幻創のイデア～Oratorio Phantasm Historia～ – Thoughts

That was amazing. I went in expecting a somewhat generic chuunige and I came out with a well weaved dual protagonist story pretty much about something else entirely.

To be fair, there was battles and there was magical powers here and there but to be honest, they sat in there as the “setting” and never took the main stage. To go with this, instead of a glorious final boss battle for the finale, it was shown that taking such actions would not have led to a positive outcome.

The fact that characters in the story were practically making fun of chuunibyou stories at some points really says enough about this topic.

Now about the actual story.

The main goal of the story ended up being more about solving the mystery behind the disaster that occurred 7 years ago and the two protagonists, Yuma and Akashi confronting and coming to terms with their past. Both which are deeply twined with the disaster.

Omitting the actual contents of things, as we progress through the story the story tended to have certain arcs where one heroine takes focus and for the most part, the problems that the heroine holds gets solved in the process. In Naru’s case she didn’t exactly have a problem but it was more like one was invented out of nowhere.

Naru taking a 180 degree turn in personality wasn’t exactly pleasant but since she returned to normal afterwards, all is good.

Once you reach a certain scene in Yuma’s route, you’re cut off and forced to read the other side of the story and vice versa.

In Akashi’s side of the story we get to learn a lot more regarding the organization called Archive Square and some bits of what exactly happened 7 years ago. Mitsuki’s story was pretty weak but at least the contents of her story was interesting.

Noel’s arc was pretty painful to be honest. I mean, the contents were splendid but that ending… that ending. Look here, they pretty much throw it in your face. Noel was a walking death flag, she raised every death flag she could and at the end of Yuma’s route you even get to hear Himawari sorrowfully screaming Noel’s name.

Now it would have been more ridiculous of nothing happened to her after all that.

However, even so, even then… apparently I wasn’t prepared enough for when the time came. Like with every other tragic twist, it decided to happen right at the height of happiness.

She sure looks… happy.

… Nonononono stop that right now

S-she’ll be fine right? She’s pretty sturdy after all…

NOOOOOOOO ;___;

GAAAAAAH GOD DAMMIT THIS STORY, IT’S CHEAP, IT WAS OBVIOUS, BUT DAMMIT.

… Well then again, it was revealed to be a farce right after you start the final story.

A mysterious woman appears to save the day!

One thing I enjoyed about the story is that the writer did a pleasant job in combining the two stories. Individually, it feels like the story has holes in it that hasn’t been filled yet. But once you read both of the stories and recall what happened in both sides of the story, you realize that each side provided answers that when combined together, showed you resolution to mostly everything that actually mattered at that point.

So then it came to the final arc. I’m not sure what to say honestly, everything pretty much came together and I suddenly realized how good the two protagonists are when paired together as allies. Though of course, before that came to happen they had plenty of skirmishes. It felt a little unnecessary as it gave me a feeling of look, there’s that huge mass of doom gathering in front of you, take care of that first before killing each other dammit.

Quite frankly, the “sub” heroines and side characters received pretty rudimentary treatment in the finale as they were given some pretty irrelevant but still important roles in the story. However when they went out and flat out declared themselves to be “supporting characters” I felt that it could all be forgiven.

Though perhaps only briefly, at least all of the side characters received their chance to shine in the story. Kyoko’s backstory that happened amidst all of the chaos was pretty interesting and at the same time, she received a pretty gruesome end.

Despite rarely appearing after the first portion, she’s clearly one of the best characters in the story.

When she went on about her role ending at a place like this I truly nodded in agreement. After all this hype of her strength, she ended in a place completely irrelevant to the final battle. Well that’s this story for you.

It even fits quite well with the theme of the story in Yuma’s side where no matter what sort of dirty job it is, there has to be someone who needs to do it. After all, the problems won’t vanish by themselves.

POSITIVISM!

The finale also showed how Yuma is a great protagonist with his endless positivism. To be fair it’s more because I always disliked it when protagonists mop around for something stupid, meanwhile Yuma while carrying things you can nod to even if he gets depressed for, still managed to behave brightly. I mean, heck he was pretty much still joking around when his death was imminent.

Now with all of the problems solved, they could seemingly happily go on with their lives…but then it turns out that all of the people who originally came from the other world is scheduled to vanish because of reasons.

Nopenopenopenopenopenope not this again dammit.

Stop right there, stop ;_;

HOWEVER YUMA FINDS A WAY!

Yeah, I was pretty glad when Yuma found the path to a true happy ending.

And thus with the events over and everyone not having to vanish, actually Yuma went ahead and revived some people while at it but we’ll throw aside the details, the story ends happily ever after.

Stories must have a happy ending after all.

Despite the story taking a direction quite different from my expectations, the story managed to be exceptionally good. They also managed to handle the dual protagonist thing very well as well as general character chemistry. I was honestly afraid they’d screw it up when starting since well, having two protagonists can make things pretty delicate. Finding yourself to dislike one of them can tone down the enjoyment by quite a few notches.

After the epilogue of the final story ends, you receive heroine epilogues which… while technically does serve as an epilogue, like most things of this sort is really just a glorified hscene unlock. I guess it also provides some sort of resolution on relationships as well. It was pretty half assed but after the great story from before, I’m honestly not complaining.

Confess on TV in front of all of your fans and simultaneously step down as an idol, why the hell not? As expected from Re;non.

YES, AFTER ALL THE MOODSWINGS THAT NOEL CAUSED ME TO HAVE, YES THINGS ENDED HAPPILY DAMMIT.

Next up I’ll be trying Nitroplus’s new game 君と彼女と彼女の恋。 I can’t say that I don’t know what to expect considering I came by plenty of light spoilers on the contents but well, the time has finally come to confirm it for myself.

I’m personally wondering if it will make me look at the moeges that I intend to play afterwards any more differently than I look at them now.