Title: アマナツ
Developer: Azarashi Soft
Release Date: 26th August 2022
Age Rating: 18+
Length: ~20 Hours
Links: Official Website, VNDB
The protagonist Touga Haruto grew up in the city and hated the rushed, competitive nature of the lifestyle there. So he takes the chance to transfer to a highschool deep in the countryside one summer, ready to face new hardships. However this doesn’t happen and he finds himself enjoying the slow-paced life with his new group of friends.
Shortly after moving, he meets three girls, and with the background of his first summer in his new surroundings, finds friendship and perhaps even love.
Thoughts
As I’ve mentioned a significant amount on this site, Azarashi Soft are my favourite eroge company for moege – they have perfected their formula and offer incredibly sweet pure love stories. Amanatsu was one of the two full price titles they released last year so I of course pre-ordered it. Was it up to the same standard as their other games?
Amanatsu differs slightly from the other games in the “Ama” series by almost being closer to a more stereotypical moege than the usual Azarashi Soft formula. This means that the game has a longer, more clearly defined common route centred around a group of friends and greatly focuses on the theme of enjoying youthful summer days. Despite being something a little different, I think this was managed well and its not as if the heroine routes suffered as a result so it was fine by me.
One thing I have been sad about in some of their other games is the lack of group CGs and we finally get them in Amanatsu! Despite still maintaining a good number of CGs per heroine they managed to squeeze in a few extra in the common route which just adds to the production quality of this already great game.
Surprisingly the three male side characters – Kou, Iori & Mitsuru – are all voiced and have sprites which also marks a departure from the usual. While not all of the characters would be on my favourites list, I think having their inclusion was definitely a positive thing and they added a lot of humour to the game. In fact, Amanatsu is probably the most light-hearted of the Ama games.
We’ve had winter and autumn (and spring if you count Amaemi as that season?) so I guess it was time for a summer game and the staff definitely managed to create the perfect vibe for the game. Playing through it immediately brings you back to those lazy summer days during school break which was immediately nostalgic for an oldie like me (lmao). The slow-paced life of the cozy countryside setting was also captured well and was refreshing to read.
Even though I’ve spent some paragraphs talking about the differences, Amanatsu is like its sister games in that the romance with charming heroines is a selling point. It definitely delivers in that regards and all three of the heroines are as likable as one would want from this type of title.
Kazuha is the daughter of the landlady who is renting the protagonist a room. She’s also a tsundere who isn’t exactly pleased about having some stranger live in her house so as you can imagine there’s some sparks flying there. Overall she’s actually a very good example of the trope and once you crack her shell Kazuha is incredibly cute. I imagine she was very popular, haha.
Kogane is the token genki kouhai character who the protagnist mistakenly thinks is drowning and dives in the sea to save her, leading to their chance encounter. Being voiced by Akino Hana, it should be quite clear that she’s similar to the original Amakano’s Koharu in more ways than one which clearly makes her an easy favourite for me. Her cheerful disposition is infectious and there was a lot of cute fluff in her route. Very good.
Personally, Yashiro was the heroine who surprised me the most. I initially thought she’d be a bit boring – the typical yamato nadeshiko type miko heroine which isn’t a trope I really enjoy. However, she’s a little more than this and I found the more eccentric areas of her personality to be very fun and memorable. Super cute for sure.
Honestly the artwork in Azarashi Soft games are enough of a reason alone to pick their titles up and Amanatsu is no exception. Character design and artwork were provided by Gintarou for this game and it was generally of VERY high quality. The SD artwork from the queen Marotaro were too cute as always. The were a good number of CGs per character as well – the game’s production values and volume were something I was definitely satisfied by.
Conclusion
Rating: 8.5/10
Whilst there are some changes to their usual formula to keep things fresh, Azarashi Soft has once again managed to deliver an excellent moege. I truly believe that they are one of the best at the genre if you are looking for solid, sugary romance stories with memorable heroines and impeccable artwork. At this point I’m hooked and plan to buy any new releases from them but at least I have their back catalogue to get through between those as well. At this point I’d say just pick the game with the heroines/setting that most appeals to you.
The next Azarashi Soft title I plan to play is Amakano2 and hopefully soon because the fandisc is out at the end of April! If only memoria hadn’t taken so long…
Thanks for reading~
Zettai Renai! 