Let's Play "In Your Arms Tonight"...because...you know...

Don't worry! I'm sure it's just Batman.

GAME.
STAHP THAT.

Hehehe so I got impatient and tricked politely requested to borrow my cousin's itouch so that I could play this game~ Oh Ebi

Or Randissimo boyfriend Amanohashi:

I knew swapping AMI/me during that LP would result in terrible yet hilarious things.

I want to regret this but I'm laughing too hard to do so.

I had a feeling this would happen.
Should've, could've, would've just answered that damn phone.

Aw man. Okay, who's the harpy that's going to ruin everything?

P.S. Memo to Lysa: Divorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorcedivorce

....

Welp I just breezed through Ebi's route and my kokoro is full of asghdvasd. I'll be going to bed now with a smile on my face (´ ▽｀).。ｏ♡

/quietly fangirls over G-Dragon being adorable don't mind her

Who is watching Ebi-chan and Lysa???




Rrrrrriiing...





Ebi-chan, always the voice of reason!



Oh, it's just mom. Hey mom, what's up?

Yoshiko: "Where are you right now?"







Crap, it's mom guilt.



Yep, effects of mom guilt successful.





Voice of reason, and a gentleman ❤

Ebi-hara is officially going to be my voice of conscience in everything I do. He's gonna be standing in my shoulder, wearing Britannia Angel's clothing and calming me down in immensely stress-exploding situations.

Ebi-chan, why are you so perfect?!! Why are you not real?!!!

Ebi-chan takes Lysa to the station.







Awwwwwww
Lysa is waiting for her train, when a little boy runs into her.



Lysa smiles and says it's alright.













✧*:･ﾟ✧YES!!!!!✧*:･ﾟ✧

Attagirl, Lysa!

Lysa is an excellent protagonist. Everything is better on this route.

Kick his ass Get that divorce!

Haha, I didn't think Ebi-chan could get any better, but then suddenly:
- has glasses
- knows language of flowers
- willingly takes girl shopping
WHELP

I'm so glad she's finally facing up to Koichi. But... who was watching her?

FTFY.*

*Note: i do not support abuse in relationships. i just want koichi to hurt.

Lysa get's home as quickly as she can, but her mother is already in the living room when she arrives.





No!
No cake for you!



Yeah I bet you were you little *censored*







Heheh, it's Lysa's turn to be dodgy in front of her parents.

She promises to call back sooner though.



Wow, that is one impressive bitch glare.
Koichi's phone rings, interrupting their conversation.



So, of course, the second he leaves the room...

The mom guilt begins....




Well Lysa, no time like the present to expose your scum sucking hubby for what he truly is!

I have never wanted to assault a fictional character more than I do Koichi.

I REACHED THE END!
*holy angel music*

I'LL NEGLECT YOUR FACE KOICHI
and on the list of threats that do not make sense

OOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH GUUUURRRRRLLLLL
yeah, i should probably never meet any people like this in real life because i am about to SLAP MY COMPUTER SCREEN

HOW CAN YOU MAKE ME HATE YOU EVEN MORE.
Someone set him on fire, I don't care anymore. Really, just die.

No, neglecting it won't do. That's the part you want to mess up most, you need to pay attention to that. Meanwhile, all of my berserk buttons are being successfully slammed down.

Sure Koichi. I'm sure Lysa was not worried at all when you didn't come home until late because you were with your mistress. Nope, Lysa's not the type to care and worry about her husband even when he's a cold, distant, unappreciative douchebag. Fuck you.

And unless this is all a misunderstanding, he knows that she saw him and he knows how he treated her at the hotel. I'm surprised he expects anything else but her trying to stay far away from him after he acted like a giant douchebag.

Koichi, I wanted to be understanding. I mean, your actions pissed me off, but I didn't just want to hate you without knowing your reasoning. I still don't.

But I am hating the way you're treating Lysa so much, I'm starting not to care about my previous stance anymore. Just. Fuck you.

Edit: Unless you're purposely trying to get Lysa to hate you, in which case, you win the damn prize now get out of her life.

I--
why is this LP hitting on basically every heartstring I have Koichi no just--
Ugh I normally don't get this emotional but seriously I am reminded of lots of stuff from my personal life and no koichi just don't go there please. :c

I am without real response to this. I'm sorry, I can't muster enough hate to counteract the sympathy-despair I'm getting for Lysa right now.

