Title: 同級生 リメイク
Developer: Fanza Games
Release Date: 26th February 2021
Age Rating: 18+
Length: 10+ Hours
Links: Official Website, VNDB
Thoughts
Doukyuusei is one of the classic dating sim games originally released by Elf back in the early 90’s. As is the trend in recent years, it was remade for modern audiences with new graphics and a more user friendly system using the 1999 Windows Edition as a base. In a sea of mediocre remakes, was this finally a title deserving of being dragged into the present times?
One thing that needs to be said about Doukyuusei is that it is just generally a very fun game. There’s a reasonable amount of gameplay elements to keep you engaged (& the convenient Easy Mode which makes subsequent playthroughs infinitely less painful). The dating sim aspect was done well and I can see why so many people hold the original game dear.
Despite being a more “romance/moe focused” title, the protagonist Takurou walks this odd line between having a very prevalent personality, and yet still being a self-insert appearance wise. I don’t normally like overly perverted protagonists but Takurou was written in a way that made you somehow root for him – probably the mix between feeling like an actual dumbass horny teenager and having at least some morals occasionally. It also helps that his quips and banter are genuinely entertaining most of the time.
As for heroines, the sheer number (14) means that while you do get a large number of different personalities (thus the likelihood of the player being attracted to at least one is pretty high), the focus on quantity over quality means that there’s not a huge amount of character development for a lot of the girls due to their “routes” being very short. I guess this fits the game’s idea of “go and pick up as many chicks as you can and then get serious with one after summer vacation” but it is a bit of a shame that the remake doesn’t expand on any of the heroine routes – some definitely were a bit underwhelming.
That being said, I did enjoy the way the endings were done – they featured a peek into the protagonist & heroine’s future in a series of short scenes and manage to give a decent conclusion to their stories without spending too much time. I particularly liked that not all of the endings were super idealistic either and showed some hardships. Made for an interesting change.
The remake’s artwork was handled by the ever talented Sumeragi Kohaku. I can’t say I had any complaints about the art actually – everything looked nice.
The OST has also been remastered and there’s both a large number of tracks, and the overall quality of the BGM was good. They manage to retain their nostalgic feel but have a more modern recording quality. The new voice cast was made up of tenured favourites and I also have zero complaints here.
One thing worth mentioning is that the H scenes are also kind of a point and click mini-game. For the most part fine and made me pay slightly more attention than usual. For a game about nanpa there’s not many H scenes but I think this was probably a limitation of the times the game originally released.
Conclusion
My Score: 7.5/10
Whilst it may not offer the same level of innovation to modern audiences, there is no doubt that Doukyuusei is just a genuinely fun and light-hearted game that does a great job of capturing the youthful freedom Takurou experiences. Don’t go into this expecting an intricate story or a lot of H but if you need something to cleanse your palette then this would be a great pick.
I think this makes Doukyuusei the first game I’ve played that I feel deserves its remake. I have played the sequel & will review that soon.
Thanks for reading~
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