X-Change 2

"Better than the first, but still plenty of room for improvements."

X-Change 2 is an adult h-game. So if you're under the legal age restriction of your country, then you're not welcome here.

"X-Change", a name that will cause some h-gamers to shake their heads do to the bad experiences they had from the first X-Change. But don't worry, X-Change 2 is a lot better than X-Change. So do not let the bad experiences with the first X-Change haunt you.

The story is about Takuya, a highschool student and a year since X-Change 1. Asuka, his childhood friend, became his girlfriend after X-Change 1 and since then the two of them have being closer than ever. However, their happiness was short-lived when Takuya, who is also the president of the chemistry club at school, got involved in an experimental accident which turned him into a girl once again. So the bizarre story begins from there as he tries to find ways to change himself back into a man.

Gameplay:

Click, click, click and making choices. Typical gameplay from games in this genre. However, the addition of the fast-forwarding button to skip texts that you've already seen before really helps when you're replaying the game. Furthermore, Crowd got innovative this time by adding in a couple of mini-games. This, in my opinion, deserves credit because not only are mini-games rare in this type of h-game, but they also provide a little entertainment when you're about to get bored reading the texts.

Graphics:

The graphics are very good, especially if you compare it to X-Change 1. The graphics of girl Takuya was particularly attractive, especially her poses. I must admit that the girl version of Takuya is probably one of the few female characters that I really liked best in terms of graphics. There are lots of cgs too, so for those who're into cgs, this game is recommended.

Music:

Nothing to complain about. Pretty standard and situable for the game.

Story:

Ok, here's the real meat of this review and is probably the main differences between X-Change 1 and X-Change 2. Unlike X-Change 1, where the whole point of the game was about rape and how Takuya turns into a sex toy for everybody, X-Change 2 actually have some story and humour. There are a total of 23 endings in this game, which is quite a lot compared to other h-games in general. So expect quite a number of variance in choices that you can make. Unlike the first X-Change, X-Change 2 has 7 girls to choose from with some endings for if you decide to stay as a girl, 1 lesbian ending and a number of bad ones.

What I particularly liked about X-Change 2 is that it gives you a choice if you want to stay as a girl while at the same time you don't get penalised for that choice. (ie. It doesn't lead to a bad bading.) However, the main problem is there is only one guy to choose from, which is pretty bad considering that guy is one crybaby and he actually forced Takuya to have sex at some point during the game. It would had being much better if they take away some of the girls (some of the girl's story are pretty rushed and shallow, so one could do without them) and put some better guys in and let Takuya have some ending with these better guys.

Since this game is about how Takuya, through being a girl, experience how a girl feels (emotionally, sexually, etc) which in turn allows him to understand girls better, it is just logical to have some story where the girl Takuya gets to experience things like going on a date as a girl with a guy, romances, shopping as a girl, etc. X-Change 2 does indeed touch on these, but unfortuately very lightly. This is one of the potential areas where they could had improved greatly on the game.

Speaking of the 7 girls, some of the endings were good. But you're going to find that some of the other girls' ending were pretty rushed and shallow in respect of storyline. I would rather they reduce the number of girls and endings and instead give more story and detail to the girls' story than just give us lots of girls without any concrete story to them. I guess quantity never beats quality after all.

The next on the list are those rape scenes. Well, there's still plenty of them and they are definitely inappropriately badly done. (Not in terms of graphics though. The graphics are good.) The infamous "rape bus" is back again. Rape scenes like raped by a teacher are also back. Personally, I don't mind if they put in rape scenes. However, at least they should had done it properly. Rape bus? Please...how illogical is that. Raped by a teach IN the OFFICE in school time? Please...where are all the other teachers? I wonder if any of the script writers and scenario writers ever seen games like the famous Syusaku with all those blackmailing, drugging, etc. So there's plenty of ways to do them properly and you're going to find those rape scenes in this game to be totally out of place.

The last thing that I had to question about the story is...why does everyone have to know that Takuya is actually a guy who turned into a girl? It would have made much more sense and probably do much better to the storytelling if only a few close friends/family to Takuya actually know that he was turned into a girl.

Replayability:

There's definitely replay value to this game, especially if you're not using a guide to play this. Personally, I think the ending with Asuka and Chisato is a must get. The other girls are fine too, but most of their stories were pretty rushed and shallow. If you like Takuya to stay as a girl, then his ending with Kouji is also definitely a must get, especially when Takuya actually gets to experience how it feels for a girl to be loved and cared for.

So this game only deserves a 7/10 because there's just so much room for improvements.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 07/14/06