Title: Zettai Meikyuu Grimm (絶対迷宮グリム)
Console: PSP
Genre: Otome
Language: Japanese
Company: Karin Entertainment
Summary: Even if you never bother with the actual game, the OST might be worthwhile.~
Story: At 10 years old, the lead girl makes her dream of the future to find the man of her dreams by age 16 and live as a happy family. One day, a demon appears and sends her and her childhood friend into a “nightmare” where they are suddenly 15 years old!
Characters: 7. One of the few full-out otome games where the lead female has a voice (that you can turn off, of course, but I generally prefer to have it on) \o/
Cast:
Ise Mariya – lead
Mizushima Takahiro – childhood friend
Kakihara Tetsuya – genki kid
Asumi Kana – Rapunzel (who happens to be a female gamer)
Terashima Takuma – mysterious adult
Kishio Daisuke – Frog Prince
Mizuhara Kaoru –
Suwabe Jun’ichi –
Narita Ken –
Hirakawa Daisuke – older brother

Graphics: 9. beautiful art and nice interface~
Sound: 9. Great music, really brings out the mood of the game. I also really like the op song in a creepy way. XD Only problem is, the whole OST consists of like 4 BGM tracks that are just flat-out overused throughout the whole game, so you’ll be hearing them… a LOT. They’re GREAT BGM pieces, but I really don’t think they should be used THAT much in a single route.

After taking some time off from playing the game, then just listening to the OST, it’s easier to get to like the pieces and hear the actual difference between pieces, so I’m bringing the score up to 9.~
The character concept CDs are full of nice character songs with similar compositions.~
Gameplay: 6. Interesting bit about this game is you have a time-limit to answer the choice questions, and some questions require you to let the time run out in order to get the right event.
Weak points are having to clear another route in order to open the frog prince and childhood friend’s routes… and not being able to skip the prerequisite routes properly if you’re not interested in them. Also as thus, this game is a HUGE BUTT to play if you don’t use a walkthrough or if you’re horridly unlucky with multiple choice (me). One different choice will send through you through to a bad end 5 hours later.

I’m also a bit irked about the storytelling in general. The whole feel is too episodic with little to no connection from one chapter to the next sometimes, especially when you start moving down someone’s route successfully. That’s kind of to be assumed because it’s going over different fairy tales, but it’s not very enrapturing.

Mizushima snaps towards the end of his route… to me, that really came out of NOWHERE. Narita’s part was at least foreshadowed, but what. I don’t mind some DRAMA in an otome game but I need some proper lead-in into it ._______.;
Replay Value: 6. The game does a nice job of making each route unique, but unless you’re really into the characters enough, it’s somewhat of a pain to skip through every time, or do any of it without a walkthrough.
Overall: 6/10. If you’re a TOTAL geek about Grimm’s Fairy Tales or something, you might find something amusing about this game. And one of the biggest pluses was the option of having the girl voiced. But if you’re anticipating some juicy otome goodness from the cast selection alone, I’d say you’re in for somewhat of a disappointment.

Screencaps (From Mizushima’s route. And yes, I picked that name for the girl quite on purpose :D)
Music shares
Official Site

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