Review Coverage: April 11 to 17
Some of the major events that happened in this week include Konomi having to cook bento (lunch) for Takaki. Finally, Karin Sasamori has been introduced, and we get to see part of her scenario when Takaki gets (forced) to join her Mystery Club. They get to pet a cat too…
April 11
All Takaki talking to himself, so I won’t understand what happened.
April 12
Konomi asks and suggests that the four of them eat up on the roof from now on, seeing that there are too many people in the canteen every lunch time. Seeing that Yuji and Takaki only could only buy and eat bread everyday, the girls propose that they will cook bento for them! So Konomi will cook for Takaki, and Tamaki will obviously cook for her annoyed brother.
After class, Takaki bumped into Karin Sasamori. She seems to hold a questionaire, and wants to advertise her club through it. That point, she seems quite soft-spoken. Given Takaki’s kindness, he answers her questionaire. But turns out that he got tricked! The questionaire seems to be an application form already! More on that later…
Konomi and Takaki walk home, talking about Genjimaru. While in a flight of stairs, she does the jumping thing again, and falls. Takaki is quite annoyed, meaning worried, about her. Konomi implies that she can’t be as strong as her onee-chan Tamaki.
April 13
Konomi made a mess of herself when she jumpstarts the day with the wrong school uniform. During a break, Konomi called Takaki as Takaki-sempai (attributed to upperclassmen), but it’s kinda weird to hear. At lunch, as promised, Konomi made Takaki a bento. It tastes quite good, but just because it was partly made by her mother too. Anyway, Tamaki gave some tips and advice to Konomi, with the usual antics reaction by Yuji.
After class, Manaka appears and says that the teacher is quite happy for Takaki that he has finally chosen to join a club. Club? He’s forced into it. And so the thing with Karin yesterday was resurfaced. Takaki rushed into the backroom of the gym to meet with Karin. Indeed she was there. Karin introduced her Mystery Club and all, but doesn’t seem to be interested. After numerous pleadings by Karin, she starts to cry. This softens Takaki a bit and forces himself to join the club, albeit not quite seriously though. Well Karin became quite happy for that, and so she continues on with her Mystery Club blabbering, until a comic accident made Takaki stumble on top of Karin! A quite embarassing situation, but Karin turned this into her blackmail event, and so Takaki should really join the mystery club now, or else…
April 14
At a break, Takaki saw Karin, but he doesn’t give her too much attention. At lunch, the four is at the roof again. Konomi made another one of her bento, but it seems like a failure in cooking for now. Yuji reacts again. After class, while waiting for the girls, Takaki and Yuji play with this puzzle toy game called “chienowa”, where you seem to have to disassemble metal rings, with a bet of a free treat. Their little bet gets halted when the girls arrive and get interested in it. They join the bet… and Konomi wins! It already seemed like Yuji loses and will treat the girls in this expensive cafe, but thankfully Tamaki treats everyone instead.
April 15
Konomi mentions about Takaki’s school field trip to Hokkaido, and is quite jealous. She wanted to be together with him on a field trip, but instead she will suggest some good ramen shops over there that her father might know.
Then, Takaki came back to the gym’s backroom where Karin is waiting. Karin talks about the Mystery Club again, although she doesn’t seem to be clear in explaining at all. She just says that there are many mysteries to solve in the world. Aliens and UFO’s maybe. She also seems quite obsessed with food, especially something with eggs on it, and so she has a ham and egg sandwich. She also gives Takaki some.
Karin wants Takaki to return after class, but he doesn’t go to her. Takaki meets Konomi, who says that she saw some black cat around. They finally found it, and surprisingly the cat is quite friendly to Takaki, but not to Konomi. Maybe it’s because Takaki’s hand smells like the ham and egg sandwich.
April 16
Karin meets Takaki outside, and seems to ask what kind of girls Takaki likes. Takaki answers, maybe a girl with short hair. More talk, and now Karin concludes that Takaki likes normal girls, and is quite sad about it (why, she’s not normal?)
Walking home, Tamaki ordered Takaki to look closely at Konomi, and see if there’s anything different about her. Anyway, Tamaki says that Konomi has matured. This embarasses Konomi a bit.
April 17
They seem to be talking about the cherry blossoms in the morning, then ghost stories in the afternoon.
This week, our impending lovers make a notch up their relationship by the bento cooking. Yup, the best way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. Konomi doesn’t seem to be confident about her cooking skills though. Also, we see that Yuji is still Tamaki’s pinching bag, very unlike when she is still not around. I guess his true role in To Heart 2 will be up later on. Tamaki remains the big sister of Konomi, who is looking up to her and tries to be like her. And Karin finally makes her major appearance.
Karin seems to have a mix of Aoi’s story (about unpopular clubs) and Shiho’s hyper attitude. She’s an interesting girl, maybe I’ll play her scenario next (if I still have the energy to). Well it seems evident by now that the other To Heart 2 girls will not make an appearance anymore. None of the twins, and none of those two mysterious characters. Maybe next time (if I still have the energy to).
Having known a little bit more about the game thanks to all the help from game-players all over the net, I find out that To Heart 2 is a branching visual novel that is quite easy to win through. It seems that some wrong choices would not instantly veer you away from a particular girl’s scenario, but a player should make sure to make the right major choices, such as choosing places where they can meet the girl, choices that accord to the personality of the girl, etc.