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I've been considering this for some time, but it has suddenly become a reality. To be blunt, I've come to my limit when it comes to playing pure SOL games. Oh, I can still enjoy many of them, but if you asked me whether I can look at them without my resentment of 'normal' SOL content blinding me, the answer is no. If I have to read through one more template date scene or see another osananajimi climb through the window from next door, I'm going to start tearing out the last remaining hairs atop my head. *coughs* Ahem, now that I've got that out, it needs to be said that I've been doing this since September of 2012... a ridiculous amount of time to be playing roughly 80% of all non-nukige VNs that come out (I'm figuring those I dropped or just couldn't play because they were just that bad into the twenty percent). Just to be clear, I will still continue to play VNs and comment on/review them in this blog. However, I will no longer play as many outside my tastes, nor will I go out of my way to seek gems from companies I hate reading from. I realized while I was playing Koisaku (Ensemble's latest game), that a few years ago, I would have read this game without any real problems, and I wouldn't even have blinked at the crap that now drives me up the wall. Oh sure, Ensemble's base quality has fallen massively, but when I took a step back, this is actually one of the better amongst their more recent games, with plenty of indications of real stories for the heroines in the background. However, I found I just couldn't tolerate it. It hit me in the date scene that occurs in the common route... I have no tolerance for date scenes at all anymore. Scenes like that exist for every heroine in every SOL VN, and they all turn out in almost an identical fashion. Reading it, even though it was basically a 'friend date', was like dragging my brain through mud. I just couldn't do it. I promised myself that I wouldn't BS myself on this particular matter years ago... and I knew the limit was coming. I just didn't realize that it would be this soon. So, I have to announce that this is the end of my VN of the Month column. Now, all that remains is my Random VNs and whatever VNs I choose to play each month. I will continue to play what I'm interested in, and that will probably include slice-of-life at times. However, I will no longer play SOL out of a sense of duty to my readers. My original reasons for starting VN of the Month When I first started Clephas' VN of the Month, it was because vndb gives nothing to you for info on their games beyond poor tls of the game summary from Getchu, character profiles, and sometimes tags (that might or might not be accurate). I felt that that didn't do most games justice, and I hated the way I had to go into a game blind on so many occasions. As such, I started putting up commentaries on just what kind of VN I was playing, with few or no spoilers. This was a need that, at the time, was not being fulfilled (and as far as I know, still isn't, since most reviewers include major spoilers because they are inconsiderate). Over time, my routine each month started with figuring out which games weren't nukige and which I would play first... and picking out which one was the best after I played them (the latter of course being entirely a matter of my opinion, informed as it might be). However, it is time to set down my burden. I tried handing off my work to others, and that worked for a while (thanks to @Dergonu@fun2novel@BookwormOtaku@Kiriririri for their help over the last year - yes, even you, Kiriririri). In the end, though, I'm just one man... and one middle-aged man with increasingly bad health isn't going to be able to keep this up any longer. Heck, I'm amazed i kept going this long. I do hope someone else takes up the torch of at least informing people of what to expect in newer games (and not just the ones from popular companies), but that isn't my job anymore. Thanks for reading, Clephas

