Nameless ~The One Thing You Must Recall~ Review

“Eri, the main protagonist, is an ordinary looking freshman at Crobi Academy. With her parents working at overseas, she is left all alone in her grandparents’ house after her grandfather’s death. Eri becomes keen on her ball-jointed dolls after being all by herself. However, she cannot tell anyone about her hobby…”

🎠 General Route 🎠

     Eri is a freshman in high school at Crobi Academy. She used to live with her grandfather, but he passed away the year before. Her parents were quite worried about her living alone as they worked overseas in America doing research, but Eri is able to cope. She takes comfort in her ball-jointed dolls: Lance, Yeonho, Yuri, Red, and Tei. She is a collector, buying clothes for them and posing them, and talks to them often for comfort. But, one morning, she wakes up to seeing them all in human form in her kitchen! She is incredibly surprised to see all her dolls come to life, with Tei cooking breakfast in her apron and Yuri wearing a ridiculous face mask (which he wears often).

     The boys all decide to attend school with Eri, minus Yuri who becomes the new music teacher. Lance and Yeonho are first years in the same class as Eri, while Red and Tei are second years. They are quick to become the most popular boys due to their beauty, being deemed the “HOT5.” Eri’s friend, Soi, is constantly fawning over them, along with other girls in the school who constantly try to flirt and give them presents. Yuri buys a limo to take them all to school, but since being so close to the HOT5 can cause her trouble, she often opts to using the bus. It is also worth mentioning that throughout the story we hear ???’s voice. He seems to have some control over the heroine as well, contributing to the mystery of the game. He also sometimes talks to a mysterious man, who seems to be guiding him somewhat.

🎠 Lance 🎠

     Lance is a cold, logical character. He is named the “ice prince” by people at school due to his uninterested demeanor. He constantly turns down girls with no extra thought – once a girl cried after he replied harshly because she was so happy that he didn’t ignore her (LOL). He does extremely well in class – especially in math – and is in the student council as well.

     One day, the whole crew decides to go to the mall to buy clothes, using Yuri’s mysterious “funds” (sketchy). When they go, Lance is uninterested and goes to the rooftop to hang out, and Eri follows him. He seems pretty cold, as per usual, when Eri asks for ice cream. Lance offers to go get it, and when he comes back Eri takes the initiative and shoves the ice cream in his mouth since he was too stubborn to eat it (fav). After they get warmed up, Lance decides to actually go shopping and let’s Eri picks out all his clothes for him. When they get back, Yuri is basically crying over the shopping bill (oops).

     Eri often goes with her friends Soi and Shinbi to Banjul, a cute antique cafe that Tei works at. She invites Lance to go with them and Yeonho to study, but he declines. He ends up going anyways, but Eri forgets her phone at school. She runs over and can’t find it, when Lance runs in, out of breath. She is sad that she lost her phone that held a lot of memories. Lance asked if he also held memories (referring to himself as a “thing”). Lance is constantly worrying about his worth during his route. His doll was made to be dependent on the owner. Whatever he was given, he was made to fit the owner. When he found a broken doll on the ground in the street, he stood in the rain upset. He felt like he was just something to give away. He also says this is why he doesn’t get along with Red – he is jealous of his uniqueness. He was freezing and passed out due to standing out in the rain, and Eri brought him home. He has a fever, and she stays with him until she falls asleep. She dreams of her parents, and saying that she wasn’t lonely because she had her Lance doll. Lance was the only doll she had at the time her grandfather was alive. She woke up in Lance’s bed, and when he is worried Eri reassures him that he isn’t worthless or something to be thrown away.

     Red, being the overly excited hero he is, gets offered a part in the school play. He asks Eri to play as the heroine. She is unsure at first and Lance is against it, but eventually he warms up to the idea and says to do it; that is, until he finds out there is a kissing scene at the end. Eri tries arguing against it at a drama meeting, but doesn’t win. After, Lance is waiting for her, totally worried and going off about how she shouldn’t do it anymore. He also interrupts practice before the kissing scene, and comes into her room, telling her not to do it. When she says she’s a bit scared, he is like “yea! totally! you shouldn’t do it!” (captain obvious). He wants to meet her on the rooftop at ten the next day, but she’s busy and couldn’t make it. Red gets her to put on her costume, but Lance arrives and pulls her into the dressing room. Instead of Red stealing Eri’s first kiss, Lance decides to put on her costume and play the heroine (LMAO).

