Symphonic Rain
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Symphonic Rain (シンフォニック レイン Shinfonikku Rein?) is a musical visual novel developed by KOGADO studios for the PC platform, as part of a series of "Musical Adventure Games" done by its Kuroneko-san Team. Unlike most visual novels published, this title does not contain any eroge contents and it is suitable for all ages, although the themes revolve around romance and relationships. This game was first published in Japan on March 26, 2004, and was later published and released in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Mainland China by T-Time Technology Co., Ltd. The game has never been officially released in any English-speaking countries, and no English translations are available.
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[edit] Game Synopsis
Symphonic Rain takes place in a fictional city of apparently Italian heritage, where rain falls everyday. The locals there have adapted to this peculiar phenomenon, and carry on with their lives as if the rain was never there. No one takes an umbrella, no one wears a rain coat.
The main character of the story is 17 year old Chris, a Fortelle student of the famous Piova Communal School of Music (Scuola Comunale di Musica Piova, in Italian). Separated from his childhood sweetheart Arietta when he left his home town for the city, he keeps in touch with her through the means of weekly letters. Penning their thoughts on those letters, Chris treasures and keeps her weekly writings, for he had promised her that should his drawer becomes totally filled with them, he would return to her.
The game starts during Chris's third year as a student, a few months before he has to take the school's final graduation examination: a staged performance. As an instrumentalist, he is required to search for a vocalist partner before he is eligible for the examination.
[edit] Gameplay
Similar to other games of its genre, Symphonic Rain is highly text-based and most of the game requires little player interaction apart from clicking a few options presented to the player, usually dealing with where he wishes to head to after school.
However, at certain points during the course of the story, the game switches into a "song-playing mode" where the player is required to hit keys to the beat of a background song, usually sung by one of the heroines of the game, guided by different-coloured musical notes scrolling from the right of the screen to the left. Each one of these notes are inscribed with a letter on the keyboard, which the player has to press when the note reaches a boxed-up region besides the treble clef.
Points are awarded for the accuracy of keyboard input, starting with 0 points for an inaccurate attempt, 8 points for being slightly off and 35 points for being spot-on. The value of each 'spot-on' attempt increases as the player successfully creates chains of such accuracy, 'breaking' the chain when an error is made or becomes 'slightly off'.
Spot-on attempts also raise the evaluation meter at the bottom left corner of the screen by a single point each (marked by a small ring, which lights up with every point earned). When 10 of these rings are lighted, a large circular lamp directly above lights up while the rings revert to their darkened state. Similarly, an inaccurate attempt would darken a ring or a lamp should there be no lighted rings.
A minimum of 4 lighted lamps are required for the song to be evaluated as a "pass", and this directly affects the story in a usually positive way. Players who are not proficient with this "song-playing mode" can switch on the autoplay function in the menu to enable the computer to hit all the notes. However, in this mode, the score would remain at zero.
[edit] Characters
Chris Velding (クリス・ヴェルティン Kurisu Verutin?)
- Voiced by: Michio Miyashita (in Al Fine only)
The main protagonist of the game, whom you play as. A 17-year-old who came to the town with his childhood friend Tortinita to attend the music school. He is a third-year student of the keyboard-like instrument Fortelle, and dreams to become an accomplished musician. Apart from Tortinita and Asino, he virtually has no other friends at the school. A laid-back person, he is very talented at music. A week before he was to enter the school, he and Arietta got caught in a traffic accident where he damaged his ears and Arietta went into a coma. This accident also caused Chris to lose a lot of his memories. Ever since then, he kept seeing rain, even if the sky is clear. In order to maintain his sanity, Tortinita had been posing as Arietta and writing letters to him every week.
Tortinita Fine (トルティニタ・フィーネ Torutinita Fiine?)
- Voiced by: Mai Nakahara
A 17-year-old childhood friend of Chris who is likewise attending the music school, and arguably the leading female of the cast. The younger twin of Arietta, she's an active girl with a strong personality. Tortinita is a third year vocalist student of the school, and as such has the option of being able to give a solo performance for her graduation performance. Her nickname is Toruta. She has likes Chris ever since they were young, but since Chris chose Arietta, she decided to hide her feelings even though she like Chris before her sister did. After the accident, Chris and her families decided to send them to the music school and possibly help Chris recuperate. They eat lunch together in the school cafeteria almost everyday.
Arietta Fine (アリエッタ・フィーネ Arietta Fiine?)
- Voiced by: Mai Nakahara
The elder twin sister of Tortinita. She stayed in her hometown while her sister and Chris went to attend the music school, seemingly because she lacked the ability and talent, though the truth is that she is in a coma. A quiet girl who's good at cooking and domestic work, she's introduced at the beginning as Chris' girlfriend, and they communicate every week by sending letters to each other, even though it was actually all written by Tourta. Her nickname is Arie.