The biggest one: We need to stop treating VNs like they're Video Games Lite. I think we're all guilty of this (myself included), but by doing so, we're effectively limiting VNs' potential reader base to just gamers. An assumption I see often is that gameplay VNs like Ace Attorney or Danganronpa are inherently more newbie-friendly than normal VNs or especially kinetic novels. This only makes sense if you're assuming that you're trying to market VNs to gamers. I'm not saying that it's bad to try to get gamers into VNs, but why should we limit ourselves to that? Why are they the only audience that we're trying to get? Other groups who might be interested in visual novels: Regular novel readers. Yes, they still exist. This is such an obvious thing to me (after all, we're trying to promote visual novels) that it almost amazes me that almost nobody considers that people who like to read might be interested in...well, reading. Comics fans, especially fans of indie comics. We're seeing a tiny bit of overlap between indie comics and EVNs already. I read a short yuri VN named Serre by Adrienne Bazir not too long ago that does really nice things with CGs and sprite animations (especially considering she did everything except the music/sound effects). There's also an interactive graphic novel (which I haven't had the opportunity to buy yet) that came out recently named It Will Be Hard that I've seen get a good reception. I don't know if it'd be called a VN per se, but surely it'd be of interest to people who are interested in interactive storytelling? There's a lot of things that our mediums could learn from each other if we bothered to expand outside our normal horizons. People with disabilities who can't/don't want to play "normal" video games. After all, 99% of VNs have no interactivity beyond clicking to advance the text and possibly making choices. This makes them inherently more accessible than 99% of video games. There are some things to keep in consideration (for example, making sure you can access the menu easily; adding screen reader or text-to-speech support for visually-impaired readers; adding an option to use a dyslexic-friendly font like OpenDyslexic), but overall, making a VN accessible is much easier than making your average video game accessible. More things that would help VNs' reputation and encourage people to check out the medium: Stop pretending that porn is a necessary component to VNs. I'm not saying "drop the porn" (that'd be hypocritical of me, since I've wished for more 18+ otome in the past), but it's off-putting to a lot of people, and a lot of time it's shoehorned in anyway. Sex in VNs should be treated the same way as it is in books: some books have sex in them, in some books (erotica) sex is the whole point, but you don't need to have sex in a novel for it to be considered literature, nor does having a sex scene in it automatically disqualify a book from being literature. Longer is not always better. I personally like long stories, but a lot of people just don't have the time (or, yes, attention span) for a 50-hour epic. There's value in shorter VNs that tell a good story not just despite, but because of their length...similarly, by holding longer works up on a pedestal, we're encouraging creators to add pointless shit to pad the length of their stories, which just wastes everyone's time. We need to support diverse VNs by diverse creators. Diverse settings, diverse characters, diverse plots, diverse artwork. Basically have something for everyone. There's nothing wrong with high school stories, but it's boring when it seems like that's the only setting that people will read. Part of this is supporting EVNs and EVN creators, who may not have the budgets that the big Japanese eroge creators do, but who are still doing cool stuff. (There's this weird perception that EVNs try too hard to be like JVNs and are all set in Japanese high schools, which hasn't been the case for years? Katawa Shoujo and DDLC aren't representative of the EVN scene as a whole, for a lot of reasons. I will say that there's a disproportionately high number of anime-style EVNs, but even then there are plenty of exceptions. That's just the first few I found when going through my VNDB collection.) I think the reaction to this year's AX announcements really shows how much pushback there can be against stories that don't fit into the mold of "normal" eroge: JAST USA announced three BL VNs, and MangaGamer announced one BL and one yuri VN, and people are complaining about this year's AX being "overly gay," or about how MG has supposedly "abandoned" the "traditional eroge audience" (never mind that they also announced two Rance games and already have plenty of "normal" eroge in the pipeline) and is now a "fujoshi paradise." I understand the appeal of self-inserting, but some of my favorite stories have been about people very different from me--in fact, a fully-fleshed character who's very different from me can be easier to relate to than a blank-slate protagonist. Basically, if I can read through VNs with straight male protagonists and manage to enjoy them, a straight guy can read through an otome or BL game without...dying, or whatever you think will happen if you touch something not aimed at straight men. Don't promote lolicon/shotacon stuff. This creeps out the vast majority of people, myself included. Maitetsu was a mistake. Just because it's legal (in the US) doesn't mean we have to support it.

Those are some pretty interesting points you all made. Regarding sexual content - just as Lunaterra wrote - I like my games having sex in them. The only difference is, I truly enjoy it when it's meaningful, instead of being devalued to exaggerated fanservice sex romps; many vns treat erotic content like some sort of wish fulfilment for their players to indulge in, not to mention sex rarely works like that in real life. Outside the scope of sex as drama (NTR, arranged marriages, rape) and reproduction, sex is something we do to comfort ourselves. It's selfish - indeed - but there's nothing wrong in demanding love from people who want to share it with you. You take it in and want to repay for their kindness in return. This is what relationships are about. Very few games reach that sort of character development and I really hate when likeable characters are suddenly forced into a pointless sex scene by their creators, just because medium demands it. It's the most grave sin any writer could make. VNs need to stop being porn on purpose, if they want to achieve something more, otherwise they will never crawl out of the hellhole they're stuck in. Regarding lolicon, I presume it's quite similar as with porn. Writers need to stop treating lolita characters as walking fetish fuel dispensers. Younger characters can sometimes give a completely different outlook on many elements within a story from their perspective. In the end, it obviously depends on the writers themselves, but ultimately - if a character exists only for the porn, you're getting nowhere, unless it's a porn game you wanted to create. By all means - I'm not saying to stop creating nukige games, as they have their own place as well. What I'm saying is that all devs - but especially western ones - should start trying harder, because I'm certain they are capable of that. We can truly create immersive, story-driven vns. It's just a pity so many creators end up falling into this niche they dug up under themselves.