I really, really want Koichi's route to come out in English.

Because I want to understand what the hell is going on in his head.

This.

At least the reason why he's upset is because he was worried, not because he's like "WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU, YOU NEED TO LET ME KNOW WHERE YOU ARE EVERY MINUTE OF THE DAY!!! I BET YOU WERE WITH A GUY, WEREN'T YOU!?" Yes... I think abusively controlling people are worse than people who don't pay attention to their partner. I don't condone what Koichi is doing, especially the way he's going about it (where he refuses to discuss it), but considering the pressure young people in Japan (and a lot of other places) get from their parents, coworkers, and friends to not just marry, but to marry well, I still have a little sympathy for him. He probably only sees this as a business marriage and maybe he thought Lysa saw it that way as well. He still should have talked to her and he still shouldn't be cheating on her and I don't think that business or convenience or pressure from your parents or whatever is a very good reason to get married in the first place, but I don't hate Koichi nearly as much as I hate Lysa's parents.

Honestly, I don't think the way Lysa's handling the whole situation is that great either. Even if Koichi had one first, Lysa is still having an affair. Just because there's no sex doesn't mean it isn't an affair and we don't have positive proof that Koichi is having sex with the other woman either. So far we know that they are both kissing someone else and going on dates with someone else. And Lysa's refusal to answer the phone was just aofjdoaifd because I thought she was the one who wanted to talk things through with Koichi and now she's being no better than when Koichi was avoiding talking to her. She has just shown so little initiative to get out of this relationship and yet she's not willing to give up on Ebihara either. YOU CAN'T HAVE BOTH, LYSA. LISTEN TO EBI-CHAN AND GET A DIVORCE ALREADY.

Ugh, this route makes me so uncomfortable. I hate that Voltage lets you choose to get a divorce, but it has no effect on the plot. That could easily mean that someone ends up paying for a route that forces them to cheat. If they are uncomfortable with cheating on someone in a game, then they're out that money. Not cool, Voltage, not cool.

Considering the fact Lysa doesn't seem to be able to stand up to her parents and she's constantly giving more than receiving and doing all in her power to make her father happy, I'm not surprised she's scared of confronting Koichi. It's one thing wanting to do something, namely talking about a problem, and it's a completely different one when it comes to actually doing it.

Speaking from personal experience (albeit within a completely different context, I'll admit), getting a spine and the strength to face these problems and discuss them is difficult. I wouldn't be surprised if her entire life, Lysa's been submissive to her father's whims and just can't muster up the necessary tact and strength to discuss divorce with Koichi because of the numerous and, to her, severe consequences involved.

Because if she says she wants to divorce Koichi, that means she thinks the marriage is failing. And if she wants to divorce him, her parents will know. Which means her dad will know. And from what we've seen of her father, the results will be far, far, far from pretty. And I mean, I would not be surprised if he ends up disowning her because of it, that's how bad the consequences could be. And I doubt Lysa wants that. Overbearing and forceful though he may be, he's still her father and she still loves him, and when you care about someone, the last thing you want is for them to hate you to the point of erasing your existence from you life.

Maybe I'm being extreme when it comes to the negative results that will come out of this, but I don't think it's far fetched and Lysa's already pretty delicate emotionally. Not to mention that bringing up divorce will mean the chance of bringing up why they should divorce, which means hearing why Koichi doesn't give a damn about her, which will also hurt. There's no easy way to do this. I'm not trying to defend Lysa being in an affair, and honestly, I don't care if Koichi is or isn't sleeping with his possibly-a-girlfriend. He's being cruel to Lysa and spending time with someone else. The nature of his relationship with that woman is unknown. Even if he just thinks this marriage is business, even if he thinks Lysa feels the same (which is ridiculous considering the efforts she's put into being there for him and pleasing him), that does not excuse him abandoning her. I find his cold treatment to be just as harmful as an overcontrolling one, because either way, there is psychological and emotional abuse being performed. Not to mention that even if Koichi's only being cold and distant, she has the overcontrolling abuse coming from her father.

(Also, it's only in the English release where the decision to divorce or not has no effect. In the Japanese one, choosing divorce prevents you from playing the three non-divorce options and means you have to buy the chance to play the other three routes all over again. From what I understood, earlier. It's a fault with the English release.)

