Recent reviews by Hideki Saito

If you’ve been even remotely paying attention to the recent avatar / 3D space glow-ups, chances are you’ve heard of gogh—that virtual environment software that aggressively whispers “cozy… cooosy…” into your ears while you work. You make an avatar, it becomes your silent (and non-judgmental) buddy, and together you conquer emails, spreadsheets, and whatever else life throws at you.

Now, gogh originally came with its own charming set of avatar parts—cute, tasteful, very “I drink herbal tea.” But if at any point you’ve found yourself thinking, “This is nice, but what if Miku were here?”—good news. Waiting is over.

This DLC brings you Miku, lovingly reimagined to fit gogh’s ultra-chill aesthetic. You get Miku-style avatar parts and room items, meaning you can fully commit to a Study With Miku setup. Work session? A companion for focused silence? Productivity shrine? All valid. Twist it, customize it, rearrange it until it matches your exact vibe.

One tiny disclaimer: actual music is not included. (Yes, that’s a separate DLC. Yes, capitalism wins again.)
And no, leeks are not included either. I checked. Thoroughly. Painfully.

Whether you’re a die-hard gogh fan, a lifelong Miku believer, or just someone who wants their productivity boosted by 100% anime energy, this DLC will absolutely make your work sessions way more Miku.

(Leeks still not included. I’m coping.)

“Laid-Back Camp – Virtual – Fumoto Campsite” is what happens when someone looked at the anime Yuru Camp and thought, “What if we made a VR game where literally nothing stressful ever happens?”

You play as Rin Shima, everyone’s favorite introverted camping philosopher, and spend your time hanging out with Nadeshiko, queen of chaotic wholesomeness. The gameplay? Imagine a point-and-click adventure, except instead of solving puzzles or saving the world, you’re just… boiling water, eating cup ramen, and occasionally pointing at Mt. Fuji like, “Yeah, that’s nice.”

Now, the store page might tell you that you need a VR headset. The description, however, admits you actually don’t. But let’s be real — playing a “virtual camping” game without VR is like buying a marshmallow and then staring at it for 20 minutes. Technically possible, but you’re missing the flavor.

Speaking of 20 minutes — that’s about how long the entire game lasts. You can finish it faster than it takes to cook real curry rice. You’ll unlock all the achievements, experience the full extent of Rin’s inner peace, and still have time to wonder why the Steam point shop expects you to play two hours before you can buy that adorable Nadeshiko avatar frame.

Despite that, it’s hard to stay mad. The world is cozy, the visuals are cute, and for a few blissful moments, you too can feel like an anime girl living her best camping life — no mosquitoes, no rain, and no tent poles that mysteriously go missing.

The price might feel a bit steep for something shorter than your morning coffee break, so maybe wait for a sale… unless you’re the kind of person who thinks “wholesome VR marshmallow vibes” is a valid lifestyle choice. In that case, pack your thermos, charge your headset, and prepare to be aggressively relaxed.

Undertale is one of those games that takes the good ol’ JRPG formula, flips it upside down, shakes it until loose coins fall out, and then politely hands you back something both familiar and very, very weird. At first glance, it looks like your typical retro-style RPG, but instead of the usual “select attack, press confirm, sip tea while animation plays” routine, you’re suddenly dodging a barrage of projectiles like you accidentally booted up a bullet hell shooter. And trust me, you’ll be dodging a lot. Your keyboard will feel like it just ran a marathon.

The game doesn’t just borrow inspiration from JRPGs—it screams it from the rooftops, waves a glowstick, and adds a wink-wink-nudge-nudge while it’s at it. The references range from subtle Easter eggs that make you grin like you’re in on a secret, to so-obvious-you-can’t-miss homages that hit you over the head with a foam bat. Either way, you’ll be smiling.

Now, don’t worry: Undertale isn’t the kind of RPG that demands you quit your job, live on instant noodles, and dedicate two weeks of your life to endless grinding. It’s a reasonably sized adventure with plenty of quirky encounters and enough narrative twists to keep things spicy. You won’t need to beg your boss for “Undertale leave.” Save that for when the next 100-hour AAA monster drops.