A few words before I get into this... As my previous post spells out, I will no longer be doing the VN of the Month column, and this VN was the one that was the straw that broke the camel's back. That said, it isn't like I didn't enjoy what I played of it once I got past the sticking points (date scenes). If anything, this game is a definite increase over the quality seen in Ensemble's works since Gokigen Naname blew me away. That said, when it comes down to it, this game is SOL all the way. The protagonist is the son of the owner of a small but stylish restaurant cafe and what amounts to the assistant cook. He has a firm grasp on what he wants out of life (to become a fully accredited cook), and he is also very responsible and good-hearted in general. The common route is basically one typical harem-building element after another, ranging from meeting a girl who constantly gives off 'I'm sickly but trying to hide it poorly' vibes (the protagonist doesn't notice, of course) to a seemingly strong-willed and free-spirited oneesama who shows off her fragile side at odd times. By the time it was over, even though it wasn't really long, I was so happy that I wanted to thank the magic bunnies for releasing me from that cliched hell. It needs to be said that there are too many heroines in this game, and Ensemble's current art team has such a limited range of facial designs that I honestly found it hard to tell the 'normal heroine' trio (Iori, Sanae, and Misato) apart from visuals at times. This was one of the reasons that my first impression of the game was blandness, despite the characters having dynamically different personalities, for the most part. Before I go any further, I'll say that the paths I played were the omake Nazuna path and Youko's path. This was because those were the only heroines I became interested in during the common route, which is probably the best reason possible. Youko's path is surprisingly long (it looks like the short common route is compensated for by longer and more complex heroine routes), and it is pretty emotional. While there were some definite moments where I winced at the predictability of certain events, I did manage to enjoy it to the end... which brings up the ending, which is actually excellent, because it is a 'four years down the road' ending that sees Youko having grown past her hangups and living happily with the protagonist... a definite benefit of an epilogue that goes forward significantly in time. Nazuna's path is an omake path, but it shouldn't have been. Nazuna is probably the cutest character in the game (other than possibly baby Minamo or a certain character who pops up in Youko's epilogue), and she is a rare yamato nadeshiko type to boot. However, she is cursed with an omake path that is short, feels forced, and ends without an epilogue. The decision not to make Nazuna a central heroine was a horrible one, and it isn't one I'm going to forgive anytime soon, lol.

http://vn-hooking.wikia.com/wiki/H-Code

Niché interests (which means damn near all interests) always gets this topic for some stupid reason, don't U understand that the mainstream is not desirable? I don't want to share my hobby with some of you people, because your end goal is to eliminate stuff that I like for the sake of popularity, you want to "drop the porn" and "drop lolicon", screw you, screw your "diversity", screw your ideals of ruining it for others. Freedom of choice should always win, and that's why the mainstream is not desirable to fans; it's incompatible with Japanese VNs. This does not stop you from reading, creating or promoting the VNs you like. The nature of what the medium is does not change just because a lot of Japanese VNs have porn in them. Go your own way and don't drag others down with you, please.

TAKE YOUR BLASPHEMOUS IDEAS SOMEWHERE ELSE, YOU HEATHEN!!!!!

