DRAMAtical Murder - General Review

IN CELEBRATION OF THE ANIME COMING OUT TODAY, I DECIDED TO THIS LAZY ASS GENERAL REVIEW 8'D (May do a more in-depth one of the routes someday, but not sure)

(because I need otome breaks lol)

So since this is a general review, it'll pretty much be spoiler-free, save for a couple important details that are needed to know to understand the story.

Gawd I've been wanting to play this game forever. XD But, not too shabby if I do say so myself; only about 2 years after the release date. 8D (For some reason, I thought it was longer than that. Guess that's what happens when you try and play catch-up with Vivid Color)

I loved this game so much. This may come as a shocker to some, but I actually do thoroughly enjoy engrossing plot in my BL besides just frick-fracking all day lol. Despite its colorful art and upbeat music (especially for a Nitro+Chiral game), the exact reason that it is a Nitro+Chiral game means it's not going to be some fluffed up game. I mean damn, half the reason I found it so intriguing was Aoba Desire's whole "I'll destroy/break you" (俺 が お前 を 壊してる) thing haha. On top of that, you could say it's sci-fi-ish in a way with it being futuristic. Though if you think this is bad, you really ought to play Nitral's other titles LOL

Main Cast:

Aoba → Atsushi Kisaichi

Ren → Takeuchi Ryouta

Koujaku → Hiroki Takahashi

Noiz → Satoshi Hino

Mink → Miyake Kenta (Though for the anime release, it got changed to Matsuda Kenichiro)

Clear → Masatomo Nakazawa

PV1

Note: Although the video says "Noise", the official spelling is "Noiz"

PV2

 

 *ahem* Anyway. DRAMAtical Murder (DMMd) is a BL R-18 game created by Nitro+Chiral (so if neither are your thing and you're just gonna bash, do click the back button)

In Midorijima, a plentiful island to the southwest of the Japanese islands, mankind and nature once coexisted.

However, due to being purchased by "Toue Company," a powerful corporation in Japan, one-third of the island has been changed into an extravagant amusement facility called "Platinum Jail". Equipped with the latest cutting-edge technology, Platinum Jail has gathered attention. On the other side, the islanders who became victims of forceful development are forced into the "Former Residents' District", and have no choice but to carry out their lives in a place that is by no means prosperous.

The protagonist Aoba Seragaki spends his days working part-time at a junk shop named "Heibon," inside the Former Residents District, living with his grandmother Tae.

Among the youth of the Former Residents District, a certain game has become popular. In "Ribstiez," teams are created and days of human-bullet turf wars unfold. On the other hand, "Rhyme" is an electronic brain online game using a virtual world as its setting. Aoba shows no interest in either game, thinking that it would be nice to just live peacefully with his grandmother. But naturally, a disaster is bound to shake up those peaceful days.

Well when you begin to play the game, the order of whose routes you do first doesn't really matter, so long as you complete the first four first. From there, you can access the True Route and True Route's Bad Endings. ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉAnd cry from feels or be slightly disturbed

Common Route
The common route sets up the foundation of the game, throwing you into the plot before you branch off to a specific character's route. Basically what happens is this: Aoba is your normal young adult who lives with his grannyma and works to make a living. Customers he has to deal with over the phone love his voice (it's important) so even though Aoba gets disgusted with them, he just sucks it up and deals with it. He also has to deal with constant migraines, also which are important.

Aoba has this ability called Scrap where he can enter the conscious of others. Obviously this is a dangerous power of his because it grants him the ability to destroy/break someone's mind (Hence the quote "I'll destroy/break you"). And the way to activate Scrap is to lure someone in with your vocal chords/voice. Aoba wants to stay way clear of this crap but of course life won't make it easy because his ability is well sought-out for. As to why he even has Scrap in the first place, well.... That's something revealed in the true route: Him and a certain other person were birthed in a certain place, and that other person has an ability that parallels Aoba's vocal Scrap.

As to why he gets migraines, that would be the doings of "Other Aoba" inside him trying to awaken, who wants to do nothing more but take control of Aoba's body and destroy destroy destroy. Having a migraine is a sign that other Aoba wants to come out to play.

To simplify, other Aoba is like another conscious. "Normal Aoba" is "Reason", "Other Aoba" is "Desire", and the final conscious whom I will not say is "Restraint."

So through his adventures, Aoba lands himself in dangerous situations and ends up meeting a wide range of characters - Koujaku, Noiz, Clear and Mink - who basically have a similar goal: Destroy Toue, who is stirring shit up and has affected their lives one way or another.

Aoba is also very attached to Ren, his All-Mate, despite being a really old model. Just throwing that out there~

CONCLUSION

My thoughts on the boys: (This section will have slight spoilers for each of the boys, so feel free to skip to "Music")