The story? Surprisingly heartfelt. The characters? Quirky, memorable, and sometimes unsettlingly relatable. It’s the sort of narrative that sneaks up on you—you come for the memes and end up with feelings.

Now, if I had to nitpick, my only gripe is the game’s “bug-or-feature” antics near the finale. Yes, I know it’s supposed to be meta. Yes, I know it’s intentional. But let’s be honest: at some points it behaves like your computer’s about to explode. It’s the kind of thing that feels like it deserves its own CVE number. (For my non-security friends: think of it as “so erratic it should be officially registered as a digital misbehavior.”) Once or twice is clever; overdoing it feels like Toby Fox wanted to troll me personally.

But here’s the bottom line: I had a blast. Undertale is witty, charming, and surprisingly moving. Definitely worth every minute, whether you’re dodging pixel-sized death or laughing at talking skeletons with a suspicious fondness for bad puns. And if you’re still unsure after this glowing review, just wait for a sale—it happens often, and trust me, the game’s worth even the full price.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been having an absolute blast waving my hands around like a caffeinated octopus, pretending I’m some kind of world-renowned orchestra conductor. You know, the kind who shows up in documentaries with dramatic lighting and subtitles in six languages.

This is especially impressive considering I don’t actually play any instruments (unless you count those six traumatic weeks with a plastic recorder in elementary school). I also once tried to learn guitar, which went about as well as teaching a cat to swim. The guitar is still somewhere in my room, quietly judging me from under a pile of clothes. Occasionally I give it a pity dusting.

Reading sheet music? Oh, absolutely—I mean, if you count looking at it with mild panic and pretending I understand the little squiggles. So yeah, being a real-life conductor was probably not in the cards. But now, thanks to Maestro, I get to fake it very convincingly in VR.

This game lets you conduct a virtual orchestra with your whole body, waving your arms around in front of a group of impressively well-behaved musicians who don’t seem to mind that you have no idea what you’re doing. It’s a rhythm game, yes—but instead of tapping circles or slapping taiko drums, you’re giving big theatrical flourishes and dramatic hand gestures like you’re about to summon a storm. It’s elegant chaos.

And then there’s Eric. Who is Eric? He’s this pale, stressed-out figure who appears to be in charge of something—your assistant? Your stage manager? Maybe just the guy who had a meltdown and never left. He shuffles over during rehearsals with sheet music and champagne like he’s hosting a party and a nervous breakdown at the same time. Of course, I immediately drop the champagne on the floor like some kind of clumsy diva, and Eric reacts like I’ve insulted his entire lineage.

To make things even better, Eric keeps yelling at someone named Nicole. From the stage. Loudly. Like, “Nicole! We need lights!” and “Nicole! The strings are late again!” And Nicole? Nicole never yells back. She just responds through the PA system like some all-seeing, all-knowing voice from above. She’s basically the ghost in the machine, and I am certain she’s the one actually running the show. Someone’s cleaning up all the broken champagne bottles, after all, and we both know it’s not Eric. She’s probably got a mop in one hand and a production schedule in the other.

Now, as for the conducting itself—look, I have no clue if I’m doing anything remotely correct. But the gestures feel right. And that’s what matters. You wave, you sweep, you point dramatically at the brass section like they just confessed to a crime. It feels powerful. Your movements start to flow in rhythm with the music, and suddenly you forget that you’re in your living room wearing pajamas and looking like a wizard with motion sickness. You are the music. The baton is your wand. You are unstoppable. Until you shatter another glass, and Eric sighs again.

Also, shoutout to my fellow left-handed folks—you can switch the baton to your left hand in the options. That small detail made me feel seen. No more awkward flailing or wrist cramps from pretending to be right-handed just for game mechanics. Thank you, devs. Left-hand rights in the conductor’s pit!

In conclusion, you don’t need to read music. You don’t need to play music. You just need to move like someone who might have been banned from the Vienna Philharmonic for excessive flair. And if you accidentally turn the stage into a glass recycling bin, Nicole’s got you covered.

