Criminal Girls 2: Party Favors Review

When you think of Hell you probably think of fires raging, demons ripping people to shreds, and an incredible amount of suffering, right? That’s not the case with Criminal Girls 2: Party Favors. In this journey, you play as a Program Instructor, who is tasked with helping seven beautiful girls get a second chance at life through “reformation.” This is, of course, met with many different challenges from an antagonizing pest that is constantly slowing down your progress by making you go through trials and tribulations in attempt to keep you in Hell forever.

From the beginning of the game you have access to five of the seven characters, but can only use four during battle. The battles start off pretty simplistic due to the lack of skills, but eventually get much more involved with combo attacks, skill attacks, group heals, and support skills. You earn these skills by “motivating” the girls using bondage style mini-games such as “Scrubby Scrub", "Spanking X" and "Pinch the Balls” which I will get to later.

Once you have a few skills under your belt and you start fighting stronger enemies, the game really begins. During fights each girl has an attack, heal, or support option. These options are mostly situational, so if you have a lot of magic power or MP, you’ll most likely be forced to attack using a skill. Also, if your characters are low on health, your healer or healers will get a healing prompt. The game definitely knows what situation you are in, which makes the battle system a lot of fun. There are a few ways that you can re-randomize the skills as well, just in case you don’t like the hand you were dealt. It’s always nice when a game attempts to change up the turn-based fighting, but it’s even better when the game nails a unique design. 

As I mentioned before, you use mini-games unlock new skills. Each mini-game has four levels and after each completed level you get to choose one of two skills. These mini-games use the in-game currency, CM, so you can’t just play them whenever you want, but as long as you’re doing well you can get a new skill every 2-3 attempts. Now I’ve played a few games with fan service and I feel that there is no reason to make a big deal about them, but the one mini-game that I felt was a little odd was "Shocking Bondage." The other mini-games aren’t really meant to inflict pain, although I really have no idea what is actually happening in “Pinch the Balls", but this one does and I don’t know why. You may have heard about the western version’s censorship, but after watching a few videos and doing some research, I would say that the censorship is being blown way out of proportion. There are only a few things that changed and the most noticeable one is the sounds that the girls make while actively playing one of the mini-games. There is also supposed to be a reduction in restraints, but when you think “censorship” you imagine something that is much more explicit and that’s not really the case here. So if you’re in the mood to protest the game because we aren’t getting the “real” version or something along those lines, I’d have to say that the fight you’re putting up is a lot of effort for something that really doesn’t change your experience. With all of that being said, I do have an issue with how the mini-games and the story are somewhat disconnected.

Criminal Girls 2 is all about facing your demons and getting a second chance at life. The girls start off timid, nervous, and reluctant, but as the story progresses they become powerful and confident. So my issue lies in the fact that you have the development of strong girls only to shock, pinch, and scrub them. There is even one scene when one of the girls appears to have a tear on her cheek. I’m not even saying that the motivational games are a problem, but there is definitely a better way to work them into the story. Maybe next time the motivational tactics can unleash some sort of direct ability from them that makes a bit more sense. I’m not a game designer by any means, and I trust NIS, but there has to be a way to incorporate these activities in a more seamless way. Are you ready to get back to the gameplay? Me too!

As you traverse through Hell you find quite a lot of landscapes. There’s Bloody Hell, which features big stuffed animals (or real animals) with severed heads and blood everywhere, Sunken Memories which is dark and has school / home feel to it, Maze Hell which has butterflies and flowers everywhere and a few more. The changes in scenery make it a lot easier to traverse through, compared to a game which is just fire and demons over and over. I really enjoyed the different levels and always looked forward to see what the next one held. 

There are also plenty of enemies in the game and the only time you really feel like you’re seeing the same enemy over and over is when you’re grinding. This is a nice touch, because there are a lot of games with fan service that rely on the sexuality of characters to propel them through the story. There are also many interactions between the characters that show fantastic character development. You really feel like you’re learning a lot about the girls and you begin rooting for them. 

Overall Criminal Girls 2: Party Favors is a JRPG that with many upsides. I do wish that the mini-games were more connected to the story and who knows, maybe we will see that in Criminal Girls 3. If you’re looking for a new JRPG to play then Criminal Girls 2: Party Favors should definitely be on your radar. I mean, there’s no doubt that this is the sexiest journey through Hell you’ll ever take!

4 out of 5 stars 

Thank you to NIS for providing the code!

The Gamers Lounge Goes Hands On At The 2016 NIS Press Event

NIS' 2016 lineup is going to be incredibly strong. Here's my impressions of the games that I was able to get my hands on. 

