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Is highschool more fun the second time around or more of the same?
June 6, 2007 | 11:09 AM PSTby: Matt Furtado
Well it’s time to go back into high school and relive the days of old. Whether you were a jock, cheerleader, nerd, goth, or another social class in high school, Brooktown High will let you relive your high school experience all over again. But lets be honest not everyone was in the "cool" jock or cheerleader group when they attended school or maybe you never attended school and bunked daily. Well either way this is your chance to go to class and be king of the school. Engage in the makeout sessions, dances, tests, and talk with all the cool kids. Brooktown High wants to give you another chance at high school but whether or not you want to be the coolest dude in school is still up to you. Time to revisit your past high school days with Brooktown High: Senior Year.
Brooktown High plays out like a traditional dating-sim. Dating-sims are big in Japan, but they haven't really made a huge impact on the American market of gaming yet. The goal of the game is to pick up a member of the opposite sex while maintaining your grades in classes. Sounds like the old day’s right?
The game will start you off with creating your character. After a series of simple questions your characters personality will be determined. After you get your personality all set and done with its time to choose your name and how you will look. You will have limited options of clothing at the start of the game but as the school year goes on, and you collect allowances and may be land a job you will be able to purchase more clothing for your character. Remember, clothing makes the person in high school.
The school week is very simple to go through. Monday morning comes and you have to get to class in the morning. Before class begins you will have time to talk with fellow Brooktown High students and befriend some of the cooler kids or whomever you decide. Once you enter the school and take one of the four classes you will be jumped to Friday where you'll automatically join up in any job or club you may have signed up for. After you’re done with that its Saturday morning. On these lazy Saturdays you can spend your time studying or practicing one of the games mini-games, and if you happen to have a date planned you'll head out on your date. The games mini-games are unique to say the least. The mini-games include 21 Knickers, BoogieTron 5000, and Tongue Twisters. 21 Knickers is strip blackjack, BoogieTron is kind of DDR but not as fun, and Tongue Twisters is a disturbing kissing game that has two giant tongues flapping each other with a slurping sound go off in the background. Fun, right?
The games pacing would appear to be rushed at the start of the game. However, the pacing of the game is actually very beneficial. The game gives you enough time to talk with the students before class on Monday morning and set-up dates and increase your social class. The rest of the week then flies by and you can get to your date quicker instead of waiting all week for it to occur.
The main problem with the game is the interaction between characters. You'll find yourself in the same conversations with others time and time again. Sometimes they will change what they say on dates, depending where you go but overall you will hear the same thing a lot. Most of the conversations leave hints in what the character likes or wants to hear. But after talking to them a few times you'll know everything about that person.
The conversations are also plagued by another problem. In many conversations you will find two answers, one being positive, and one bad. Sounds easy to understand, but it will get difficult when you don't know what each of the answers mean. The game will offer your two choices at parts in which both answers would appear to be negative but you have to choose one.
All of the talking and dating does have some benefits for your character once you’re all set and done. It will lead them to some kind of makeout session. Those who are looking forward to an intense intimate scene will be disappointed to hear that you won't see any pixel on pixel action but instead see flowers blooming or oil rigs pumping.
The game does have a loading issue. None of the loads are incredibly long but they are very often. If you change clothes, it loads. If you walk into a different room, its loads again. When you use your PDA to check your social schedule or to call someone guess what another load. This slows down the pace of the game obviously and makes the game feel very slow.
The game does feature voice acting, but it is incredibly limited. At times you will hear someone say the first line of a conversation but this leaves you with reading the whole conversation. This is disappointing because the UMD is more than capable of holding voice-overs and has been done of numerous PSP titles like, Grand Theft Auto and Metal Gear Solid.
The game's graphics are actually nicely done. The character models are well designed and nicely detailed. Even the classrooms are nicely made and give you the feel of being back in the halls of high school.
Brooktown High: Senior Year came to America with a dream where dating sims could possibly make it. But it misses out on making the game a really good dating game. Something about a dating game where you don't see anyone holding hands or the makeout sessions is missing the entire point of a dating game. Brooktown High will be attending summer school this year.
Brooktown High plays out like a traditional dating-sim. Dating-sims are big in Japan, but they haven't really made a huge impact on the American market of gaming yet. The goal of the game is to pick up a member of the opposite sex while maintaining your grades in classes. Sounds like the old day’s right?
The game will start you off with creating your character. After a series of simple questions your characters personality will be determined. After you get your personality all set and done with its time to choose your name and how you will look. You will have limited options of clothing at the start of the game but as the school year goes on, and you collect allowances and may be land a job you will be able to purchase more clothing for your character. Remember, clothing makes the person in high school.
The school week is very simple to go through. Monday morning comes and you have to get to class in the morning. Before class begins you will have time to talk with fellow Brooktown High students and befriend some of the cooler kids or whomever you decide. Once you enter the school and take one of the four classes you will be jumped to Friday where you'll automatically join up in any job or club you may have signed up for. After you’re done with that its Saturday morning. On these lazy Saturdays you can spend your time studying or practicing one of the games mini-games, and if you happen to have a date planned you'll head out on your date. The games mini-games are unique to say the least. The mini-games include 21 Knickers, BoogieTron 5000, and Tongue Twisters. 21 Knickers is strip blackjack, BoogieTron is kind of DDR but not as fun, and Tongue Twisters is a disturbing kissing game that has two giant tongues flapping each other with a slurping sound go off in the background. Fun, right?
The games pacing would appear to be rushed at the start of the game. However, the pacing of the game is actually very beneficial. The game gives you enough time to talk with the students before class on Monday morning and set-up dates and increase your social class. The rest of the week then flies by and you can get to your date quicker instead of waiting all week for it to occur.
The main problem with the game is the interaction between characters. You'll find yourself in the same conversations with others time and time again. Sometimes they will change what they say on dates, depending where you go but overall you will hear the same thing a lot. Most of the conversations leave hints in what the character likes or wants to hear. But after talking to them a few times you'll know everything about that person.
The conversations are also plagued by another problem. In many conversations you will find two answers, one being positive, and one bad. Sounds easy to understand, but it will get difficult when you don't know what each of the answers mean. The game will offer your two choices at parts in which both answers would appear to be negative but you have to choose one.
All of the talking and dating does have some benefits for your character once you’re all set and done. It will lead them to some kind of makeout session. Those who are looking forward to an intense intimate scene will be disappointed to hear that you won't see any pixel on pixel action but instead see flowers blooming or oil rigs pumping.
The game does have a loading issue. None of the loads are incredibly long but they are very often. If you change clothes, it loads. If you walk into a different room, its loads again. When you use your PDA to check your social schedule or to call someone guess what another load. This slows down the pace of the game obviously and makes the game feel very slow.
The game does feature voice acting, but it is incredibly limited. At times you will hear someone say the first line of a conversation but this leaves you with reading the whole conversation. This is disappointing because the UMD is more than capable of holding voice-overs and has been done of numerous PSP titles like, Grand Theft Auto and Metal Gear Solid.
The game's graphics are actually nicely done. The character models are well designed and nicely detailed. Even the classrooms are nicely made and give you the feel of being back in the halls of high school.
Brooktown High: Senior Year came to America with a dream where dating sims could possibly make it. But it misses out on making the game a really good dating game. Something about a dating game where you don't see anyone holding hands or the makeout sessions is missing the entire point of a dating game. Brooktown High will be attending summer school this year.
February 8, 2010