Original Fakku forum release: Thanks to the help from a kind benefactor, I acquired the Steam release. Steam users can now y o r o k o b e. Figuring out how the Steam release worked was such a damn pain. Not much was updated, apart from a few thousand scene seek thumbnails. Mainly giving Steam users some love. MAITETSU 18+ RESTORATION PATCH v1.3 7-10-2018 MAITETSU 18+ STEAM RESTORATION PATCH v1.3 7-10-2018 Maitetsu WIP Decensor patch thread The main issues I was dealing with while making that patch that most certainly limited how much I can do are: 1. KrkrExtract just doesn't want to cooperate majority of the time when extracting XP3's. 2. When it does, it doesn't even extract the stuff I needed. 3. Repairing the sprites requires my being able to repack EMote .pbs files with edited .bmp images. Not hard at all to do, just repacking is the issue AFAIK 4. The data.xp3 is encrypted. About half of it KrkrExtract can get done, but the half that i'd need to fully repair the "filesystem" I guess you can say into something usable is. 5. God help me TJS2 bytecode is one of the most disgusting atrocities I have seen. Bless based nihongo tools If there is anyone out there who knows the KiriKiriZ engine or EMote engine, your input is always welcome. Suzu ga besto desu

Confession: Okay, so I managed to get my learner's permit yesterday with 40/48 questions answered correctly on the test. Holy yikes the test here in Florida was way harder than the one I took for Texas. I was only allowed to get up to 10 questions wrong, so I was getting a little shaky once I got to 6, and the other two I answered incorrectly out of sheer nervousness (at which point I started deep breathing exercises). I almost failed the vision test too, but only because there were a couple letters that were easy to mistake for others. Probably didn't help at all that I haven't had my glasses updated in a few years... Yeah, I guess it was something of a miracle that I even got my permit in the first place, lol. And don't worry, I will update my glasses soon! In other news, I discovered a cool new way to boost my exercise by reintroducing caffeine back into my daily routine! I had given it up in the past when I was desperate to get my sleep under control because I was so used to drinking it in the afternoon and didn't like the idea of drinking it in the morning (I just didn't feel like it). But eventually the sleep deprivation I've been experiencing has hurt my ability to concentrate on studying due to lack of energy. After watching Doctor Mike's video on sleep, I got the idea to start drinking tea again to see if it could help at all, and it ended up helping me in ways I wasn't expecting it to! It was thanks to that extra energy I from that tea that my performance in both studying and even exercising has improved. It worked so well, in fact, that I went from running on the elliptical for 47 minutes at a moderate pace to 65 minutes at a slightly elevated pace. In fact, I wasn't even tired by the end of it either, so I think I'll try running that with a little more resistance tomorrow. Studying has also been a little more tolerable, though I'm still having issues concentrating for longer than 20 minutes. Maybe I should take up meditation or something.

Hi Everyone, I have a bunch of new free seamless images ready for everyone here: TXR - GROUND http://soundimage.org/txr-ground/ TXR - ORGANIC http://soundimage.org/txr-organic/ Also, if you haven't already noticed, to streamline my site a bit I’ve eliminated the gigantic text block under the header image that showed all the pages on the site. Instead, links to all the pages on the site are on the right side of every page, listed under MUSIC, SOUND FX and IMAGES… (scroll down.) Simply click on the name of any page to navigate to that page. Then scroll down. The links appear at the right side of every page so that you can quickly navigate from any page to any other page on the site. Enjoy!

Sorry, slip of the finger.

You play enough VN's, you start recognizing some voice actresses (when they use the same voice at least). Sometimes even the characters they voice across multiple VN's have very similar personalities. Then again, one voice actress can voice an "imouto" in one VN (Sorcery Jokers), only to voice a cat (yes, a cat!) and a timid basketball player, which funny enough, BOTH meet horrible ends (Grisaia).

Salutations! And welcome to Fuwa! Hope you'll find your stay here a enjoyable one!

I took issue with lolicon specifically because of how accepted it is among VN fans. And yes, unfortunately, BL games tend to be rather rapey. :/ I'm not a fan of that kind of content either. I wouldn't recommend it without a content warning, though honestly, I probably wouldn't enjoy something with rape very much anyway. I also don't think it should be banned. I specifically said I wasn't advocating for a lolicon ban. That's outside the scope of this topic, and my own feelings on the matter are complex. The OP asked what we, as fans, can do to lure people into the medium...and that'd be a helluva lot easier if we didn't have so many people advocating for VNs with child sex in them.

