#not only do they reuse their Doppel (and maybe some of their sprite’s) animations

[kiwisandpearls]

So…do we ever get the context of these memoria?

because like we never see them in the event quest and we don’t even get a story for the irokuroe unit. Like yeah this is probably super nitpicking to point out but from the memoria i saw i thought Iroha would play a bigger part in the event and she really didn’t.

[thewhitefluffyhat]

Art

What is this review?

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Good

Gekidan InuCurry is back!

Half of InuCurry (specifically, Doroinu) returns for the game, and his designs continue to be creepy, cool, and just plain awesome.  Witches are just as unsettling and beautiful as in the anime, and new additions like doppels can sometimes be even more so.  Meanwhile, the transformation sequences he storyboards are the best in the game.  And he also did a few magical girl character designs - they’re definitely something to look forward to, for anyone who hasn’t been spoiled on them already!

Mixed

Character card art

Good news: If you want to, it’s easy to have a full team of characters with non-fanservice-y outfits.  Heck, it’s even pretty easy to have a full team of magical girls designed and illustrated by women!  

Furthermore, when the girls are leveled up, their outfits don’t change – instead, the art gains more elemental effects and dynamic poses rather than making their clothes devolve into I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-lingerie.  As a result, girls like Felicia might not have the best costumes, but since their final art prioritizes looking badass over fanservice, I find I’m not as bothered by the original design.  (Your mileage may vary, of course.)

That being said, while you can choose which art you want to use for each character… there are also some pretty darn bad illustrations.  And there are some girls who just don’t have a good option.  

(For a more in-depth discussion of the character card art, see my addition to @otapleonehalf’s post here.)

Extra costumes

One usually nice addition to the game is alternate outfits for the character you set on your home screen.  While some of the outfits are very fanservice-y (swimsuits gonna swimsuit), many are also unproblematic cute and fun.  Plus, since these aren’t new gacha characters and the costume unlock sticks even if you only obtain the character later, they’re a bit more friendly to collect for nonpaying players.

Live2D animations

This is the first time I’ve played a game with the Live2D engine, and I’m impressed.  The animations are rather “tween-y”, but they have lots of secondary motion and some great character details.  Character traits like Kako (above) and Sana’s shyness or Tsuruno’s restless energy are sold just as much through their unique animations as through their dialogue, which really helps the characters feel like people rather than archetypes.

Also, despite what you might expect from a Madoka Magica spin-off, there are no hurt/defeated portraits for the cutscene models.  The battle sprites have alternate poses for low health, but there is no clothing damage or blood.

Unfortunately, that Live2D animation I mentioned?  Also includes jiggle physics on the girls with larger breasts.  Thankfully, only a few girls have it to a noticeable degree, but the ones who do… hm.  The effect isn’t  unrealistic, I suppose, (that is, not weird bouncing whenever the character breathes, just secondary animation when the character makes a large or sudden movement), but I still wince whenever I see it.  You couldn’t afford more than one body type or skin color, but you can afford this?  A bad sign for the game’s priorities.

Bad

Transformation sequences

Wow, it’s weird to say this about a magical girl franchise, but honestly?  The transformations are probably the worst part of the game.  It sometimes feels like they just exist as an excuse to see leering closeups on some girls.  (Ironically, the nudity that got altered for the Taiwan and North American versions was one of the less objectifying examples.)  

And even beyond that, they’re boring!  Most girls pose, get a brief sparkle of their associated element and bam, that’s it.  Plus or minus some boob jiggle of course.  (sigh)

SHAFT really let everyone down here, and it’s another place where it’s tragic to consider what could have been.

However… as I mentioned above, if you get lucky enough to roll one of the original series magical girls, you’ll get a taste of that possibility.  Those sequences were mostly handled by InuCurry, and the difference is night and day - they’re creative and delightfully surreal new transformations.  If only the rest of the game had lived up to that standard…

Lack of body diversity

One of these girls is a semi-famous model and the other spent her life training to master the naginata - good luck guessing which is which based on their body types, since below the neck, they’re nearly identical.  And these two are not alone - every girl in the game has this Barbie doll-esque frame, with only small variations for height and (you guessed it) breast size.  

On top of that, there’s only one, very pale, skin tone.  Boo!

Thus, while I can understand the resource argument for this reuse, it’s to such an extreme that the result ends up looking off-puttingly lazy in a game that is otherwise has a lot of care and attention to detail.  

It also actively hurts the story.  There are characters who are said to be athletes, or who are sickly and spent a long time in the hospital, and so on.  Yet unlike the animations, the actual designs work against those characterizations, since everyone is the exact same level of generic cuteness.  Probably the most blatant example is when a character is stated to be beautiful in dialogue - for all we know, maybe she’s actually plain and it’s the person talking who has a weird opinion!

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