23 - Hermitage: Strange Case Files
Cosmic horror VN with a pretty strong start, but whom fails to stick the landing in the end. Shame too, I really liked the aesthetic and thought its characters were really endearing, but the plot just unravels itself very unsatisfyingly.
This one didn't work for me. The main antagonist sucks, the cast is way too big with prior important characters having nothing to do, and bloated runtime episodes that kill the pacing as well as devote way too much time to nonsense unrelated to the main story.
It brings to mind something like Umineko's TIPS: Umineko is a kinetic novel where the "game" is reading through the story and piecing together what happened on your own, outside of the game itself. The extra information given is crucial to piecing things together on your own.
I got some real Tokyo Godfathers vibes out of this. Its a deep dive into the troubles of seemingly ordinary people and how they cope with them, paired with really cute visuals and animation. EVERYONE has issues, even if you only get 5 seconds of screen time.
@Bat_Boss I've only really killed Margit and Godrick along the critical path, but I really felt that for Margit. Just plain out of your hands if Margit just decided to just keep his combo going with more attacks instead of just stopping and letting me have my turn