Wagamama high spec Narumi Kouki, our hapless protagonist, writes a risque romcom for a weekly manga magazine. Due to its content, he's kept it a secret from everyone except the two closest to him: Mihiro and Toa.

• • Platforms:
  PC
• Developer: madosoft
• Publisher:Sekai Project
• Release: July 26, 2017

With so many visual novels to choose from these days, it can be tremendously difficult for any single title to stand out. This is especially the case when it comes to slice of life tales set in Japanese high schools. Not only are there tons from Japanese developers, but there are also a surprising amount coming from Western studios. WAGAMAMA HIGH SPEC attempts to tweak the formula by offering up a more intriguing protagonist than most. Players jump into the shoes of Kouki, a high schooler with more on his plate than simply getting good grades. As it turns out, he’s actually engaged in real world work as a manga writer for a weekly publication. His writing work often goes into erotic territory, so he’s terrified of anyone at school finding out about his current career.

Rule 34, if it exists there is porn of it. There's Rule 34 of Vibri out there. Thankfully, it's very rare and not much of a problem (unlike PaRappa The Rapper and Lammy The Lamb), specially due to the game's obscurity. Mistakely calling Vibri 'Vib-Ribbon' (as in the titular dimension the game takes place) will upset or even annoy most of the fans. Vib ribbon rule 34.

There are a few folks who know, though. Kouki’s sister, Toa, knows of his job. It also doesn’t bother her in the least. Most of the time, she’s locked up in her room on the computer or gaming and doesn’t care about much else. Mihiro, Toa’s best friend, also knows about the whole manga thing. Fortunately, neither are tattletales. Everything changes the moment that Kouki accidentally loses his script book at school one day. In the most dramatic turn of events possible, the student council president picks it up. Kaoruko isn’t just the beloved student council president, however. She also happens to be the (up until now) secret illustrator for Kouki’s manga. Thanks to this chance revelation Kaoruko invites Kouki to join the student council – and he accepts.

Soon enough, Kouki gets caught up in student council antics despite the begrudging acceptance of the other member, Ashe. Given her unwavering love for Kaoruko, she can’t help but view Kouki as an annoying boy getting in her way. The story plods along with this neat setup, but doesn’t actually make as much use of the “secret manga author” angle because all key characters know about it already. So that leaves WAGAMAMA HIGH SPEC to survive off the comedy of its hijinks and how interesting its characters are. Despite being touted as a comedy title, it’s honestly not all that funny.

Perhaps some things were lost in translation. Or maybe the script was never outlandishly hilarious to begin with. Yes, there are some super amusing character traits. For example, Mihiro for some reason has the ability to attract and speak to all manner of animal. Ashe, despite her small stature, is a gourmand with insatiable appetite. Overall, however, the writing is at best chuckle-worthy at times and rarely laugh out loud funny. Still, the game moves at a relatively quick pace and most players should be able to go through each of the four heroine endings in about 15 to 25 hours.

WAGAMAMA HIGH SPEC does not seem to live up to its name, which presumably is meant to imply that the women in the game are high maintenance/needy/etc. Sure, they do get jealous and some become clingy to the protagonist. However, none of their behavior is particularly extreme when compared to other visual novel romances. There is one ending in the game that stands out among official English-released titles, though it might not be for the best reasons. One route explores a clearly taboo relationship in a not particularly realistic way. Some players may find this refreshing and others may find it gross.

The Steam release does not include adult content and a patch is not available either. In order to experience the complete game players must purchase the complete game from Denpasoft. In regards to the Steam edition, you won’t feel too lost without sexual content. It’s pretty clear where it is removed but does not detract from the storyline much at all. With that said, there are a lot of scenes cut out. Both versions are quite close in price so it may be worth simply picking up the Denpasoft edition to begin with if you’re interested in experiencing everything.

It might sound like there’s no need to play WAGAMAMA HIGH SPEC, but it does mesh with a certain audience. Folks who adore the character archetypes present will be happy to romance them here. Folks looking for specific taboo aspects in visual novels also don’t have too many official titles to choose from at this point. This is also a high production game with lovely artwork, CGs, and on-point voice acting and music. Typos are infrequent and the localization makes sense throughout each storyline. In other ways, the title plays it safe and that’s really the biggest disappointment about it.

Closing Comments:

Those who devour slice of life high school tales will not likely have qualms about playing this one. It tries to differentiate itself with the variety of character paths and manga author subplot, but unfortunately, none of this elevates the title above its peers. Instead, it stands as an easy, if predictable, read that can keep players company over a weekend gameplay session. If given the choice to spend their funds on this and something else from Sekai Project’s catalog (like the impressive Grisaia trilogy), WAGAMAMA HIGH SPEC proves a much tougher sell.

Version Reviewed: PC

I seem to be reviewing a lot of straightforward moege lately. I guess that’s fine. This particular one has two hooks: 1) the main character is a manga writer (not illustrator; just writer) creating a minor weekly-serialized romcom, DereDere Scramble, in collaboration with an illustrator who turns out to be one of the heroines, and 2) the heroines have massive breasts.

And I mean massive. Mihiro, especially, is well beyond the realm of believability and getting into the realm of, “What the heck were they thinking?” So let’s start off talking about art: aside from thinking the heroines are a little top-heavy, I think it looks pretty good. That said, I admit I’m not especially discerning in this area. The sprites are varied (more on that later), the CGs look good, and the SD art is typically endearing and entertaining. Backgrounds are fine. Nothing extraordinarily memorable here, but no disappointment either. It’s a modern bishoujo game with apparently a decent art budget: as long as you don’t mind its particular aesthetic (big boobs), you’re probably not going to be disappointed on this front.

