Gakuen Club

Genre: Visual Novel

Players: 1

.

Review:

Gakuen Club is a Visual Novel released on PC in 2017 and ported to Nintendo Switch in 2018. More specifically, this is an Otome game that has players taking the role of a young woman just starting out at a highly-exclusive school and manages to find her way into a strange secret after-school club worked by a select group of students and attended by the wealthy elites of society. After being roped into working in the club as well, the protagonist will learn about the club and get close to her handsome peers.

So I’ll get this game’s main flaw out of the way right off the bat – the localization here is not great. The grammar and word use here is at times confusing, and while it’s usually not so bad that you can’t understand what was intended, it still breaks the immersion in the story.

That flaw aside, the story here is decent but generally low-impact. Also, the characters are reasonably likable. There’s nothing here that’s truly mind-blowing, but it is nevertheless a pleasant read, if you’re looking to play a largely typical Otome game.

In terms of the presentation, this game uses beautiful anime-style art for its 2D character portraits, and some very nice-looking painted backgrounds. All of the characters are nicely voiced (in Japanese), and the game also has a lighthearted soundtrack that works well enough for the game, but isn’t especially memorable, and at times can even be a little grating. Also, I should note that this game has good gamepad controls and good touchscreen controls – either works.

In the end, Gakuen Club is a decent lighthearted Otome game. It doesn’t excel in any particular area (save for the nice artwork), but is overall a decent entry in that genre. I will say that the normal price of $25 seems steep for what’s on offer here. However, if you’re looking for an Otome game with a school setting, I think you’ll be satisfied with this game… just perhaps when it goes on sale.

tl;dr – Gakuen Club is a Visual Novel about a young woman at an elite school with a secret after-school club that serves the wealthy and powerful members of society. This game has its strengths and flaws, but largely it’s a fairly typical Otome game. It’s decent, but the $25 price tag seems a bit much.

Grade: C

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are MB, Andy Miller, Johannes, u/RamboFox, Exlene, Eli Goodman, Ilya Zverev, Stov, Connor Armstrong, and K.H. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}