     In the good end, Eri is able to tell her friends Soi and Shinbi about her love for ball-jointed dolls, which they are very accepting of. Lance is jealous that she went to the showroom and saw all the other dolls, and is like “you’ll be saying my name all night long” (oh my). In the Christmas scenario, Lance is staying in Eri’s room now. They go to the amusement park together, and when Lance goes to get food for them, Eri has disappeared when he gets back, and we hear ???’s voice. In the first bad end, when he gets sick you call others into the room when he freaks out. The next morning, when you check on him in his room he has turned back into a lifeless doll. In the second bad end, Eri plays the heroine and kisses Red. That night, we hear ??? and a mysterious man talking, saying she was useless and couldn’t get the “piece.” The next day, she is hit by a car. While I didn’t expect to, I really like Lance. He is cold, but is honestly such a sweetie and just a worry wart. I really enjoyed his route.

🎠 Yeonho 🎠

     Yeonho is such a cutie patootie. He is the “yellow chick” and causes motherly feelings to arouse in those around him (myself included). He calls Eri “master,” which she tells him not to do in school so they won’t get weird looks. He makes her cute rabbit shaped eggs in the morning, and is always clinging to her side. He is quite adorable and lovable, but he has a rough past which can cause him to be a bit… strange at times.

  Yeonho is always sweet and tries to take care of Eri. One night, he came into her room and covered her up with a blanket, saying he really likes her. When Eri wants to ride the bus, Yeonho offers to go with her so she won’t be alone. He is constantly surrounded by girls, but does try and sneak out to speak with Eri. Once, a girl gave him a picture book she thought he would like. He snuck out of his little harem to show Eri the merry-go-round in the book, saying that he really wants to ride it. This causes her to reminisce about the past and having gone on the merry-go-round with her grandfather when she was young. Yeonho starts coming home late with Tei, bringing Eri some carrot cake from the cafe that she brought him. Eri gets quite worried, until one day he says he has a surprise for her. They go on the bus to the “secret location,” which ends up being the amusement park! He is very happy to finally ride the merry-go-round. After, Eri suggests the rollercoaster, and even though he is scared Yeonho wants to go on. He does, however, get quite sick and Eri has to bring him home, which he is very upset about.

     As I mentioned before, Yeonho has quite an interesting past. He was a doll that was previously owned, bought used by Eri. We see flashbacks of his past of a young girl who was his owner. She always said that he has to be a good boy, and if he was a bad boy he would be punished and get scars. This is the most probable cause as to why he always wants Eri to reassure him that he is “good,” and he does get quite obsessive over  her, to the point of being creepy. Eri wants to separate herself from him a bit, so while he has cleaning duties she goes to the cafe with her friends, where she learned Yeonho had worked part time to get money for the park tickets. Since it was raining and they shared an umbrella that morning, Eri is worried Yeonho may not be able to get home safely and goes back. He is standing in the rain, getting himself sick and has a fever. She takes him home, and when there he falls asleep in her arms, where Eri sees the scars on his arms left by his previous owner.

     Eri’s parents come home and want to go out to dinner with her. When she gets back, however, Yeonho has been waiting out in the cold for her. He goes a little… crazy, to say the least. Eri does manage to calm him down, thankfully. While acting out is not acceptable, I do have a bit of pity for Yeonho due to his abusive past. While the situation is a bit complicated, if I was Eri I would’ve probably gotten him a therapist to help cope with his past (just my opinion, anyways). Now comes the school festival! Yeonho reads tarot cards, that he was apparently taught the day before. A bit of a personal input but, as someone who practices and is interested in things such as tarot, you can not learn the deck in a day. I know this is a game, but its inaccuracy regarding card reading made me a bit angry LOL. Back to the game, Yeonho was taking a while to read tarot when a rude girl burst in and flipped his hat off, to which he ran away. Eri finds him on the rooftop, where he explains the girl looked like his previous owner. He explains a bit more in depth about her; about being punished, and how he was kicked aside, but didn’t mind because he felt maybe one day she would love him again (quiet sobbing, poor baby).

