Prepare your heart, because EastAsiaSoft is bringing two of the Hakuoki games to Switch as part of Hakuoki: Chronicles of Wind and Blossom. It will bundle together 2017’s Hakuoki: Kyoto Winds with 2018’s Hakuoki: Edo Blossoms.
Back in 2020, I was still poking away in the background of Destructoid, waiting to get my big break and find my place. During that time, I did a series of nine articles on my personal blog covering dating sims and romantic visual novels. I only stopped because I had exhausted my enthusiasm for the genre, but I still had a list of games to try out, and among them was the Hakuoki games.
The Hakuoki games actually date back to the PS2 in 2008 with Hakuoki: Shinsengumi Kitan. The pair of games in this compilation, Kyoto Winds and Edo Blossoms, are remakes of that game, splitting it in half and expanding it. As such, it’s optimal to have both games together as they’re a complete, singular narrative.
If you’re wondering what the hook is here, it’s that your character is out to date the members of the historical group, the Shinsengumi. If that sounds familiar, the Shinsengumi were the focus of the story of Like a Dragon: Ishin, with characters from the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series standing in for the historical figures. The Shinsengumi was a real group that existed during Japan’s Bakumatsu period and into the Boshin War. Here, however, they apparently fight demons.
I never got around to the games, but they’re pretty well-respected otome romantic visual novels. If the fact that they’ve been remade isn’t evidence enough, the series was spun off into an anime series, as well as a stage production, apparently.
The individual Hakuoki games are available on PC via Steam. Hakuoki: Chronicles of Wind and Blossom will arrive on Switch sometime in 2024. According to the press release, this is an “updated version” that includes “revised text.” A special physical version will be available for preorder on play-asia.com on January 11.