Would I wave my hands at invisible violins again? Without a doubt.

Parcel Simulator is essentially a high-stakes spiritual journey into understanding why your online orders arrive looking like they’ve been kicked down a flight of stairs, emotionally neglected, and then gently sneezed into a shipping container. And now, you get to be the mysterious figure behind that chaos — the lone parcel handler in a world held together by duct tape, conveyor belts, and probably several violations of labor law.

Your day begins not in an office or a warehouse, but in what looks suspiciously like a converted shipping container someone once called “cozy.” You sleep there. You work there. Your commute is a brisk 30 seconds — which is either a dream or a cry for help depending on your tolerance for concrete walls and silence. It’s the logistics industry’s definition of remote work: no traffic, no coworkers, no oversight, and definitely no HR. Somewhere in a dark corner, OSHA weeps softly.

You run the whole operation yourself. Just you. No coworkers. No interns. No mildly helpful AI assistant. You are the business, the labor, the management, and the unfortunate soul who has to sweep up afterward. Trucks arrive throughout the day, carrying exactly three packages at a time, which feels wildly inefficient until you realize the game is slowly preparing you for a career in chaotic realism. At that delivery rate, I’m pretty sure the shipper’s paying about $1,000 per box. Maybe more if it's fragile. Maybe less if it screams when shaken.

Before you can even think about package inspections, you’ll be spending your workday unloading boxes from those trucks, one by one, because there’s nobody else to do it. You and your human arms are the entire workforce. Hope you like cardio and repetitive motion injuries. You’ll carefully move each box to the floor — or a shelf, if you’ve managed to afford one — and start to understand, deep in your soul, why your packages arrive looking like they’ve seen things.

Technically, you could begin inspections before 5:00 PM. The system won’t stop you. But you’ll be so busy offloading deliveries that it’s a laughable idea unless you enjoy working against yourself. And even if you do sneak in some early inspections, it actually penalizes you — inspecting earlier means fewer packages stockpiled, and less money earned. This game has a beautifully broken incentive system where efficiency and profitability are in direct conflict. In other words: welcome to capitalism, we hope you enjoy your unpaid overtime. If the Department of Labor ever stopped by this warehouse, they'd probably pretend they were just looking for directions and moonwalk out.

When the clock hits 5:00 PM, that’s when the real “fun” begins. You’ll spend your evening hunched over conveyor belts, checking serial numbers, confirming destinations, and occasionally discovering that someone tried to ship a suspiciously unlabeled bottle of “liquid not poison.” If it passes inspection, you slap on a sticker of bureaucratic approval. If not, you deny it with the righteous fury of a TSA agent seizing a bottle of shampoo. Then you slide the box into the appropriate chute with a satisfying thunk — no throwing allowed. This is a workplace, not dodgeball.

At the start, everything is manual. No forklifts. No power tools. No union breaks. Just you and your freakishly strong arms, lifting crates like you're auditioning for the logistics division of the Avengers. But as you earn money, you can automate the entire process. Conveyor belts. Scanners. Sorters. Gradually, your warehouse evolves into a glorious, mechanical ballet of boxes, labels, and satisfying clunks. It’s hypnotic. Beautiful. And probably violating at least six safety regulations per second.

It’s hard to describe Parcel Simulator without mentioning Papers, Please and Satisfactory. It’s like the two went drinking, vented about shipping logistics, and then created a game that simulates the relentless, low-key chaos of modern supply chains. The attention to detail is oddly meditative. The humor is unspoken but ever-present. And the gameplay loop is as addictive as it is existentially haunting. It may not get you a job at FedEx, but it will definitely give you just enough "practical experience" to bluff your way through a warehouse interview with unsettling confidence.

Eventually, you begin to take pride in the chaos. In the layout of your warehouse. In the flow of your machinery. In the methodical rhythm of scanning, labeling, and sorting. And that’s when it hits you: you’ve become the system. A very tired, slightly broken, almost certainly illegal one-person logistics system.

