BLUE REFLECTION Reviews

Stepping into the world of Blue Reflection feels like entering a captivating anime, where ordinary schoolgirls secretly wield extraordinary powers. They become "Reflectors," journeying into the Common, a fascinating dimension born from our collective unconscious. Here, emotions take on monstrous forms—the "Sephirot" and "Maligna." We follow Hinako Shirai, a talented ballet dancer whose dreams were cut short by injury, as she discovers this hidden ability alongside her new friends, Yuzu and Lime. It's truly engaging to see them dedicate themselves to protecting their classmates' emotional well-being. As they delve deeper, battling these emotional manifestations and solving personal dilemmas, you're drawn into a larger mystery about their world and the very fate of humanity. What really stands out are the charming character moments and compelling story beats. The game's full of fun interactions and genuinely good humor, especially in those text message exchanges that feel so real. The core of Blue Reflection is a neat blend of daily school life and turn-based RPG combat. During the school phase, you navigate the academy, chatting with classmates in visual novel style and engaging in activities like crafting or joining clubs to deepen your bonds. These interactions aren't just fluff; they reveal character backstories and emotional struggles, directly leading to missions in the Common. The gameplay loop itself is pretty enjoyable, offering some really cool attacks and a fun, laid-back vibe during battles. However, not everything is perfect. Those after-school activities can feel a bit tacked on, almost like a less polished version of what you might find in Persona. There are times when the walking and fighting just feel too slow, making everything seem a little stilted. And honestly, the combat can be super easy – almost to the point where you can't lose, which takes away from the challenge. The ending also felt a bit lackluster to me. And let's not forget those side missions; they can be a real chore, especially when you're forced to complete them just to move the main story forward. It can be a real pain. While it's enjoyable, and I had a good time, I can't help but feel it's such an uneven experience I can see people dropping this one at times. Overall, I'd give it a 6.5 out of 10.

Honestly, a really poor execution of an otherwise good idea. The plot revolves around female friendship and dealing with trauma, where empathy is kind of a game mechanic. I said "kind of" because, like everything else in this game, it's also half-baked and surface-level. They knew the majority of players who would play this would be either women or perverts (as you've probably seen in the reviews), so they didn't think it deserved a proper budget, story, or gameplay. They thought marketing a game toward women alone would be a bad business decision (which isn't true at all if you check how well "girl games" sell when made properly), so they shamelessly added fan service to a game about trauma, vulnerability, and empathy... The gameplay is also a complete joke, and it's by design. Since this is a "girl game," they assumed we wouldn't know how to play video games, and the game starts by explaining how to open the menu and other basic stuff like that, and this is an underlying problem throughout the entire thing. Everything is so shallow and basic, including the insultingly easy turn-based combat. You may think this is a narrative-driven game about friendship dynamics and that we can forgive the fundamental game design issues, but you would be SO wrong. The story has an interesting concept that isn't well explored in the gaming industry, so it seems nice on paper; but like everything else in this game, it's also shallow. The friendship dynamics aren't the worst, but the characters lack depth, and their traumas are mostly downplayed or just lazily written. I bought this alongside the second game during a sale because they never go on sale, and I didn't want to miss out. But I can wholeheartedly say: SKIP THIS GAME. I wouldn't even buy the second one after playing this mess if I didn't already have it, but people say the second game is better in every aspect, so I'll give it a chance sometime.

