The most important thing that a visual novel can do is attempt to grab the player’s attention in the first several minutes. Some do this by being overly lewd, some do it with humor, Adventure of a Lifetime does it with memorable and likeable characters. This instantly manages to draw anyone in, because instead of hoping that the other choices hit the person’s strike zone, good characters can make the someone actually care what happens next and make the jokes and lewd matter even more when they do happen, which is why this game manages to shine so much. They remember the small stuff.
The larger stuff, mainly the art, still matters too. Thankfully Adventure of a Lifetime managed to hit pretty much every checkmark that it needed to in that category as well. All of the girls in it are suitably cute and well-drawn enough to keep the attention focused on them for their scenes, and they have a wide enough range of movement that they can emote well enough to get the emotion of the moment across. Gladly it never seems like the art itself outshines the script.
The script, while not award winning by any stretch of the imagination, is also well done and memorable. Aside from the aforementioned highly memorable characters their interactions with each other, and the world building that takes place on the small island that the story is set on feels believable enough. Several points throughout the game there were raised very specific topics having to do with certain odd things, but were dealt with in such a way that I never felt the need to fact check them; it just seemed like those characters knew what they were talking about and I took what was going on as fact.
Adventure of a Lifetime isn’t going to be the game that changes someone’s mind on Visual Novels, because there are very little titles out there that can really make someone feel differently about an entire niche genre. But for everyone who is already well ingrained in this field they will find something worth playing and enjoy. While it isn’t the brightest star that has come out in recent memory, it is a great story that should be experienced by anyone that is willing to take the time to enjoy it.