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I don’t know what the average age of visual novel fanatics is. At 38 I’m probably tilting heavily on the wrong side of it, but soldiering on with my passions regardless. I’ve been something of an anime fan for over ten years now but in the last few years I’ve been struggling to keep up with the explosion of new series and I’ve found dipping casually into past classics is just as rewarding as voraciously devouring everything. I’ve always enjoyed an eclectic range of stuff – I think –and my favourite shows have ranged from Cowboy Bebop, Evangelion and Rurouni Kenshin (that recent movie – glorious!) to Haruhi Suzamiya, Bakemonogatari, Sailor Moon and Revolutionary Girl Utena. At one point in my life I thought I’d watched quite a lot, but actually I’ve barely scratched the surface. I’ve been itching to get into Visual Novels for years but the poor availability of translations as well as the time factor put me off a bit – I had other doorstop books to read like Game of Thrones. I tried getting into Light Novels but they don’t feel any fresher than western ones. Visual Novels, however, are a different beast entirely and although I’ve so far only read a few– older ones like Eve: Burst Error and Divi-Dead - I’m fascinated by what the form can do, who there’s a need to approach the narrative differently from a written novel (again, I’ve read so many, I still love them but are less drawn to them) and the way one approaches reading them, in-between a book and a TV show, makes for a markedly different but just as rewarding experience. Anyway, because, like most people, I like writing about my experiences with new things, I’ve decided to try and read VNs a little systematically so that I can see how they’ve progressed over time and to blog my thoughts as I go along – I’m not just going to read older VNs though because that would stupidly ignore the fact that we’re probably in the golden age right now … the only more recent VN I’ve read is Planetarian which was formally and experientially much stronger than the others that I’ve read. Anyway, hi! I look forward to contributing a few thoughts and hopefully helping to bring VNs to the West.

Dont worry. @Darklord Rookeis approx. 73 years old.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/477740/ https://vndb.org/v3112 https://vndb.org/v7809

His word choice was simply off. He meant "ridiculous" rather than "retarded". Common mistake among teens. Let's try again with proper expression. "Learning a language just to play video games is ridiculous." But that doesn't address the common complaint, which is that whenever untranslated games are brought up and people pine about playing them, they're usually told to "go learn Japanese". So to further refine that: "Expecting someone to go learn a language just to play video games is ridiculous."

One last Halloween themed picture before we jump to turkey season!

Okay so there seems to have been a breakdown of communication at some point, because this was not supposed to be announced yet. It's not Time Leap Paradise the VN, it's a different thing, and I'm assuming we'll make a detailed announcement in the next few hours since we kind of have to, so I guess "more details soon!" until I can get confirmation on how to handle this.

This is probably not my place to give my opinion on the matter but, from my understanding, this thread is the result of a misunderstanding of the situation yes?

Hi! *awkward stare*

Okay hi, I am the person that is referred to as "DM" in this convo and quite a few things are being taken out of context, the biggest being that my point was that if you are text hooking Steins;Gate 0 when its just weeks away from official localization that , i felt that is more than a bit silly. I never tried to discourage anyone from learning Japanese, (another thing refereneced was me pointing out others in said community trying to force feed the idea that people NEED to learn Japanese and they are somehow LESS of a fan if they do not" I do apologize though that this conversation from a PRIVATE group floated on to this forum here.

