Thoughts about Hana Awase New Moon -Himeutsugi Volume-

Hana Awase New Moon -Himeutsugi Volume- is the Nintendo Switch rerelease of the second game in the Hana Awase tetralogy, which originally debuted as a series of Windows PC games back in 2012. The Switch port from dramatic create (HuneX) comes with an extra short story as a bonus with each volume, as well as multilingual translations (text only) and an upgraded card battle system. 

I played the previous game (Hana Awase New Moon -Mizuchi Volume-) back when it was first released on the Nintendo Switch in English in late 2023, and really liked its blend of unhinged plot twists, menacing love interests and hanafuda tournaments, so it was only a matter of time before I got to the second game in the series: Himeutsugi Volume. Each of the four games is based around a specific love interest (or love interests) from the 'Five Brights', the star pupils of the card-battling school the main character attends. 

Although Mizuchi, the stoic romantic lead of the first game, wasn't my favourite of the Five Brights, I ended up finding him endearing by the end of his volume once all of his secrets had come to light. Conversely, the other male leads - who only have 'bad ends' in the games which don't bear their names - ranged from nasty to disinterested, displaying all kinds of controlling and abusive behaviour. The one I enjoyed most ended up being the angelic-looking Himeutsugi, whose twisted yandere approach to love was interesting. As a result, I went into his game with high expectations for a delightfully bad time.

I won't even try to describe the details of the plot of the series, which can generously be described as 'convoluted'. The format of Himeutsugi Chapter is very similar to that of the previous game but everything plays out differently in the story. The main character (default name Mikoto) is enrolled in a famous school specialised in the art of Kasen, which requires male-female pairs to do battle using magical hanafuda cards which can purify or destroy people. This time around, her assigned partner is the 'princess-like' Himeutsugi. Mikoto has to quickly improve her skill at Kasen and figure out who she can trust - and learn about her popular, superficially-perfect partner. The lead also has to take care to ensure that she remains a virgin throughout for contrived plot reasons, so needless to say there's a great deal of pent-up sexual tension in between all of the card games.

Himeutsugi is preoccupied with the idea of playing the role of a prince, partly due to his 'princess' name and dainty stature, and partly for backstory reasons which become apparent later on. Meanwhile, his childhood friend Kagami is a woman who speaks, dresses and acts like a dashing man. The lead's affectionate friend Momotose is also voiced by a male seiyuu despite being very overtly feminine in every aspect of her being. I like how the game freely plays with gender expression and convention even though, at this stage at least, there's no great depth to any of it; there's even an in-universe metaphor for being intersex and card game 'pairings' with three people instead of two. It softens the inherent awkwardness of the in-world card game being structured around a rigid gender binary to accommodate the otome game formula - and adds to the inscrutable atmosphere.

The other characters range from stereotypical to the bizarre. I'm particularly interested in the twin headmasters of the Kasen school, who seem to know a lot about what's going on even if they aren't sharing at this point in the series. The main story is only revealed in tiny snippets sandwiched between moments of overblown interpersonal drama so there's still a lot to explore in the next two games. If you play your cards right, however (sorry), you'll at least be able to make a happy ending for Mikoto and Himeutsugi this time around. 

And then there are the bad endings, where you can end up with one of the other leads but never obtain happiness with them because the lead still yearns for Himeutsugi in some way. These are wonderfully dreadful with all kinds of problematic tropes, yet they're worth playing through because a lot of the exposition comes up in the other boys' storylines. It's also fun to see Hime as an antagonist again; I seem to like him best that way. The ill-fated routes for the other characters are reasonably lengthy and detailed even if they can't ever lead to a good end.

The artwork for Hana Awase is provided by prolific otome game illustrator Yura and eschews more conventional designs, presenting the game world in flat, stylised, minimally-detailed drawings which add to the traditional themes of the world building. It works pretty well, supporting the voice acting to convey emotion. Speaking of the voice acting, I particularly love Fukuyama Jun (Mizuchi) and Tachibana Shinnosuke (Himeutsugi) in their roles. Mikoto is sadly unvoiced.

