Surviving High School 11

I can't help but think that I lucked out at high school.

Unlike the pupils of Surviving High School 11's Centrescore High, the geeks at my school weren't especially bright, the popular folks hardly had Hollywood looks, and the bullies were more likely to be flicking their nasal mucus across the classroom with a ruler than working out at the gym.

Surviving High School 11 is unashamedly American, filled with jocks with perfect square-cut jawlines, gorgeous girls obsessed with gossip and glitterati, and self-proclaimed nerds who could give your average Mastermind champion a run for his money.

But, though the melodramas within tend towards the superficial, there's actually a lot of fun to be had inside Centrescore High's classrooms and corridors.

Like that cheap cable soap opera you know you really shouldn't be into, it's not long before Surviving High School 11's interweaving storylines begin to take effect and hitting that 'exit' key suddenly becomes less appealing.

That's essentially because each of the game's five episodes – which see you take on a different challenge, and indeed character, each time – feel like mini plays, your basic role being to engage with the plot and bond with as many people as possible in five short days.

Whether you're attempting to throw a massive house party or get onto the school's cheerleading squad, the foundations of play remain the same.

Your time is divided between answering questions posed by the game's extensive cast of characters and performing a number of reaction-based mini-games in order to win them over.

Said mini-games focus around the phone's number pad, with either picking out symbols paired with keys '1' to '9' in quick time, or memorising a set pattern of button presses, the tasks at hand.

Neither is especially difficult or compelling, but it's the effect they have on the game's non-player characters that is most crucial.

Come out on top and you're one step closer to adding a friend to your roster. Every single character rates your relationship on what is effectively a scale of 1 to 8.

But while it might seem farcical playing for their attention in such a rudimentary fashion, it's choosing just who you want to spend your time with in the first place that's actually the most important facet of play.

Given that each episode comes with three possible endings - primary tasks, for instance, sandwiched by winning over a particular guy or girl, or befriending a set body of characters – your attention is essentially divided throughout.

The key is to make sure no one character dominates your time, with covering all bases the only way to ensure you meet each and every objective.

It's actually an art that takes a fair bit of practice to master, and one that – perhaps surprisingly – can easily lead to you replaying whole episodes again, opting to follow a different path entirely just to see what the end result is.

Indeed, so addictive is play at times that even when the game drapes itself in Americana - charging players with knowing who led the Confederate army in the US civil war, for instance - it's easy to forgive, restart, and have another crack.

It's ultimately the cheesy but nonetheless compelling relationships that win the day, with Surviving High School 11 taking up its rightful place as that guilty little secret you just can't put down.