Week of 02 Apr 2023
Most of this week was spent working on the gonzo Gal*Gun on my Japanese Xbox 360. As the week began, I had completed my three runs for the first of four love interests, so I had my bearings and was ready to start knocking these out quicker. First up was the spoiled and bossy Kaoruko. Each girl has two unique minigames you have to complete and perfect as part of their playthrough. For Kaname last week you have to hold her steady on a stepladder as she searched for a book, protecting her from falling ones, and fight off a tentacled monster. Kaoruko, on the other hand, first requires a nude model for her art. You are provided a prompt and have to choose the correct pose from three options. Hard to do when you can’t read Japanese! Luckily, I found a picture guide over on PlaystationTrophies and managed to easily perfect that one. Some level of actual skill is needed for her second minigame, as you have to shoot the corners off a cage swinging around in midair while avoiding hitting Kaoruko inside for the achievement.
Next up was Akira, and she’s a lot more annoying. Her first minigame, where you’re challenged with shooting metal balls out of the air without taking damage, really was the hardest thing I’ve yet to face in the game. The “lightgun” aiming just isn’t the most accurate, especially when trying to make small adjustments in a hurry. I had to give this one a few tries, but luckily you can just die and try again if you take damage. Her second minigame is much easier and I passed it on the first try.
And finally was Aoi, who I was going to become very familiar with, but more on that in a minute. For someone that doesn’t know Japanese her first minigame is easily the most difficult since she provides bits of a lyric and you have to help her complete it without making any errors. Again, a visual guide helped a lot, but you’re on a tight time limit and have to contend with the choices bouncing around the screen so you have to be accurate and quick. Her second minigame is actually pretty easy (on Normal…) and I got a full progress bar on the first try.
Sadly, even after the three playthroughs for her, I was locked in to many more as her route is the best for score. I’ll admit, the first time I tried going for a “Godlike” score (for obtaining 600k points in a single run) I felt that it was impossible. When I started, I was under the impression there’d be an “All Routes” mode I could use to very easily score the points I needed for this ranking. It wasn’t until I was trying to figure out how to access it that I was made aware of the fact that this mode is exclusive to the PS3 version! That means I only had use of the much shorter Story mode routes I’d already been playing, and to get the score you’d need you have to score an Ecstasy Shot for over 80% of the girls you subdue by hitting every girl in their sensitive spot to have any hope of getting the high score. Even worse, to obtain all the titles you have to make at minimum eight Godlike runs with a particular set of stats. This is a problem since one of the best ways to clear a large group of girls and get a massive boost to your score is using the Doki Doki Bomb, but using this ability actually changes your stats based on the girl you enter Doki Doki Mode with. For runs where you’re focusing on only one stat (like when getting the God of All Fashion title, for having max Style and low other stats) you can look up which girls only raise those stats and use a Bomb on them when they show up, but for others (like having all your stats high except for Lewdness) it can be too much to juggle using Bomb on certain girls while also trying to maximize score and keep your stats where they need to be. It’s a LOT of rote memorization, but it wasn’t long until I had most of Aoi’s route memorized and could recognize a fair number of the girls from their hairstyles and know their sensitive spot off the top of my head. I managed to finish three Godlike runs before the end of the week, and I’m very confident I’ll be able to finish this now.
Achievements unlocked: 33 (+21) | Completion: 85%
Um…could you get off me before your security team ends me?
As is too common nowadays, I had to take my spouse out of town for a visit to Mayo up in Rochester for a few days. I didn’t want to lug my Xbox 360 with me, so I decided I’d start the Game Pass game I planned to play next and get a quick achievement to extend my streak. Which means I got to start the anticipated Life is Strange: True Colors! I’ll be playing this soon, but not much to say for now since I simply got to the first collectible, earned my achievement, and turned it off.
Achievements unlocked: 1 (+1) | Completion: 2%
Highest ratio: 2.44
ランク達成 神 (Gal*Gun)
Lowest ratio: 1.09
A Letter To Riley (Life is Strange: True Colors)
