When Dairoku Ayakashimori was announced in the lineup of 2021 otome games localisations, I realized immediately that playing it soon, before twitter becomes full of spoilers, was the best idea.

So, here we are!

The heroine, Akitsu Shino, is a human who has the ability of seeing ayakashi since her childhood; for this reason, she’s chosen to be part of a secret agency which works to keep the peace between ayakashi in their city, Sakuratani.

My first impression of the characters wasn’t that good: Tokitsugu was the only guy who seemed interesting, since I couldn’t understand if he was nice or secretly evil; all the others seeemed boring, none of them made me curious at first sight and I even wished I could date some of the side characters instead.

The common route was short, but it managed to make me sleepy anyway: nothing happened and I had the feeling that there was no plot at all, just random everyday scenes one after the other.

I was almost tempted to put the game on hold, but I know there’s the risk of never getting back, so I forced myself to go on and give this a chance.

I obviously started with Tokitsugu, to give me some motivation.

When I entered his route, I expected him to be the main character, with a huge secret: you know, those characters with closed eyes, who usually open them when there’s something shocking going on? Sadly, not even this plot met my expectations.

I admit it was getting a bit interesting, since his younger brother is a nice guy and I enjoyed talking to him; but when I was waiting for a terrible family secret or even something deeper to be revealed, it was a huge disappointment. This feeling of non existent plot stayed the same.

I usually play every ending of a game, even if the Switch doesn’t have the trophy system; but I had no motivation at all this time, since even the best endings were boring.

I hoped Hira would surprise me, since he’s a mysterious guy who barely talks and hates people, apparently; sometimes this type of weird guys are actually tsundere, or at least they end up being interesting. Well, it wasn’t the case for me.

I admit it, I spent most of his route wondering why I couldn’t date Takao instead: he looks good, he’s nice… I’d gladly spend some time alone with him, I’m sure he would be a great boyfriend.

Sadly, Hira was a typical kuudere who lacks emotions, so I mostly got bored: who wants to chase an annoying, lazy boyfriend, even in games? I want those ikemen to be interested in me, come on!

After this route I had to take a long break, I stopped playing for about 6 months before I finally found some motivation to give Dairoku Ayakashimori another chance; and I’m glad I did.

Shu’s route was my favorite, he’s such a cute tsundere, seeing him blush so easily gave me life.

He’s so innocent, he’s not used to get along with girls and his feelings were so obvious, even if it took a while to admit he liked the heroine. He’s a good guy.

Shiratsuki is a nine taled fox, he’s funny and I enjoyed his route, but I couldn’t consider him a potential boyfriend because of his way of talking: I felt like I was dating an old man, I don’t find this attractive at all! It’s a pity, I think he had a great potential, but it was wasted.

I guess this problem applies to every character in this game, some are just worse than others.

Akuroo was the greatest surprise of the game for me.

My first impression was bad, I thought he was just a playboy who seduces girls and he’s actually a dangerous liar; it turned out that I was completely wrong, he’s really sweet and caring!

I fell in love with him quicky, you know how weak I am to price-like types.

I had a lot of fun with all the subcharas, oni why enjoy reading manga and playing games are unusual to imagine, they are an amazing group of friends!

There’s a True Route which unlocks after you’re done with the main characters, but since I was dragging this game for so long I honestly just wanted to put it back on the shelf forever and start something new.

I decided to read some reviews to find out if it was worth playing or not; everyone seemed to agree that it’s not very interesting, so I just decided to skip it and consider this game done; I guess I did my part for the fandom, I came up with some kind of review and I can get out of here.

So, did I enjoy Dairoku Ayakashimori?

I want to be honest, overall I’m kinda disappointed: I think the writers put all their efforts into creating an ayakashi world with many characters, but without giving those characters a proper story to shine. The routes are short, the plot barely exists and I feel like some subcharacters were more interesting than the main guys.

I don’t know if this was made on purpose because Otomate plans to release some kind of sequel, but it doesn’t seem a smart move.

This saddens me, I think the scenario could have more potential, but it was wasted.

In the end, it’s a decent game, but not memorable at all.