You should all be playing School Idol Festival

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Earlier this year I posted my rundown of 2014, including this game at the end. That small mention was enough to ruin Phil_'s life. Today, I'm back to take a few more of you down with us.

What is Love Live School Idol Festival?

LLSIF is a rhythm game playable on any device that runs Android or iOS, based on the popular Love Live! Franchise. Nine girls band together to form idol group Mu's in an attempt to increase enrolment at their school so it doesn't get shut down- and they need a manager!

The rhythm action parts of the game use music performed by Mu's as their basis and are superbly well-rendered. The game is fluid and functional and responsive, and the beatmaps actually match the music being played.

The management side of things comes in a moderately pokemon-esque collect-em-all type dealy. You can “scout” new members to add to your troupe, each with a strength in a certain stat. These stats match the songs- so for example, when you scout a girl whose strength is her Smile stat, you'll want to put her in the team you use for Smile songs. Scouted members can Practice with other members to level them up, and if you have multiple copies of the same girl you can Special Practice them to unlock their idol form, which grants new art and raises her level cap among other benefits.

There are an astonishing number of scoutable girls in the game, and for the most part they have cute and memorable designs- collecting new members really is a highlight and it's always nice to get a whole load of recruitment points at once and see who you get that you haven't seen before.

Of course, Mu's is nine members, not 54- and the main characters all have Super Rare and Ultra Rare versions, each with unique art, to collect too. This is where Premium Scouting comes in- your chance to get these powerful members relies on spending Love Gems, the microtransaction currency of choice.

Steady, there. Microtransactions are the work of satan, I know, but I've been playing since November without spending a penny- they aren't at all required. I promise. They'll get you where you're going quicker, but you get enough free love gems thrown at you that it's fine to be F2P. The girls you get from Premium scouting are still random, so if there's one in particular you're eager to get hold of you might need to open your wallet, but they're all cute!

Aside from premium scouting, Love Gems also refill your Live Power, used to buy your way into each song. These refill naturally at a quick enough rate that you won't mind waiting.

Twice a month, there is an event run to earn a special Super Rare version of one of the Mu's girls, and these events are the real meat of the game. You can play the event by yourself until you earn enough event points to win the SR, or you can play competitively and try to rank in the top 3000 players to earn a second copy- and that otherwise difficult-to-attain Idolised version. This is where you'll be spending a lot of money if you plan to rank in EVERY event, but if you just rank in events for your favourite girl you can again get away with being F2P. With the event SRs being fairly easy to obtain (you'll need to spend a few gems at lower levels), you don't need to Premium Scout at all to get Super Rares if you don't want to, but the thrill of the gamble is worth it in my opinion

So, why am I trying to sell it so hard? Three reasons:

1) I've played and loved the heck out of it so I'd like to push some custom their way as I feel they deserve it;

2) we're currently between events so now is a good time to learn the ropes before the next event begins;

3) adding people as friends in-game lets you use them to enhance your scores in songs, and you also earn Friend Points for doing so- the currency used to perform normal Scouting... and since I'm planning to rank in the next event, the more friends the better >_>

Ultimately, it's a very cute, very fun game with catchy music you'll never forgive yourself for enjoying, wrapped up in the most anime packaging ever.


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