As I began this VN, I decided to change my approach to how I would handle it. My dislike of ladder-style story structures will probably cause me to go berserk when I finish the final (Haru's) route, but for now, I'm going to evaluate the story based on each arc and its associated heroine route, ignoring the VN as a whole until I've gone through the final route. Now, the protagonist of this story is a pretty archetypical character... a PI who has been scarred and run down by life living in a town ruled by a vampire, controlled by two mafia organizations, and dominated by something approaching a capitalist caste system, where the financial circumstances of the individuals involved determine their social status completely and it is almost impossible to climb up the ladder, though it is relatively easy to fall down. Technology in this world hovers about the level of the 1980's, with the biggest differences being the existence of real-life magic and magical beings, as well as beast-people (cat-people, bunny-people, dog-people, etc). The protagonist isn't a wielder of magic, if you are wondering. His role is something close to a neutral party in the realpolitik landscape, due to his role as the vampire Rizal's representative, as well as his personal relationships with high ranking members of both mafia groups. This VN has a lot of situational comedy in it, ranging from Haru 'fixing' machines by hitting them and using magic to Chiroro's (a chibi homonculus that is something like a servant to both the protag and Haru) foul mouth toward the protagonist and fawning on Haru. I honestly enjoyed the back and forth between the characters through most of the first arc, and I doubt that will change through the rest of the VN. The first arc covers the introductions to the characters and the city of Naoka, and it ranges from non-school slice-of-life events (protagonist and Haru going out to solve problems as part of their work) to moments of tension in the shadowy underworld of Naoka. The first route that branches off is Kazuha's... Kazuha is the VN's resident genkikko+doggirl. I honestly fell in love with her from the first (I mean, she is working to support her twelve siblings and is endlessly cheerful and generous by nature... what could you not like about her? Not to mention that she is a mimikko, which automatically skyrockets my impression of a given heroine based on my fetishes, lol), so, while I'm sad she isn't the true heroine, I was happy to get a chance to see her route early on. And it is a surprisingly detailed route... in fact, it is roughly equivalent to 1.2 times the length of the average charage heroine route, in my experience. It doesn't mindlessly focus on the heroine and protagonist's love affair, instead involving all the characters (a bad habit with many VNs of this type is to sideline the massive cast of characters during the side-heroine routes, weakening the setting in general) in a dramatic mess whose impact is equal to that of the story arc previous to the heroine route. So, my initial impressions of this VN based on what I've played so far are positive... let's hope they stay that way.

If people want to learn a language just to read more porn games, and not because of bullshit like "I like the culture" or "I want to go to x country" etc. then more power to them.

Living your life by only doing what is necessary to be the working cogwheel of our society everyone expects you to be is retarded.

Nothing wrong with being retarded.

Shamelessly copy from this. Basically, use terms that are technically correct, but misleading/obtuse to describe a visual novel of your choice, and others will try to guess it. Let me go first: A bunch of people watch nuclear explosions from afar. Said explosions give one of them a fatal disease. Also, there're ghosts.

Welcome to Fuwo!

Somos como hormigas, estamos en todos lados y no nos matan más jaj Por ahora estoy leyendo Kara no Shoujo a un ritmo bastante tranqui, por el laburo, las clases de japones y la vida en sociedad jaja Cuando arranque una nueva lo voy a tener en cuenta. Gracias!

Ok, I finished Monogatari S2 now and have to admit, it's one of the best animes I've watched yet. It's waaaaaay above Bake and even somewhat above Nise (not nearly enough Tsukihi though they better change that in some sequel). I'm also able to rank now somehow just how much I liked each heroine: 1. Hachikuji - BEST GIRL. Clearly. It didn't matter with who she interacted, it always ended up fun if Mayoi was involved. It's nice to see such a happy-go-lucky ghost wandering around and throughout the seasons she always served as a very important pillar in Arararagi-sans life. And on a sidenote 2. Tsukihi - Best imouto. Her OP is probably the most catchy one of all and she is such a refreshing charakter with her spontanous outbreaks and her combination of brocon and borderline-yandere. And constantly changing her hairstyle, very nice. The only thing in which her sister surpasses her is sex-appeal (and that's just because she didn't have a touthbrush scene yet) 3. Shinobu, Sengoku - Yeah like you see I can't really decide between them. Shinobu has this awesome 500-year-old-badass-vampire vibre but can also be too moe for my heart to take at times. Sengoku on the other hand is a whole different type of adorable and looking at the Twister scenes for example I can't deny that she is one of the sexiest characters I've seen in anime for a while. Different from most people it seems, I liked Sengoku from beginning through end, even with all those changes she went through. 4. Hanekawa - That one's surprising. She started out as my least favourite character but from arc to arc she improved and stands here now. Interesting and charming character and a big help for anyone. And great tits. 5. Kanbaru - Everyone's favourite pervert. She has a lot of hilarious moments, looks nice and would possibly be higher on this list if she had more screentime 6. Karen - Strange for me that an imouto is on such a low place (well her sister makes up for that I guess). She started of somewhat annoying, but became a easily likable character after her own arc. I guess I'm just not such a great fan of the energetic type otherwise she would be at least place 5. 7. Senjougahara - Yep, main heroine on last place (I wish this wouldn't happen so often). I've already written before why I don't like her so I won't repeat that. I even admit that I almost started to like her as the seasons went by, as her character improved through time just like Hanekawa. But in the end it still wasn't enough to keep up with such a high-level cast, so sorry. Winner of the hearts: Kaiki - Seriously this guy started as a bit weird but interesting villian and become a personification of awesome in the end. He is the protagonist we truly deserve. Cynic, materialistic, and throughly hilarious. And his OP with Senjougahara is probably one of the biggest troll moments in the monogatari series.

