Well, it has been a little while! I’m just enjoying my brat summer and by brat summer I mean, being a general cave troll. I have been doing a lot with the Lovelycraftians (and I do have a day job unrelated to the internet…well, not really).
Anyway, I’ve started streaming Star-Crossed Myth: Department of Punishments. I started playing dating sims during the pandemic because many were available on Switch and I had terrible insomnia (before being diagnosed with ADHD and getting on Adderall). I’d play games as a way to focus my brain and let my body get tired enough to shut it down.
I’m pretty happy with how the editing came out, I did it all by myself and switched to a program I use for my day job. Its fun to find the exact cartoon sound effect I am looking for when trying to heighten a silly face or feeling. And I always have a fun time doing different voices for every character, although, I always struggle with masculine voices.
This was the second otome game I played, after Kissed by the Baddest Bidder. I think, technically, you are supposed to play the Department of Wishes first but I’ll be honest, those anime dudes didn’t look that enticing but Punishments looked cute so I played it first. I mean, can you blame me?
As much as I tried to deny it when I was a lot younger, I’m a sap for romance and love stories. I think plenty of stories are great without romance but you throw in a good ole romance trope and I’ll hooked faster than you can say enemies to lovers. While the pandemic was tough, and don’t get me wrong, Covid isn’t over, folks.
However, during the height of it, it was tough when I couldn’t see my friends but this allowed me to explore parts of myself I think I kind of ignored for a while. One of those parts is the awful mushy romance lover that I am. I started playing more romance games and reading more romance books, and honestly, I don’t know why I didn’t before.
I love enemies to lovers because I feel at times, it is two characters who have let down their masks in front of each other. We all have masks we wear in society, whether it be in a neurodivergent sense or otherwise. And to be honest, most of the time people I now whole-heartedly love were met at first with dodgy apprehension.
However, a lot of this genre gets enemies to lovers, my favorite trope, completely and utterly wrong. Enemy is a term that should be used with a wink, either they are enemies (say characters on different sides of a war or on various teams that are competing against each other) or they could be two characters who have clashing personalities or aesthetics. They can also be enemies because things may have started with a harmless misunderstanding or judgment on either part.
However, they should not hate one another. The character Scorpio in this game hates your character and all of humanity — sure there is good reason for it, I mean, I guess. However, he is a literal god and has had only just a hundred years or more to go to therapy and work on his weird hatred.
My best friend who I met when I was fourteen, said hello to me in gym class and I panicked feeling awkward, and said hello in an asshole tone. He called me a bitch and I said, “Right back at you buddy.” It took a little while and some other silly circumstances (like him realizing he was not in love with me and that he was gay) for us to form the friendship we have today.
What I love about my friend is what made me react poorly to him at the beginning. I was and still am a shy awkward idiot who sometimes has a tone they don’t mean to have but will match sass when met with it. And I like it when I read stories about folks able to move beyond these things and see the beauty in each other’s flaws.
I’m used to people not understanding me or having a very specific idea of who I am when they first meet me but it isn’t the whole picture. Most of the time when people describe who they thought I was when they first met me and what initially put them off, is actually what they come to enjoy about me the most.
“I thought you were such a weirdo” I am.
“I thought you were a bitch.” I am.
“I thought you were a know-it-all.” or “I thought you were an airhead.” I am.
“I thought you were too quiet” or “I thought you were too loud” I am.
A lot of times what initially puts us off is just a reflection of our insecurities and I’m guilty of this too! This is not to say you shouldn’t trust your gut but don’t be afraid to double-check your doubts and where they come from. Your gut can protect you from a lot of harm but also your ego can wall you in and make you miss out on a lot of cool people. As someone who finds it perfectly fine to ghost after only one date, (which the internet was severely pissed at me for) I think it’s important to trust your instincts when you understand that you are not coming from a place of insecurity.
I also like it when characters have very fleshed-out personalities which happens in enemies to lovers (typically the reason for their initial clashing). However, they do not at their core hate the other’s entire being.
Scorpio hates us in this game and even when he was turning around on his opinion of us, I still hated him. Someone can have trauma but also recognize it as what it is, trauma. Especially when you’ve had plenty of time to reflect on these feelings.
His story was unsatisfying and there is this whole weird boy-mom incestuous love the king of heaven has with him, it’s all super weird and way too complicated to explain here.
Anyway, this game has very varying levels of drama when it comes to each character’s storyline. One character is dying and another is like, I just broke up with my god girlfriend, and now it’s awkward. So, if you play through all the storylines it can be a little jarring, to say the least.
Also, the stories can become so overly complicated and probably could have used a bit more editing. The art is very pretty though, despite it sometimes being a little bit ridiculous (looking at your god outfits).
So I guess this is a review slash rambling? I don’t know I should have been in bed an hour ago.
