Vokoca

I didn't make a proper post in a while, but now that I made proper progress in Senshinkan, I finally can. I've finished Akira's route. What a journey that was - left a lot of impressions for sure. As for the story structure as a whole, it's almost like an interesting twist on the traditional shounen genre - you have the usual formula of 'get beaten by a bad guy > get stronger > beat the bad guy', the iconic friendship power, or, mainly, those exciting moments where the tables get turned at the end of the battle - all that hidden under a thick layer of despair, gore and ridiculous(ly good) writing. What Senhinkan does well is taking all those 'cliches' and removing as much of the cheapness (deus-ex machina) from them as possible, and setting the rest tightly into the rules and workings of the dream world most of the story takes place in. There are clear reasons why such things as trust in your friends should ever work - or, why it sometimes wouldn't - because despite it's focus on human virtues, the story likes to put the main cast through horrendous things a lot. Still, it's nowhere near Muramasa's level of cruelty, so you can expect some happy times in the slice of life sections taking place in the real world at least - or, most likely, the endings as well. Well, there's no utsuge tag at the very least, but don't take my word for it. To sum all that up, it's just dark enough to make even a weirdo like me appreciate the nice things when they do happen, but at the same time it never really makes it its goal to crush you with despair and depression either, even if it comes close to that at times. As for Akira's route itself, I enjoyed it a lot. If there were any complaints, it'd be about the structure, since they quite obviously cut the main story in half for obvious reasons - but it still had a nice enough epilogue to be able to stand on its own as a route. Definitely don't expect a satisfactory ending to the main story itself though. That said, I can't really hold that against the VN too much, as it's clearly going for a multi-route mystery - which, I might add, is very intriguing. I love weird time travel bullshit - and when you combine that with cool concepts like lucid dreams and the collective unconscious... I'm so much in! The world itself is extremely interesting, and so is the main story, I just hope it lasts till the true ending.

Rather than the setting, I meant the basic idea of a 'at a first glance harem' turning into something horrible. Though yeah, I also think this is mostly PR talk - doesn't change the fat that I hate that kind of stuff, though. :x If this is a proper dating sim at least, I suppose that'll set it apart from the rest, though.

While I didn't read it yet, based from what I heard about the VN, this really sounds like Harumade, Kururu. While flipping genres on their head is something I really enjoy, a dumb statement like that alone is already detracting from my interest a lot. I can name at least one more VN that makes it its goal to twist and deconstruct the conceptions of eroge itself, and I didn't really read that many VNs in the first place (very little, actually) - so I'm not expecting anything ground-breaking from this. Well, let's wait and see how it turns out, I suppose.

Don't forget to get the fully voiced version, because Tomo's voice is love. <3

The first release + Kai includes all of the 8 arcs, which make up the main story. The only thing you're missing are basically fandisc arcs, or ones that never even came out on PC in the first place.

Just wait till you start coming across this sound: PTSD warning ;_;

Euphoria also has 6/9 not NSFW pictures on vndb :x EGS has it tagged both as nukige, but also as something 'in between'. So I suppose it's not completely out there, but it's not entirely innocent either.

I can't help it but ask... isn't this just a nukige in disguise? It looks quite suspicious. Not that it'd be the first one on this list.

Yep, riajuu (リア充) is the one. If you were to forcefully translate it, it be something like having your 'fill of real life'; it's a fun word. Actually, on this topic, a lot - if not all - of the memes that appear in S;G were in C;H first, too. At least that's what it feels like now that I'm reading C;H, which is practically exploding with them... 95% of the TIPS is just japanese internet slang trivia. As for the second entry, no idea what it actually says, I'll definitely check it out when I'm on the second playthrough. Still just at chapter 4 at the moment.

From what I hear though, the translation absolutely butchered most, if not all, of the original style. It's definitely one of the examples where the translation hurt the VN a lot, since I've numerous times heard about how good the writing in CC was - yet the TL didn't really leave any impression on me at all, other than being decent. Very unfortunate, though at least it's still very much readable, which can't be said about some other 'translations'.

More C;H spoilers

I will, I'll also take screens of any noteworthy CGs. By the way, I have a question about the original VN. In chapter 3 (Shogun),

Unfortunately it isn't. Also, I don't know if this is happening to me only because this is my second time reading it, but I have to admit that most of the negative delusions and Takumi's reactions to things in general are (unintentionally?) comedy gold. I seriously can't stop laughing at some of those, this is just so good.

Yep, after you get the normal ending, every heroine gets a route - which is the main reason why I'm re-reading C;H in the first place. Really curious how some of these will even work out... I'm looking forward to Sena's in particular because Sena is awesome, but how Yua's will work out is completely beyond me. Rimi also seems to have a route of her own in spite of the normal and good endings, which is awesome. <3

I have to agree with this - I mean, the fact that I went through the entire VN without even knowing they existed proves this point all too well. The devs must've known this as well, because in the Noah version I'm playing right now, the delusion triggers have a huge overlay over the entire screen, so they're impossible to miss in this version.

Just finished the sixth chapter in Senshinkan. What... what the hell did I just read? I don't even... ;_;

Hm, since you included Corpse Party, you might as well include the two sequels too.

You might want to spoiler-tag that Cross+Channel one.

For a moment I was worried Senshinkan wasn't even in there. Nice work on the list, very well put together!

Oh my god, that's horrible - I feel bad just imagining that. For me, the only similar thing that happened was with my roommate, I guess. We were reading AXANAEL together, and for some reason Nitro+ thought it'd be cool to stick a h-scene right in front of the OP. I felt a bit embarrassed at first but we just got a few laughs out of it in the end - both me and my roommate are studying Japanese, so we're 'deep' enough into the culture to both know what to expect - can't imagine reading a VN with anyone else though.

You're missing euphoria. No, really, I'm serious. The sad thing is that it handles the 'death game' and its effects on people way better than, say, Killer Queen/Secret Game does.

Finally, finally done with Ushinawareta Mirai wo Motomete. I think I've complained about it here enough before, so just to sum it up into two sentences, it felt something like this: "What, you didn't like that endless slice-of-life with boring jokes and flat characters? No worries, we will repeat it again, and again, and again and again until you do!" This might've came out a bit too soon after S;G to be true, but it honestly just felt like a very poor attempt at cashing in on its ideas, since it just tried to do what Steins;Gate did - but they failed horribly at every single thing. If I had to compare this VN to something else, I'd say it felt like Muv Luv Extra. Imagine you were promised more, but nor Unlimited, neither Alternative ever came out. It just felt like Extra on its own. Final rating? 5/10

I feel like I'm starting to understand how people got lured in... ;_;