"Kari" (仮), alternatively pronounced as , is a permanent part of the actual title. Translating to roughly "provisional title" or "working title", it is often used to denote works-in-progress, however in this case it is used as a joke, since the player's "girlfriends" are not real. Despite the title ''Girl Friend Beta'', the franchise is not actually undergoing beta testing. is a 2012 Japanese smartphone game developed by

CyberAgent is a Japanese digital advertising company, which was founded in 1998 by Susumu Fujita and headquartered in Shibuya, Tokyo. It is owned by Susumu Fujita with 20.50% interest; Fujita is representative director, while Yusuke Hidaka is executive vice ...

for

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

and Android devices. As of June 2014, it has over 5.3 million users. An

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

television series produced by

Silver Link is a Japanese animation studio. It was founded by ex-Frontline animation producer Hayato Kaneko in December 2007 and is based in Tokyo. History After the company's establishment in 2007, Shin Oonuma, who was previously a director alongside S ...

aired in Japan between October and December 2014. There are also five

manga Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is u ...

adaptations based on the game, and a

PlayStation Vita The PlayStation Vita (PS Vita, or Vita) is a handheld video game console developed and marketed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on December 17, 2011, and in North America, Europe, and other international territo ...

spin-off game was released in November 2015.

Gameplay

The game is a dating simulator which features over 100 different virtual girls, each with a unique voice actress. The player progresses their relationship with the virtual girlfriend by taking her on dates. The game is

free-to-play Free-to-play (F2P or FtP) video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content without paying or do not require paying to continue playing. Free-to-play is distinct from traditional commercial software, which ...

, however the player pays real-world money to gain premium services. The game features various events that occur, including battle events when bad guys appear. The player can engage in club activities and school class events to solicit romance and increase intimacy with female students. There is a card-based system within the game, where the player collects different cards of varying rarity; each card has different attributes, such as attack and defense costs. Cards can be enhanced by engaging in a part-time job.

Characters

Main characters

; : :A second-year high school student belonging to the rhythmic gymnastics club. She has shoulder-length brown hair and brown eyes. She is said to be the ace of the club and is extremely popular. ; : :A second-year student in the school's broadcasting committee. She has red hair styled in a ponytail and brown eyes. She is a cheerful and kind girl. She has a rather close friendship with fellow club member Tomo Oshii. ; : :A third-year student in the book committee. She has silvery-blue hair that is partly braided. ; : :A third-year French exchange student in the Japanese Culture Research Society. She has long blonde hair and blue eyes. ; : :A third-year student in the photography club. She also has long blonde hair but wears purple bows, and has green eyes. She is best friends with Fumio Murakami.

Other characters

*: A third-year student and a member of the pottery club. Her grandfather runs a cake shop, where she becomes a part-time worker. *: A first-year student belonging to the Lacrosse Club. She has impressive reflexes and is always in a lively, cheerful mood, often making noise when everyone is gathered around. However, in reality she is lonely. She is Momoko's childhood friend. *: The president of the student council. She appears to be ditzy and sometimes unknowingly becomes a hindrance to other members, with her only known talent is serving tea. Due to her personality, her position as the president makes it questionable to other members. *: A second-year student who is a member of the Flower Arrangement Club. *: A third-year student who is a member of the Handricrafts Club. *: A second-year student belonging to the Literature Club. *: A third-year student belonging to the newspaper club. * * *: A second-year student who belongs to the Tennis Club. * * * * * * * *: A second-year student belonging to the Light Music Club. She is the vocalist of the all-girls' band called "Neuron★Cream Soft", although she is also seen playing a guitar or composing music. *: A Japanese teacher. *: A second-year student and a member of the Robots Research Club. Unlike other students, she wears a rainbow-colored blazer. She also sparks an interest in Monochrome for being an android. *: A second–year student in the broadcasting committee. However, she prefers to work mostly behind the scenes, unlike her other club members, which explains why she hardly does any kind of open broadcast. * *: A first-year student belonging to the Art Club. Loves fruits so much that she draws them in her paintings, with a desire to taste every kind in the world except for Durian which she dislikes the most. *: A first-year student who is a member of the Handicrafts Club. * * * *: A Russian exchange student. *: A second-year student belonging to the Go Home Club. * *: A second-year student belonging to the Light Music Club. She is the bassist of the all-girls' band "Neuron ★ Cream Soft." * * * * *: An original character designed by Yui Horie herself. * * * * * *: A member of the Movie Study Group. She wears a green scarf around her neck in a similar manner to the ''

Kamen Rider The , also known as ''Masked Rider Series'' (until Decade), is a Japanese superhero media franchise consisting of tokusatsu television programs, films, manga, and anime, created by manga artist Shotaro Ishinomori. ''Kamen Rider'' media generall ...

'' and likes

tokusatsu is a Japanese term for live action film or television drama that makes heavy use of practical special effects. ''Tokusatsu'' entertainment mainly refers to science fiction, War film, war, fantasy, or Horror film, horror media featuring such te ...

films. * *

Related media

Print media

A manga adaptation illustrated by Tsukako Akina titled began serialization in the September 2014 issue of

ASCII Media Works ASCII ( ), abbreviated from American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for electronic communication. ASCII codes represent text in computers, telecommunications equipment, and other devices. Because of ...

's ''

Dengeki Maoh is a Japanese seinen magazine published by ASCII Media Works (formerly MediaWorks). It first went on sale on October 27, 2005, and is sold every month on the twenty-seventh. The magazine features information on video games, manga, and light nove ...

