Adventure of a Lifetime

In Adventure of a Lifetime, you play as Hiroki Mizuno, a teenager returning to the Ogasawara Islands to help his grandmother with her restaurant. On the way to the islands, he meets the half-Japanese, half-American Emily who is traveling to the islands to look for a lost sunken treasure. He also meets up with his childhood friend Chisa who is a skilled swimmer. Hiroki and Chisa take an interest in Emily's goal of finding this treasure and work to retrieve it all while Hiroki gets closer to these two girls.

Adventure of a Lifetime is a visual novel which means it is just about reading the story while making a few decisions at points along the way. As a relatively shorter visual novel, the paths are generally straightforward with a single common route that makes up the first part of the game with two branching paths, each focusing on either Emily or Chisa, to experience with two endings in total. I would estimate it would take around six or seven hours to experience everything this game has to offer assuming that you listen to all of the dialogue.

I thought that the artwork in this game is pretty good. As is expected of a Japanese-made visual novel, the character design sticks to a rather standard anime appearance that is not very exceptional, but it is competent. Where the game really shines is the various background art and CGs which do an excellent job of bringing the environment to life. Taking place in the Ogasawara Islands means that the setting is mostly a tropical paradise. I really appreciated the work that the artists did to really make the player feel like he or she is exploring the islands and the ocean world. All around, it is very detailed.

The sound design is another positive aspect. Befitting the more lighthearted nature of the game, the music often takes on an upbeat feeling with some of the tracks being quite catchy and enjoyable to listen to. The game is also fully voiced in Japanese (with the exception of the player-character Hiroki) which is another good addition. I thought that the voice actors did a mostly admirable job, even if it often felt like cliché anime acting.

The main aspects of any visual novel are the story and characters. This is where the game fell short for me. While I appreciated the setting of the game as being different than most other visual novels I have played, almost everything else felt like a game that was trying to shove in as many of the clichés and usual beats associated with the genre as possible. This is a real problem because this game is on the shorter end with one play-through taking around only four or five hours. You have two stereotypical main girls. They are both gorgeous, easily fall in love with the protagonist, have large breasts, etc. One is even the typical childhood friend archetype. The protagonist himself is no better coming off as a typical, plain vanilla leading male character without many interesting personality traits. The story hits the usual stops with shallow romance, very mild drama, a summer festival featuring the main girls wearing yukatas, and even excessive beach scenes which is bizarre for a game that takes place by the ocean. That is not even mentioning the often blatant fanservice. While there are no true 18+ scenes in the game, there are plenty of scenes of characters wearing bikinis and partial nudity. It all comes off as lame wish fulfillment that does nothing to progress the story.

The main storyline itself, which is Emily's quest to find the sunken treasure, is not really given the focus that it deserves which is disappointing because of the short length of the game. I just do not understand why the writers made a shorter game and then felt the need to put in so much filler material. Even at the end of the story, there was not much of a sense of satisfaction because the characters are just not interesting enough to have kept me engaged.

I should say that this story is not terrible. The story is serviceable enough and there are some funny bits of humor here and there. But there is just nothing original or memorable about it or the characters.

Overall, this was a weak experience for me. While the artwork is excellent and the sound design is good, the story and characters came off as boring, predictable, and unoriginal. It is hardly the worst visual novel that I have ever played and it is on the shorter end, so if you are looking for a quick experience without having to get too invested, you might find some enjoyment out of it. If you are looking for a deeper and more original story, this will likely leave you disappointed.

Steam Deck: At time of writing it would crash about halfway through the game on Linux, so had to reboot to Windows to finish.

At first I was pretty iffy on recommending this, but after finishing both routes and reviewing the price I think it's a pretty good buy, especially on sale.

There were way too much gratuitous booty/booba shots for me, and one of the two routes feels really undercooked and phoned in, but the other route is pretty cute and has some good twists. It's not at all a long read. You're not going to get anything earth shattering, but this made me reconsider my relationship with the ocean and I am kinda interested in scuba lessons now. Overall very cute stories, wish it went on for twice the runtime honestly. Just be aware that it's gonna be rough around the edges for anything not related to the main heroine.

Adventure of a Lifetime

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I’ve played a few visual novels, and while searching for new ones, I remembered If My Heart Had Wings. This led me to discover Adventure of a Lifetime by the same developer, Moe Novel.

Technical Details: I played this game via Proton 7.0-8.6, which worked well with only occasional audio glitches. The game ran beautifully on my low-powered laptop.

Gameplay and Story: The game is short for a visual novel, but honestly, for the sale price, I don’t mind. It features two routes and many incredible CGs. The music was also incredible; I had to stop and just listen more than a few times.

Content and Themes: As expected from Moe Novel, the game depicts some themes but never shows anything too explicit. The themes and the island setting transported me into a beautiful world full of awesome characters and side characters. Even the side characters were amazing, looking at you, Grandma!

Conclusion: This game may be short, but it knows not to overstay its welcome, and I appreciate that. I’m so happy to have had the chance to play this and experience the adventure of a lifetime.

Music is what I came for and it was incredibly good music. I liked the story, well written. The art is pretty. There is so much I didn't know about scuba diving and the Ogasawara islands. The dolphin was really the best character for me EEK EEK EEK

Adventure of a Lifetime is a short, two route game that is filled with summertime vibes. Both routes of the game are sweet, with Emily's being the more fleshed out, in terms of being relevant to the main storyline. However, Chisa's route has its own perks, including a particularly sweet nighttime beach scene between her and the protagonist. If you are looking for a simple, upbeat story then this is a great option.

There isn't much to say about this VN. It's pretty basic, nothing special. But it's a good short story if anyone is interested. The characters are all charming and the music is also pretty good. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to read a short VN or just wants to read it real quick.

My first Visual Novel.
Cute arts and CG. Good BGM to hear every time. Pretty well interactions that sometimes makes me laugh a bit.
I love Chisa. Though Emily is still cute too.
I like the information or facts that sometimes popups.
Kyuutarou the Dolphin is cute and funny. Mc and Machiko grandma's interaction always funny too.
Though I really underestimate how long VN could be... This is so long, I thought I can just play it 1-2 days to get to the end. Didn't know VN was this long. Still it's good I guess to be long.
For the routes, what matter was the last decision, huh. Thought there'd be some decisions that will lead to some other endings. There are only 2 endings apparently. Well, pretty good for my first VN I guess.

Overall, I like this VN. Recommended to people who want to start play this kind of game.