     In the good end, Eri says he wants him to be happy and they confess their love. In the Christmas event, they go back to the park on the merry-go-round. When Yeonho gets drinks for them, Eri is gone when he gets back, and we hear ???’s voice. In the first bad end, when Yeonho is in the rain she doesn’t rush back to him. When they get home later, Eri becomes quite creepy and says he will love her no matter what she does, right? It was really disturbing, but very different to see the heroine do something bad rather than the love interest. In the second bad end, when she comes home from meeting her parents she fails at comforting him. Later, she wakes up to Yeonho choking her, when Tei comes in. He says that he is the only one that can hurt her, and smashes Yeonho’s dolls head in, telling Eri to keep quiet about it (shivers). In the third bad end, when Yeonho runs away at the festival, Eri just goes home, and never sees him again. The bad endings can be quite chill worthy in some of the routes, I must confess. They don’t really hold out, which I both appreciate and dislike all at once. Yeonho is a super cutie, and I really can’t bring myself to hate him even with his creepy moments. If anything, I just feel terrible for him.

🎠 Yuri 🎠

     Yuri is seemingly the oldest out of the dolls. He works as a music teacher in the school rather than a student, and is known for being quite flirtatious. He often hits on and makes his flirty remarks to Eri, which causes him to get Lance’s infamous “slipper to the face.” He seems to go out with many woman, getting his “funds” from them, and comes home late quite often (stripper yuri, anyone?).

     Yuri is a bit blind when it comes to girls at the school being jealous that Eri is so close to the HOT5. When they ride in the limo, Eri usually gets out last. Yuri waited to be the last out, and took advantage to slide next to Eri and try hitting on her, to which she kicks him in the stomach. He tries again, to be hit with her bag. Still not getting the message, he gets out and opens the limo door for her. Tei has to come up with an excuse so that girls don’t murder her, so now she is deemed the HOT5’s “maid” (rip Eri). Along with other members of the famed group, he gets hit on by many girls and given presents, including from teachers. There were several occasions when Yuri gave Eri his presents, like a muffin basket from the korean teacher or some chocolate a girl gave him. Eri really doesn’t like this, as the gifts were meant for him and don’t have any actual meaning to her. Yuri asks her on a date, and of course he declines and says to go with some other woman. The next day, when called to Mr. Yujin’s (the strange school doctor) office, he gives her a pin that was from Yuri. While he isn’t there that night for dinner, he comes later and brings her shoes, which he actually used his first paycheck to buy.

     After this, Eri actually decides to go on the date, since Yuri is being serious. When he mentions it to the other boys, they are in disbelief and think he is lying. But, off they go to the mall. Yuri picks out a bunch of very nice clothes for her, but she declines as they are way too expensive. They go and get Eri a haircut, then sit for some tea at Banjul. There, Yuri talks about how he was made to be everyone’s “perfect man.” Due to this, he is always trying to please everyone and like them all equally. Eri realizes, though, that he must be very lonely. When she gets home, a bunch of packages have arrives, which was the clothes from the date that she refused. Another day, it is raining out so Eri texts all the boys to see if they had umbrellas. Everyone but Yuri replied, so she got worried and checked on him. He was in the music room playing piano for a bit until she noticed him. He has been practicing drums for his band, and gives her a ticket to his concert. She gets all dressed up and goes, but it is mostly older people. He plays great, and after he introduces her to all his friends who are tall and gorgeous woman who say that she is adorable. They invite Eri to an after party, but she declines. After, Yuri says he has to get something from his dressing room and to wait for him, but Eri bolts out of there. After, he comes chasing after her and asks why she didn’t pick up his calls. She says he should hang out with “the hot woman he loves,” but he denies it. Eri goes home and Yuri goes back to the venue, where he is questioned on his feelings for her.

