Hakuouki Stories of the Shinsengumi

Intro: Chizuru’s searching for her missing daddy whilst genderbending in Kyoto. She makes it so far only for some dudes to try and steal her sword, and as she’s fleeing, Rasetsu (called Furies in English lol) slaughter her pursuers. Luckily, the Shinsen-ikemen arrive before they get to her. But now that she’s seen the Shinsengumi’s “secret” they have to deal with her. Prepare yourself for La Tragedy of Le Ikeman.

Final thoughts at the end!

Heisuke Todou: a nationalist imperialist who looks like he inspired Hinata‘s design rofl. Heisuke’s the youngest of the group and is generally a cheerful guy until PLOT happens. He leaves with Itou and Saitou as part of the Guard (for the emperor’s tomb). Itou plans to destroy the Shinsegumi by revealing the Rasetsu. The Shinsengumi decide to kill Itou and the Guards to stave off the threat, and Kondou asks them to save Heisuke before it’s too late. When they confront the Guard, Chizuru doesn’t do a thing and so Heishi shields her and he dies. He chooses to become a Rasetsu because he was born as a bastard son and figures no-one would miss him. She and Heisuke run into demons called Kazama, Amagiri, and Sen. Sen proposes that Kazama impregnate Chizuru, who is a demon lady, because demon babies are powerful.

Sanan then loses all of his marbles and force kisses Sen to transfer his blood to her, claiming that he’s been”chosen” to make a Rasetsu army and he kidnaps Sen. Chizuru goes DERP what does he want her for? (ლ‸－)(－‸ლ) Heisuke evolves from ikeman to MegaIkeman via haircut and Chizuru’s ovaries explode.  They get a letter from Sendai about the Great Northern Alliance and it’s signed by Sanan as Retainer of Sendai Domain…They go take down Sanan and his army, kiss, and omg I was so confused. Kimigiku dies and then she doesn’t? Well they murder Sanan’s ass and Kazuma and Sen go off to make babiez. I liked Heisuke and even liked his hair before he cut it – Chizuru, I can’t believe you never once realized how amazing this dude was until he cut his hair!

TB Okita Souji: was on my AP World History exam a few years ago so the moment I saw the Shinsengumi otoge rofl I just knew where it was gonna go for everyone. Okita’s adamant about Chizuru not getting close to him but she does so anyways 😛 Turns out Kaoru is her twin oni-chan who hates her guts and yet is a total siscon. Kaoru tricks Okita into drinking the Water of Life. Eventually Kaoru’s all “what else can I do to make you feel pain?” and he shoves a bottle of Water of Life down Chizuru’s throat. But this was only a test to figure out how much Kaoru needed to drink to be stronger. He thought once Chizuru remembered the past where the humans murdered their village, she’d magically join him on a quest to kill all of the humans and create a Rasetsu kingdom. But alas, it didn’t go as according to keikaku.

Daddy shields Chizuru from Kaoru and he finally dies!! (￣ー￣)//”” And then Souji and her roll around in the grass and his tuberculosis never went away…so it sounded to me like he died when he “fell asleep” and begged Chizuru to tell him her feelings. Which she did over and over and over and over. So, did he die? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  I liked Okita but his route was: “Hijikata betrayed him Kondoooooo” + ANGST & tuberculosis. Oh and evil siscon traps. I liked how Chizuru actually did something for once other than stand there going “Oh there’s a sword coming at me but I’ll just stand here and do nothing DERP” but the romance was really lacking.

I fully admit to squealing when I got this CG

Hajime Saito: is who everyone swoons over. I can see why, his design is on point;) but the real Saito was an unattractive drunk. Saito’s extremely taciturn and when he does speak, it’s only because he has useful advice to share. He takes heed of every situation and twists it to his advantage when he can. He’s also a master of the iai sword technique. His route was how he learned to see another way of being a warrior even when he first believed it meant following a leader and killing people. Saito was so scared that his life would be nothing when the way of the warrior was gone but Chizuru helps him with that. He gains the respect of Amagiri who literally helps him wipe out Kazama who loses his shit when he starts getting bested by a “fake” demon rofl. The whole fight reminded me of those cheesy ass cartoons where the villain just goes insane and starts dramatically speaking like he’s the most evil dude evar. Thank God Saito killed him. I was getting a headache. Saito and Chizuru spend their days in peace after we find out that everyone else just died.

He finds a new lord to serve under and one day when he doesn’t come home on time Chizuru goes to find him. I thought he got her a present because he kept ducking away from her. But he just wanted to have her watch the snow fall with him rofl (｡♥‿♥｡) He was a blushy cinnamon roll and I wished the romance had been stronger. Especially on Chizuru’s part because damn gurl. You never once thought about him romantically until he kissed you. WTF.

