Voltage Inc: After School Affairs — Rikiya Mononobe Review

Voltage latest game is here! While I did not like the butlers… or the samurai one… or the school one…. and the other school one… and the other school one…. and the wedding one with the two rehashed characters from the other wedding one…. and the pastry one…. and the only route I was interested in in the professional one turned out to be a dud….

This is back to being stuff I like. Namely, secret relationships! A guy with a darker shade of skin! And uhh… that’s pretty much it.

I have to admit I like the SWD games more than Voltage. It used to be the opposite, but I feel like SWD have better concepts and art. Especially art.

Seriously, all those Voltage dudes look the same.  Don’t come after me voltage fangirls

I always play the prologue, but if it doesn’t interest me then it’s deleted.

Anyway playing the prologue and suddenly

Oh.

Oooohhhhhhhh

Okay. I’ll play his I wonder when it’s going to come out–

OH LOOK IT’S THE ONLY ONE AVAILABLE

L-U-C-K-Y!

So, Sir Rikiya takes the “tough nuts teacher with the heart of gold and sketchy background turns rag-tag students into success stories” trope and… well, that’s his story summed up in a nutshell.

The premise is stupid. So you’re a teacher and you teach at an all-boys school full of idiot kids who happen to be great athletes. Your school is pretty poor and your building is run-down and such. Next door is an all-girls school that happens to be one of the best academically and full of the right princess-y types.

Like there would be a inner cities school right next to a upper crust boarding school type. Like any single-sex school is going to be where the poor are. Come on.

So the girls school buys out your school and they’re combining into a coed school (Called Seishun High School, which is literally “Youth High School” and laziest name I have ever heard.) and your idiot students have to keep a 90% score on all tests in order for you to keep your job. Oh, and the students can’t date. And neither can the teachers. Because morals and all that jazz.

In Rikiya’s route (IDK if it’s like this in the others), he gets the students with Ds and Fs. And ofc they’re all a bunch of troublemaking rejects. And ofc he’s going to have a shady past that lets him identify with those students and inspire them to greatness.

And your new apartment? It’s where all the teachers live. Of course. Voltage just loves to use that in practically everything they write.

Okay, so I didn’t like the prologue.

BUT Rikiya.

Yes.

Swoon.

So I went over the plot several times in talking about the prologue. That’s literally the plot of the story, so I’m going to talk about other things.

I noticed this a lot in Voltage Inc games, but the heroines are so caught up in how amazing the men are, they end up paling in comparison. I’m not saying MC needs to be ~the best~, but she does need to be able to stand on her own two feet a bit. In this route, she was a little over her head with the delinquent students and she did learn a lot, so I’m happy with that, however, she didn’t really seem to contribute at all to the overall scheme of things. If we took her out the students would still succeed because their success was tied entirely to Rikiya. I would have enjoyed the story more if she applied what she learned using Rikiya’s unorthodox methods and thus contributed to his classes after school, for instance. As it stands, she adopts his methods for her class only, and that’s about it.

For instance, there’s a part of the story where she’s staying late after school to work on custom review papers for each of her charges. Rikiya comments that it’s a lot of work and she responds that she wants to do it for her students. So when they compete against the advanced classes in every subject, it would have been nice if they beat them in English. Instead, they beat them in science, Rikiya’s subject.

I already know Rikiya is an amazing teacher. It would have been nice to give MC a bone and let Rikiya congratulate her and be happy for her. Shows MC growth, gets a nice scene with Rikiya, all that jazz. I feel like Voltage MCs end up as arm candy for their great men and I’m not too fond of that. Some people like that, and that’s okay. Just not my cup of tea, anymore.

So.. like….

This is after a tense scene. We learn some key things about Rikiya’s past and if you can’t tell by the cuts on his arm and hand, he was supposed to have the tar beat out of him. (To be honest, it sounded really bad reading it, but the sprite’s injuries are more –err– artistic hurt rather than real hurt)

Did they just try to make that sexy?

My homeboy is hurt, got his ass kicked by five men, and now you’re trying to treat his wounds and he’s… licking… his hand. Shirtless. With the fuck me eyes.

But he’s supposed to be hurt.

It’s so ridiculous I started laughing. How can I find that sexy? Why would you draw that sexy?

JFC, look man I love otome games but I’m not desperate for some 2D loving. It’s cool. Tell your story, leave fanservice for like, a skins v shirts basketball game or something. Rikiya loves basketball, he plays shirtless, it would work. Not after one of your most tense scenes.

The second half of the story is about Rikiya’s past catching up to him. It’s sad. After reading it, I decided I really love Rikiya’s character. But as far as the love story goes between him and MC? Not so much.

I’m not a fan of the dual ending thing they have going on. The romantic ending is obviously the real ending, and the other ending is just… not a good ending, from the ones I’ve played. Actually, I was disappointed in the romantic “amorous” ending, for the most part. I felt like it lacked that one “swoon”-worthy moment.

The endings are super easy to get. As long as the meter is in one or the other, no matter how small that window is, you’ll get that ending.

My heart scale is defined as follows – 5 hearts = a story everyone will fall in love with, regardless of preferences; 4 hearts = a well-done story that people who love the concept will adore, and people who don’t may end up liking it; 3 hearts = if you like this type of story or this type of hero, then you will enjoy this, but those who do not like either of those things will probably not; 2 hearts = it had potential, it squandered it; 1 heart = just a waste of time from the get-go; 0 hearts = why was this made?

 

Favorite Moments

 

 

Hidetaka: Just the two of you?

Aki: Please stop reading more into this…

Hidetaka: But Mr. Mononobe’s definitely fond of Miss Kuriyama.

MC: Yeah! I’m a pain in the… Wait, what?!

 

Rikiya: But not everyone meets someone who changes their life like I did. The more hopeless you become, the harder it is to change. I know what it’s like to be a loser. So that’s why I do everything I can to save students who were like me. I’m not saying that because I’m a teacher. It’s ridiculous to even call me that.

 

Wwwwwweeehhhhhhh eh eh eh ehe ehhhhhhhhhhhh

 

I would like to note he does have a variety of expressions but I loved the smirk so much I think I ended up taking too many of them…

Here, have a laughing one

This… this is like super freaking sexy for a bad boy archetype to me… I don’t like the smell of cigarettes.

…. He has a motorcycle… in his apartment…. on the third floor…

I admit, I kept seeing his hurt eye like eyeshadow.

Amazing statements taken best out of context for $5oo, Alex

This is me. This is my life. Who doesn’t like stationery? No one, that’s who!

Side note, there is a character named Konno. She’s not given a sprite, but it’s mentioned that she looks like MC. As a girl who grew up listening to Japanese music, there is one Konno in my heart (center girl) —

So that’s my mental image for MC now, hahaha

 

Anyway, Voltage throws a fit if you upload CGs, so they’re not here. And frankly, they’re not that great. I couldn’t really decide on what to use as a feature image because I didn’t like any of them.

The other After School Affairs Reviews:
Rikiya Mononobe/His POV
Shinichi

Taishi

Forbidden Orientation