izigame.me

Steamdeck compatible: yes, but it requires using the right trackpad or R2 button to click through dialogue and either the A or L2 button to hide the textbox. Personally, I found these controls to be awkward and uncomfortable.
Rating: 6 or 7/ 10; neutral review!
❀ Important note ❀: This is a short censored DLC/ fan disc that continues after the previous game's ending. I played this immediately after completing the first game, due to having bought Oshirabu 1 + 2 on sale a couple years back and wanted to see if anything improved from the first game. Additionally, I completed both games last night in one sitting, so my memory is very fresh, when writing this review. Despite having a bad experience with the first Oshirabu, I'm not sure if I'll make a separate review on that, since there's already a fair amount of negative reviews on its Steam page (highly recommend to check them out!!). Please be mindful of my experience from the first game and comparisons to this DLC as well as some spoilers I'll be delving into.

Similar to the first game, the art style was the primary feature that carried the game and what pushed me and many other players interest to playing it. It's one of the most beautiful and quite polished GL VN's I've played. However, this game is more of a middle ground experience; it's not good, but also not bad since it does have some things that have improved over the first Oshirabu.
In terms of music, I am sad to say that some of the tracks, especially a certain one (that's used for comedic/ slice of life-ish scenes and heavily annoyed me) were reused in this game. The soundtrack loses its charm either for repetitiveness or how it doesn't fit the mood of the scene/ sounds like a blaring alarm. Furthermore, some previous background assets were reused as well like the anime con, cafe, and alleyways. I will give credit to how they did add a couple of new backgrounds and a new animated intro and OST, which definitely surprised me. The CG's are very beautiful as always, but there was nothing that really wowed me to an extent.
The writing improved with better grammar and spelling, including the text font being more readable this time. I believe the black text outline played a key role in that. However, the tidbits of slang coming from Ren (not as common in this one as it was in the first game) still took out my immersion sometimes. There's only two major "different" happy endings and they're designated for two couples-- our main couple and a side character couple. Before I get into the positive for this, it's important to note that it's only in the LAST chapter where your choice MATTERS. Everything else coming before it just serves to act like it's a choice, but has zero affect on the final outcome as the story is quite linear. While I don't mind linear storytelling, I do wish wish there was more meaningful choices, so the buildup to the final choice and endings have more impact. Besides that, I do appreciate that the endings focused on two different couples and their development over the course of the game. This is probably the first dating sim where it has an ending dedicated to a side couple outside of the main one and I wish more games did this. The writing for the side couple felt somewhat lackluster, but had the blueprints for potential (see more details below).
Regarding characters, this is where the meat of the experience derives from as it serves as the backbone for driving the plot forward. While the status quo for the characters' personalities remains mostly stagnant, there has been moderate signs of them demonstrating emotional growth. However, due to previous patterns of transgression from certain characters, it's hard to pinpoint whether they have grown or not as their dialogue and thought processes don't align with their actions. For example, Ren continues her insistent behavior of having things her way through constantly pushing Akuru to get married, despite Akuru saying and behaving reluctant to it. Although Ren has stated in the third chapter that she was just pestering Akuru as a joke or in the fourth chapter where she tells Akuru that she's not "that" desperate for the wedding, Ren's whiny and constant insistent behavior, body language, and phrase of language makes the character cast and me as the player believe her to be serious. It's even more believable, since this was the same behavior she pulled from the previous game, when she plotted to couch crash at Akuru's apartment. Whether she's a good actor, a bad communicator, or just a selfish person, it's difficult to decide whether her emotional maturity has grown and if she's joking or actually serious about something. Credit where credit is due, I did appreciate the scene where she and Akuru had a proper adult conversation about the wedding, during their bath together. Ren was quite mature in valuing Akuru's financial struggle to support them both and promises to put more thought into her future, so she can get them both marriage rings. Or that other scene where she and her mother have a conversation about her final decision in getting married and Akuru puts a lot of thought into the way she communicates her feelings and reasons. It's moments like these where I wish the game allowed this side of Ren to shine more openly, because she's shown to be a better and more compatible person for Akuru and beyond just being a ditz. If she had been allowed to grow, none of the miscommunication would have occurred and Akuru may have been more willing to get married. It's quite disappointing, since she was the major reason to disrupt my enjoyment of the game.
While Akuru is less annoying than Ren, I'm struggling to understand where the devs were going with her character. Her struggle is that she doesn't want to get married, because it would encroach on her freedom to simp over 2D men. However, I fail to see how that's an issue as many IRL gamers and hobbyists have been able to juggle between their romantic lives and hobbies very well. I believe the actual message they were trying to/ should have conveyed was the fear of losing freedom in many aspects in life after settling down/ struggles after settling down, the person who's not/ never will be ready for marriage, and the fear of a marriage not lasting. I would even add exploring how adults' interests and priorities possibly changing in the future as new situations crop up. Those themes would have been more interesting and complex to explore in Akuru as she's in her late 20's figuring out where she wants her relationship with Ren to go/ debating if she's too complacent with their relationship status, her financial priorities shifting as they continue living together, and Akuru's new perspective/ worries on Ren soon becoming an adult along with Akuru projecting her own worries about her own adulthood. I think these would help Akuru not only retain her charm, but also enhance it as we learn another side of her.
Lastly, for Airi and Shino, I did appreciate that the game shifted perspectives away from the main characters and even provided their own romantic ending. However, Airi should have gotten her own chapter exploring her perspective as we've only heard her thoughts through Shino's POV. It would have made her character more well rounded and filled in the holes regarding her character development. Moreover, the game should have added more scenes of the girls bonding together outside of plotting for the wedding downfall. It would have provided an interesting narrative contrast between two couples (one transitioning into marriage and the other slowly blooming) and help make their relationship near the end believable and solidified. Without any of these as mentioned, I found their ending to be rather weak and less compelling.

While my experience is in the middle, I have difficulty recommending this to anyone, unless you really enjoyed the first Oshirabu.