'' magazine, released on July 26, 2014. The first issue of the official ''Girl Friend Beta Magazine'' was released by

on August 22, 2014, and four different manga series that cover specific characters began serialization in that issue. The first manga is illustrated by Takahiro Seguchi and is titled . The second manga is illustrated by Sawayoshi Azuma and is titled . The third manga is illustrated by Kakao and is titled . The fourth manga is illustrated by Na! and is titled .

Anime

An anime television series based on the original smartphone game was announced in June 2014, with an official announcement press conference taking place at the Akihabara UDX Theater. Produced by

, the series was directed by Naotaka Hayashi, with anime character designs by Noriko Tsutsumitani based on the original designs by QP:flapper, and story written by Michiko Yokote. The series began airing in Japan on

TX Network TX Network (TXN) is a commercial television network in Japan owned by Nikkei, Inc. The "TX" is taken from the callsign of its flagship station, TV Tokyo. It is also known as TV Tokyo Network. History Tokyo Channel 12 almost went into ban ...

(

TV Tokyo JOTX-DTV (channel 7), branded as and known colloquially as , is a television station headquartered in the Sumitomo Fudosan Roppongi Grand Tower in Roppongi, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, owned and operated by the subsidiary of listed certified b ...

) from October 13 to December 29, 2014. It was simulcasted by

Crunchyroll Crunchyroll is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned by Sony through a joint venture between Sony Pictures and Sony Music Entertainment Japan's Aniplex. The service primarily distributes films and tel ...

. The opening theme is by Neuron★Creamsoft (main vocalist Haruka Kazemachi (voiced by

Saori Hayami Saori (written: 沙織, 早織, 佐織, 砂織, 沙保里, 沙緒里, 紗央里, 紗央莉, 左多里 or さおり in hiragana) is a feminine Japanese given name. Notable people with the name include: * Saori (television personality) (born 1981) ...

)), and the ending theme is by

Satomi Satō is a Japanese voice actress and singer. Biography Satō is affiliated with Aoni Production's Junior Talent. She attended Tokyo Announce Gakuin Performing Arts College. She is known as , as means "sugar" in Japanese. She announced her marriage ...

as Kokomi Shiina. An

original net animation An original net animation (ONA), known in Japan as , is an anime that is directly released onto the Internet. ONAs may also have been aired on television if they were first directly released on the Internet. The name mirrors original video animati ...

adaptation of ''Girl Friend Note'', produced by

Encourage Films is a Japanese animation studio established on August 5, 2008. The studio is based in Nerima, Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, la ...

, was released from October 14 to 21, 2016.

Other

is a spin-off adventure

visual novel A , often abbreviated as VN, is a form of digital semi-interactive fiction. Visual novels are often associated with and used in the medium of video games, but are not always labeled as such themselves. They combine a textual narrative with sta ...

game developed by CyberAgent and published by

Bandai Namco Games is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational video game video game publisher, publisher headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo. Its international branches, Bandai Namco Entertainment America and Bandai Namco Entertainment Europe, are resp ...

for the PlayStation Vita, released on November 19, 2015. The game involves the player romantically interacting with eight different characters from the original smartphone game. Game features include

Live2D Live2D is an animation software developed by Live2D Ltd. It can be used to generate real-time 2D animations, usually anime-style characters, using layered, continuous parts based on an illustration, without the need of frame-by-frame animation ...

character movements, binaural voices, touchscreen events and microphone voice communication, and involves an original story. An

Internet radio Online radio (also web radio, net radio, streaming radio, e-radio, IP radio, Internet radio) is a digital audio service transmitted via the Internet. Broadcasting on the Internet is usually referred to as webcasting since it is not transmitted ...

show began broadcasting weekly from October 8, 2013 onwards, hosted by voice actors involved in the game. A similar smartphone game targeted at females, titled , was released by the same developers. is a spin-off

rhythm game Rhythm game or rhythm action is a genre of music-themed action video game that challenges a player's sense of rhythm. Games in the genre typically focus on dance or the simulated performance of musical instruments, and require players to pres ...

developed by R-Force Entertainment and published by CyberAgent for Android and

. Released on December 1, 2015, the game underwent a two-week long maintenance due to unforeseen complications regarding various game systems. Maintenance ended on December 16, 2015 for Android and December 17, 2015 for iOS. It got a web anime adaptation in October 2016. In July 2018, a stageshow will be held in Shinagawa Prince Hotel and the main cast is portrayed by the idol group , with an original character named .

Reception

There are over 5.3 million users of the smartphone game as of June 2014. Virtual currency expenditures within March 2014 were valued at 1.8 billion

yen The is the official currency of Japan. It is the third-most traded currency in the foreign exchange market, after the United States dollar (US$) and the euro. It is also widely used as a third reserve currency after the US dollar and the e ...

, accounting for over 40% of Ameba's entire smartphone division earnings. During the New Year celebratory period in early 2014, a promotional commercial for the game featured a handful of character introductions, including the character ; her self-introduction became an

Internet meme An Internet meme, commonly known simply as a meme ( ), is an idea, behavior, style, or image that is spread via the Internet, often through social media platforms. What is considered a meme may vary across different communities on the Internet ...

on Niconico due to her awkward-sounding speech. More than 100 parody remixes of the original video were created on Niconico, with some reaching over 660,000 hits within the few days following the initial release.

Footnotes

References

External links

*
Anime official website
* {{CyberAgent 2012 video games 2014 Japanese television series endings 2016 anime ONAs 2014 manga Anime television series based on video games Android (operating system) games ASCII Media Works manga Bishōjo games CyberAgent Dating sims Encourage Films IOS games Japan-exclusive video games Manga based on video games Moe anthropomorphism PlayStation Vita games Romance anime and manga Romance video games Seinen manga School life in anime and manga Silver Link Social casual games TV Tokyo original programming Video games developed in Japan Ameba (website)