Shall we date?:Ninja Love

I’ve been renewing my love for otome games lately, and started playing Shall we date?:Ninja Love just a few days ago.

The Shall we date? is a series of otoge, made by NTT Solmare for android and iphone and is powered by GREE. So you would need to register for GREE before you’ll be able to play the game.

Ninja Love is a 2D dating simulation game where you start at level 1, just like any other RPG games. But unlike RPGs, there are no battle scenes. Well, there is, but you don’t get to see the action. All you get to see are the dialogues. Well, that’s how otoge and visual novels are, anyway.

Like other otoge, you follow through a set story line of a preset character.  As the story progresses, your level increases as well as your Love Meter.  But unlike the usual otoge, where the progress of the story changes depending on which dialogue or decision you choose, for this particular game, you arrive at the same story line by whatever dialogue or decision you chose, however, your Love Meter’s growth will be slow.

The Love Meter is the measurement of whether you’ll get the best/desired ending. Love Meter increases more depending on which answer you choose for your character to respond in situations. I often get the normal response and sometimes, I get “Brilliant!”

Before starting with the story, you’ll have to choose a name for your character. But you’ll be able to change this later on. And then, you get to choose which “ninja” you would like to “protect” you.

And I chose Saizo Kirigakure of the Koga Ninja! Here’s some fan service screenshots I took that I might interest you with~

   

Honestly, otoge bores me for the lack of action while playing them. I was probably just used to playing hack and slash too much. Well, they are visual novels, after all. Though there are rare cases, sometimes, I kept playing them because I do like the story line. I actually wanted to keep on playing to see how the story would progress. But most of the time, however, what keeps me on playing are just the fan services. Most of the stories are just cliche stories like that you would read from a shoujo manga. if you like them, you’ll probably get hooked.

The story line in Shall we date?:Ninja Love is just the typical shoujo manga one – you’re suddenly chosen to become a “ninja princess” and stand in the middle of a war between Tokugawa and the ninjas. And then, you slowly fall in love with your “protector” who, besides from protecting you, also teaches you ninja tricks and other things.

The think I hate about this game is the waiting time and the checkpoints. You are only given 5 energies and it depletes as you go on chapter by chapter. When your energy is empty, you can eat “rice balls” to regain energy and continue on with the story. While going on, you’ll encounter checkpoints where you’ll need “passports” before you can proceed to the story. Though rice balls and passports can be bought using in-game currency, unlike rice balls, passports are extremely expensive and the only way you can seriously get one the quickest is to buy them using “coins” on which you would actually need real money to buy, and that’s where GREE comes in. There’s no way you’ll be able to buy all passports using in-game money by merely farming them. Basically, it’s a subtle way of saying, “buy GREE coins” to continue to play.

If you’re okay with spending a bit for more fan service, the game’s not that bad. 😀