The second arc of this story is focused narrowly on the aftermath of the first arc and Yurika. Yurika is a rare type in VNs these days... a sexy adult woman who isn't another man's wife or widow (yes, I went there). She is a member of the 'Virgin of Chains', the more 'peaceful' of the two mafia groups dominating the area. She is the protagonist's friend, occasional partner, drinking buddy, and sex friend. She has a somewhat nihilistic attitude toward life and an absolute love of teasing the protagonist... and anyone else who leaves an opening for her. Like all the heroines in this VN, she is fairly attractive, though she is somewhat overly pessimistic at times. Of course, she has very good reason for this, but I won't spoil that for you. In the aftermath of the second arc, I took pleasure in reading her path, which was a bit more icha-love focused than Kazuha's was at first. It does fall into the classic 'it was nice up to this point precisely to outline the drama' area, so the drama near the end of the path is pretty satisfying, and I honestly enjoyed the atmosphere of the path as a whole. I will say that I preferred Kazuha's path and I thought they could have gone a bit farther with her personal story (I thought that they glossed over a bit too much detail when it came to her eye).

Late to the party, but welcome to Fuwanovel here. If you want to show some of your writing, try that in Creative Corner section there. And if you need more VNs Recommendations, just ask us here (So does fif you need the feedback). Hope you enjoy yourself here.

Sure.

I was so excited about my Ideal Societies essay, in which I was able to do it on Psycho - Pass, but in my frothing excitement I forgot to add the anime itself in the works cited before I submitted the paper .

100% agree. People complain when companies release the same game over and over again. Then when the company tries something different, they complain it isn't as polished as the game that the company's made 4 times before already. Or they complain it's too weird, or not enough like the game that awhile ago they were complaining had been rehashed to death. If companies never take chances, then the market dies from stagnation slowly. That's not good for anybody.

Welcome, I see you have best girl 1 as your avatar. What kinds of stories do you write? Hope you enjoy your stay.

Fate?

Welcome! If you do buy one I highly suggest If my heart had wings it's one of my all time favorites but sadly the translation is bad BUT some of the people here are working on a re-translation and it may be worth waiting on that

I like how the creator of this post tried to lure us to comment on some private conversation that it was also taken out of context. Kiso... kiso, ダメダメだよォ btw if you didnt want people to know you are "justin" you shouldnt have posted your skype on your fuwa's profile in the first place

Not in the slighest. I still think it was a valid question. Edit: I should point out I mostly just looked at the title. Since it was asking a question (well, sort of) I figured that was the point of the thread and the example given was just an illustration of 2 different opinions (even if we now know that wasn't the case in that particular facebook post). Maybe i just don't like reading too deeply into things.

Welcome! Anyone into Neps is great in my book. If you ever need anything, feel free to ask. Hope you have fun around here.