Toshizo HIjikata: I decided to play him next because Harada and Kazama were supposed to be the “happy” routes and I wanted the death and sadness over with. Hijikata is a total ikeman. Even back then! He was given poems and stuff declaring his bishiness rofl. Hijikata seems to take a liking to Chizuru right away but he’s too tsuntsun to show it and she constantly tries to be useful but always messes up. He then fights against Kazuma and becomes a Rasetsu. During a decisive battle against foes well practiced in Western battle techniques, he makes her promise not to die and to protect Kondou. Amagiri attacks her. But he saves her and later everyone starts saying that she and Hijikata are getting pretty close 😉 Kondou does his sacrifice as in every route & ugh I felt bad for Hijikata. Keisuke Otori, Commander of the Denshu, wants Hijikata to become the commander of the advance guard. They end up taking a castle but the oni are here to mess that up and Hijikata nearly dies. Otori appoints Chizuru as Hijikata’s official page when he leaves her and he realizes what an idiot he was and he kokuhakus. They kiss, he fights Kazama and one shots him like it was nothing, and is named ‘Hakuoki’ because like the cherry blossoms, he’ll wither and die very fast.

I can see why he’s the poster boy. Damn he was great. He started off as a farmer who was raised by his sis and he finds that what do you know? Chizuru’s not that submissive in his route once she realizes she wants her man 😉 And his voice was so sexy. I love the accent he had. I get that he was supposed to sound gruff and angry but damn I loved his accent. Yes please. 😉

Sanosuke Harada: seemed like the typical flirt but that wasn’t the case at all! xD Dude is best friends with Nagakura (who should have a route too-why doesn’t he have one?!) and while Naga likes to go have some fun bunny humping time with the ladies in Yoshiwara (red light district) Harada isn’t keen on it. He’ll drink but not anything more. He’s also the only member of the Shinsengumi who doesn’t die or takes the Water of Life so no bad ends! After Kondou becomes daimyo and is all “let’s take down  the enemy!!” via suicidal tactics, Naga and Harada ragequit and leave the Shinsegumi. Eventually Harada reveals he’s always wanted a waifu and to live in peace. So they have sex. Rofl like what every other guy dies, endures being Rasetsu and only get a chaste kiss. WTF Chizuru has a son and they live the rest of their days happy and content while we’re reminded of the fact that lol everyone else died miserable deaths.

Chikage Kazama: Chizuru’s told to go to Yodo Castle with Inoue but a cannon separates them and she’s almost raped by soldiers that betrayed the Shinsegumi. Kazama murders their butts and informs her that everyone’s going to betray her. Sen pops up thinking he’s here to kidnap Chizuru but nope. He just wanted to mess with the humans cuz he was bored -_- which makes those showdowns in all those other routes completely pointless and messed up his character. Chizuru asks to go with him. He owed the Satsuma domain for hiding his clan when the shogun tried to wipe out the demons but he no longer aligns himself with humans and he can’t stand what Kodo is doing. He kills him and comforts Chizu.

He lets her do whatever she wants, tagging along to watch the end of the Shinsengumi, and he admits he only got involved with the samurai was because he liked her but was too tsuntsun to admit it. He kisses her and tells her he’ll come get her if she doesn’t come to him 😉

 

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Final Thoughts: Death of the Ikemen

If you’re a history nerd like me, you’re prolly gonna shit bricks because YAS. Sure there were liberties taken but it was enjoyable to go “Zomg I know what they’re talking about!” while my friends had to constantly wikipedia dat shit 😀

In the otoge community, Hakuoki is regarded as God, or le pinnacle of otoge…and well, this was the first game brought over for English speaking audiences. But the constant reiterations of this same damn game was a little much. Like I have the 3ds version, the PS3, etc. and then I had to figure out which was the definitive one. And don’t get started on how Otomate is milking dis shit. I don’t understand the hype but then again I didn’t even know what otoge were when it came out. So I don’t go insane over this like some do.

I knew going into this that all of them would die. It’s based on historical events so no spoilers there guys. If, like me, you haven’t gotten around to title this for some reason, it ain’t no spoiler. Everyone cries over this game. I even was given pre-funeral announcements when I started this game rofl.

Considering I had a real funeral to go to before I finished this game, it was 10x more depressing to play it. 

I wanted Otoki, Nagakura, and Yamazaki to have routes and why did they use the death music for the kiss scenes?! That just killed the mood for me….

I loved the op and ed songs. Art is gorgeous as expected. The PS3 has so much more content than any other port but holy shit was the platinum annoying to get. 

So, that was Hakuoki. I was shocked with how much I loved Hijikata. His route was depressing (as all the Shinsegumi ones are except Harada’s) but he was so damn perfect. I’m perfectly fine with him being the poster boy! XD Next fav would be Kazama but they should’ve developed the romance between Chizu and him a little more. 

In order from fav to least fav:

Hijikata>Kazama>Saito>Harada>Heisuke>Okita (I still can’t like yanderes sorry)

If you’re new to Hakuoki the most romance you’ll get is in Harada and Kazama’s routes. The game is literally a history textbook with romance and “vampires” and demons thrown in for plot. Personally, the textbook stuff was awesome, but I can see others going “omg just kiss already”

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Have you played this? Who were your favs? Who did you want to have routes? What did you think about the romance?

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