Title: Hot Roomies
Title in Google Play: Love Triangle – Free Otome Game
Developer: Hanabi Media
Release Date: June 17, 2016
Genre: Otome, Romance, Visual Novel
Ok, the first thing you have to know about this game that would make you really happy is: IT’S ABSOLUTELY FREE!
That’s right! IT’S FREE! Play it until you finish it!
Most otome games offer in-game purchases, though you can play without paying anything ’till the end. Those games are the type that let’s you read about 5 sections of a chapter each day, or you need to fulfill some kind of mission to proceed (which sometimes takes forever to complete). If you want to free yourself from the hassle, you can buy stuff in-game.
But this game doesn’t have those kind of game enders which sometimes takes so long to fulfill you lose interest in the game. Again, it’s absolutely FREE!
The only feature you can buy there is removing the ads (which only appears at the far bottom of the screen, very easy to ignore. It’s not a bother). And, even if there are ads, you can play the game OFFLINE! (Again, unlike other otome games).
Ok, enough with it being free. I think you get it. (oﾟ▽ﾟ)
Story
Basically, the game is about MC-chan (your character who you can name), who just graduated and is looking for work and a place to live in independently. On her graduation ceremony, she and her childhood best friend, Tsukasa, saw each other. Tsukasa just returned to Japan from America and is now starting a career as a professor in a new job he landed. He is also looking for a new place to stay, so they decided to look together. Eventually, they were offered a place to rent and they went to check the place out. It so happened that the owner of the house is Kazuya, a well-known author who MC-chan looked up to when she was a kid. And so, the three of them became roomies and eventually, a love triangle was created.
The game also has a few side characters they talk to and get together with such as MC-chan’s friends, Kazuya’s grandmother, and one of Tsukasa’s students. It’s a shame that the game was too short, the side characters weren’t much explored.
Anyways, the story was very interesting because, well, you’re in the middle of the love team. You’re the prize in the competition between two handsome guys! Aaaand, both of them are very sweet and loves to flatter you a lot. Haha!
I did mention before that the story was very short. It was. I think, you can finish it in maybe 1 to 2 hours of playing. There are lots of potential plots and it was really a shame that it was very short to explore them. The cute student who likes Tsukasa, for example, wasn’t really a threat. Actually she’s just there to help MC-chan realize that she feels jealous.
(SPOILER ALERT!) The game ended when I didn’t expect it to because it was short. You know how otome games let you pick what to do or what to say? Well, there was this one choice where the two guys ask you out to some place special because they were going to say something important to you. So, you had to pick who to go to. I casually picked Kazuya because childhood friends are strong enough to wait haha. But lo and behold, that was the last choice you’re going to make in-game because that will determine the end of the story. So, I ended up with Kazuya while in the back of my head, I still wanna explore my choices with Tsukasa. That was fast…
Gameplay
Very fancy and engaging.
Aside from the usual gameplay where you read dialogues and click next, this game has a lot more to it. I’ll just enumerate them:
– Get to choose the words you put in the ad in a fill-in-the-blanks style
– A mini game about cats
– Phone calls
– Choose messages to type in texts
– Choose your room, present, and dress
– Choose who to dance with, go with, and etc.
– Pop out photographs
– AND! Manga-style pages for special scenes
And for me, it was nice ❤
Conclusion
Do I recommend the game? Absolutely! It’s free! And the story is interesting anyway. I’d rate it:
It’s very nice but I left it on 4.5 because it was very short. It just… ended like that. Though, you can repeat and try different choices. Anyways, do play it and enjoy it yourselves. 🙂
Thanks for reading!
* ~ Koi Miazaki ~ * 