![]() When you talk to someone and a choice comes up and you get it wrong, they don’t tell you what you did wrong so you can fix it next time. Little things that make visual novels more comfortable to play, like quick saves, quick loading and text-skipping are missing. Hmm, then again apart from the large head part, I just described Japan’s reigning queen of pop Ayumi Hamasaki, so maybe Namco’s on to something here. We never get to see her perform, but from what I can see, Mai has better looks, a better sense of style, greater charisma, greater magnetism and just all-around greater “star power.” Ai’s just a loud noisy kid with everyday looks, a squeaky grating voice, average dancing skills and a large head. It’s a bit of a shame that I have to compete with her, because IMO her mom Mai is the greater star. As the game goes along, her mother returns to the entertainment world and challenges her, and they have a great showdown at the end of it all. Ai’s story is that her mother is a retired famous idol and so she grew up with a complex about it. To make them more interesting, each girl (or trap) has her own story that plays out over the course of the game. The point of the games, as far as I can tell, is to chronicle the rise of an idol from a nobody to a superstar. And at the end of the day none of your hard work even matters, because the auditions are largely down to luck and probability. Plus Ai just won’t shut up during them, so you’re playing the same things, getting the same results and hearing the same loud comments throughout the game. No new games, no new levels, no added difficulty, no surprises. It’s just that it’s the same three mini-games from beginning to end. I appreciated having something to do other than read long conversations and listen to bad music, and the games even grew on me after a while. To raise Visual expression, you have to tap little smiley faces (I hate that game) and for Dance skills you have to tap out the correct steps when they reach a particular mark. To improve your Vocal skills, you have to fill in missing lyrics in hiragana as in the screenshot on the right. The bulk of the “gameplay” consists of using the touchscreen and stylus to give Ai “lessons” through mini-games. There’s no way to buy outfit or accessories either, you have to wait till Sunday and pray a fan sends you one. Idols are supposed to be cute and fashionable, right? Right, Namco? Oh, you didn’t get the memo? Ah, that explains why your idols only have three outfits with a few palette swaps, some ratty-looking accessories and no hairstyle changes at all. Ryo has a soothing, boyish voice (being a trap and all) and Eri’s voice is high and sweet, but Ai is just loud, bordering on screechy. The same songs sung by the other playable idols are slightly more bearable. I’m not a fan of cutesy-poppy idol music in general, and Ai’s voice grated on me. After all that effort, though, your idol’s success in auditions still depends largely on luck. The player’s involvement consists of picking out outfits, adding a few moves and helping her “memorize” lyrics and “learn” dances through minigames. What music there is is pretty bad and the songs your idol can sing are fixed, as are her dance and vocal performances for each one. There’s no tension at all.ĭearly Stars is a game about a musician, but it’s not really a music game, per se. When you have an audition lined up, your rivals and the organizers will wait as many days and weeks as it takes for you to get your act together. ![]() You’d expect that as a teenaged idol you’d have to balance your school life with performances while finding time for training and taking care of your health and getting enough food and rest, that sort of thing, but there are no schedules to worry about or deadlines to meet in Dearly Stars. ![]() All of them are very easy to raise and keep high. There are only three stats to manage, plus tiredness. ![]() The Dearly Stars disappointed me in nearly every aspect I could think of:
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