Of the routes I've played (which is, er, all of them that are out in English so far), I'd say Koichi's at his worst in this one. He's more of a jerkface right out of the gate in Aiba's route, but at least the confrontation and subsequent divorce is gotten out of the way quickly, whereas here...

...well, I'll just say we haven't hit rock bottom yet.

Of course Lysa's handling the situation poorly too, although at least she's making more of an effort at communication than Koichi is.

The fault here is on whoever decided to a) remove the relevance of the decision in the English version and yet b) leave the decision in the prologue as though it affected anything. That was really dumb. I understand wanting to make the routes more accessible to players for the English version, but they could easily have simply removed the choice entirely since it literally affects not a single thing.

(Although honestly I kind of think that someone who's uncomfortable enough with the idea of cheating in a game that they wouldn't be able to enjoy or even complete the route should... probably pick one of Voltage's other games to begin with, since the whole concept of the game is kind of based on the protagonist starting off married.)

Again using other routes for context, I'd say this is a pretty reasonable assumption. In Genji's route she actually identifies her father's behavior as emotionally abusive (although not to his face).

Sorry guys, I'm out, I keep wanting to follow this but with every subsequent update my sympathy for Lysa keeps plummeting and I'm not fond enough of Ebihara to stick it out. So. Um. Sorry,

Yes, I know it's just the English one, but still, what the hell.

It's kind of a bad situation on both ends and I would never condone Koichi's actions one single bit, but if we're cutting Lysa a little slack about not getting a divorce, I think we should probably cut Koichi a little slack on agreeing to the marriage in the first place because there were probably consequences for him if he didn't accept it as well, maybe even the same consequences Lysa might face by ending it in addition to the affects it might have had on his job. If there weren't some sort of consequences involved for him not agreeing to the marriage, why wouldn't he have just married this other woman in the first place? (Unless they hadn't met yet.) I'm not saying that makes it okay for him to cheat and treat her the way he has, but I don't think that his cheating and ignoring her makes it okay for Lysa to have an affair of her own, either. I don't care how little of a spine she has, she needs to talk to Koichi and let him know that she knows and that she's unhappy in the marriage and that she loves someone else. I understand she hadn't had a chance to do that up until now, but when he called her, she should have picked up or she's turning herself into everything she hates about Koichi.

I don't like what Koichi's doing, but I'm not too happy with Lysa at the moment either. I don't think either one is being a bright and shining example of what it means to be a good person, so I don't really understand why Koichi is "OMG, WHAT A MONSTER" (for saying he was worried about her, no less) and Lysa is still "BEST PROTAG-CHAN EVER, COME 'ERE BABY, LET ME HOLD YOU." Yeah, sure, maybe Koichi's actions starting the whole thing, but it's not like Lysa's doing anything to help matters. At this point, I don't think that she's much better than a lot of the other spineless, self-effacing protagonists I've seen.

tl;dr: An affair is not a sign of an independent woman who is taking things into her own hands and putting right all the times she's been wronged, it's ugly and deceitful even if it's a response to your husband having an affair.

I don't mind the concept of your spouse cheating (I mean, not in a game, cheating is bad, you know what I mean), it's the fact that we're forced to do it ourselves that bothers me, especially since having the choice in the prologue made it seem like we weren't going to be.

I'm almost to this point too, Vide. I'm considering cutting out for now and just coming back when we get to Genji or Aida or someone who doesn't force you to lower yourself to your husband's level.

I don't think anyone here is saying that Lysa is justified in having an affair because of Koichi's behavior or anything else, and certainly nobody's cheering her on for her independence or saying that it's a show of empowerment on her part. If I'm reading the reactions in the thread correctly, everyone has been pretty much unanimously in agreement that Lysa should have put her foot down and gotten out of the marriage chapters ago, that she really shouldn't have accepted Ebihara's invitation to stay the night and definitely shouldn't have continued to spend the day with him afterward, and that she should have answered the phone when Koichi called. That she's done all of these things are signs of weakness - something she herself acknowledges.

But especially given that all indications are that she was raised to be a doormat to her father, Koichi is still much more in the wrong here than she is. Lysa has tried repeatedly to begin a dialogue with Koichi about the nature of their relationship and Koichi has repeatedly shut down every effort and avoided having any kind of meaningful conversation with her. A few decisions made in emotional weakness notwithstanding, Lysa doesn't show any intentions of saying "hell with it, Koichi's cheating so why shouldn't I have a relationship with Ebihara?"; rather, she's acknowledged that her recent behavior was wrong and weak and that she needs to confront Koichi as soon as possible, because she knows that his bad behavior doesn't justify her doing the same things.