WagaHigh’s biggest draw, and its most distinguishing feature, is that it is a beautifully scripted game. I’ve never seen a game with as much thought and care put into the scripting as I saw here, and it was incredibly consistent throughout. Most games consider it a job done well to give you a new expression for the speaking sprite with every line, and for those rare lines that need some extra punch, they might even switch up mid-line. WagaHigh is on a whole other level: individual lines probably have on average three separate expressions appearing over the course of the line. Short lines have fewer, of course, but lines with four expressions are common. Moreover, everything is carefully scripted so that the change in expression is aligned with the voiced line, so that the changing mood is reflected both in the voice and the sprite. The translation, while staying readable and avoiding the trap of going overly literal, generally keeps thoughts in order so that they match well with the voiced lines and the changing expressions. The unbelievable scripting imbues the characters with incredible vitality: by the end of the common route, I felt like I knew those people inside and out. For me, the obviously enormous effort put into WagaHigh’s scripting really paid off. The attention to detail with facial expressions made the overall experience special, especially for the common route, when I was hanging on every line and watching every changing expression with glee.

The routes were more of a mixed bag. Ashe’s route was my favorite by a wide margin: it led with a natural progression of the main characters’ relationship by means of a plot which was both unique and engaging, and it concluded with a conflict which seemed inevitable given the characters’ backgrounds and life goals, and which was handled expertly. Everything that happened in the route fit together, made sense as a progression, and resolved in a satisfying way. In contrast, Kaoruko’s route was a mess: pretty much nothing happened for the first three quarters of the route, and then they quickly spun up what looked to be a decent plot, only to have its resolution charge in completely out of nowhere and feel totally unnatural. Fade to white, roll credits, and then a shallow epilogue which felt more like an excuse to show a heroine in a cheongsam than like an actual conclusion to their story. Toa’s and Mihiro’s routes were somewhere in between: not great (Ashe’s was simply great; easily the highlight of the game), but not terrible (Kaoruko’s was actually terrible).

The music is very good. The game likes to lean on a handful of tracks, but “Good Morning to the Sunrise” is so marvelous it sounds like it belongs in a Danny Elfman-scored Hollywood film, so I don’t think I’d mind even if they’d played it twice as much as they did. Sakuragi’s piece, “Straight Ahead,” is far and away the best of the heroine’s theme tracks (and perhaps part of why I like her route so much), and the infrequently used “Run Like the Wind” provides a nice injection of adrenaline for the brief moments when the action kicks in. All in all, it’s a decent soundtrack and well-used.

The characters are fine. Kaoruko is a typical supportive, sweet older sister-type, while Ashe is a classic tsundere: both of them are pretty much stock characters, nothing special. Mihiro gets some uniqueness points for being an abusive but head-over-heels underclassman (underclasswoman?), while Toa, the smart but unspeakably lazy and selfish younger sister, is unique in my experience. None of them felt particularly novel, but a combination of good voice acting and the aforementioned incredible scripting made them all feel quite lively and real, which is as much as I ask for from a moege. Despite my summing up Kaoruko so quickly and dismissing her route as terrible, I thought her character was wonderful, or perhaps simply my type. You rarely see characters in a VN who truly deserve to be called “sweet,” but she’s the poster child for it: supportive, loving, and pretty much perfect to the end. But in general, all the heroines captured my heart in their own way. There weren’t any obviously lackluster heroines in this VN, which I claim isn’t common, in spite of my recently having reviewed Chrono Clock which exhibited the same phenomenon. Among side characters, the class rep, the teacher, and even the good-looking male sidekick with horrible taste in women were good complementary characters, though you probably could have evicted the puerile idiot sidekick and the androgynous underclassman and not lost much from the game.

One important point about this game is that it has a central hook (the protagonist is a manga writer), and it makes good on the promise of the hook. I have a beef with certain moege (looking at you, Chrono Clock) where maybe they start with an interesting premise, but then once they have you hooked they toss it out the window and build a route around the relationship. I’m pleased to report that WagaHigh does not suffer from this problem: it sets up certain expectations, and it generally follows through on those expectations soundly. Some routes are better than others at this, admittedly. Mihiro’s route, in particular, lost sight of the manga focus pretty frequently (though there were still obvious efforts to call back to it). But Sakuragi’s, Toa’s, and of course Kaoruko’s all made a big deal out of the manga, and especially out of tying the relationship with the heroine back to the manga itself. Asking for this kind of consistency and follow-through isn’t really asking for much, I suppose, but it’s nonetheless pleasant to see it done. I also will say that I found the manga-oriented side of the plot to be consistently believable and interesting: it does a solid job of carrying the game, where characters alone would probably have fallen short.

That said, ultimately, this is a pretty shallow game. Pick a girl you like, she naturally likes you back. Things get a bit hairy for a little while, but all’s well that ends well. Like the manga that’s so central to all the stories in this game, the game itself is a simple harem romcom. But there’s a reason this formula is so enduring: it’s also endearing. People like to see pretty girls and happy endings (of all kinds). WagaHigh isn’t anything unique or revelatory, but it is a well-executed game, especially if you look at Ashe’s route in the writing department, or across the board in the scripting department, where, in my admittedly limited experience, it sets a high bar for the visual novel genre. Wagamama High Spec leverages its core plot well, and when the stars align for it, it delivers a truly satisfying read. Give it a try, at least for Ashe’s route.

Pick up Wagamama High Spec on Steam (all ages) or Denpasoft (18+) VNDB

• Fred the Barber's Review

Summary

Pros:

+ High production values: solid music, art, and CGs.

+ Incredibly thoughtful scripting makes the speaker come to life on each line.

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+ Ashe's route is well-written and complete, with drama that's both believable and cleanly resolved: a well-told story.

Cons:

- Other routes are not as solid as Ashe's, especially Kaoruko's, which feels rushed and incomplete.