Bakumatsu Renka SHINSENGUMI

Oh boyyy. Is this game really finished? I am not 100% convinced. The voice acting is really nice but that is about it. I mean, the characters are also able to blink so there was a lot of work put in there. The art style is extremly outdated (~2004). Of course that is very subjective but none of the characters were really speaking to me. The first time i started this game the heroine was like a ghost and it took 1 whole minute for her to load completely. I wasn't really able to read the plot. It just wouldn't let me. So I closed the game and restarted it. And oh my. Apparently there was supposed to be an intro video that didn't even load for me the first time. Normally I am a sucker for this plot but this game was so hard to play. Everything just felt like it was going in slowmotion with the background changing like you put a video on 0.25x on youtube. You can escape the voice lines but you can not escape the slowmo scenery changes. Every. single. small. gesture. change. As a small reference: Currently 44% of all players have finished the prologue which took me even with restarting about 3 hours. Sooo.. if you want to try the game out to see if you might like it, you are not really …

Uhm... So, don't get me wrong...I LOVE the Shinsengumi, I LOVE Japanese history and bakumatsu specifically, I LOVE the fact that the MC can fight--unlike the the typical female otome protagonists. A lot of reasons to get this game and this game would have a lot of potential, but the major problem is that the game is OLD and there are so many bugs that it's just not worth playing anymore... I was so excited to play this game and I really...REALLY wanted to play this game, but I just got disappointed in the end. It's not worth getting this game unless they fix the bugs, but given how many years have passed without any updates, I doubt it will ever happen.

Haven't gotten very far yet but I'm enjoying the game so far. Contrary to what another review said, the heroine DOES NOT disguise herself to join the Shinsengumi, everyone knows she's a girl and she doesn't hide it. I thought that was very interesting, no one holds it against her and she's the only girl in the group. She is still just a rookie in the group though so she isn't privy to a lot of the inner workings, but she's not stupid and won't just accept things as she's told. She's proactive in seeking out the truth. Still she's more of a bystander than someone who's directly involved in the direction of the Shinsengumi. The player's choices do not influence the outcome only which guy's route you're on and each guy only has one ending. Haven't experiences any particularly slow transitions so I guess the bugs have been fixed. This game's got a crazy large amount of dictionary terms, even with the same term coming up over and over I'm afraid I'm still not that familiar with all the terms as I'm not that big on history despite being a fan of Bakumatsu themed stories. I saw a bunch of reviews comparing it to Hakuoki but I personally find this game more interesting, I only managed to …

Bakumatsu Renka SHINSENGUMI is a visual novel that wears its historical inspiration openly, blending the romantic conventions of the otome genre with the turbulent political climate of late Edo–period Japan. Developed by VRIDGE INC. and published by D3PUBLISHER, it places the player in the role of a young woman who disguises herself and joins the Shinsengumi, the legendary samurai militia tasked with maintaining public order as Japan edges toward massive cultural and political transformation. Rather than treating history as simple set dressing, the game uses the era’s tension—rising Western influence, internal ideological conflict, assassinations, and shifting power dynamics—as an emotional backdrop for every character route. The result is a story that feels larger than any single romance, where loyalty, survival, and duty constantly pull against personal desire. The narrative structure follows the traditional otome format, introducing a shared prologue before branching into multiple character routes, each focusing on a notable Shinsengumi figure. Characters such as Hijikata, Okita, Harada, and Kondō are written not merely as idealized love interests, but as flawed, passionate men…

好

i found this game boring. tried it about 3 times, couuldnt get past like chapter 2. idk i just couldnt get into the story, im just curious why this game has such good reviews. maybe i just dont get it.