What is Bakumatsu Renka Shinsengumi?
Bakumatsu Renka Shinsengumi or as we like to call it, BRS, is actually a Shinsengumi dating game for the Playstation 2. This dating game is aimed towards girls and is more story driven. It goes on the premise, what if there was a lone girl in the Shinsengumi? What will happen? It is also follows certain events in Shinsengumi history like the Sumo wrestlers in Osaka, Serizawa’s assasination, the raid at the Ikeda-ya and so on. Undoubtedly there is blood shed and relatively “mature” themes, thus the game has a rating of “for ages 12 and up”. BRS was released December 22, 2004 and since then has had a decent following in Japan. Decent enough that the publishers, D3 and Vridge, along with Twin Date Books, have gone on to release manga, drama CDs, character goods etc. So in a way BRS is now not only a Shinsengumi dating game but a small universe of it’s own.
What so special about BRS?
Aside from the beautiful character renditions (yes most of the Shinsengumi here are bishies!), BRS is unique such that it doesn’t necessarily -focus- on the war, the miseries and bloodshed that almost always is a subject matter of Shinsengumi games/films/anime etc. Instead it focuses on the day to day interaction of Sakuraba Suzuka with the Shinsengumi members. This does not mean though, that it ignores the reality since BRS itself is patterned after what did happen in history. Simply put it is a fresh take on the Shinsengumi and with NHK/PMK/RK done, BRS would be a nice follow-up!
If you’d like to learn more about BRS you can also visit the Official Sites for Bakumatsu Renka Shinsengumi:
D3, the game publisher: Link
VRidge, game developer: Link
Site for Oozora, who publishes the manga: Link