• I feel like Koujaku fans are going to impale me... 8D There are some parts of him like I liked, but there were quite a few times I wanted to punch him. A lot lol. In the end, he's kind and understanding towards Aoba so I suppose he made it up. His does seem a little stereotype, which is why I actually thought some parts of him to be boring... I think I actually enjoyed him a little more in other's routes than his own. XD Anyway, Koujaku is the perfect childhood guy friend.
• Noiz's route was intriguing. At first he comes off as some brat, but it doesn't take long to find out he can't feel pain. Hence why he wears to many piercings; to try and discover what pain feels like. (Trust me, there's a story behind the pain thing) Despite his initial meeting, he's actually a sweetheart and gets quite a bit of fluff scenes haha. He's also younger than Aoba - the youngest out of all of them actually - so that was interesting. Did you know they originally planned to make him a Shota? XD He's so tsundere though haha.
• *snickers* Clear is so silly. If you want to go with something light-hearted and comical, then I'd go with his route. Just make sure to grab some tissues at the end. 8D Clear would be the adorable/gentle android in this game.
• Egh, Mink. There was a reason I saved his for last... See, I loved some parts but hated other parts of his route. Just FYI, there's zero romance in his route. For me personally, I'm not fond of overly possessive/abusive/raep characters. HOWEVER *slaps defensive Mink fangirls away* I understand where he's coming from, seeing as he's the type to never give up on his mindset no matter the consequence and to throw out things that are no longer useful to him. That doesn't excuse his actions though. He does also have a caring side to him as well that shows through every now and then. I was completely hooked towards the end with all the tension and whatnot. He also wasn't as fleshed out as he could've been (And got much justice in the sequel game: ReConnect). He's the BDSM rough oji-san in this game.
• Self-cest? Incest? I don't know. But the "True Route" is ridiculously adorable AND IT ANSWERS ALL OF THE GAME'S QUESTIONS.  (ﾉo3o)ﾉ (And his fangs, HIS FAAAANGS ;akdsfj) No matter what form he takes, he's adorbs all around. This dude's my favorite in both character and shipping (despite the questionable thought that might bring haha). Regardless, I think he fits as the "main seme" (even though many people see to think it's Koujaku). He's a type of character I don't really see too often, the "forever guardian angel" :3 (And it's so sweeeet)
• Bad End Boys ... They're not twins~! ;D You don't see them too much throughout the game, mainly making their appearances towards the end. But their route is a bad end only so... poor Aoba. ewe Really I'm not sure how to label them other than yakuza that make a toy out of you. 8D

Music: I was a little surprised to hear such upbeat music from a N+C game. But it fits well with the art and theme of the game, and I adore it. Yes, it even works during the tense moments haha. Besides the array of BGM music, each guy also gets 2 different credit songs: 1 for the good end and 1 for the bad end. (The exception would be Virus/Trip, since there's is an automatic bad end)

Art: I really enjoyed the art of DMMd. As I've stated before, the art's actually kind of cheery with a bright palette, and I adore it. There's also consistency and no anatomical inconsistencies between sprites and CGs that'll give you eye cancer (´∇ﾉ｀*)ノ (And no, not in "that" way, all my head-in-the-gutter readers haha)

Replayability: There's a lot of reasons to replay DMMd. The obvious reason is because of who's route you're going towards. I like the routes in this game because it's a bunch of puzzle pieces to figure out what the hell's going on. You learn more as you go along, and finally all the knowledge that's been building up is answered in the true route (which is why you need to play the first four first to completion). Now I know some of that might seem kind of "well... duh", but you'd be surprised how many times I've felt disappointed, playing one route and then having no motivation to play others because they're all the same copy-pasta over and over. ewe

Story: I really adore the story here. 8D Especially Aoba's Scrap ability which doesn't make him the stereotyped submissive male-damsel and allows him to destroy people's minds, hnnng. (Go strong protaggie! haha) Stuff just keeps adding up and once you understand everything it's just... it's a wonderful feeling haha. Also, only completion of the Good Ends are required to unlock true end. However, I would definitely play the Bad Ends. They're so interesting! Plus, if you're into Yanderes, you get some yan moments in half of em. It's interesting to see where failing or succeeding in Scrap can take you. (°∀°)b This game is also (much) shorter than most N+C games - and if I'm not mistaken, not as heavy.

Not really into BL? If you can get over having to skip over the H-scenes that are typically in the middle of the game (During Glitter) and the end of the near end of the Good End, then you should be good and free to enjoy the plot~

Voices: I'm very pleased with the voices in this game and who got paired up for who. Let's start with Aoba's seiyuu: Atsushi Kisaichi. I liked his voice a lot (it sounds unique to me ewe), and it didn't sound strained at all when he went lower for Aoba Desire. It also wasn't the stereotypical uke voice. I think the first time I heard Noiz's seiyuu was Toma in Amnesia, so it was a different change of pace to hear his tsun voice than his happy and... yandere. XD Mink's seiyuu, holy crap his voice is deep. I loved how Clear's voice was upbeat, fitting with his personality. Trip didn't speak much other than just grunts of affirmation, so it's hard to say. Virus' voice held a touch of sarcasm, which worked well with his role. I'm not sure how to describe Koujaku's and Ren's voice, but they're fitting to the character they're for. Even though Sei (CV: Iguchi Yuuichi) isn't a dateable, the soft voice went well with his gentle nature. Even antagonistic characters such as Akushima had great voices. XD

Miscellaneous thoughts: Aaah, poor Sei. I wish we could've done more with him. He seemed like such a sweetie. (´；ω；`) Aoba Desire is also misunderstood a bit. Despite wanting to destroy everything, he's actually not that terrible a being as Aoba (Reason) makes him out to be. He's actually pretty lonely. I also like to think that he was protecting Aoba after he failed Scrap in Koujaku's bad end; he knew Aoba felt extremely guilty, so he took over so that he wouldn't have to see what Koujaku had succumbed too. Also. . . I WANT AN ALLMATE TOO!! I'd have it do all my homework, hahaha. 8D Jk jk. It would be cool to have one though. Ren is so adorable, and so so fluffy. Gawd, I love fluffy things; I'd cuddle him and stroke his fur all day. I want an All Rate like Ren kay? ≖‿≖

My favorite routes would have to be True Route > Clear & Noiz (Two separate routes but they're tied; don't make me pick) > Koujaku > Bad End Boys > Mink

Until next time! 

俺 が お前 を 壊してる ♥