And strangely... it’s kind of fun.

gogh is less of a “game” and more like an ambient productivity pet rock—but cuter, more animated, and slightly more emotionally available. Imagine an emotional support animal… but not an animal… and not particularly supportive either. Just there—quietly vibing with you in the background while you try to get your life together.

Gameplay? Well, that’s a generous word here. There are some light interactive elements: you can hatch eggs (yes, eggs!), and tame whatever creature hatches out of them. But if you’re looking for boss battles or inventory management, turn back now. This is less “epic quest” and more “soft background comfort while you doom-scroll or finally tackle that spreadsheet.”

The real appeal lies in the atmosphere. You get a cozy little 3D character (which you design from a set of charming presets) sitting—or standing—around in a room of your choosing, while 127 lo-fi BGM tracks hum along in the background. Yes, I counted. And if that’s not enough, there are 20 sound effects to sprinkle in, ranging from chirping birds and frogs, to wind, thunder, white noise, and its edgier cousin, pink noise. You can pretend you're working from a tranquil forest, a rainy cityscape, or a peaceful hilltop with suspiciously good Wi-Fi.

There’s also a built-in clock, Pomodoro timer, count-up timer, and a simple to-do list. No, it’s not going to replace JIRA or Microsoft Project—unless your team’s OK with your sprint backlog being managed by a virtual frog—but for solo productivity with a cute twist? It does the trick.

Customization is decent but not limitless. You can’t import your own avatar (which would’ve been awesome), and 3D object import is a no-go. But the art style is cute, and I’ll admit—my little digital buddy grew on me. Like a houseplant, but one that sits in a chair and judges no one.

Room customization is a nice bonus—you can decorate with desks, beds, shelves, and other furniture. Plus, you can display your own images (including animated GIFs), webcam streams, or even OBS feeds, which opens up fun possibilities… like projecting a live feed of your cat watching you work. Productivity recursion!

If you're looking for a peaceful digital companion that doesn't talk, doesn’t judge, and never asks for a raise, gogh might be your new favorite coworker.

This isn't your usual DLC where you get extra gameplay content. Instead, the CLANNAD 10th Anniversary Artbook offers something different and special: a PDF version of a beautiful artbook.

Back in 2013, KEY celebrated CLANNAD's 10th anniversary by hosting an art contest on Pixiv, gathering entries from fans and professional artists alike. The result was a large, serial-numbered artbook that originally sold for around 7000 yen. (I own a copy myself, and it's a real treasure.)

Now, with this DLC, you get an English-translated version of that book. The original Japanese version is the kind of rare item you probably won't find sitting on the shelves at your local bookstore, let alone outside of Japan. Considering it was a limited print run back in 2013, it's doubtful that any Japanese bookstore would still have it either. If you really wanted a physical copy, it would mean binge-hunting through used bookstores, and even then, finding one would be pure luck.

It's important to note that artworks related to the anime adaptations (from Toei and Kyoto Animation) that were present in the original Japanese physical book are omitted here, likely due to licensing issues. Still, the collection remains impressive, showcasing a wide variety of fan-submitted illustrations alongside official package and concept art.

If you're a CLANNAD fan, a collector, or someone who appreciates beautiful artwork, this is a fantastic addition to your digital library.

You get access to a wonderful collection that is hard to come by. It features many different art styles, and it includes some official materials as well. While it doesn't include anime-specific art and is a PDF rather than a physical book, it is still a wonderful celebration of CLANNAD's legacy.

Highly recommended!

The CLANNAD Original Soundtrack (Steam Edition) is a treasure for any fan of the game. Containing pretty much every single track used in the original visual novel by KEY/Visual Art's, it spans a wide range of music styles, from emotional instrumental pieces to vocal songs (both in shortened and full versions).

What makes this Steam Edition particularly special is that it isn't just a direct port of the original soundtrack. All tracks composed by Shinji Orito have undergone subtle remastering and retuning. Orchestration changes, sound balance tweaks, and even slight melody line adjustments can be found throughout. Some tracks even feature additional outros, giving them a slightly fresh flavor while preserving the essence of the originals.

