Meh. What a boring guy. I thought the more boring the guy appeared the more WTH his route would be, like when I chose the ‘normal’ guy in Kanuchi and he turned out to be all kinds of messed up. Since Hanayaka nari Waga Ichizoku is from the same team I wouldn’t have been surprised if Susumu had turned into an immortal vampire murderous kiddie-fiddler, but alas he had a regular lifespan, nobody he tried to kill actually died and no kiddies even exist in the game, so we can all heave a sigh of relief.

Since his route was so boring I won’t bother summarizing it. There’s not much to summarize anyway, since half the game is the common route. Some stuff goes on with an assassin who has it in for the Miyanomori family but can never quite get the job done and there are betrayals and getting back together and… stuff… I was so bored I fast-forwarded through the final showdown with the assassin, so I never found out what his problem was. Sorry.

Susumu himself, well his mom told him to be nice to everyone, especially girls. So he’s all like “I can be nice to everyone because I don’t really care about anyone” and his route is spent discovering “Actually I do care about just about everyone” sooo, I dunno what made him think he didn’t care? I… I dunno. Urgh… It really sucked.

The worst part of it was when he had to confess his love to Haru. He spent far too much time deciding that he even liked her in the first place, then even longer getting round to confessing. And then when he does confess, it’s just like “I love you.” My dear sir, that isn’t nearly enough! Haru is a maid in your household, and the game has gone on at length about the potential problems such a mismatched pairing might face, beginning with the fact that they might not even be allowed to marry in the first place.

So you don’t just go up and say “I love you,” you actually put some thought into it. What do you want to do? Marry her? Have her as your bit on the side? In the Taisho era there’s no such thing as dating so you either defecate or you vacate the commode, you don’t just say “I love you” and stand there like a chump waiting for an answer. This stupid confession just came across as irresponsible, and Haru was understandably confused. Like, what do you want from me?

Buuuut I was so annoyed and bored that I fast-forwarded till the end of the game, as I said, so I have no idea how they sorted that out. I think Susumu is going to try to talk his father into agreeing (now? why didn’t you do that before talking to Haru so you could make a concrete proposal instead of a vague confession?) and eventually they’ll get married. I don’t even know how they’re allowed to be in a romantic relationship while she’s still a maid and he’s still a member of the hoi polloi but you know what? I don’t care.

It’s partly my fault for choosing a boring guy and expecting him to suddenly get interesting. Idea Factory has spoiled me (in a very bad way). I’m doing a replay from my July save and doing Tadashi’s route this time. He’s a lot less nice to Haru, so it should be fun to see him soften up. If I still have energy after that I’ll do Isami as well. If the nice guys fail, go for the nasty ones!