Tick! Tack! Is one of several sequels to SHUFFLE! and the first to be translated into English. It is a direct continuation of Nerine’s ending and begins when Mayumi, Nerine, Rin and Itsuki accidentally activate a magical device and hurl themselves twenty years into the past and into the demon world, where they meet a younger Forbesii, his fiancée Ai and the maid Sage. As it turns out, Nerine’s mother is actually Sage, but due to the distraction that their appearance caused, Sage was unable to give Forbesii the gift she had intended that would have led to him proposing to her.
In order to fix the past, you need to help Sage and Forbesii get together. Unfortunately, Rin happens to be incompetent, so attempts to do so alter the timeline much more than if he leaves well enough alone, which can throw all sorts of wrinkles into the development and even lead to him seducing either Ai or Sage. Thus, there are four endings, all of them based on how much you manage to screw things up. Likely on purpose.
Tick! Tack! provides examples of:
- Accidental Pervert: Rin walks in on Sage changing once and Ai bathing three times. The first is shrugged off, the second one is forgiven but only just and the third is only if you’ve pursued a relationship with her, meaning fun times for Rin ensue.
- A-Cup Angst: Sage and Mayumi are quite distressed over their small cup size, though Mayumi tries to console herself by saying her figure appeals to some people.
- Alliterative Title
- Amnesiac Lover: If you mess up the timeline enough, Nerine will forget Rin. Works out okay anyway.
- Arranged Marriage: Ai’s marriage to Forbesii was arranged before they even met. She loves the idea. He likes her well enough, but does not love her though if Rin seduces Sage, she'll quit, allowing Ai and Forbesii to get together instead as Forbesii grows to love her instead.
- Battle Butler: Bark is noted to be very strong despite his goofiness, but mostly does the housework that Sage or Forbesii don’t take care of.
- Black Comedy Rape: When Nerine turns into a loli offscreen, causing her to fall out of her now-too-big clothes, she was found by Ria, who later jokes to Rin what would happen if it was Itsuki who've had found her. This causes Nerine to visibly cry at the mere thought.
- Bodyguard Crush: Bark, much to everyone's unease, appears to be passionately in love with Forbesii.
- Break His Heart to Save Him: Best way to get perfect ending (with Itsuki noting how its guaranteed that Forbesii and Sage get together), is by making Sage fall for Rin, but rejecting her when she throws herself at him. She will be heartbroken, but then Forbesii can save her from drowning, giving us Sagex Forbesii H-sceene.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Rin mocks Mayumi early on for not having a route in SHUFFLE!.
- But Liquor Is Quicker: Ai has to get herself really drunk before switching to going after Rin.
- But Thou Must!: If you trigger enough flags for Ai that she falls in love with Rin, saying either yes or no to sleeping her ends up with Rin doing it. She’s even happier if you say no at first.
- The Casanova: Despite his failure to get on Sage, Nerine or Ai’s good sides, Itsuki is still noted to be very popular.
- Chick Magnet: According to Ria, Rin just has a natural charm and ability to flirt without consequence that Itsuki just can’t pull off. Ai and Sage make similar observations when their attraction to him begins growing.
- Clingy Jealous Girl: Downplayed in Red Nerine Good Ending. While walking with Rin, she notes she would get jealous, if he played with girls she doesn't know, implying it would be okay if he fooled around with Kaede or Sia.
- Comedic Underwear Exposure: Thanks to the Thunder Kick, numerous people get to enjoy Sage’s underwear.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Bark is a complete idiot, but he’s noted to be very strong.
- The Devil: Thanks to human misunderstandings, a race that is more like elves are known as devils. Rin dryly notes that satanic cultists around the world would commit suicide if they could see what a dork 'the devil' is.
- Double Standard Rape: Female on Male: Both Red Nerine and Ai can, to various extent, try to rape Rin. Former has event, that can happen if she loses her memories... except her body still remembers Rin, and she wants to know what it feels like. She is rather forceful, straddling him despite his objections, and he will point it out later that she basically raped him, even if won't be slightest angry about it. Latter will joke about forcing him to sleep with her if he refuses her advances after she falls for him (Sage takes rejection more gracefully, if through tears), and although she seems capable to go through it, with her being decent magician, she quickly lets Rin take the lead once she persuades him to go through with it.