For those curious about exactly which tracks have been altered, here is a list based on my research:

Disk 1: 6, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 19, 20
Disk 2: 1, 2, 3, 9
Disk 3: 2, 3, 4, 18

While opinions on these remixes are divided, I personally enjoy the updated touches. I find that they enhance rather than detract from the emotional impact of the music. That said, taste is subjective, and purists may prefer the "classic" versions, which have been available through digital music stores and streaming services like Spotify.

In short: if you're a CLANNAD fan who appreciates the world and emotions it built through its music, this Steam Edition soundtrack is well worth picking up. It offers a slightly different, but lovingly crafted take on the unforgettable soundscape of one of the most iconic visual novels of all time.

Aviassembly: Where Flight Sim Meets Frankenstein Engineering

The premise of Aviassembly is gloriously simple: slap some wings on a thing, fly it around, deliver some cargo (medicine, batteries, inexplicably perishable fruit), make cash and scrap, then upgrade your monstrosity of a plane and repeat. It's part courier service, part aviation experiment, and part banana crisis management simulator. Seriously, I’ve had bananas survive a full day in my backpack—how are these in-game ones turning into compost in five minutes? Are we flying through a microwave?

This isn’t Microsoft Flight Simulator or X-Plane—you won’t need a binder of checklists, a headset to yell “roger” into, or a PhD in switch-flipping. There’s no ATC barking at you for taxi clearance, and if you're wondering about autopilot—nope, that’s not on the menu. You’re flying this baby yourself, wobbles, regrets, and all.

Aerodynamics? Streamlined. Physics? Negotiable. Want to build a plane with ten fuselages duct-taped together like some kind of metallic centipede? Go right ahead. Six wings stacked like lasagna? Absolutely. A tail in the front and wheels that come off like dollar store shopping carts? Yes, chef. Your creations will (probably) fly, (sometimes) land, and (almost never) explode in mid-air without a good reason. Honestly, it’s a miracle of modern duct tape engineering.

Landing is usually the hardest part of any flight sim—ILS, flaps, wind vectors—but not here. In Aviassembly, the landing process is more of a suggestion. Sure, a wheel might bounce off and roll into the distance like it's quitting its job, but hey, if you’re still in one piece and cargo’s not on fire, that’s a win. No idea what these planes are made of, but I suspect it's mostly hope and scrap metal.

Worried about grinding to unlock parts? Don't be. There's a Sandbox mode where you get everything right away. It’s like the cheat code version of engineering school—no classes, just chaos.

And considering it's in early access, the game is surprisingly stable. The roadmap looks promising too—like it might evolve from “chaotic postal flight simulator” to “chaotic galactic postal flight simulator.” One can dream.

Just don’t expect Boeing or Airbus to come knocking after seeing your plane design. And no, this game won’t get you a real pilot license… but come on, would you really want to be in charge of an actual aircraft after what you just built?

VRM Dance Dream MV is a neat little early access app that lets you import your VRM avatar and make it dance. That’s the pitch—and it mostly delivers, assuming you’re okay with a few rough edges and the occasional “wait, how does this work again?” moment.

You pick a song from the included selection (which is… not huge), apply a dance animation, and watch your model do its thing. It even lets you export the whole thing as an MP4, which is perfect if you’ve always dreamed of uploading your avatar doing interpretive finger guns to YouTube or social media.

You can also import your own motion data, which opens up more possibilities if you’ve got some files lying around from other tools. That said, the interface is still a bit clunky—it’s not always clear what buttons do what, and figuring things out sometimes feels like a dance of its own, one choreographed by someone who really likes hiding features behind vague icons.

Still, it does what it says on the tin. If you want a quick way to animate your VRM without dealing with full-blown 3D animation software, this is a fun and (mostly) easy option. Just know it’s still a work in progress. If you're the kind of person who gets excited by seeing your model groove to canned animations, it's worth a shot. If you're the kind who wants polish and custom everything, maybe wishlist it and check back after a few updates.

Recommended, but with the understanding that it's more “bedroom DJ debut” than “world tour.”