and it really nails the struggle of generational expectations. Yuma is a fantastic character who brings a lot of comedy, and when she's at her lowest, you feel it in your gut. I thought she was a little too boisterous for my liking in the beginning but she quickly grew on me as time went on in other routes, so getting to play her route was cathartic. What was going on with her? Why was she so loud? What are these hints being dropped? The romance is a bit campy, but you're playing a goddamn dating sim from Aquaplus. C'mon.

Sasamori Karin

Stealing your credit card information.

    She enters your life by tricking you into signing up for her school club, and you, as the player, have to consciously make the decision to join the club. It turns out to be a "Mystery club," that explores...mysteries, like UFOs, aliens, and the supernatural. Karin herself is a bit of an oddball with a penchant for stealing your egg sandwiches. The route actually comes to a standstill if  you don't choose to continue to get egg sandwiches.

    So you go about your days in this club, and Karin shows...rather rampant interest in Takaaki. At one point, she hypnotizes him, and asks entirely about what sort of girl he likes, and if he likes her. He wakes up and acts like it never happened, that he was in control the entire time of the answers, but she doesn't buy it. Another day, he walks in on her building what looks like a bomb, but is actually a UFO detector.

    One day, the mystery they face is what's on the other side of the hill behind the school. They pack a lunch and set out, only to get lost in the woods, until they stumble onto a fire path, or a cleared path between two sets of the forest to slow the progress of a forest fire. Following it leads them back to town, where they depart after their grand adventure comes to a close.

    A few days later, she suckers him into trying to use alchemy to produce the Philosopher's Stone, in a book she found elsewhere, and accidentally instead creates chlorine gas. They escape after opening the windows, and go home for the weekend, and Karin forcibly takes him on a date where they hit up an arcade, have pictures taken in a booth, and she says that she's packing it in. This is vague for Takaaki.

Gonna say it: this scene takes place in April. Long sleeves in April? What sort of tundra do these people live in?

    They return to school to find out that the classroom somehow exploded, and Karin is being blamed for it, leading to the disbanding of the club and further discipline. Going to her rescue, Takaaki realizes that it wasn't the experiment, but something dropped outside on the porch of that room that caught fire, and after further investigation, finds out that it's a piece of twig that was being incinerated with school refuse, dropped by a bird.

    This, following video game logic, then leads him to realize that the bird is also carrying that same fiery piece back to its nest, and that there's a forest fire. Karin and him run to the fire path and see that the other side of it is on fire, but the fire path has fallen to disuse, so it's up to them to clear it and save the town. After their efforts, they do manage to slow the fire enough for the fire brigade to arrive and take care of the rest. They're brought back to school where they can shower and have a rest (they bang in the showers), and they live the rest of their school lives as President and minion.

    Karin's route isn't bad, but I find her a little grating, and there isn't ever a moment where something is pointed out and it doesn't come back up. It's like the most literal use of Chekhov's Gun in the game, and I recognize it may not seem like it, but every detail that comes back up is just so obtusely pointed out, it might as well have been delivered via 2x4. I think your mileage may vary depending on how well you like Karin, as well.

Kusakabe Yuki

 

    Prepare yourself because we're going places. Have you ever heard of SeaBed? It is one of my favorite visual novels ever, and it's about a girl, Sachiko, and her girlfriend, Takako, on vacation, when Sachiko wakes up some indeterminate amount of time later back in her home, and Takako's nowhere to be seen. She runs into her friend, Narasaki, and asks if she's seen Takako, and Narasaki replies, "she's been gone for...some time now." The chapter ends there, and the perspective switches to Takako, now in a sterile white, hospital-seeming room.

    That air of mystery was astounding. This route had the same air.

    About halfway through the common route, you forget your homework at school and are given the opportunity to go to school to find it. The front is locked, and while scouring for a way in, you're distracted by a girl in a field singing. When Takaaki approaches her, she says it's wonderful to see him again, but he has no recollection of her. They spend time together anyway, because of the intrigue of it all, but almost fleetingly, she disappears without a trace.

    The encounter sticks with Takaaki, who continues to visit the school at night to find her. She does show up, and just as previous, she also has a penchant to disappear. They discuss fated encounters, and how she's waiting to view the upcoming meteor shower. Eventually, their relationship progresses and Takaaki invites her out to the aquarium for a weekend date.

    Upon meeting up, on the way, they stop at an intersection with no cars, but a red No Crossing light. He steps out, but she stops him, chiding him for being "the type to not follow basic rules," and they share a laugh. They enjoy their time at the aquarium, but just as it's been in the past, Yuki disappears towards the end of their date with no trace.

There's a song she sings here. It's no White Album or Todokanai Koi, but still pretty good.

