Ballade: With Memories

Ballade: With Memories is a university story centered on Nan Wang, who returns to his hometown after years away to attend Langrun University. There he befriends Wen Shuo, known as “Big K,” and Wen Shuo’s girlfriend, Cheng Ke. After the three spend a happy year together during their second year, Nan Wang returns to campus for the start of his third year and discovers that their close friendship has changed. As he faces Cheng Ke’s grief and meets a mysterious girl at Big K’s family dinner, his life takes an uncertain turn. The story has four endings.

Langrun University

The story is set in a fictional university inspired by Xiamen University and Tsinghua University. Founded in 1910 by Langrun, a patriotic industrialist modeled on Chen Jiageng, it began with departments of literature, science and law. Langrun supported the school for 15 years and recruited prominent teachers; it later grew to include an engineering college, a music college and an information college. Its setting draws on Xiamen, including Minnan-style Jiageng architecture, arcades and the lanes of Gulangyu.

The characters

Nan Wang lost his parents in a fire when he was young. After returning to his hometown for university, he found a sense of family with Wen Shuo and Cheng Ke during their second year. The unexpected changes at the start of his third year leave him uncertain about what comes next.

The story also features several women in the students’ lives. Li Ruoyu is a second-year piano student at the music college, its most talented student, and an accompanist for the choir club. Quiet and well-mannered, she enjoys classical music. Cheng Ke, Wen Shuo’s girlfriend, leads the university drama club; she is gentle in appearance, stubborn at heart, and lively and cheerful, with interests in drama, cooking and fortune-telling. Echo is a mysterious girl who appears in the empty choir club and seems unusually close to Nan Wang. Xiaomi, one of Wen Shuo’s tutoring students, appears to have feelings for him and has turned up several times on her motorcycle outside the apartment building where Wen Shuo and Nan Wang live. Wen Shuo is a wealthy, talented student who joined the university’s SAR project in his first year and is interested in simple, clear theories.

Story presentation

The game contains 65 main scenes and props, 235 character illustrations, 25 CGs, 16 original music tracks, 2,206 lines of voiced dialogue and a script of about 150,000 Chinese characters.