     After this, Yuri starts acting quite awkward around Eri. She dresses pretty for school, and starts getting more attention from boys, especially one named “Flowerboy” (yes that is his actual name). He first gives her strawberry milk, then some candy with a love note asking her to be his girlfriend. She is a bit conflicted about this, so she doesn’t give him a definitive answer. He wants to walk around with her at the school festival, and she says she’ll think about it. After school one day, she talks to Yuri, who is still quite awkward. He lets Eri leave, but then offers her a ride home. When driving, he asks her if she ever liked cute stuff. She said she has but never really bought or wore them, and told a story about how her grandfather said she would start dressing cutely when she likes someone, to which Yuri slams the breaks. He continues after, and acts more normal after the event, but isn’t flirtatious anymore. When Eri asks his advice on Flowerboy, he gives his advice plain and simple, which upsets Eri a lot because she just wants him to think she’s pretty. Momma Tei threatens Yuri about hurting Eri’s feelings, and says he needs to think about them and be serious about it. She turns down Flowerboy at the festival, and is asked out by Tei, to which she also declines. She goes to Yuri’s concert there, where he announces that he will resign as he has fallen in love, and for that person to meet him at the “secret garden.”

     In the good end, she goes to the music room, where Yuri confesses his feelings. He wants to resign so that he can do “adult things” to her, when Tei pops in, saying that it takes 30 days for resignation papers to process LOL. Yuri is now always going in Eri’s rooms, sleeping in her bed and nagging her constantly. In the Christmas scenario, they go to the amusement park, where he proposes. He goes to get something, and when he gets back, Eri is gone and we hear ???’s voice. In the first bad end, Eri is harsh on Yuri and he moves away and gets another job. In the second bad end, Eri has a dream with the merry-go-round and ???’s voice, and wakes up as a “doll” for Yuri and Tei to dress up. In the third bad end, she says yes to going out with Tei, but gets a creepy vibe from him. In the fourth bad end, she doesn’t go to the music room and is supposedly “hurt” by Tei, when we hear ???’s voice saying that she has to start over. Yuri is my favorite – if it isn’t obvious yet that I tend to like the beautiful, flirtatious types. Also, just an opinion but, Yuri is SO pale. I mean, I am too, but he makes me feel like an ugly rugrat version of himself LOL.

🎠 Tei 🎠

     Tei is the “mother” of the group, sometimes referred to as Mama Tei or “Commander” by Red. While he seems very caring and cautious, he is present in many of the bad ends, revealing he has a hidden, creepy side.

      This route is where we start beginning to really lose memories. When Eri wakes up in the morning, her memory is quite fuzzy and she doesn’t feel well. Tei, of course, carries her over his shoulders to the bathroom. She also doesn’t remember many other things, like the cafe Banjul. Soi already knew the workers there, yet she didn’t even remember getting ask to go there. We hear ??? and another man’s voice constantly during this route, with ??? ripping out pages from her diary and the other man warning him to be careful what memories he erases. Her diary pages are also all smudged, and when Tei asks about it, she isn’t quite sure. It is also worthwhile to mention that Tei is quite popular with the ladies. He gets asked out a lot, even by Eri’s friend Soi. He politely declines them, though. While at the cafe we also hear Zion, one of the other waiters, talk about playing the harp. The harp, however, is stolen one day. Eri sneaks out to try and find the thief at night, but Tei comes into the store and admonishes her for doing so. They then sit and talk with some tea, when Eri falls asleep at the cafe. The next morning we find that the harp was actually just taken away for maintenance.

     Similar to Yeonho, Tei was bought secondhand and definitely had some.. difficulties, with his past owner. He was kept in prime condition, still in the box. She wanted Tei to stay “clean.” However, one day her sister dropped the doll, and the girl was horrified to see her doll ruined. Since Tei was limited edition, there was no replacement parts, and so Tei was “dirty.” He was sold in mostly pristine condition – besides the minor injury – to Eri. He is very aware of how he believes he is so “dirty,” which is why he tends to push people away from becoming so close. He pushes Eri away as well, always keeping busy and even going as far as to date Soi to divert Eri from himself. Soi, however, realizes he doesn’t have many feelings for her and breaks up with him. Tei also gives her tea every night to sleep, which contains a sleeping drug to put her to sleep immediately.