     Finally, the date of the meteor shower comes, and after sharing in the sights, she tells him that she's never going to see him again. She disappears after a final embrace and he, distraught, runs through town looking for her. Without noticing, he steps into a street (with a No Crossing light, nonetheless) and a truck comes careening towards him. Yuki appears behind him and tells him that he has to live in this universe, as he died in hers, and to save him, she came back. She pushes him out of the street, where he's knocked unconscious.

     He wakes up to her looking at him in the hospital but as he comes to, he realizes that it's actually Konomi. Takaaki received a concussion from landing on his head during the accident, but he asks about the girl who was at the scene. The driver said there was no one else there, just him.

    Days later, Takaaki returns to school, where he sees Yuki. He runs up to her, remembering everything that's happened, and it mirrors their initial meeting, except he suddenly remembers everything about her--she was a child who he'd play tag with in grade school, even when it was raining, as no one else wanted to play with her since she was moving away. They've always been chasing each other, even now. In the alternate timeline, he dies in the same way, and she chases him to this timeline to rescue him, so they can finally meet up when the two timelines converge.

    Anyway I'm gay for storylines like this. This was, like, a route where I went in with zero expectation, played it in about 2 hours, and it floored me. Just stopped reading for the night. Pet my cat. Cried a lot (I cry a lot anyway). ToHeart 2's an old game and since then, a lot of games have come out, so you can see the lacquer of this game on the walls of other games for sure, but there's not a lot that really stands out, but one of the routes that does is Yuki's.

Lucy/Ruuko Maria Misora

    If you're reading these in order, get ready for some whiplash, because everything I have to say good about Yuki's route is shot into the sun with Ruuko's route. The route is, I think, the second longest route in the game, and feels like an entire game in itself, because nothing progresses with any sense of urgency in this route. It also starts significantly earlier than any of the other route (the game starts with March 1st, this route starts March 5th, and the workup to the other long route starts on the 7th, but we'll get there. See Sasara's route for more details).

    The route starts with Takaaki visiting the park, lamenting that there aren't cherry blossoms, when he steps on a girl lying on the ground, covered in cherry blossoms. She wakes up and greets him with a "Ruu~." This is Ruuko, and she announces that she's an alien from the planet Ruu, here to observe the primitive lifeforms, the Uu (the humans, we reside on a planet Uu). This is met with hearty skepticism.

Me when I...when I...when I...

     Ruu takes shelter in a playground, trying to hunt and scavenge for food herself, which prompts Takaaki to try to take care of her by providing food and care. His endeavors are met with being called primitive and very little thanks, and when I say "his endeavors," I'm not saying, "he tried once." This is half the route. This is like 3 hours of reading the same thing happen, like countless times. She tries to use Earth thing, fails, he uses Earth thing, she says Earth thing is wrong, repeats the next scene.

    So the first third of it is that.

    The second third is her becoming homesick and trying to get her mothership to come pick her up because she was actually marooned here. She can use the Power of Ruu to do 3 miracles for the benefit of the Uu, but after that, they won't come pick her up. She uses the first for Takaaki's sake, I honestly don't remember what the second one was, but the third was as a thanks for caring for her (finally), he wakes up in a tree on the tallest mountain in the area to look at the moon with her, since he asked to go to the moon, but didn't actually want to go through with it in the end.

Also, she, like, almost gets a job at one point? I forget, but she pours tea, almost for money.

    So the fated day occurs, and along the way to the mothership, she spots a crying child who's missing. She's torn between returning and finding the mother, but knows she could use the Power of Ruu a fourth time. She does, and the mothership sees it, telling her, "deal's off." They go back home and Ruu sulks for a time.

    Later, in the last third, she approaches Takaaki to tell him the good news: she's getting picked up, but she awaits trial, and may never see him again. They get sad, and touch each other, but in the end, she returns to Ruu. Days later, trial is sent, and she's sent back to Uu for the punishment of continuous observation (as Lucy Maria Misora, hence the two names up there).

    This route wouldn't be bad if, again, it wasn't longer than every other route in the game. The first part is just so irritatingly cyclical. Yuki and Ruuko's arcs both remind me of Key visual novels, but Yuki's reminds me of Planetarian, while Ruuko's reminds me of Clannad. My patience wore thin at one point and I really anticipated DNF'ing this, but I drank like 8 White Claws and pressed on. You're welcome.

Himeyuri Sango/Ruri

    Unlike the previous route, this one actually has two (I mean, at least two) heroines, Sango and Ruri. They're twins, with Sango being a manic dream fairy-type girl, and Ruri being loud, angry, and violent. Honestly, I liked this route! It was among the longer of the routes, but it went places.

     I don't actually know, based off the walkthrough, how they got to this route, because I stumbled on this route by going home every day, trying to skip scenes to get to Karin's route when I was originally playing. After a while, Takaaki has a scene where he's about to set off home from school, lamenting his existence being so devoid of female interaction, he just wishes one would fall from the sky. As he does that, he hears a cat meowing in distress, looks up, and there's a girl up there, too, also in distress. She crawled up there to get the cat but now neither of them can get down. Takaaki helps her get down, and she tells him that she loves him, before setting off home.