Finally got around to finishing Monmusu. Not normally something I have much interest in (excessive fanservice, weak/non-existent plot), but I really liked the characters, and was curious to see where it might lead. Overall enjoyed it for what it was, got some good laughs out of it. Miia top girl- snek, Suu's a close 2nd place~

Welcome to fuwa!!! Hope you enjoy your time on the forum.

Heya, welcome to the Fuwa forums. I completely approve of your Noire avatar Have fun and see you around.

If the thread was solely about that question, then the referencing of the argument wouldn’t have been needed. The identities of the participants in the conversation wouldn’t have been needed. All it does is shame a certain participant while putting his ‘lad’ in the best possible light. That the section of the discussion presented was dreadfully out-of-context backs up the idea that the thread wasn’t solely about presenting a question. Think of it this way - the question as presented is woefully retarded as a discussion point. Why? Because in a vacuum the idea that ‘learning anything is stupid’ is itself a stupid idea. Because you get something (the knowledge of another language) for nothing (or almost nothing.) Hooray, a new skill and no downside, what's to discuss? Nothing, that's the point. Context provides boundaries and pay-offs. Context provides scope. “Is learning a language stupi-” “Of course not” “If it means destroying your marriage” “Oh” That this context was not provided not only makes the thread a circle-jerk for people who learn Japanese, it deprives it of any useful discussion. Which was probably the point, Nosebleed. That is, you’ve been conned into participating in a circle-jerk for reasons that are suspect and possibly mean-spirited. Doesn’t that annoy you at all? :S

I remember playing corpse party. Some of the puzzles were too hard for me so I played with a guide. Don't worry about getting locked in a bad ending or something, because the game won't allow you to save when you are. Plus, half of the fun in corpse party IS the bad endings.

Well, yes. Generally, their business is to sell VNs. If they get a big seller, it's only natural to "try out other things hoping to make the same impact". It's not like I particularly believe they think this'll be highly impactful, but if they don't try then... what do they do? "Oh, we got a big hit. Time to pack up and go out of business."

I recognize this one, it's that chick from Owari no Seraph

Rewrite? It feels forced, but I can think of several interpretations. The protagonist climbed a very high building to kill a crazy robot with a voice of a little girl.

So I just went though this entire topic. Time to post some pics! Some with a nice Halloween theme!

I'll be surprised if anyone manages to get that one, considering like five people on this forum have played it. Yup! It's Tsui no Sora. Not only is it untranslated, but it's completely unhookable as far as I can tell, due to arcane 90s engine structures. It's first on my list when I actually bother to learn Japanese. There's a subbed version of the OVA floating around, but I'm 99% sure it's the worst commercially released anime ever released. The animation is awful, the voice acting sounds amateur at best, and the art is on the level of MS Paint. I almost recommend watching it for the pure humor value.

Same, that's my philosophy in games. I never use a guide until I'm absolutely, positively stuck, so stuck, that I've been trying to figure it out for the past 30 minutes to an hour. I played Corpse Party after I had seen a few playthroughs of it, so I'm not sure if I would've used a guide or not. I'd say don't use a guide, because of spoilers as well as because you lose a sense of accomplishment and other such things.

When I started my Japanese classes back in my first year my teacher already automatically assumed this. (she wasn't wrong either) What was interesting about that first year experience though was that at the start of the semester she sent us a non obligatory inquiry via e-mail asking us what we expect to learn from the class and what other things we'd like to know about outside of the language. As you could expect, most people wrote things like "Japanese culture" in the "other" field. The end result was that every once in a while my teacher would give a small presentation about particular things the Japanese do (eg: cherry blossom viewing, new years card exchanges, new years shrine visits, etc.) and imo these were rather interesting because they really showcased a lot of behaviors we normally don't get to see. However I must be in the minority, because most of the class didn't seem to enjoy these presentations and found them boring. I guess this didn't fit with the class's idea of "Japanese culture". ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Personally, I think you should not play ANYTHING with a guide, unless you are stuck.