      Soon, however, Tei’s feelings overtake him as he cannot control his love for Eri. He believes Eri is too good for him, so he must bring her down to his level and “contaminate” him. There are several moments when Tei discusses how he is “dirty” and how he should be the one to hurt her. When she trips and scrapes her knee, he puts a bandaid on it, but becomes very creepy about her being hurt, then has to excuse himself. Later when he cannot control himself, he brings Eri to his room and pushes her against the chair against her will. Yuri, however, realizes this and confronts Tei to to admit his true feelings, no matter how he feels about himself. When Tei comes clean to Eri, she is incredibly happy. She reassures him that she doesn’t care what his past owner thought. He is so happy that he is crying with joy, and becomes the bestest boyfriend ever! (jokes)

      In the good end, Tei sets up a surprise concert with all her friends and the dolls in the cafe. He asked Yuri to teach him piano, while Zion plays the harp. She has finally earned Tei’s heart and trust. In the Christmas scenario, they go to the amusement park. Tei gives her a lovely heart necklace as a present, and of course when he leaves for a moment, Eri is gone. In the first bad end, Eri completely loses her memories. She starts over, working as a waiter in Banjul. The next two endings are not very special – usually Tei just being creepy. The last bad ending Tei turns Eri into a doll, and uses her for plays. I have a tough time deciding how I feel about Tei. I think he is a sweetie, but I don’t agree with a lot of his actions and he is just so.. creepy. Regardless of that factor, I did enjoy the route.

🎠 Red 🎠

     Red is a one of a kind doll – Eri won him in a contest and they ended up never selling more of his models. He believes he is a superhero, and is always very excitable and bright. He even nicknames the other characters, with Tei being “Commander” and Yeonho being “Yellow.”

     During Red’s route, Eri is constantly losing her memories. In the beginning, we see ??? and the mysterious man (who is the wizard from dandelion!) talking. Apparently he is in the room where toys who lost their name go, but he refuses to give up. He got the wizard’s help in getting Eri to remember his name. In order to do so, she must collect the “pieces” from each boy. The wizard was the one who put these pieces in the dolls and made them human. ??? also has possession of Eri’s diary, and he constantly rips out pages, which causes her to lose her memories. When she wakes up, Red is sleeping beside her – he fell asleep when he went to wake her up. She constantly is dizzy and has headaches during this route, probably due to ??? messing with her memories. When she gets out of the limo in the morning, she trips and Red comes and “rescues” her. He also does other things like giving Eri food other girls gave to him. He doesn’t quite understand that the girls get jealous from these things; that is, until three of these girls knocked her out and questioned her in a dark alley. While Eri tries hiding this at first, everyone eventually finds out. Red is upset because he didn’t save her – Soi and Shinbi did – but he decides to stay with her all the time from now on.

     Red asks her to play the heroine in the school play, and she agrees, with even Lance backing her up so that she can go home safely with Red. Soi has a huge crush on Tei, so she wants Eri to give anonymous presents to him, which causes confusion between them. When Eri wants to ask Tei if he liked girls like Soi, he asked him if he liked girls with big boobs (LOL). Red also misunderstands this as Eri liking Tei, making him exclaim at dinner that he wants them to be happy and he still likes Tei, making everyone believe he is gay for Tei (this route is a misunderstanding train). Tei, however, figures out that Eri doesn’t have a thing for him, so he gives her tickets to go to the amusement park with Red. She explains the misunderstanding, when they find a lost little girl. She is upset because her mother is never home, but Eri explains that she is only working so much to make her happy. Red says that he is a super hero, and the little girl asks if protecting Eri is more important than protecting Earth, to which he says yes (melts). They walk around the park and find her mother, and thanks them for taking care of her child. After this we run into more trouble with the three crazy girls. They first try to harass her at school, and one day when Eri went to get a prop for the play they locked her in a dark warehouse. Luckily Red is able to save her both times, but he is still quite upset he couldn’t have been there earlier.