Stranger of Sword City

Stranger of Sword City is a first-person dungeon crawler where survival is the name of the game. You control a party of six characters, but don’t think that having more characters gives you an advantage. I consider myself a pretty seasoned JRPG player, so I figured each battle would be fairly straight forward; however I was wrong. Stranger of Sword City isn’t the type of game where you can press X, kill stuff, and move on. Each battle really makes the player work and this is perfect for those who love a game with a challenge. When I asked about the length of the game, I received a rough estimate of 20-30 hours, but was told that there are multiple endings which add a lot of replay.

One of the things that was mentioned by the NISA team was that the Stranger of Sword City took a more western approach to the artwork to make it look less like an anime. As a result of this, you get a JRPG with art that is sort of similar to Dragons Crown and that’s not a bad thing at all.

Stranger of Sword City will be released March 22nd for the Xbox One and April 26th for the PlayStation Vita.

Grand Kingdom

Out of all the games at the NIS Press Event, the one that I heard the most discussion about was Grand Kingdom. This 2D tactical RPG features an awesome battle system where you really have to plan out your attack. Your party of four, as well as the enemies, are spread out on a plain where you must strategically move around and attack. Sounds easy enough, right? Well, where the real challenge comes is that your movement and attacks are limited to the amount of stamina you have. If this wasn’t enough of a challenge, you can also hurt your fellow companions with friendly fire and accidentally heal enemies if they are too close to your allies when you cast a spell / use an item. If you’re a fan of the Valkyria Chronicles series, you will definitely want to check out Grand Kingdom.

One of the greatest features of Grand Kingdom is that you can take your created team online to battle against other players.

Grand Kingdom will be released on the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita June 21st. One quick side note, I was able to play Grand Kingdom on both platforms and can honestly say no matter what system you choose, you won’t regret it.

Touhou Genso Rondo

Love bullet hell games? Then you need to see Touhou Genso Rondo! This game features all the intensity that you would expect when you are being bombarded with thousands of bullets, but with a huge twist. Touhou Genso Rondo is actually a competitive shoot ‘em up (or shmup) that was compared a few times to Street Fighter. Having played very few shmups in my day, I was confused on how it could be compared to a fighting game until I got my hands on it. At the beginning of the game, you select a character that you want to play. You then go into a mode that would be similar to arcade mode in any other fighting game where you take on enemies one on one.

This mix of genres was fascinating, if nothing else. I was pretty confused at how to effectively attack at first, and I ended up getting destroyed in my first attempt. Once I switched characters, I was able to get a better grasp on what I was doing and began defeating opponents. I hope that bullet hell fighters catch on, because I believe that there is a lot of potential and NIS deserves praise for not only introducing this genre to the west, but for taking a chance on a game that you wouldn’t normally see in the states.

Touhou Genso Rondo will be out on the PlayStation 4 this summer.

Criminal Girls: Invite Only PC

I love my PlayStation Vita, so it’s no surprise that I’m always on the look out for the next game to play on my commute to and from work. One of the games that I keep seeing pop up on Amazon, GameStop or Best Buy is Criminal Girls: Invite Only, but I have been reluctant to pick it up because of my crazy backlog. So when I saw Criminal Girls: Invite Only on display, I figured it would be a good chance to try it out. What I didn’t expect was to get as hooked as I quick as I did. The battle system is fairly unique in which four options appear on the screen and you have to select one. Some of the options can be solo attacks, group attacks, or heals. I should mention that there could possibly be more attacks, but these are just the ones that I saw during my hands on.

Criminal Girls: Invite Only for PC will be released in April of 2016. Now I just have to decide if I want to wait to get it for my PC or if I should just pull the trigger now and get it for the Vita. Also, at the end of the of the announcements, there was a hint in the picture below that Criminal Girls 2 will be coming to the West.

Yomawari: Night Alone

Now for the darkest game at the NIS press event, Yomawari: Night Alone. What seems to start off as an innocent game about a girl and her dog, almost instantly takes a surprisingly dark turn. Unfortunately, the game was still in Japanese when I was playing it, so I couldn’t really advance that far in the story, but what I did gather was that there are ghosts all around that you can reveal by shining your flashlight on them. If you get spotted by a ghost, you must run and hide until the coast is clear. I’d talk more about the story, but I’m going to choose to leave out any details because I believe that it could spoil the game. What I will say though is that if you like games like Limbo, Murasaki’s Baby, and Dokuro then Yomawari: Night Alone will definitely be a game you will want to pick up.

Yomawari: Night Alone will be coming out in North America in late 2016.

There you have it! Overall the 2016 NIS press event was a success in my opinion. They have a great lineup of upcoming games, and the fact that they are making a strong push to PC and are continuing to support the PlayStation Vita, shows that NIS is dedicated to all gamers, no matter what console they prefer. Thanks for reading!

Pictures from the 2016 NIS press event