Sometimes I just have to wonder: if they're so many people out there who can write good stories, why the hell are they all making eroge? Take out all the stupid R-18 stuff, turn it into a light novel or even a web novel and it'd still be a great read. In fact, that's kinda what the writer(s) of Neko Kawaigari did after the release of the game: write a after-story of sorts and release it as a bonus disc of sorts. A very beautiful after-story, mind you, but nevertheless.
Then again, considering the general success of the eroge industry nowadays, I'll say it's the only sure-fire way to get people to
So anyway, since I'm feeling a little talkative today (oh you know what I mean), here's another
The story begins in a small veterinary clinic run by Dr Crane. The clinic, surrounded by forests and a large fence bordering the forest, houses herself and 5 patients: the 4 cat-girls Norma, Faye and twins Umi and Nami, along with a dog-man named Jack. According to Dr Crane, she found Jack one day in the forest surrounding the clinic and took him in. Suffering from amnesia, Jack is unable to remember anything at all, including his own name, so Dr Crane named him herself.
The days pass peacefully everyday. Dr Crane performing check ups on the patients everyday, Jack helping out around the clinic with chores everyday, Norma either napping around or reading books all day long, Umi and Nami playing around all day long, and Faye getting toyed around by everyone else all day long. Everyone enjoyed the company of each other, and everyone wished the days would continue peacefully.
The happy prince (True End)
WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD (After Story)
The story skips ahead. No sooner had Alice reached Norma's former research facility to administer Nami with the vaccine than the research facility came under attack by am armed group hired by a pharmacy, Major, who seek to hold a monopoly over the vaccine to control the world. Alice escapes with the vaccine and Nami at the cost of the lives of the supporters of Norma and goes into hiding. It is soon discovered that the vaccine caused Nami to become pregnant with Yuusaku's child, a fact which causes Alice further sorrow. Still, she persists to care for Nami, and continues to escape her pursuers. Eventually the pursuers catch up to them, kidnap Nami, and shoot Alice in her shoulder, leaving her to bleed to death.
Alice then loses all hope for survival due to everyone she ever loved having left her, her misery at having lost Yuusaku again, and her jealousy towards Nami for carrying Yuusaku's child. She then suddenly remembers the various promises she made to everyone to not give up and to save the world for them, and finds enough strength to get up and attempt to take back Nami. The attempt fails however, and just as she is about to be shot in the head by the kidnappers, a pack of infected, having already succumbed to the virus and turned into wild animals, attack and kill all the kidnappers. Fortunately, the infected do not touch Nami nor Alice as they recognize Nami as one of them, and Alice thanks the heavens for this miracle...
Time skips ahead, and Alice is finally reunited with Yuusaku, happy that she has fulfilled her promise to everyone at the clinic, as she looks down upon the earth, at a grown-up Nami and her child.
-the end-
As a side note, the full term for the virus, DOTES, is Deaden of Originalty and Talent for Earthling Syndrome.
What? Just listen to the theme songs of this game, and tell me if this is normal for the writers.
The original Japanese term provided translates roughly to "loss of racial originality and intelligence syndrome". tl;dr people become wild animals. There, so much easier to understand now.
Also, between the memory loss and final mutation, apparently the infected will go into heat. A lot. Thank god for the skip button.
Overall though, it's still a nice and touching story. Apparently, the story is based on the short story "The Happy Prince", and references it a lot. For example, in the final scene of the True End, Jack calls Dr Crane the swallow and himself the Happy Prince. Tee underscore tee.
What I like about the game, however, is how they advertise it as a cute girls game (the title translates loosely to "dote up a cat" anyway). And yet one of the cat-girls actually gets killed in cold blood, and only one of the 4 survive ultimately.
Either way, touching ending song. I like to think of it as Dr Crane singing it for more touching points.
Sweet Outbreak - Rita
Now Playing: Sweet Outbreak by Rita, Neko Kawaigari True End theme song
EDIT (25/05/2009, 04:02 AM): Refitted with new spoiler tags for convinience. Or rather, I hated the invisible wall of text really.
All of a sudden, Nami's condition takes a turn for the worst, and Dr Crane transfers both of the twins to another facility beyond the fences. A few days later, however, Faye and Jack discovers Umi, tied up in a secret room deep within the clinic. A room filled with operating tools and machines. Despite the initial shock at being lied to by Dr Crane, Faye and Jack hurries to release Umi. Suddenly, Umi attacks Faye and is about to bite into her neck when suddenly, Norma appears with a rifle and kills Umi.
Norma and Dr Crane finally reveal the truth about the world: That cat-girls and dog-men are not a natural occurrence in this world. The world was one day struck by a virus named DOTES that slowly killed off various mammals of the world, primarily cats and dogs. Soon after, DOTES mutated and began to infect human beings too, turning them into a hybrid of humans and animals: cat-girls for females, and dog-men for males. The virus will initially rob the infected of their memories first, then eventually their minds, turning into that of a wild animal.
Norma, the resident intellectual, turns out to be Norma Crane, older sister and mentor of Dr Alice Crane, along with being the scientist who first discovered the presence of DOTES. Her mentor was a Professor Asou Seizou, father of the twins Asou Umi and Nami. Asou Seizou passed away one day when their home was attacked by the infected, and the twins, although surviving the ordeal, were also infected. Fortunately, the virus robbed them of their memories too, so they lived on without trauma. Norma takes the twins in, but one day Norma is accidentally infected by one of the twins while taking care of them, and is chased out of her research facility.
Fortunately, she still has friends and supporters from the research facility. Her friends help her to escape to a long-deserted clinic far away along with her research, Alice and the twins. There, they find a girl, Faye McClintock, who has recently lost her family to the virus and who was similarly abandoned at the deserted clinic due to being infected. Surprisingly, Norma discovers that Faye's body holds part of the key to creating a vaccine against the virus, but the operation will kill her. Soon after, her memories are consumed by the virus.
The story returns to the present where Jack decides he would rather not hear about his past from Norma and Alice. Faye, after finding out the truth, decides to go on with the operation for the vaccine, and she passes away. Soon after, Norma is also struck down by the virus, but not before handing a pill to Jack secretly. With Jack and Alice now alone, they continue solemnly with their research on the virus. As Jack's health begins to deteriorate, he decides to take the strange pill from Norma out of desperation, which causes him to fall into a coma and jolts his memories.
He was Iseya Yuusaku, assistant to Norma Crane prior to Alice. Yuusaku and Alice eventually got into a relationship and kept a dog named Jack. Soon after though, the virus occurs and kills Jack. Subsequently, Yuusaku himself is also infected, and it is through this that he discovers that his body contains the second half of the key to the vaccine, and that he once volunteered to sacrifice himself to create the vaccine, but Alice objected. With the virus consuming his memories, Alice then decides to hide this truth from him to save him.
Back in the present, Yuusaku shares a tearful reunion with Alice, but their reunion is cut short as Yuusaku is reaching his end. He finally convinces Alice to perform the operation on him to complete the vaccine to save the world, and with this Alice is now all alone. She takes the completed vaccine and leaves the clinic, out the fences and into the now-desolate world...