    The next day, he sees her and calls out to her at school, except it's the other twin (he doesn't know, because anime). She chastises him and gets violent, when the other twin appears and thanks him for yesterday, by kissing him. The other twin goes apeshit and they leave together. Later, he goes to find the nice twin, who he now knows as Sango (and the other one as Ruri), and she tells him she'll be in the computer lab after school. He goes.

    Upon entering, he sees a teddy bear walking around on its own and begins to investigate it, tilting it upside-down, until the bear lashes out on him. Sango appears and tells Takaaki that Milfy, the bear, doesn't appreciate him looking at her ass. She introduces him to her work on robotics, programming AI to control small stuffed animals. This isn't anything new in this universe, as robot maids exist (see Multi from ToHeart 1), but still surprising how someone so lost in her own little world is doing it.

Shown here: me discussing visual novels with all my friends (presumably with my wife's leftovers)
 

     While his relationship with Sango is improving, it's rapidly declining with Ruri, who it turns out is in love with Sango, and doesn't want anyone to come between them. This comes to a bit of a head when Sango's newest creation shows up, Ilfy (like Milfy from earlier, except an actual robot girl). Ruri, who normally takes care of all the housekeeping for Sango, suddenly finds herself replaced by this new robot maid, whose AI is so advanced that it seems like an actual person. This drives Ruri into a cycle of hatred of everything around her.

    A lot of the rest of the arc is trying to get Ruri to accept Ilfy as a new member of the family, and Takaaki sitting on his hands like "man I wish someone would come along and do something about this." Eventually, Tamaki (she does exactly this in a lot of routes) comes across and tells him that he's going to allow this family to cause irreparable damage to each other if he doesn't do anything, and so he takes action, slapping Ruri, telling her that Sango loves her and Ilfy's just here to help, and that he loves her just as much as he loves Sango.

    That's right. He can't love one without the other, and he knows that Sango can't either anymore, so it's up to Ruri to accept everyone now. Anyway, there's an orgy in the shower, and I'm not making that up.

     Tongue-out-of-cheek, he does buck up and resolve it by exposing to her that she's cherished by everyone around her, even if her narrow vision can't see beyond Sango. And also the shower orgy does happen.

    Ruri is annoying, just as a heads up. She's loud and screams almost more than she doesn't, and honestly feels like one of those characters that prompted visual novel developers to integrate character voice sliders into the game for. She does, however, see a lot of growth, from a petulant child, to a slightly-less petulant child, to someone misplaced from her own identity. There's a found-family quality here, too, between Takaaki integrating with the twins and Ilfy (and all the other robots that pop up at the end). If you can read Japanese, in the sequel to ToHeart 2, Another Days, Milfy (the bear) gets a body and is also in love with Takaaki. I hear it's Very Good, but alas, I can't read it.

Kusugawa Sasara

    I go back and forth on this route. It was my last route, and much like Ruuko's route, it's really done in three parts. The first part is pretty long and feels like it HAS to drag on to a specific part of the story, then the second part will put you through your paces if you really like Takaaki, and the third part has some Real Visual Novel Ass Parts to it.

    Sasara is a second-year, student body president, going into her third year. Takaaki runs into her at the graduation ceremony (he's on staff by behest of Best Girl Manaka) on the roof, where she's crying and rips a piece of paper in half, before letting one half go. He surprises her, and she's weak and fragile, so he takes her to the infirmary to recover. She tells him to forget everything that happened.

    Takaaki continues to visit, trying to figure out what was up with her, but she's cold and emotionless now, like the rumors surrounding her make her out to be. Eventually, he runs into Ma-ryan (you never find out her name in ToHeart 2, but it's Maako, in case anyone asks), the previous student body president, who just graduated. She recognizes that Sasara's relied on Ma-ryan in the past, and now it's up to her to learn to grow up and become less reliant on others (or at least...rely on Takaaki).

Ma-ryan (right) acts sort of as a deus ex machina mechanic for a good portion of this route.
 

    So, Takaaki assumes the mantle of her helper, helping her through Spring Break by coming in every day to help. When they return to school, it's rumored that he's a shoo-in for the next vice president, which he reacts negatively towards. Wants the girl, not the responsibility. This doesn't go well for him, because now she thinks that he doesn't want to hang out with her. After much reconciling, they decide to go to the aquarium.

    This starts the second part of it, where we see Takaaki fumble at every possible interaction. At the aquarium, he realizes Sasara's looking at sea slugs and sea cucumbers, and she confides that she loves weird animals like that. He drools and she takes that to mean that he thinks she's weird and boring. This happens...a lot. Eventually, after like, another aquarium date and this whole storyline that you find out that she can only eat specific foods that are mass produced or processed, the two eventually come to a mutual understanding.

