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I believe I've mentioned this elsewhere, but my problem with a lack of voices is when it's selective. Or, even more specifically, when it's just the protagonist who lacks voices. I'm fine with partial voices or no voices, but going out of your way so that only the protagonist lacks a voice irritates me to no end. There really is no reason for this on games such as this one.

I wrote a review on MM here: https://j-addicts.de/master-magistrate-early-access-review/

Few EVN studios leave me with such mixed feelings as Reine Works – a small team creating otome and yuri VNs at an impressive pace since 2017, known for titles such as Blossoms Bloom Brightest and Reflection ~Dreams and Reality~. While I enjoy the ideas behind much of their work and there’s usually a visible improvement in quality with each new release, the storytelling in their games always proved lacking, leaving me either bored or weirded out in the end. Still, I was invested enough to still support their increasingly ambitious and interesting-looking projects, including minor Kickstarter pledges. This is how I ended up playing Our Lovely Escape – a small VN with choosable protagonist gender and three female romance interests, which appeared on Steam in late September 2019, after many long delays. Marketed in a way that suggested a dark twist to every heroine arc, hidden under a façade of a cute, New Game!-like story about an all-female game studio, it seemed to mix many elements I personally enjoy. What I got, however, is quite likely the worst Raine Work’s game to date and will stay in my mind as one of the most upsetting VNs I’ve read to date. Read the full article at evnchronicles.blogspot.com

I'm probably a bit late to the party but I've just noticed that Ouka Sabaki, the novel I kept requesting in surveys, is now available on Steam by the courtecy of some new folks called ShiraVN. If Doddler is to be believed, the TL should be more or less fine so it would be great if they gained a bit more support, poor Magistrate seems to be doing pretty bad for the assumed Ace Attorney: The Eroge right now. I also remember seeing that ShiraVN have close ties to DMM Games so Magistrate's success (or, well, not a complete failure) just might open up the possibility for a decent official TL of the stuff like Iwaihime, Ryuusei World Actor or, say, DiGination titles. Though currently it feels more like we are drifting away from those possibilities. Ah, right, there's also a very weird release format and they pushed it out as the Early Access game. Quoting VNDB page Sure doesn't look like a wise decision in hindsight. Even though I bought it, even I'm not going to read it in a "three chapters beta" form yet. Oh well, maybe more people will buy a complete version next year (?), who knows, I still have some hope that this will trigger a new player on the market with an actual access to some of the more demanded VNs.

Forgive Shogun, he's not the best when it comes to announcing new information. I didn't bother to correct him, as I am too tired to say it every time.

So I went on and concluded Machikado Mazoku. I recall watching the first episode and thinking... not terribly much of it. It was good, but didn't really push me to continue watching. That's why I stopped a few months ago when I watched the first episode. That said, now that I restarted it the other day, I quickly finished the whole thing! It turned out to be so good! The best thing about this series, besides generally funny moments, is how heart-warming it is.

Good thing that they don't bother with 18+.

On one hand, I'm glad they finished the game. On another, it doesn't seem to be a very good one. I mean, for me, it likely wouldn't be the worst, but it's sad that it's not what it wanted to be. I backed this game when it came out and was excited to play (I was the girl for the protag). Cute story but with darker elements can be a great game. Sadly, it appears the devs weren't able to get the story down right. I don't regret backing, but wish I got a better game. Also, sad that the girls are so unlikable. I mean, when I played the demo, they were nothing amazing but okay for me. I loved the art and the premise of being game devs too. Like How to Date a Magical Girl though, they are trying to copy Doki Doki, and though I don't mind if they take some elements from that, neither game did well enough to pull it off. And this one seems to have bad love interests. Well, I do hope they can make a better game next time. I know it's not easy, especially writing. But, good review.

Good morning too and welcome to Fuwanovel. If you need some more VN recommendations, you can try to ask us here. I hope you'll have fun here.

Yeah... I'll admit that I'm pretty curious on how bad it could possibly be. But not so much to actually buy it and much less invest so many hours into it I'll stick to my boring, wholesome vanilla shit.

I'm definitely gonna be trying it one day. Of course the one day would need me craving for dark stuff and also with renewed SAN.

You're all sick.

Yet Steam opened the floodgates for porn in a situation when they were in no way forced to do so by their financial situation or pressure from the community, pretty much only censoring content that could be deemed illegal – illegal due to decades-long legal crusade against paedophilic material that is based on very classic form of moral panic which is always in its core reactionary/conservative. Maybe my perspective is different specifically because I'm in this country where conservative ideologies have way bigger influence on my life. But generally, while the Sony case is probably the biggest one suggesting deep consequences of left-wing cultural movements scaring media companies into self-censorship... For the most part, actual customers and their money always win and it'd take some extremely radical shifts to "eradicate" Japanese popculture. The biggest, very real threat is the anti-child-porn hysteria personified in progressively-more-strict laws, which, once more, has very little to do with any "SJW" positions. Plus, it's not like the line of what's culturally acceptable shifting is a new idea. We're living, generally speaking, in times of unprecedented access to all kinds of media. Incredible freedom to consume whatever we like outside of anyone's scrutiny. People that want to genuinely change that or hate our favourite niches... I still have doubts if they have more to say than actual market demand. Sony's case worries me because of the influence it might have on eroge market and the all-ages versions of VNs that were always primarily aimed for PS... But you suddenly have Nintendo opening arms to more daring third party games and Switch is a gigantic market. Maybe I'm underestimating the impact of the culture wars... But really, both sides of them suck to such extremes that I can't force myself to take sides myself. I know the "all libs are Antifa" statement you spew makes me cringe as much as the most ridiculous leftist mischaracterisations of anime. At least I'm very sure this world will burn (quite literally) thanks to the beautiful capitalist order that gave us those decades of prosperity and stability before any communist utopia can take over. And I'm quite unlikely to run out of VNs or anime before the shit hits the fan. ^^

Man, I was just tryna be a good socialist and advocate for living wages for translators. Now we here

The guy does have a choice, yes. he exercised it and you called it narcissism and virtue signalling that he warned others. Your obvious personal distaste for the guy aside, I am failing to understand your point. If the industry cannot survive without exploitation of worker passion, then the industry should not survive. The demand to support higher wages isn't there and MG along with other companies deserve to go out of business. Unfortunately, the VN community is stupidly passionate about working for free and taking for free, so yes, you are right. I doubt much changes. Maybe it's just the fact I study a lot of worker exploitation, have first hand experience with worker exploitation, but I will always supporter someone wanting a livable wage. The translator made a choice and is being paid better by translating mobile games. So I'm glad he made a choice while also telling others where they might be able to make more money and live more comfortably in a different market.

It makes no sense here, since the protagonist has a unique design and personality, and plenty of scenes where his entire sprite is on screen, talking. This is a bloody curse, I tell you!