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crush crush (*/F, 18+, free*, browser*)

• overall: C. enjoyment: D-.
• i have almost a thousand hours in crush crush on steam. it is not by choice. i fucking hate this game. anyway. crush crush is an idle dating sim, likely the first of its kind. given that, there is a lot more focus on art and gameplay and zero focus on writing, which shows. this is forgiveable. unfortunately, the game is pretty poorly balanced and the art is only sometimes good. the game is fully voiced, obnoxiously. the characters are 75% jokes. the games high points arent bad, but they aren't impressive either, which they need to be when they're all it has going for it. also, it's obnoxious to play without cheating, which is always a flaw.
• plot: F. i've been playing for a few years now, and damned if i can tell you what the "plot" is. it's very, very irrelevant.
• characters: A. if you just start throwing characters at the wall non-stop it's a given that some of them are going to stick. there are so many girls in this game. all of the designs, overall, are pretty good, and most have tolerable personalities -- when they have personalities, that is. there are a few bad eggs that bring it down, and since youre expected to date every girl that's unfortunate. i'll just say it. rainbow dash (the pony) is in this. the phone fling girls tend to be much better, but they also have less content.
• writing: D. the phone flings, for the record, are wonderfully written. theyre compelling, realistic (mostly) short conversations where you truly get to know your girl and what makes her tick, and get some scandalous selfies to go with it. ...the majority of the game is not that. almost no care whatsoever is given to the writing of the main game. there's no story, most of the dialogue is either one-line jokes or meta references, and they're all entirely formulaic. the quality drop when peanut, the first phone fling girl, was added to the main game is abysmal. it's very clear different people were involved in the different areas.
• routes: there aren't really "routes" and im not ranking 40+ girls
• gameplay: B. now here's where things get a little better. crush crush is an idle game that revolves mostly around leveling up certain skills and gaining money, both of which are done by spending time doing different hobbies/jobs. as you move along, you'll unlock different girls who will require certain gifts or skill levels to increase their relationship. you can also tap on them to gain affection (though if your skills are high enough, itll increase on its own). this is why the writing and plot is so overlooked; this format is the key appeal of the game. while it's fairly typical for an idle game, for a dating sim it's a phenomenal concept and the first of it's kind (as far as i'm aware). honestly? great work. ... however. the game is balanced very poorly. as they add more and more girls, they just kind of blow up the numbers arbitrarily. there are limited time event girls that you can unlock by logging in every day or paying a small number of gems for missed days -- unless you miss the last day, in which case you need to pay the outrageous full price (EDIT: theyve fixed this now). there are girls that you can't even unlock without paying real world money, which is just always kind of scummy. the game gets so exorbitantly hard as you move on that there just isn't anything you can do besides cheat. and while cheating is easy, it isn't fun.
• art: B. some of the art, particularly the final CGs and the phone fling pictures, is actually very well done. however, the art you see the most of--the sprites, outfits, and date pictures--are just kind of half assed and frequently pretty wonky. given the huge disparity of art quality in this game it's hard to give it a definitive rating, but i can't go above a B.
• sound: C. jesus fucking christ. why does cassie speak in baby talk? i unmuted the game specifically for this review and was instantly horrified. i think shes going for some kind of accent? but it literally sounds like baby talk. unlike the sequel, the game does appear to be fully voiced. however, it's not great. many of the early girls sound like theyre voiced by the same not-very-good artist. even among the better ones, none are particularly standout, and most of the fake accents are bad. the lines are either entirely over the top or just read like they're reading a book out loud. its... not exactly on the bottom half of all the voice acting ive heard, but its not great. music is fine but gets a little annoying.

https://www.nutaku.com/games/crush-crush-online/

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