There's always someone that's going to be alienated or offended by stuff. I'm all for respecting different people's needs. I react negatively to a lot of different things, but I've never experienced a panic trigger attack or something from a VN. I understand that there are a small group of people that might have legitimately triggering responses to stuff like rape or loli or suicide or bullying etc etc etc. I respect that, but my respect and understanding ends at just that: respect and understanding. It's still on the people with these kinds of triggers to make their own decisions. You can very easily accidentally stumble upon a rape scene in a VN that you didn't know was there, but if it's really a huge issue for you, it's more likely it would be pretty easy to do your research first. The same thing applies to lolis, lolis are very common in VNs, if you can't handle lolicon then it's very easy to do the research and find out if a title has it. I fundamentally disagree that offensive content shouldn't be promoted. I fundamentally disagree that anything morally questionable in fiction is inherently bad. Whether people strive to be challenged by certain content, or they just have fetish for certain content, or they enjoy seeing comedic situations with certain content, whether it is rape, suicide, loli or anything else offensive, I will always stand up for the rights of writers and artists to explore and create in whatever fashion they like because the more you limit them then the worse it is for all of us. Yes, there will always be people that are left out by certain popular conventions, like for example, some people simply won't read anything with porn. That's a shame but there is still plenty of gems for them to choose from. I'm not holding back on promoting titles I love just because they might offend a vague ~someone~. Neither should you or anyone else. What you should keep in mind, though, is to always have respect for others as individuals with individual needs and tastes. That's something very important. That's why SubaHibi is not a suitable recommendation for a lot of people. However, for people that can challenge themselves and explore all this difficult content, then it should be promoted above all else.

I never said that loli content should be banned. I said that we, as VN fans, shouldn't promote it. I consider this a moral issue, not just a reputation issue. Promoting that content (especially without adequate warnings) alienates actual, real life victims of child sexual abuse--this is why the Fuwa recommendation site (which I help out with) includes all loli/shota content under the "underage sexual content" warning, regardless of the characters' actual ages; someone who's upset by pictures of children in sexual situations is unlikely to be comforted by "oh, but she's actually 120, not 12!" Comparing lolicon to LGBT+ content is totally ridiculous. What's the worst thing that could happen by someone discovering BL? They discover that they're gay? Oh no, the horror.

Fujos won all right. Back to learning moon it is.

hello and welcome! hope you have a wonderful time and make lots of new friends!

i just chose the one with the most boobs. i am a simple man.

Sounds right at first glance, but it's a slippery slope. Next the stories are too long, then it's lack of minigames. Eventually it will be something, which might be more popular, but will they still be VNs? Sounds like you want to take the path of sacrificing the existing VN readers in order to maybe gain new ones. I was thinking something like that, but more like adult stuff like an all age title and storyline like a pure nukige.

Nope, drop the west, keep the porn.

The sad truth is, where porn or fanservice aren't involved, those games aren't popular either. VNs are mostly about reading and no one really reads nowadays, especially gamers; the reading rates have been constantly dropping across the world. When you compare the sales numbers of popular games like Nekopara and story-driven, plot-heavy all-ages titles you will see they barely sell at all; no matter how good they are and how well praised they get by critics, Steam curators and gaming websites, they won't ever be able to fight with those. It's another reason why we get so little of them and what gets translated nowadays are typically light charage and moege instead. VNs are destined to remain a niche and interesting vns will always be a niche within a niche. It's because the population those games were once directed at is actually declining and new generation that's ought to replace it remains completely different.

Well, let's look at all the announcements, then. JAST USA Spike Chunsoft Frontwing Denpasoft Mangagamer Askys has announced no titles for the PC, and therefore no title I could play. Although... PS4 remains a reluctant possibility that I may consider tackling in the future. I will comment that I have noticed every otome protagonist seems to look the exact same somehow. I will ask Eclipsed to confirm, as I believe he has played some. @Eclipsed

It's hard to edit your own work, as it's very easy to miss mistakes you made. Self editing can at best help kill some typos, but that's no better than simple proofreading, which is not at all what editing is about. For a VN this big, I strongly recommend you try to figure out a way to get an editor onboard. Self editing simply won't be enough.