Runaway City

The Good
"Run away"; that was too easy wasn't it? I considered "Run away: shi**y" but the vulgar additional word seemed to be detrimental to the overall hilarity - in my mind. But now I just don't know any more. I just don't know. Any ideas? Answers on a postcard to the usual address.

Anyway, I'll stop wasting your time. "Runaway City" is horrendous. It's a colostomy bag of a game. It is devoid of almost any redeeming features, but I'm going to try hard, really hard, to find one.

...(at this point, the reader should go and take a walk around the block to get the feeling of time passing. Alternatively, they should stare at the second hand on a clock for a full three minutes.)...

Okay, by the end of the story, you almost sympathise with the central character in that you could understand the empty, guilt-ridden, emotionally void yet physically pleasurable life he might find himself in if you mess up the last sequence in the game and get the bad ending, which you are guaranteed to do without a walkthrough.

That's it.

The Bad
Whatever it is that hentai games are supposed to do, they fail at. Why the hell is this? If this is supposed to provide pretty cartoon girls to fawn over then it fails. If this is supposed to interest you with it's story then it fails. If this is supposed to arouse you then it fails. If this is supposed to make you feel emotional or empathic towards any of the characters then it fails. If this is supposed to be fun then it fails.

The graphics, especially the obligatory sex scenes, are dog ugly. The characters are almost universally without personality and the ones that have a hint of it never go beyond stereotype. The plot....well there isn't one. There are no choices to make in the game except a long sequence near the end, where you have to do every action correctly (you have absolutely no idea which action might be right and which wrong) otherwise you get the bad ending. The music sounds like a pig dying on top of a two-octave-wide keyboard, and finally, the game forces you to do consistently banal actions like walk down town, go to a clothes store, go to a coffee shop, order a coffee, go to a park, sit around, and then go home, nothing of consequence having happened. Now, it's not too difficult to get what they're trying to do here, but it doesn't work. In Seasons of Sakura, it did, but with this, you feel cheated, insulted and very bored.

The Bottom Line
So why did I play this damn thing? I DON'T KNOW! I was younger and foolish, and I liked 'Seasons of Sakura' because it was different and sweet and I'd never played a game like that before. I'm reviewing it to provide balance to my CV given the fact that yesterday I completed "The Indigo Prophecy", and that review will be about as positive as this one is negative.

What I think is hysterical is that 'Runaway' is being sold with 'Seasons' and the almost as dire 'Three Sisters' Story', and the games will have almost no appeal to anyone over the age of 17, which just so happens to be the minimum age that you can buy them. 'Seasons' is the best by an enormous margin, but if you're going to play it, it has to be one of your first bishoujo games, and you have to be a schoolboy like the character. 15 or 16 is perfect, otherwise the effect is lost and it'll have no meaning for you.. But you legally can't because it has hardcore sex. It's baffling.

So one more time: don't play "Runaway City". I escaped alive. You might not be so lucky.