Falcita Fawcett (ファルシータ・フォーセット Farushiita Foosetto?)
- Voiced by: Masumi Asano
The former president of the student's council, Falcita is a talented third year vocalist student who's searching for a Fortelle-playing partner for her graduation concert at the end of the year. She appears to be a gentle and graceful girl, but is known to be highly calculative and demanding, and is popular with the students of the school. She often does favor for people (such as writing a speech for the teacher), this habit, plus her part time job of working at a restaurant, makes her very busy. Her nickname is Fal.
Liselsia Cesarini (リセルシア・チェザリーニ Riserushia Chezariini?)
- Voiced by: Fumiko Orikasa
A 15-year-old Fortelle student who loves to sing. She is the daughter of the famous Fortelle player Grave Cesarini and hence is constantly pressured by her father to follow in his footsteps. She is a shy girl who hides in the abandoned school building to practice her singing in secret, away from her father's notice. Her nickname is Lisel. When she was small, her mother ran away from the house in order to be with a singer whom she loved. After wards, Grave sent Lisel into the orphanage. A few years later, he discovered that she had a lot of talent at Fortelle and adopted her again.
Phorni (フォーニ Fooni?)
- Voiced by: Hiroko Kasahara
A small, fairy-like creature no taller than 14 cm and possessing tiny, translucent, fluttering wings. But, even though she's so small, she can sing and speak at a normal person's volume; even though she has wings, she cannot rise above a certain height. Phorni is the self-declared, 'fairy of music' who shares the room with Chris ever since he moved in. Apart from Chris, no one is able to hear her, see her, or touch her. She enjoys singing (which she's very good at), and would pester Chris into playing the Fortelle so that she could sing along. She has a habit of saying "miyah" when she's surprised.
Asino (アーシノ・アルティエーレ Aashino Arutieere?)
- Voiced by: Hayato Watanabe
Chris' best and only male friend, he supports Chris from the side and seems to be very popular with girls. He had originally planned to partner with Falsitta, but she was only using him to get information about Chris and dumped him soon after.
Cordell (コーデル Kooderu?)
- Voiced by: Yu Asakawa
Cordell is a strict but impartial teacher of great repute in the school. She is liked by many of the students there.
Grave Cesarini (グラーヴェ Guraave?)
- Voiced by: Kouichi Nagano
A nobleman who is both Lisel's father and a famous Fortelle player. He looks at his daughter's efforts in singing with great disdain and frustration, and this has resulted in him employing rather drastic methods to force his daughter to follow in his footsteps.
Nina Fine (ニンナ·フィーネ， Nin'na Fiine?)
- Voiced by: Michiru Wada
The grandmother of the Fine twins, she chose to live in the city because of her love for music. She lives together with Tortinita and gives much moral support to her. She's quite fond of Chris. She is blind but still very good at cooking.
[edit] Secret Endings
There are a total of 6 good endings and 3 bad endings. The player would have to complete the 3 main heroine's story (Also known as "Da Capo" Scenario) before the "Al fine" scenario is unlocked.
[edit] Al Fine
In this part of the story, the world is looked through the perspective of Tortinita Fine, and many questions about the story are finally answered by the end of the scenario. This is considered the "true end" of the game. Chris, the original protagonist, is voiced in this scenario while Toritinita is not.
It is interesting to note that Da Capo and al fine are actual music terms and are both appropriate names for the story's parts in relation to the game's nature, as the story has to be repeated three times (one for each heroine) before finally and truly ending with Al Fine's part of the story.
[edit] Phorni's Scenario
After going through both the possible endings for Al Fine, players who return to Da Capo would have unlocked Phorni's Scenario. The events that make up this scenario would highlight the truth about Phorni and finally tie up all the loose ends of the story.
[edit] Soundtrack
The 10 songs available for the player to play are released on two different albums. The first one, Symphonic Rain - Rainbow features the original voice actresses singing the songs. The second album For RITZ has Ritsuko Okazaki singing all the songs.
The composing and the lyrics of these songs are by Ritsuko Okazaki.
- The other side of the sky (空の向こうに?)
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- voice: Ritsuko Okazaki
- Even when crying (涙がほおを流れても?)
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- voice: Ritsuko Okazaki
- Secret (秘密 hi mitsu?)
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- voice: Mai Nakahara
- Always smiling (いつでも微笑みを?)
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- voice: Mai Nakahara
- The music of rain (雨のmusique?)
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- voice: Masumi Asano
- Melody (メロディー?)
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- voice: Masumi Asano
- High school girl (リセエンヌ Lyceenne?)
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- voice: Fumiko Orikasa
- Hello!
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- voice: Fumiko Orikasa
- fay
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- voice: Hiroko Kasahara
- I'm always close to you
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- voice: Hiroko Kasahara
[edit] External links
- (Japanese) Official site
- (Japanese) Kogado Studio official site
