Our Heroine and her boyfriend.
Love, Courage, and Leaf-Wrapped Rice Cake in English. It's another cute little puzzle game from the maker of Irisu Syndrome!. This game features the same sort of sweet-dark plot as its forerunner, so be prepared for surprises! Many have even described it as a a crossover between Kashiwa Mochi and Irisu Syndrome! in both gameplay and plot.Ai-chan is a adorable but sick girl who loves eating sweets and being in love with her boyfriend, Yuki. Ai isn't just a typical ill girl, but something more serious. The gameplay itself is pretty similar to Yoshi's Cookie, only with a wicked difficulty curve.
The computer version can be downloaded here.
An official iOS version titled "Love Mochi" was released in 2011 and could be bought from the App Store, but it has since been removed.
A sequel of sorts, Ai to Yuuki to Kashiwa Mochi Kai (translated as Love, Courage, and Leaf-Wrapped Rice Cakes: Unexpected Meeting) was later released at a convention, with its gameplay (and storyline, if you take the most obvious interpretation) being a crossover between Kashiwa Mochi and Irisu Syndrome. As of 2011, it can be bought here from DLsite English, along with some Maou Monogatari Monogatari artwork that was packaged with the convention version.
This game provides an example of:
- Big Bad: Yuki, Ai's boyfriend, is actually a shinigami out to kill Ai and keep her for himself.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: You need to score 200,000 points for Ai to completely get over Yuki, foiling his plot to kill her and keep her soul to himself.
- Evolving Title Screen: As you lose more and more, medical supplies will begin to replace the sweets on the top and bottom. After this, Ai will begin to look at Yuki with a shocked expression, and right after the 12th game over, Yuki turns into a skeleton. After the 13th loss, both of them are missing, but if you manage to score 50,000 points, Ai will return, and scoring 200,000 points will cause her to have a happier expression.
- Foreshadowing:
- Even without being told, take a good look at Yuki in the opening movie or the third ending screen. HIS ARM IS SKELETAL. Ending screen 2 also has a skeletal arm, but you don't know who it belongs to.
- When the game over sequence starts and all the candy rains down, let it keep going. A single pill will fall out of the sky in the end. This stops happening after the 50,000 point ending.
- Grim Reaper: Yuki is a shinigami.
- Grotesque Cute: Yuki after being revealed to be a shinigami is still cute despite being a skeleton.
- Interface Screw: As you progress, the sweets on the title screen become medical supplies. And Yuki becomes a skeleton. And then there were none.
- Lighter and Softer: Compared to Irisu Syndrome!, anyway.
- Meaningful Name: Ai mainly means love. Yuki, ironically, means courage. (Alternatively, it means "snow," depending on the kanji.)
- Mood Whiplash: There's no warning that Ai is slowly dying. It looks happy, and then you progress and the tiles on the title screen start turning into syringes and pills while story segments point out how ill Ai-chan is. Also, the music played during the game over sequence is rather melancholy, considering how bright and cheerful the rest of the music is.
- Multiple Endings: There's 5 ending screens, and three total endings. One bad, one where Ai just can't let go, and a happy one.
- Nothing Is Scarier: After the 13th game over, Ai and Yuki are completely removed from the game. The pause screen and animated introduction also changes to reflect this. Also if you get the 50,000 point ending, but have yet to achieve the 200,000 point ending, Ai looks as though Yuki is still in the scenes — although Yuki does appear in the animated introduction.
- Scary Surprise Party: The ending to Kashiwa Mochi Kai. Ai's mother disappearing and the various spooky pictures you unlock all turn out to have mundane explanations.
- Scoring Points: 50,000 for the Bittersweet Ending and 200,000 for the Happy Ending. Also up to 50,000 points, you get one of three screens that indicate your performance.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: The same cheery music will keep playing on the title screen, even after Yuki's true nature is revealed. Even when Ai vanishes, it'll be playing.
- Sugar Bowl: Kind of. There's plenty of sweets, but the main colors of the environment in Ai's dream is brown and orange-ish.
- Timed Mission: The entire game is on a time limit and you have to score as many points as possible.
- The Stinger: Once you do well enough, Kashiwamochi tiles are added to the game. Yuki moving away from his usual position in the Bad Ending reveals that a hospital was there all along. The hospital will then vanish after getting 50,000 points, replaced by Ai returning.
- 13 Is Unlucky: Fail 13 times and the usual game over rains medical supplies instead of sweets. And then they fall away and Yuki, now a skeleton, takes Ai away. Also, playing the game after the 12th game over will give you this alternate title screen◊.