So, yeah, although Lysa's not making the best decisions, she's still earned much more slack than Koichi, from whom the only indication that he actually gives a damn about her in any way so far amounts to one phone call and him saying he was worried.

Oh, I agree. I was originally going to try and write a post arguing why I think Koichi's... Acting like a dick, but after this update I was kind of just. Too. Angry. To remember it. Adding insult to injury is something I can't stand no matter what, not to anyone, not ever. What he's doing up there, whether on purpose or not, is not only bullying but even more emotional and psychological abuse because he never gave a damn and suddenly, he's angry. Just. No. I cannot in any shape or form stand that kind of behaviour. I get in a flying rage.

And I don't think it's right that Lysa's getting into an affair of her own, either, mostly because it goes against her values more than anything else. The subject of affairs, to me, is one where I don't particularly enjoy the situation, but if two people get married and have affairs on the side, know it, and are fine with it, then whatever, I don't care. I have a problem when it involves making your partner or yourself suffer. That's when it gets to me. Which is the case here. So we're unsure whether Koichi's having an affair or not, but even if he isn't, he's spending time with another woman. Let's say she's his sister: He's still getting more emotionally invested in that relationship than his wife and letting her in the dust. Either way, this is a terrible thing to do. Meanwhile, in Lysa's case, though she's getting the emotional warmth and affection she needs through Ebihara, she's also guilt-tripping herself over it and basically shooting herself in the foot. She's the one paying for it, in the end, hence why I think she should get out of it. I don't even care about the fact it's an affair, anymore, I care about the fact she's doing something she personally thinks is wrong and hurting herself in the process.

And I agree, but at the same time, I can understand why she didn't. One spineless wimp relating to another spineless wimp. I don't think it's right. I agree, she should talk to him and get it out of the way. However, again, I get way too well where she's coming from to get angry at her. I'm just angry at the whole situation in general. It's easy to say talking it out is the best solution. Actually doing it is a completely different story. For one, she's terrified of her dad and I think she's kind of scared of Koichi, too, though for different reasons. For another, she doesn't want to drop Ebihara, not only because she likes him back, but because he cares for her at all and she doesn't want to lose that. That one little hope at happiness. But then, as stated before, she's shooting herself in the foot if she doesn't confront the problem because it's going to bite her in the ass and bad. But I can understand much too well why she can't just speak up. Lack of self-confidence, fear of the repercussions, and because the current situation is better than the worst case scenario that's slowly, possibly being set up. Not to mention talking doesn't always make things better. Speaking from personal experience. (Generally, it's due to a lack of choosing the right words, getting upset, and no one being in the mindset to just talk it out. Which is generally the case in these scenarios. Acid flies from everyone to everyone and no one comes out unscathed.)

To be honest, I don't think Koichi was worried about Lysa at all. That's not the impression he gave me. Worried about the impression she's giving her parents about their marriage, maybe, but her personally? No. He has shown no signs of giving a damn about her before, why should I believe he does now? Though I agree Lysa's being far from the ideal role model, too. Even worse, I can relate to her despite never having been in this type of situation. (Unless you count dating someone you realized you didn't really love to be similar.) I personally think she's a good protagonist simply for being surprisingly developed, having her own set of problems and having realistic emotions. Good role model? No. Far from it. This is destructive behaviour and shouldn't be encouraged. She's not making matters for herself better. She's stuck, though, and I can understand that, having been in similar situations numerous times. I don't hate Koichi, but he has not given me any reason to like him, either, and his behaviour is setting off numerous berserk buttons of mine because I have met and interacted with enough people like him that I just. I can't anymore. I don't hate him. I hate his behaviour. I don't think Lysa's much better, honestly, because she's just hurting herself as well. Maybe Koichi's doing the same, too, but since I have not been given any knowledge on why and until his route comes out there's no way for me to ever get to know his reasons, I just cannot sympathise with him. Not until I can play his route and judge from that.

And agreeing with that last line to an extent. Except I don't think Lysa's affair is to do the same unto Koichi as he'd doing to her. She found emotional support elsewhere and couldn't help but cling to it and it's starting to spiral out of control. She's not enjoying that.