It's definitely a real possibility, and it was disguised because the OP provided a very select amount of context. I'm automatically suspicious when context is cherry picked the way it was, because context is king and the meaning of something changes drastically depending on that context. It's manipulating, TBH.

I think the guy bragging about reading VNs in their original language was the real dick. Its clear that the comment "learning an extra language for a hobby is retarded" was really just said because the guy was being a huge wanker about it. I think its great that people learn foreign languages for any reason, but that doesn't give you the license to be a dick about it.

October is turning out to be a frustrating month, with the VN I was most interested in delayed until December (for some reason, December seems to be getting all the most interesting ones...). I honestly had hopes that October would break the 'dry spell' I've been experiencing since I completed July's releases. There is still a possibility of that happening, but I'm not getting my hopes up. Right now, I'm busy with work, trying to open up a nice quiet period so that I can get all of October's releases out of the way in as short a time as possible. This is because I have a ridiculous amount of conventional games coming out next month on my list to play, and I don't want my VN habit getting in the way like it has the last few times a new game came out (yes, I'm that much of a VN junkie). Anyway this is the list of releases for October I plan to at least try to play: Nanairo＊Clip (I haven't played anything by this company, so I have no idea of what to expect, but it looks like a standard charage) Unionism Quartet A-3 Days (the fandisc to the original game, mostly playing in case they give solid after-stories to the neglected heroines from the original) Sora no Tsukurikata (Lovesick Puppies maker Cosmic Cute's newest game... definitely my initial pick for the month) Reminiscence Collection (Random VNs rather than VN of the Month, but I can't resist) Re: Lief (seriously, the Japanese finally crossed the line with this one, but I can't resist) Signalist Stars (new company, looks like an oppai-girl charage) Furerute Love Connect (charage, obviously... might or might not bother, considering how I dropped Nephrite's first game after only two hours of play because it was so boring) Gusha no Kyouben (Akabeisoft3 is pretty hit and miss, and now they are doing comedy... I'm curious as to what this will turn out to be)

