[You are mine and mine alone], alas [You are mine], a popular visual novel that managed to reach rank 9 of the top 10 in the "Scream" app for online games. Even though it's focused in dating simulator system, the changes in the gameplay thanks to an AI and the minigames over the story made it one of the bests games of the year and the tops of its genre.
To clear the story, all you need to do is to make one of the heroines to fall in love with you and get the happy true ending, but, thanks to the AI, the player is not the one that makes them fall in love, rather, it's them that tries to make you fall in love. It's one unique system where those events can occur when you pass time with the heroine, making it something bold and could have turned the sales down in the market, but the risk was worth and they managed to get many copies sold around the world.
The way they make you fall in love changes with the way you interact with them and how and when you do it. The AI will change the gameplay to adapt to your style and make the most suitable heroine go to you. The player may choose another heroine, but the AI will make one or more heroines go interact with the player and it may cause a bad end from those events. At first, it may be a bit weird to say a normal high-school girl could cause a bad end just because she is not the one you had chosen to be with, but, this is also something that the game has of uniqueness: all the girls are crazy to be with the protagonist.
Everything is allowed in war and love. The developers took it seriously. The girls will come to you with the intentions of locking you up, stalking you, confining you, hurting you to be near them, even the most extremes would kill you and die just to be together. Most of the cases, the heroines will try to kill each other in silence and be with you like it's normal. Now, this is where the game becomes interesting: to reach the happy true ending, you need to make the heroines understand that you can only love the one you had chosen and not allow them to kill each other. This is something difficult, seen that you can't know how much the heroines love you, resulting in the choices you make through the game something you must think very carefully; just one wrong answer may cause in the death of one heroine.
Needless to say, it's a fun and interactive game. Even though it's a visual novel with dating simulator on it, there were many gamers which bought it because of how interesting it was.
And yet-
-Why would I brother play it?
There was one boy that wasn't convinced of it. He looked at the game box on his hands with boredom.
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
-Really, how could I play something like this? "A thrilling experience of being haunted by your true love"? "All the girls are yanderes for you!"?
He reads the descriptions written on the box.
-I don't even play visual novels, even more with those...settings.
The boy sighs as he looked outside of his room's window. Snow falls in the streets, trapping all the people in their homes. The school was suspended until the storm is clear, even though it's middle September.
Still, it caused that nobody was recommending to leave their homes until it passes. There was no problem at all, his mother made a good amount of groceries' shopping, there was light in the house, you could say it was the ideal day off for somebody that doesn't leave the house much if it wasn't for...
-And why the internet is the only thing that is out?!
Exactly. There was no internet. He couldn't play any of his games, which requires an internet connection, and how he could do in his pc was to stare at the screen.
If it wasn't for his friend lending him [You are mine] than he wouldn't have any games to play, and for that, the boy could be a bit happy, if it wasn't...
-Seriously, why you are the only thing I can play?
(I bet this is my fault. I could have bought some of those indie games to have as a backup plan for when the internet is out, but, of course, I had to just look at the big shots and their new multiplayer-only games...)
He sighs again.
-You know what? I bet the internet will be back in no time. Yeah! Let's stay positive! The snow maybe looking bad right now, but if it calms down just a bit, I think I may be able to-
-And now we turn to the weather news. It's up to you, Sarah.
-Thanks, Tom. Apparently, this snow day is going to stay a while in our calm mountain city of Growswood. For what the meteorologists say, today is the best day to get something you may need for this snow-storm, because it will be sticking for a whole two weeks!
-Whoa there! I hope nobody was going to plan any travelings for this days because this will freeze their mood! Now, we return with the meteor who will pas-
He didn't need to listen to the rest of the news. The boy already put the disk on this pc and was letting it install.
(Ok, this is just because I don't have anything else to play. This is my last option, yep, it's just because it's my last option. There is no other way to pass time, so I'm just going to play this for a while, and not because I'm curious or anything.)
He looks at the loading bar as it's completed. The menu is formed on the screen, asking him to press any key to start the game.
-You better be good to make up my time.
The boy, Chris Chambert, press "Enter" and the game begins-