    Then her parents start showing up, and we're in the final part. Her father shows up first, and tells her the good news that he's moving closer, so they can see each other more. She's ecstatic until the next day, when her mom finds out and says they're moving to America. Comes out that her parents divorced and the mother doesn't want the father to see her at all.

    Takaaki, suddenly with balls of steel, investigates all these family problems, and Sasara and him confront the parents. The mother leaves with Sasara while the father tells you about how the mother and him were both art students who fell in love and had Sasara. The mother gave up on her dream of becoming an artist to raise Sasara and allow the father to pursue his dream, but the father swore off painting after seeing the mother fall into corporate Japan. This, the mother thinks, is because he gave up, so she divorced him. Now, she doesn't want his pitiful behavior to rub off on Sasara, even though she doesn't realize that both of  the parents are estranging her from the other, leading her to become extremely unhappy.

    So in order to combat the order of her mother to move to America with her, Sasara and Takaaki come up with the idea of, uh, running away to get married. Before they finalize their plans, they sneak into the school and stay overnight in the student government room for several days, aided by friends, all thinking they're sneaky (everyone knows). The teachers give them a forewarning that they have until Sunday to vacate or else they'll be removed, but they manage to escape because Ma-ryan (who, I should posit more, is like a veritable storm of chaos in the storyline) prepares a net to catch them as they jump off the roof.

    They escape to an island to the south, but the inhabitants are like, "nah, we don't need elopers committing double-suicide," and they send them back to their hometown. They come to an agreement with the parents, who have begun to talk again, and everyone grows a little.

    Sasara realizes, later on, that she should go to America with her mother, after all, because she'd be holding back her mother's career by staying, but while also holding Takaaki back by chasing after a romance while he should be focused on graduation, and holding herself back by waiting for his graduation before moving elsewhere for her future. He accepts her views, and they see each other off to the airport (JUST LIKE IN WHITE ALBUM 2).

    At the airport, they're both sort of standoffish (NOT LIKE IN WHITE ALBUM 2) until they break down and cry and kiss and stuff, and he promises to get a job so he can come visit for New Years. With that as their final goodbye, the route comes to an end.

Someone at Aquaplus has a type. I'm convinced.

    I almost DNF'd this during the first part of the game, but ultimately, I'm glad I didn't. Sasara is a complex character and a lot of the issues in the route actually are introduced via small details throughout the first part. I won't say that they flexed their writing chops in this route, but it was almost always compelling after the first part for various reasons. Sasara, turns out, was voted most popular girl from the series back in the earlier '10s, and so she goes on to appear in a lot of spin-offs. She's a good girl, and I can understand why people would like her almost as much as people like Manaka. I can't understand anyone who likes anyone over Manaka, though.

Holy shit, this was long.

Afterword

    After you finish all the routes, and the Bad Route (where Takaaki realizes that the girl Yuuji refers to a lot as his one true love, a girl who appeared in the park one day with a sunflower hat and blue sundress, before disappearing, was actually Takaaki when Tamaki forces him to crossdress, it's implied they get together), you get a fancy little CG:

Thanks Konomi, I feel like I really did it.

Final Thoughts

    Walking away from ToHeart 2 X-Rated, I don't feel like my world is ending, like I have other titles. It's a fun romp, with cute characters, and you can tell where other titles drew their inspiration from, from this and other games of its generation. The game itself took around 70 hours to complete, and that's not a 100% playthrough for CGs (you have to play through Tamaki's route after making a decision about lingerie three separate times).

    It's a great game for if you're into seeing the historical perspective of visual novels and dating sims from this specific era, either before you move onto the PC-98 era, or maybe just whatever else from this one (Fate Stay/Night? The hell is that?). If you're looking for something to blow you away, especially if you're familiar with the genre and medium, it may fall a little flat with some of its long plotlines.

    I think, one of the big standouts to me is that the stakes never feel particularly high. It's like conflict exists, but most of the game focuses less on it and more of developing the character through the first conflict, and how this newly developed character deals with the second conflict. It IS a dating sim, so I suppose that can be expected, but the grasp at emotions feels weaker than other dating sims, even in comparison to some from the PC-98 era. But, you know, if you're looking for something without high stakes, take a crack at it!

    It also comes packaged with two separate games: a puzzle game, Doki2 Panic Library!, and Super Sweets Scramble. The first is a puzzle fighter of sorts, while the second is a shmup. Both allow you to unlock more characters, with different aspects to each character in both games. Throw them in a mystery bracket at your local fighting game event. Do it.

    That's about it for me. I've started Little Busters!, so expect a write-up to that sometime, and probably White Album 1 before that.