A Sky Full of Stars 仰望夜空的星辰

Sky Full of Stars was interesting for me. Coming off of Adventure of a Lifetime, which I read in a week and a half, this game took me five months. So why did it take me that long? Simply put, it's long and it didn't hook me nearly as much as I’d hoped. That’s not to say it's bad. Quite the opposite, actually. But the VN has a lot of very slow, drawn-out parts that continue longer than necessary. The visual novel has four distinct routes and no bad endings. What's odd to me is that the two main heroines have extremely similar storylines and conflicts. This was disappointing, since the side heroines had very unique routes from one another. The music in this game is great! It goes from nice bops to jam to while reading to tracks that I literally couldn't read the text because the music demanded I sit in awe of the beauty this game has to offer. So you might think I thumbed this down. I didn’t, and here's why. It's good. In fact, it’s one of the better ones I’ve played. It just didn’t grip me personally as much as I’d hoped. The characters, story, and writing are solid, and I only found two or three grammatical mistakes. The game also ran pretty well once I found the right Proton version. You can grab it for cheap, and as a gamer who values a good deal, I found that appealing. Do keep in mind this is from MoeNovel, a company known for selling all-ages versions of VNs, meaning like the rest of their catalog this is censored. From my research, over 7,500 lines were cut from the Steam version. There’s no restoration patch, and the original version isn’t easily available. If scenes of that nature matter to you, I wouldn’t recommend this, as there are a few obvious rewrites to work around them. Overall, had this been half the length, I would have enjoyed it much more. I’m glad I spent time with it, but I’m also glad to finally move on after nearly 90 hours.

Overall review on A Sky Full Of Stars, the second visual novel i'm reading from the "Coming of Age" bundle that i bought and for a story that is based on astronomy, it could reach a much more niche audience but im curious to see what it could do to the general appeal. Synopsis: When Akito was small, he would gaze at the stars every night with his childhood friends Hikari and Saya. He felt excited seeing the twinkles of countless stars through the telescope lens, so close that it felt like he could reach out and grab them with his hand. It inspired dreams of journeys into space, exploring the Milky Way and solving the mysteries of the galaxy. However, now he no longer looks up at the night sky and was called the ‘astronomy club member who doesn’t watch the stars’. He received an invitation to attend the revival of the ‘Pleiades meeting’ with astronomy clubs from other schools in the area and decided to go to their next meeting to turn it down in person. There, he had an unexpected reunion with Hikari, whom he hadn’t seen since she moved some place far away. Together with Saya, Orihime and Korona, his long-lost desire to look up at the stars has been rekindled and their star-filled youthful days full of new precious memories begin. What i like: The common route was one of the best i've seen so far, i liked how they tackle the struggles of people trying to accomplish something in their niche activity and seeing Akito opening up to the 6 star members as well as his old childhood friends was really well done, they also utilise alot of flashbacks during the common route, really getting the readers to be invested in the overall dynamic of Hikari, Saya and Akito. The astronomy parts were really well informative, especially for readers like me who doesn't know much about astronomy, they were able to convey the info very well and it was very interesting to learn about it. Most of the heroine routes were also really good, but i especially liked Hikari's route, it was definitely the most drama heavy and memorable route, having realistic tension that shows a certain realism to the club's next activity and the conclusion to it, was ABSOLUTE CINEMA. Hikari has solidify herself as one of my fav heroines, Saya is a close second and their overall dynamic with Akito drives the story and each other's route to be a cut above the rest. What i dislike: Some of the explanation for the astronomy sections does get tedious and as someone not familiar at all about these topics, it's hard to wrap my head around it sometimes. Also, the story has two common routes and i can say that there is a big difference between each of them, seeing that the first one tackles the main childhood friends, which adds more drama and stakes to the story, being driven by their relationship. As such, it can seem that the second route was more slice of life in that aspect and that felt a bit boring so i highly recommend to save Hikari and Saya route for the last two imo. Also, the melodrama does get a bit too much and kinda frustrated me a little since their dynamic was very entertaining but it was still good in the end. Overall, this was an amazing coming of age story, showing us the theme of change and the effects of reliving old times, through astronomy and moving forward while everything around us changes with us. Highly recommend, especially for those who are into astronomy or space in general. 8.5/10

Saya peak