Visual Novel Translation Status (10/29/2016) Sorry for very late here, and as for the title here I didn't mean hanami (And definitely not Sakura series here) but rather it refers to Japanese folktale which tell us that there's a corpse under the sakura tree. So I think I'll just using the party part from Corpse Party (Don't care much because it was in 3DS) and sakura part from rather unknown VN. In regard of other releases, I only interested to MYTH and Sorakumo (My shortened name, since the name was quite mouthful) for now if only the graphic for those two was better than the rest of this week release and most importantly was completed and didn't released on console (Root Letter was released on PS4 and Princess Knight was still one part here). By the way, even though I knew that released Sorakumo was had the H-Scenes was cut up, I still take an interest there if only because of the gameplay there. Other This week we had some surprise from Frontwing which they decided to add another Grisaia story there with the name 'Phantom Trigger'. The reaction, let's just said it was quite mixed up here although looks like there's more who looking forward to it though. Personally I think I'll just wait and see here, because the release format here was not so favorable for Frontwing here ie instead of full Grisaia game like Kajitsu, they decided to release it by volume which is quite unacceptable imo (Chapter based usually tends to gain some apathy to the game itself). And to close this on positive note, I think blue haired long haired male MC here was quite interesting to see, if only we usually only see that MC was had black and short hair (Including Yuuji from original Grisaia). Speaking about Frontwing, this week we also had Corona Blossom volume 2 released. Well, I still did not play volume 1 yet, but maybe I will in the future. For more progresshere, Enigma will be on Steam ie launched at November 15th (By the way Conjueror also translated Miniature Garden too). And for lase but not least here, we had Libra progress advancing 15% more for Aoi's route (ie Aoi route was 30% translated) and finally they start translating 15% of Lycoris route there. Sekai Project As for them, it was only usual for them with Chrono Clock 43.98% translated, Tenshin Ranman (I always mistakenly it as Rahman) was at 61.54% translated, Maitetsu was at 47.71% translated, Bokukotsu was finally reaching 12% translated for the progress (12.01%), and Princess Knight 2 was at 81.3% translated. Other than that there's nothing special from their progress, although guess it's good that Chrono Clock finally show the progress a little bit after they stagnant for the last week. Momory Dogma demo here was released, and while I didn't play it yet I think it could be good Visual Novel there looking from the production value (Opening and seiyuu). Although too bad that they decided to release more chapter in the future, so I couldn't said that I'm interested for now (But maybe I will the future). Oh, and they had one more progress there although it was not reported on Sekai tracker though. It was Hoshimemo retranslation project, and according to the translator (Akerou) they managed to retranslated halfway of it (50%) although I'm not sure though (He was gave the info back at October 5th). Fan Translation This week we had some other progress other than usual one, so I'll list those first here. First of all, we had Majikoi A was at finalizing in which they had 75 out out of 102 scripts was finished the finalizing. While I admit here that I didn't care about Majikoi A project there if only because of a fandisc only, and beside the original one was already satisfying enough to me, look forward to it if you Majikoi fan there. Second update here we finally had Sayooshi update after there's no update for long time there, and tight now it was at 38.24% translated. The third here we had To Heart 2 was 95 edited, and according to Ittaku he was only need to editing the rest of Manaka's route to complete the editing. For the last update for unusual one, we had Nocturnal Illusion Renewal was at 4.6% for the second editing there. As for usual progress, first of all we'll had Bishoujo Mangekyou duology here. The first one here was at 95% edited and 90% QC-ed, while for 2.5 it was at 47% translated and 43% TLC-ed. In regard of Luna Translation, Tsui Yuri was at 97% translated and for Majokoi while the translation progress was slowing down there, at least there's still stable if we talk about the update here (The progress was 52.5% translated, 39.1% edited, and 19.2% TLC-ed). And for the last but certainly not the least, Loverable here showing good progress here and for more detail, it was at 22.99% (Or maybe I should call it 23%) translated, 4.74% edited, 6.93% TLC-ed, and they started the QC here which right now it was at 0.83%. That's all for fan translation section. Mangagamer As epected they give plenty of update this week, and hopefully they will go back to their schedule twice a week if we talk about update. I'll just list it first here. Evangile W was at 66.2% translated Hapymaher was 55% translated and 36% edited Fata Morgana Fandisc was 35% translated Imouto Paradise 2 was fully translated and 46% edited Suki Suki both fully translated and edited Boukaku was 40% translated and 37% edited Maggot Bait was 3% translated Pygmalion was about starting the testing Kuroinu was 44% edited Da Capo 3 and Rance VI was currently in testing Sorcery Joker was 54% translated and halfway edited Nyuu Jene was finishing the testing Hadaka Shitsuji aka Naked Butler was 30% retranslated and 21% edited for the retranslation Dal Segno was at 79% for both of translating and editing progress Not much I could said here, other than good job. And for Himawari, they only said that it was on post testing process there. I just hope thagt i will be released soon here (Mangagamer said Soon™ though, so no much I could expect here I guess). For one more progress, they also already had Go Go Nippon 2016 ready for the pre-order and it will be released at November 11th although I could care less here about that for now. Oh, and about the release they released MYTH. As for my first look, I think while it's some kind of doujin VN at least the character was look better than both of Higurashi and Umineko original design imo. The premise was apparently MC was dragged to the shadow world or something like that. Didn't knew much for now other than apparently it'll be full of question and the soundtrack was composed by some member from 07Expansion (The company between Higurashi and Umineko), so at least we could expect that the soundtrack will be fitting to the scenes imo just like in the past. That;s all for this week VNTS Review and sorry for being very late this week. See you next week.

You only got 20th place, which is indeed pretty good. Congratulations on your efforts. I'm sure it was a worthwhile experience if little else.

Confession: We got 20th place out of 120 which is pretty good