Everyone has that game that has a lot of flaws but love it regardless of it, this is mine. Blue Reflection set us on the shoes of Hinako, a highschool girl and ex ballerina that after going through a period of depression comes back to school but in the same day is recruited by two twin magical girls in their fight against outer-dimensional beings that are a threat to humanity, not only to protect humanity but also heal her career ending injury as a reward for doing so. They will also have to help their fellow schoolmates deal with their daily life problems as this is their way of getting stronger, by healing other people's hearts. Story is divided in chapters, each of them introduces a new npc that appears and gets added to HInako's friendlist allowing her to bond with them during her free time. If I'm honest I would say this game is more of a Visual Novel with some JRPG elements as this Visual novel sections are the most important part of your character growth. The story has some interesting developments here and there but sometimes they feel like something's lacking far, even so I found it interesting enough to keep me interested on it. Gameplay is where the game brings its more interesting ideas, featuring a turn based system that features a timeline to decide who attacks first and can be manipulated through certain means, giving the player 3 units, each one most suited for a certain role each but with some room to variation, some extra mechanics added during boss fights and the fragments system that allows to customize your skills with buffs. The gameplay loop is simple, each chapter will usually ask the player to do some sidequests and reach a minimun level before proceeding ot the next one (or a boss fight if there is). The sidequests are simple, go to the general dungeon and gather items or kill enemies most of the time. However there's no need to do more than the minimun required as characters level up and acquire fragments through the friendship system (talk and sometimes give advice to npcs), which means there's no real grinding needed to beat this game, instead you'll mostly be reading the conversations from the friendship events in order to level up your characters. Boss battles are a spectacle and where the game truly peaks as they expand the combat system by adding more actions and since the bosses are sturdier than the common enemies you can enjoy doing your craziest combinations to tear through their defenses but not only that, these fights go through 3 phases, each one fetauring a more powerful version of the battle theme and end with a special cutscene where our MC does a unique final attack to defeat them, a great example on how boss fights should be made in this kind of games. Since I mentioned the music, let's go with presentation. The game has kind of whimsical and calm vibe to it from the colors to the landscapes and the music by Hayato Asano does an amazing job for the overall cozy feeling the game offers. But the battle themes? they go really hard with a mix of orchestra and electronic elements that really get you in the mood for combat (specially the bosses). The cast of characters designed by Mel Kishida are pretty good, making justice to the campaign where the game was originated (Beautiful Girls festival), each girl that appears in the game (all characters are girls after all) has a simple yet effective design that manages to give hints on how each of these girls might be, either on the way they dress or the facial expressions they usually have. having said all the good points it is time to quickly mention the not so good ones: -Story lacks a little with its side characters, they have interesting problems but the solution doesn't always land with impact. -Gameplay can get repetitive even if there's no need for grind, there's only one dungeon with 4 variations that are the same in structure. -The friendship system almost has no caps so it's easy to get overpowered with it (maybe good for some) -Leveling system offers the option to level up characters by stat groups, this gives the idea that you can try different builds but there's one that will always be more OP than the others (Mainly an issue if you play on hard) -Dungeons lack guidance when chasing specific objectives during main story which can lead to players getting lost and disoriented -Fanservice: While I personally didn't care nor felt bothered by it I know some people do get picky about it (and some enjoy it lol) so here's what to expect: Undergaments (and very detailed designs at that), bath scenes with fog, pool scenes with "interesting" choices of camera angles, fondling (I don't remember if there was something else).

Weak port of a rather flawed game, held back by a lengthy social bond grind, barely existent enemy variety in typical shoestring budget JRPG form, never mind the lengthy introduction (the full experience doesn't really become available until chapter 8 or so), but stick with it, and there's a gem here, shining through the cracks. Kishida Mel's art is as beautiful as always; his way of capturing the essence of young women really shines in a mahou shoujo setting—naivety, innocence, uncertainty, and a latent sadness, back to back with classic shoujo melodrama, heavy on friendship and teenage existentialism of the feminine variety. Combined with a phenomenal score by a former [i]Atelier's[/i] regular, it's a slam dunk in narrative and aesthetics, the hit or miss nature of your befriendable fellow students and their personal stories the only piece that fails to impress. A smaller, but more developed selection would have fared so much better. A shame that the battle system is quite frankly stellar, given that, not including the bosses, the same several enemies are recycled ad nauseam throughout the entire game; reasonable depth and complexity, without going overboard, or trying to reinvent the wheel, and extremely satisfying to use skills across all three party members. For me, [i]Blue Reflection[/i] is a similar experience to other underfunded JRPGs like [i]Crystar[/i]; if you're willing to deal with a few caveats, and can wait for a sale, breezing through on easy for the story and adjacent positive qualities is worth the trouble, and good context for the far superior sequel besides.

okay, i'll be honest the pacing is slow BUT have you ever heard of the saying "good things come to those who wait"? well, this directly applied to blue reflection. if you have the patience, you're in luck! we NEED more cutesy magical girl games like this!! i was so in love with the art style/overall aesthetic.. it's VERY gorgeous!! this is what heaven looks like. that's genuinely what led me to (impulsively) purchasing the game when it went on sale!! anyway, i love how realistic the characters are! their struggles and emotions are so real.. all of the vas did an outstanding job with delivery!! this game isn't that difficult regardless of your selected difficulty, it's relatively easy! idrm that much, so it wasn't a deal breaker for me but i know it may be to those seeking a challenge. the music is peak and the ending made me tear up. i am very attached to hina-chan and the twins.. they will forever hold a special place in my heart!! i'm so excited to start the 2nd game soon!!!! <333 11/10