- Duality Motif: Mayumi has heterochromia, presumably a result of having been born between a devil and a human.
- For Want Of A Nail: Making little tweaks to the timeline can drastically effect what happens to Nerine in the future.
- Genki Girl: Ria is like some sort of perverse mix of Sia, Asa and Mayumi from the original, making her cheery, meddlesome and rash.
- Guide Dang It!: To get the Golden Ending, you need to juggle historical accuracy values, multiple sets of relationship values pointing towards different characters, view scenes in the right order and avoid doing everything too fast or Itsuki will send you back to your own time. You can get a good ending fairly easily without the precise knowledge of a walkthrough, but you’ll be missing important scenes and events.
- Hard-Drinking Party Girl: Despite her reserved appearance, Ai can drink and drink and never get drunk.
- High-Class Gloves: Ai occasionally wears very long, white gloves to emphasize that she's a proper lady. Usually, she wears much shorter ones, however.
- Informed Ability: Ai angrily notes she is good with fire spells, when Rin walks on her in bath, again. But with him being Rin, she does not follow though with the threat. Cineraria gets to actually show-off her powers, when she hypnotised Itsuki.
- In Spite of a Nail: Despite all the changes that you can introduce into the timeline, 'Nerine' will still come out of the relationship in the end. She might have red hair or be about five years younger though.
- Kid from the Future: The perspective is flipped from the usual, but now that Nerine has gone back in time accidentally she and Rin have to make sure that Sage and Forbesii get married after messing up the latter’s proposal. Unfortunately, they kind of suck at it. Fortunately, Nerine always exists in some form even so.
- Lethal Chef: Nerine and Cineraria.
- Lovable Sex Maniac: Itsuki is constantly flirting and trying to sleep with everyone.
- Love Triangle
- Forbesii is engaged to Ai, but in love with Sage. Everyone involved knows the score as well.
- Rin, being the ever helpful bumbling idiot that he is, can end up seducing Ai or Sage. Naturally, this sets up two more triangles at once.
- Marry Them All: There are endings where you also hook up with Ai along with whatever version of Nerine is with you. The purple Nerine even says pretty bluntly 'Yeah, so long as it’s a girl I know it’s okay.' However, you can't end up with Sage and Nerine.
- Meido: Sage was hired to help with the housework one year before, though Forbesii keeps irritating her by trying to take over the cooking.
- Mood Killer: Mayumi and Itsuki instantly break Nerine and Rin apart when they begin flirting in public.
- Multiple Endings: The endings all seem to be based around how much Rin manages to screw the timeline up.
- You can just hang out with Nerine the whole time and actually keep the timeline the way it’s supposed to be.
- If you pursue Sage, Forbesii will marry Ai instead and the purple haired Nerine will replace the Nerine Rin knew. Sage quits working for Forbesii and doesn't show up in the present unlike Ai.
- Causing a fight between Sage and Forbesii will delay Nerine’s conception.
- You can pile up a lot of affection points with Ai and make her give up on Forbesii and go for Rin instead. Rin goes back to his time and when he gets home Ai has been waiting for him for twenty years. Nerine is confused but apparently it’s just not that big of a deal that Rin now has two lovers.
- Nice Girl: Ai is polite, friendly, kind and social. She doesn’t even seem to resent Sage or Forbesii when the pair fall in love, though she’s certainly not happy.
- No Antagonist: There’s no bad guy in the story. The only conflict begins when the arrival of Rin’s group throws Nerine’s existence itself into question. People are saddened when their love doesn’t work out, but never lash out at each other.
- Non-Standard Game Over: If you mess up the timeline too much but without scoring the right flags, Itsuki will simply demand that you head home immediately before making things even worse by doing something like seducing Ria and causing Sia to never be born.
- Painting the Medium: Cineraria chats about the music notes that she needs to attach to the end of her sentences.
