Edit on 1.6.2020: So I officially platinumed the game! I had to read through the short stories in the extras menu, and then it was off to find out which endings I somehow missed. I was right that I'd missed one of Enomoto's, though I had done all of the others. I also had missed one from the common route that takes place before the specific routes. Got the ending trophy and then the platinum popped.

Completion: 100%

1.5.2020 For some reason, my review posted with like half of it missing and other parts unedited from when I was working on it, so I dunno what happened. Had to go back and redo it all. Hopefully I remembered everything.

Finished the fifth and final route last night, and went through all of the bad endings for him (Yanagi).

Now I just need to clean up the last few trophies to platinum. (I'm not super into trophy/achievement hunting, but I do like working toward them in most games, and VNs are the only games I ever platinum. Now that Vita is basically dead and VNs are moving to Switch, I wish more than ever that Nintendo had a trophy system.) Based on what I have, I just need to go through some of the extra stuff in the menu to get the last few CGs and bonus tracks, but I'm also missing an ending somewhere? I don't have the trophy for all of the endings, but I do have the ones for all of the good endings and the "tragic love" endings, which are glorified bad ones. I have a feeling that it's probably the first route that I played last summer (Enomoto's), because I know I did them all for the last three routes, which I played more recently. There's no way to tell because there's no log for bad endings, and I save over the load spots to go back for bad endings when I start each new route... However, you are able to load up specific chapters with affection at high/low, so I should hopefully be able to do it that way.

For the actual review:

Favorite route: Tie between Yanagi and Shiraishi. Since Yanagi's route is the "true" route and has to be unlocked by playing the other four first, it has most of the big reveals and actual information about the Adonis organization. Yanagi is also just a sweet dude. Shiraishi's was uniquely fun, because he's a whacky cat-lover who doesn't understand emotions. His ending made me feel a little ripped off, though. I like Okazaki's for being slightly set apart since he's not part of the "main group," but the story for his route was just kind of lacking. Sasazuka's the dick of the group, but his backstory was good. I think Enomoto's route had the most actual detective/mystery elements even if he himself isn't my favorite, so I appreciated it for that. It honestly had a lot of depth that the others lacked.

So, in short: Yanagi/Shiraishi > Enomoto/Sasazuka > Okazaki (which kinda makes me sad because I like Okazaki as a character)

[My actual play order was Enomoto, Sasazuka, Okazaki, Shiraishi, and then Yanagi. This was the recommended order since Shiraishi's is somewhat spoilery.]

Overall plot: The plot is decent. The main theme is discovering one's personal form of justice, so there are a lot of different approaches to justice presented. I wouldn't say that it really made me question my own beliefs, but I can't say that I fully disagreed with the "bad guys." Our heroine, as per a main character's usual, believes that every life is precious and no one deserves to die... Would I cry if dog-torturer Michael Vick died? Big nope. I don't feel bad about feeling that way, either. But I'm also not planning on starting up an organization for people to get revenge through substitution murders, so there's that. My point is that the game did a good job of actually making me think about it, and also presented the "villains" in a way that they juxtaposed the heroine's ideals, but kept them relatable and very much human.

Characters: There are a lot of supporting characters, both on the police force and working for Adonis. I really liked Hoshino's coworkers, like her superior Mochida and her new girl friends Mukai and Sakuragawa. The girls were more prevalent in Shiraishi's route, which is part of why I really liked his. Many of the criminals had interesting backstories and reasons for joining Adonis. The reveal of who the leader of Adonis was actually surprised me a bit. There weren't any hints in any of the first four routes--it's all revealed in Yanagi's route. It's not like there were a lot of options, but they still did a pretty good job of not making it super super obvious.

OST: The music suits the game and the situations, but it's nothing super exciting. None of it was really annoying or anything, but it also isn't an OST that I'm gonna actively listen to outside of the game.

Gameplay: Most of the game truly is just reading, which is what I play VNs for. There are also 3 different situations in which you'll make dialogue choices: while Hoshino is talking to another character, texting another character, or deciding what her next step should be. There is also an interactive "Trigger Mode" that happens a few times in each route. You have to time your press of X with a circle moving into another static target circle, which causes Hoshino to shoot. Failing at this is how several bad endings are reached. Overall, more story/dialogue-focused, which is good.

Overall thoughts: Character designs are really nice. Voice acting is great. I liked the game well enough, but I started the first route in summer of 2019, so... I guess that tells you that I liked it enough to finish it, but not enough to want to play it all straight through. Not bad, but not amazing.

3/5