Amagami Game thread
 

Bishoujo non-h adventure game. This was done by the same people who created Kimikiss.

Translated from Japanese:
Produced by Enterbrain of Kimikiss fame, Amagami is another love story about a boy (you) finally plucking up his courage to go ask the girl of his dreams out.

Due to a traumatic experience in the past, Christmas is a time that troubles you most. However, you know that this is your last chance to ask your crush out, as this is her last year of high school. Is it alright to leave your crush as nothing more than a mere crush?

Get your acts together and leave your shell. Who will you end up with in the end? The elite class representative? The sweet underclassman or the senior you've always had a crush on?

Features extremely clean artwork, great character designs, and a deep story and character interaction. Amagami has seen strong popularity in Japan (need source).
If a fan translation appears for this, I wouldn't hesitate to fork out the $60.

First Trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2boMcDrrJ8o

Official site
http://amagami.info/index.html

http://amagami.info/images/download/...024_768_01.jpg
http://amagami.info/images/download/...024_768_02.jpg

I was curious on what this game was all about... and it seems like it's somewhat similar to Kimikiss after all... thanks for the story summary. :D

Though, it seems like the time frame/limit now is a whole school year, rather than Kimikiss's 30 days? (Not sure, memory's fuzzy.)

Is it a visual novel or is it a dating sim a la Tokimemo?

Isn't that the same thing? Unless, you mean... Visual Novel games tend to lack decision making and has a linear story, while dating sim games allow tons of decision making and the story is kind of like the "choose your own path". However, visual novel is the general term of dating sim games in most cases with a few exceptions.

Amagami Videos (Youtube)

Watch whatever you like...

Perhaps he means pure renai as opposed to action or mystery.

Not at all. Tokimemo-type dating sims are stat-based + choice-based and most of the game is spent raising stats. Most general visual novels on the other hand are purely choice-based. Based on the videos this seems to be the latter type.

Stat-based is great. Choices-based is also great. Linear story with neither isn't.

Amagami is definitely choice-based.

I think this game only lasts about as long as kimikiss. The game start about a month before Christmas and the goal of the protagonist is to get a girlfriend before the 25th comes along.

Okay, I started this, played about 20 minutes. I quit because I couldn't figure out how to save and I was running out of time. From what little I saw I wasn't drawn in by this game. The girls all look almost exactly the same, even your little sister. Round face, big eyes, dark hair, same-ish features. Not much to choose from at that point. Also the main character is too snarky. I don't want to help him do anything, I want to smack him on the head. His "any girl will do so long as I have a gf by Christmas" goal is particularly galling. I'm going to put this on my "One day when I'm really really really really bored and I've played everything else" shelf.

I agree that the premise of Amagami is shallow, but I don't think that it's that different from Kimikiss. I disagree about the fact that all characters are more or less the same. The girls range all of the stereotypical characters that a dating-sim should have. There's the childhood friend, the shy kouhai, the popular sempai and the tomboyish girl :p.

How the main char meets some of the characters is also kinda surprising (well at least for me)

I didn't say anything about their personalities. I was talking about their looks.

My bad, misread what you wrote. I won't argue the fact that they look pretty similar. Actually, the fact that they all have natural dark-colored hair is surprising since usually, anime characters have hair that range all the colours of the rainbow.

actually
 

I thought how most of the girls had black hair was what was so attractive about the game, but yea, it is unusual. I do agree they can be a bland if they all look so similar. I find that once you start playing the game longer and get to know the girls better, they become easily distinguished, not just in visuals, but in personality.

The character designs are really clean. Colour palette is clean and vibrant. The game has sold very well in Japan, a testimony to the effectiveness of these particular set of character designs. (can't source sales data, did the research too long ago)

From the Media-Create data for the week of March 16 to March 22 (ie: the first week of sales), Amagami ranked at #3 in Japan with 42 000 units sold :)

As for the character designs, even though everyone does look similar, I wasn't really distracted by that. What drew me to the game was the solid seiyuu cast that voiced the various characters. It includes Shizuka Itou (Hinagiku in Hayate no Gotoku), Rina Satou (Haruka in Minami-ke and Mikoto in To Aru Majutsu no Index) and yukana (C.C. in Code Geass) <3

Sorry to bump this back, but got this game a few days back and it plays fine, but like Dorfl I have no idea how to save. Does anyone else know when it's possible to save in the game, where or how?
I've read the guide but couldn't see anything about it, I've probably just missed it, and i don't feel like doing a complete play through without saving at all.
Any help would be really appreciated!

It's a very nice trailer....

If you still need help, while you're on the map menu for picking events. Hit triangle to get to a menu and save.

Man... this is such a great game, yet the thread is dead.

Sorry for bumping this thread.....but some reason, while I was searching for vids with the "Gundam SEED" tag on Nico, I came across an Amagami vid with said tag.

http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm6569471

Now, at around 0:50-1:00 there's a line that could possibly be a reference to the series, but I'm not sure. Someone put a comment around there saying that it could be. Anyone able to verify this?

Great artwork, cute girls. I've never played a game like this, whats a good place to start for trailors or reviews?

I suppose you can try searching on Youtube or if you have a nico account you could go to niconico.