- Personality Swap:
- Nerine’s personality and aspects of her appearance flip based on whether or not you’re matching the 'real' timeline of events. Sage is Nerine’s mother, but if the timeline isn’t followed properly her mother will instead be Ai. The blue Nerine is calm and polite while the purple Nerine is energetic and chatty. They both have Nerine’s memories though unless you keep screwing with the timeline.
- Ria casts a spell on Itsuki that makes him think he’s a girl. Terror ensues.
- Petite Pride: Mayumi forcibly convinces herself that there’s a demand for flat chests and that she ought to be proud of them.
- Proper Lady: Ai is warm, gentle, strong and wears an outfit suggesting purity and cleanliness.
- Relationship Values: You can juggle the affection scores of characters in a couple ways. You can push Sage or Ai towards Forbesii, but you can also end up being a little too smooth and getting them to go for you instead.
- Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory: Rin, Mayumi and Itsuki remember the real history. Nerine herself tends to change depending on how history is changed. She’ll remember at first even if she fundamentally changes due to your mishaps, but keep it up and she’ll forget.
- Sacred First Kiss: Ai is kind of upset when she finds herself attracted enough to Rin to give it to him instead of Forbesii.
- Second Love: Being too nice to Sage or Ai makes them decide the Forbesii thing isn’t working out and go for Rin instead.
- The Slow Path: Ai waits twenty years for Rin if he seduces her. Nerine is pretty understanding somehow, though she doesn’t want Ai to monopolize him.
- Smarter Than You Look: Ai looks pretty spacey, but she’s able to figure out on her own from what time Rin’s group comes and what they’re trying to do.
- Stable Time Loop: It’s speculated that the group might be in one early on. Indications are that no, they weren’t, but now they’ve set one up.
- Stepford Smiler: Ai looks very friendly and calm, but she’s pretty upset that her fiancée doesn’t love her and knows he’s going to break off the engagement soon.
- Supreme Chef: Sage and Forbesii are masters at cooking and much to Sage’s irritation Forbesii keeps at it even when it’s her job. He wants to be able to make an omelet as good as the one she made but can’t compare.
- The Tease: The purple haired Nerine seems to have inherited Ai’s rather flirty nature and doesn’t have Ai’s proper girl attitude to mask it
- Theme Naming: Almost the entire cast is named for plants, though Forbesii's unseen father is named after a kind of sea nymph.
- Sage is sage, of course.
- Forbesii is a type of cypress
- Cineraria, Lyrcoris and Nerine are all types of flowers.
- Bark is simply bark.
- Even Mayumi gets in on it despite only being half devil: Her last name, Thyme, is a spice.
- Ai when written in katakana (like all devils names) refers to a plant known as persicaria tinctoria which has historically been used as a source for indigo dye.
- Kaede, Primula and the others mentioned at the beginning are also all named for various types of plants from maples to various kinds of flower.
- Three-Way Sex: If you make exactly the right decisions, a threeway is possible between Rin, Nerine and Sage or Ai, Sage and Rin. You'd think that this would cause some issues with Nerine's very existence at stake, but it all works out somehow anyway. Sage doesn't even comment on it when Rin gets back to the present, even though he took her virginity!
- Tsundere: Sage lets her emotions out through kicks. She’s pretty nice to Rin though.
- Twice Shy: Thanks to the interference in the timeline, Sage and Forbesii can’t admit how they feel to each other.
- Uptown Girl: Gender-inverted: Sage is a maid. Forbesii is the crown prince. Nerine is the result of their romance.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Sage is forgotten about in the present, regardless of events.
- With Friends Like These...: Mayumi and Itsuki are of no use in helping Rin to get Forbesii and Sage together. Even Ria is rather useless, despite her enthusiasm in voluntering to help. How does she try to help? Flat out tells her brother: "You should violate Sage-chan".
- You Lose at Zero Trust: If you screw up the timeline enough, Itsuki demands that you go home before you make things even worse by eliminating Nerine altogether or maybe even preventing Sia from being born. These endings aren’t actually bad, but it’s treated like you screwed up.