I should also mention that unlike most otome games, which are typically visual novels or stat-raising simulators with a few minigames, Hana Awase is themed around a hanafuda-based card game called Kasen. To advance through the game you have to master the card game too, learning the combinations and a few tactics to handle the difficult battles. You'll level up as you progress so that you can deal more damage to opponents and use special abilities, which ironically makes the final battles way easier than some of the earlier ones where your advancement is affected more by luck. 

The card games are quite addictive and can be difficult at times, though I ran into a bug in this volume which spoiled the challenge. For some reason, I was able to accidentally trigger a glitch which kept offering me the same cards round after round during a particularly tricky match against the opponent 'Lucky 7s', making it impossible to lose. The same thing happened later on while I was playing through the bad ends. There was also a one-time crash and a weird issue where I lost game stats, as though my saves became muddled. None of the technical problems dampened my experience but perhaps a little more bug testing would have been a good idea in this case.

The previous game in the series was rated for 16+ in the UK on the basis of 'strong language', while Himeutsugi Volume is only rated 7+ for 'mild violence'. However, even though there is no explicitly graphic content at all, several of the characters are extremely horny and there are near-constant references to sex, sexual threat, sexism, physical arousal, self-pleasure, coercion and questionable relationships throughout the main storyline. I'm not sure whether the people rating the game were unusually open minded or whether they just skipped through most of Karakurenai's dialogue (not to mention Himeutsugi's relentless lust) but I find it difficult to understand if it was deliberate. There is also frequently off-camera violence and casual murder. In Japan, all four of the Hana Awase games are rated CERO D (17+) which feels more appropriate.

It may be that the game's unusual art style is considered unlikely to attract casual gamers, hence the lower rating, but this is something to bear in mind for sensitive players who aren't expecting so much thirst and general awfulness in between their card battles. Although the challenging themes are appealing to me - I find squeaky-clean stories less engaging - they definitely won't be everyone's preference. 

This Switch rerelease is the best version of the game to date for global otome game fans due to being able to freely swap the text between English, Chinese (traditional/simplified) and Japanese. I played through with the English translation and found it acceptable, albeit with an above average number of typos and inconsistent translation choices. I must emphasise that the plot of the game is bonkers, which the translation can only do so much to mitigate. Expect a lot of card game-specific terminology, florid poetic descriptions and people with bizarre titles, emphasising how alien and specialised the school at the centre of the plot is supposed to be in-world. Sadly, Hana Awase does not include an in-game dictionary like other modern otome games, even though it would probably have benefited from one more than most.

Overall, while I enjoyed this volume and like Himeutsugi more than some of the other love interests, I found the main story a little lacklustre compared to the rollercoaster of Mizuchi's game; Hime never delivers the menacing atmosphere that I expected from the key art (and his antics in the previous title) in his own route. Conversely, despite him being an unrepentant, abusive jerk for the early chapters, Karakurenai came across quite well by the end - which is fortunate as the third game in the series has him as a main character. I'm rather looking forward to spending more time with him again soon.

And indeed, despite the games confusingly being unnumbered I think it's important to stick to the release order: Mizuchi, Himeutsugi, Karakurenai/Utsutsu then Iroha. The overarching plot is complicated but there are some late-game scenes in each volume which tease what is going on behind the scenes, and watching those play out in chronological order is definitely the intended experience.

Last but not least, the music in these games is fantastic! The battle theme (and menu music) are particularly catchy, upbeat tracks to get you in the mood for card combat, and there are also quite a few theme songs. Like this one released for the Switch port (仮初のAgape by Sakizakura Momoka) which plays at the start of the game and is - of course - no longer available for purchase anywhere. All of the soundtracks for Hana Awase are annoying to collect for various reasons but I do wish they'd at least release a physical CD with the Switch themes.

Hana Awase New Moon -Himeutsugi Volume- is available through Nintendo's online eShop platform and as a physical edition released in Japan. The game cartridge includes the same English and Chinese translations as the download edition for collectors without access to the eShop, or for those who want the security of owning a physical copy. It's definitely not going to be for everyone but now that I'm at the halfway point, I'm happy to confirm that I'm still having fun with this eccentric otome game series.