Ristorante Amore is an enjoyable little visual novel that I picked up last week.  I finished it in a couple of hours, but its short length doesn’t detract from its value.  This game was created by Cyanide Tea for National Renai Game Writing Month, meaning that it was written in just a month.  The game is very good to be created in such a short time, and though I had some problems with it I found it enjoyable overall.

Read on for my thoughts on Ristorante Amore!

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The story follows the main character Lily, who just graduated college and can’t find a job.  She ends up working in her uncle’s Italian restaurant as she searches for a job.  Of course there are three handsome men that work at the restaurant, Pierre, Ethan, and Liam.  These guys are your potential love interests.  There are also two other girl characters, Angelina and Laura who make things interesting.  There is a prologue and a post-prologue to this game, and let’s just say that things change quite a bit after the prologue.  You’ll just have to play through and see!

The story of this game is very good and pretty unique, especially considering how quickly it was written.  With that said, I still had some problems with the flow of the game.  It went by VERY quickly, and although I can forgive the length because it was written in a month, it still seemed a bit too easy for me.  The choices led to pretty obvious storylines, and those of them that were less obvious were easy to figure out after playing the game through.  Things became so systematic for me that I could play through all 9 endings in about 3 hours.  The story and endings were good, it just seemed less rewarding to obtain them.  This game probably had a rough time of it because it is the only other Visual Novel I have played besides Katawa Shoujo, which is quite detailed and was developed over a long time, but this game still felt a bit short to me.

I really liked the art and music of this game and they both meshed very well into the plot.  The music was appropriate to the situations and the characters designs were good.  I never thought they looked too stiff and they blinked consistently which took away the lifeless factor.  The CG’s were very nice and my only complaint would be that there were so few because the game is so short.  Some of the characters also seemed to have more interesting stories.  For example, Ethan seemed to be a favorite because he showed up a lot in all of the routes and his story was the most dramatic.  It wasn’t too obvious so I didn’t find the favoritism that much of a problem.

I liked this game quite a bit overall and my only major problem was the length.  I think my perfect visual novel would probably be longer than this game and shorter than Katawa Shoujo.  I really prefer lots of CGs because I really enjoy the art, but I can’t be too picky.  This game is great for someone who likes a unique story and wants a short game that they can pick up and finish quickly.  You can find more information and game downloads at the main site for the game.  

GO Rating: 3/5