     Since Eri is happy again, ??? decides to erase more memories. This causes a whole confusion as to where Eri goes to the music room and Red goes to Banjul, where he finds a note addressed to Tei which was from Soi, but he assumed to be from Eri. Red is depressed again, and the next morning, he goes missing. Eri’s memories are completely messed up after this – she wakes up and has to be reminded that the dolls are human, and that Red is actually missing. During school, she passes out and is in a merry-go-round dream with ???, to which she escapes. After school that day, the boys hold a meeting about her memories. They think that it isn’t medical, but has to do with them becoming dolls. They want to find Red to cheer her up. Since he hasn’t come back, ??? needs Eri to see Red again to collect the piece, so he “guides” her to where Red is. After this, he takes constant care of her. He reminds her every morning what she needs to know, and goes over the lines for the play every day so that she remembers. When they revisit the amusement park, however, she starts regaining her memories! The pages are being rewritten, and when they perform in the play and she forgets her lines, she keeps remembering, and ??? can’t do anything about it. She is able to collect Red’s “piece.”

     In the Christmas scenario, all of the boys go to the amusement park together. ??? is happy because he can see her again. In the first bad end, Red ends up in the room of forgotten dolls along with ???. In the second bad end, creepy Tei comes into her room at night, saying he wants to play the “endless game” with Eri. In the third bad end, Red believes he is a superhero and involves all the boys in fighting the “villian.” In the fourth bad end, Eri doesn’t escape from the merry-go-round nightmare. In the fifth bad end, they bring her to the hospital because of her memories. Red was very sweet, and while he wasn’t my favorite, his route was very enjoyable. It wasn’t as amazing as the others because of ???’s constant interference, but I think it worked well with him.

🎠 ??? 🎠

     Now that we’ve collected all the pieces, ??? and Eri get to meet in ???’s own world. Eri has now lost all of her memories, and ??? has her all to himself. He is quite torn up, and always acts creepy, claiming he is Eri’s boyfriend. They go around where the game takes place, when we see the boys in the real world fretting about Eri’s disappearance. In front of the school, we see Yeonho sensing her. In the classroom, he talks about how he waited 10 years for her, and then we switch back to the real world where we see Lance. On the rooftop, we see a feather fly by, to which ??? gets mad because it isn’t supposed to be in that world. We see in the real world Tei, and then find Lance and Yeonho who met up. They go to Banjul where they meet up with Tei. They figure out that they are each from a different universe – the one where each of them fell in love with Eri.

     While going around, Eri keeps seeing memories from the real world which she had, pissing off ???. They boys meet up with Yuri and explain the situation, then go to the amusement park to find Red. ??? and Eri are on the merry-go-round, and he refuses to stop it. The boys sense that she is on there, and try reaching out to her. She finally remembers ??? – he was her first teddy bear. She used to take him everywhere, and while he got all ripped and dirtied, he still loved her. But, one day Eri’s dad bought her a new bear, and he was forgotten. After this, the boys go home when Red sees a closet, which he opens. They are able to distract ??? and save Eri. He has flashbacks to Eri’s childhood and all that happened, when she remembers his name – Kit. He gets a “feather” allowing him to come back to life, and be with Eri.

🎠 Overall 🎠

     I really enjoyed this game! It had a dark and creepy feel, which is something that I personally like. Some of the endings were definitely really creepy, so if you aren’t into darker themed games then Nameless may not be for you. However, I like all of the love interests – even though they were dolls they still all managed to have their own personal problems and pasts. I also felt that this game was a big improvement from their last game, Dandelion. While it was enjoyable as well, the sprites in Nameless were much better drawn and I liked that there wasn’t any tedious stat raising parts to the game. One other feature that I thought was unique was what it was based on – Crobidoll is an actual Korean ball jointed doll company. While I never knew about it before, I now have a bigger appreciation for the art. It’s always great to gain interest in other things from what you already love! If you are looking for a darker, more unique otome game, then Nameless is definitely a good choice!

Rating: ★★★★

Bonus:

(stripper Yuri is canon)