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SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky made me sit and think: what exactly do I consider ‘love’ to be? I’ve been married for almost a year now, after all. Probably should have a definition. Still, one of the first things I remember about my relationship was me drunkenly babbling about Stranger Things. Hardly a scene that’s going to make it into a sweet and heartfelt game about love. Still, I rather liked that SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky made a point of asking the question. Love means different things to different people.
This is a game about dating people, after all. There’re other mysteries wrapped around it, but you’re still going to go into it with a girl in mind. It’s a difficult game for me, being generally a grumpy, old man and not really a fan of visual novels. Still, I went in with as open a mind as possible. SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky does have its share of heartfelt moments, but it falls into some of the worst traps of the genre and is tricky to recommend as a result.
Love Is In The Air
Today’s clueless dope protagonist is Junya, a handyman at a family-run general store, who wouldn’t pick up on romantic hints if Cupid fired an entire quiver into him. Still, we can perhaps forgive him on that count, as it wasn’t long ago that his brother was killed in an accident, which Junya himself just barely survived. This is enough to give our protagonist some interesting notes, as he copes with life without his older brother to lean on, and a good helping of survivor’s guilt. This is the source of some of the more heartfelt moments.
The rest come from the gaggle of girls that surround Junya. Let’s do the SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky waifu run-down, shall we? First up is Chihaya – a rich childhood friend with an indecision problem, Hinata – a princess-obsessed attendant, Azusa – a tiny ball of rage, Yuriko – an idol star trying to get back to her roots, and Chunyu – a Chinese transfer student with a penchant for being brutally honest. The characters can get a tad tropey, such as Junya’s overly energetic sister and her friend who’s creepily obsessed with him, but as the main characters unfold they gain depth.
It is rather insanely, pull-your-hat-over-your-eyes saccharine at times but that’s kind of par for the course for this sort of thing. If you don’t go into a visual novel dating sim expecting to cringe every now and then, you’ve probably not played many. Still, SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky did break through my grumpy shell at times. I went for Chunyu’s route and found myself warming to her bubbly personality, as we worked together to put on a concert in the park. It was a sweet storyline, paired with – at times – quite thoughtful conversations about love. There’s enough here to warm the heart, which is good.
Relationships On Rails
Chunyu’s route does highlight a few of the issues I have with SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky, however. For one, there’s a mystery surrounding Junya’s brother’s death that Chunyu’s route just sort of forgets about. It also ends in a giant anti-climax, which didn’t help. I read around a bit before writing this review, and it seems this and a few other paths are a bit threadbare compared to ‘main’ ones, like Chihaya, which is a shame. It also highlighted the rather strict structure of the whole experience. Rather than gravitating towards characters naturally, we literally have a binary choice between girls at set stages. Feels a tad cheap.
Basically, pick a girl and if you don’t put your foot in your mouth, you’ll end up with the ‘normal’ ending. I do like that there’s a ‘best’ ending if you choose the right dialogue options, but it feels even more hands-off than normal. I know, I know, I bang on about the lack of gameplay every time I review a game like this, but the problem is particularly egregious here. We can go literal hours without making any meaningful choices beyond a couple of similar sounding dialogue lines. It’s maddening at times.
Then there’s the fact that the writing falls down quite often. It’s mostly serviceable in the line-by-line, but a significant number of typos have slipped through, and there’s odd translation issues that make some lines difficult to parse. More important, however, is the fact that the writing often falls deep into tedium. Part of it is the visual novel habit of constantly repeating details. We don’t need a flashback of something that happened five minutes ago. But it also sticks on thoroughly uninteresting scenes. One section is just talking about building permits, for heaven’s sake. Just cut the fluff and get to the interesting scenes.
SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky – Heartfelt But Held Back
The end result is that while SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky did melt some of the ice around my frozen heart, it didn’t really stick with me. You could justifiably write this off as me not being part of the target audience. But even compared to other visual novels I’ve played, it’s on the weaker side. The writing contains a frankly absurd amount of telling over showing. If I have to see another character’s personality explained by some twinkle in their eyes, I may go insane. That, the rigid structure, and complete lack of any gameplay make it hard to stay engaged. Once a long play goes up on YouTube, you no longer have any reason to fork out £34.99.
Which is a shame, because when SINce Memories: Off The Starry Sky actually got going, I found myself warming to it. The moments where Chunyu actually starting probing into the question of love, and comparing her and Junya’s definitions, were great. Even if Junya did miss absolutely every hint, regardless of subtlety. The biggest tell, for me, came when I finished Chunyu’s route and was faced with the prospect of pursuing another. It didn’t appeal. I lasted about two hours before closing it. If you’ve got a high tolerance for this sort of game, then you’ll find lots of heart-warming moments here. If you’re a grumpy, thirty-something man then you’ll find the annoyances stacking up.
