hashihime of the old booktown.
I played 古書店街の橋姫.
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well, at least around last year.
this isn't going to be the well-written review you may expect, but i truly do enjoy this game and would like to share that sentiment with anyone who clicks on to read.
purchase the game here
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✦︎ general
summer sales are a dangerous thing, especially if you're like me and enjoy blowing through lots of money on 60% off games, only to then go "yeah! i'll play all of these later!" or "yeah! i'll play this game on stream later!" (i mean, i am a vtuber after all... so contentpilled...) and never touch the game until months or years down the line.
well, hashihime was like that for me; even though i lied about the 60% off because it's currently up for 45% off. as much as i enjoy visual novels, i normally don't purchase ones on PC since i do find sitting in front of my laptop tiring and, quite frankly, kind of painful especially considering how bad my posture is (shrimp gaming, as they say!). that being said, i spent my summer in 2024 playing a handful of bl visual novels i had purchased during the sale.
honestly, i wasn't expecting too much - i was drawn in initially because of the vibrant visuals, however i went into the game blind; i knew absolutely nothing about the game, i knew nothing about the developers and mostly, i didn't really know anyone else who played this game. normally, i would've heard about a game from another person or i would've seen another streamer play the game, but hashihime wasn't like that at all (in fairness, the content of the game would be difficult to stream considering its graphic nature) and honestly speaking, i'm quite glad that was how i discovered - through steam's recommended!
below, i will write about my experience playing the game - i can't promise that it's completely spoiler free, however, i do think that it is a beautiful visual novel to play. especially if you are older than the age of 18 - there are a handful of scenes and dialogue that's definitely not suitable for younger audiences. (they have sex. like you-will-see-penis sex scenes)
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✦︎ what is fiction? what is reality?
the story & visuals
Jinbochou, Tokyo June 1922, Taisho Era The Rainy Season Tamamori came to Tokyo with his sights set on getting accepted to the Imperial University. However, he doesn’t pass the entrance exam, and is so undisciplined and wrapped up in endless fantasies that he’s kicked out of his boarding house after only two years. Through a stroke of luck, Tamamori begins to live and work at Umebachidou, a used book store. There, he enjoys whiling away his time as a “student preparing for entrance exams” and taking advantage of friends who are also from his hometown. But one right after the other, mysterious deaths befall those friends and, realizing he’s been repeating the same rainy three days over and over again, Tamamori finds himself racing throughout Jinbochou to save them. In this pop-occult mystery that surrounds the deaths of his friends… What is real, and what is a hallucination? -Official Synopsis
rainy weather is something that i love. i love the way flowers seem more vibrant in comparision to concrete on gloomy days, i love the smell of rain as i sit by my window and i most certainly enjoy making plans with a friend (and potential love interest) to go to the movies on a rainy day - well, at least being able to see the movie with said friend without them dying on me (quite literally, mind you). to put it roughly, hashihime of the old booktown is a beautiful story of a madman aspiring to be an author, taisho era japanese literature and folklore. seriously; i know absolutely nothing about japanese literature, much less about specifically taisho era japanese literature; well, at least if you don't count my anime knowledge from bungou stray dogs or bungou to alchemist at all. however with how the game frequently references titles such as Dogra Magra, The Two Letters and even Flower Tales, it's no issue getting immersed. actually, thanks to the game, i did a little reading spree afterwards (i personally enjoyed The Two Letters, but that's a review for another day)
speaking of literature, have i mentioned that the game is a visual novel yet? it's very linear in terms of gameplay and there's about 5 routes you can take with one general storyline that the game really nudges you to pay attention to. each route follows another guy who helps tamamori solve a particular murder mystery that spans over the course of 3 days; that is not including the fact that our main character loops through said 3 days, repeating the death of his friend, the suspicious stares he recieves from others and the bizzare mysteries that pile on top. while i will not divulge into the routes in particular because i honestly don't think i have the literary prowess to properly convey how i feel about each route and character, i will say that my favourite character in all of it, aside from tamamori, is actually the professor - i think his pathetic, loser man aura has captivated me. his detachment from the main cast in particular is also quite interesting. (the same can be said about tamamori and i actually quite like how he is an unreliable/fairly delusional narrator throughout the game, but i think that says a lot about my character than anything else).
one of my favourite things about this game is its unique usage of colours that i think complement the bizzare story-telling of the game. the washed-out monotones of the gloomy jinbochou cityscape paired with the seemingly neverending rain that falls gives the story this sort of 'gentle doom' as we follow tamamori's (fairly futile) attempts to save his friend and end the 3-day loop.
to contrast, the colourful inner world of tamamori seemingly leaps right at you, bursting through my laptop screen with its vibrant colours and intricate linework mimicking taisho era patterns. the way this colourful world intertwines with reality - actually chef's kiss. this psychedelic world truly gives an insight to the madness tamamori experiences as he loops through the same 3 days over and over again. to be fair, his timetravel shenanigans and having to hear news of his dead friend alongside the disappointment of reality, i would also have the acid trip of my life.
while i did say that i wouldn't talk too much about the routes, i would like to circle back and mention how hashihime of the old booktown truly is a homage to literature; each route takes elements of various genres within literature. it's honestly really hard to box hashihime into a specific genre - you can say it's a boy's love, but i feel like it dismisses a lot of it's horror-mystery elements, or it's romantic elements or even it's most bizarre elements; to just box it into the boy's love genre (even though it most definitely can be called a blvn for simplicity's sake) would be a disservice.
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✦︎ it is worth playing.
i don't know if 1k words is truly enough to express how much i enjoy this game and its storytelling. if there's one thing i could say, i think that it's worth playing the game - do not be scared of its monotony and its long playthrough - in fact, its the long prologue (and sort of first route) that sets the ground work for such a fantastic story that just keeps you glued to your seat - actually, even though the average playthrough is 30 hours, i feel like i did do all of that in one sitting and i plan on doing that again if i do have the chance.
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thank you so much for reading this. i hope my love and passion for this game has reached you too.
