Vokoca

I've read Narcissu, not really what I'm looking for here. I'm not really sure what to make of True Remembrance based on the synopsis, but it seems different too - though I will keep it in mind, thanks for the tip. Gekkou does sound very interesting. I'll add it to the list of LNs I need to buy, right beside HakoMari.

Ok, you win. Now give me back my sleep. ;_; But really, on topic, anyone? I'm assuming this would be more common in chuuni stuff?

Oh right, Gekkou no Carnevale. I will have to check that out eventually. Have you finished the VN already? Also Kikokugai is by Urobuchi? Sounds like I wll need to add that to my list too. This would be funny if I haven't read that already...

This is going to be a weirdly specific request, so please bear with me. After reading quite some romance VNs, I've got a craving for a story that breaks the mold and does something interesting in the genre. I'm looking for something that twists romance on its head - something, for example, where the main character would romance the heroine even though there is clearly something wrong with her, and the like. The best example I can think of is Saya no Uta. I'd like to read something similar - but it doesn't have to be strictly in the same vein. The heroine doesn't necessarily have to be some kind of a weird monster, could be a yandere or something similar of that sort. The only other example I can think of is Muramasa, although since romance is hardly the focus there, it's pretty far off. Now, I'm not looking for weird fetishistic nukige. I'm sure there are more than enough BDSM-and-similar titles out there, but that's definitely not what I'm asking for. I'm looking for something with a story, if possible. I know this is an incredibly specific and vague request, but perhaps someone has read something of this sort?

While a lot of visual novels indeed focus on the much more tangible and straight-forward choices relating to specific heroines, there still are others that focus more on the moral values than characters, too. From the translated ones, Saya no Uta immediately comes to mind, and from the untranslated ones I'd definitely pick the previously mentioned Muramasa as well. But those VNs focus on moral choices an dilemmas mainly because its the central point of their story - you can't really expect heavy choices in a school romance setting, can you? Well, even in that genre you can find the rare works that even actively mock and blame you for the choices you make (Kimi to Kanojo to Kanojo no Koi), but that's not really the point here. As I've said above, visual novels focus more on the tangible choices of characters rather than the abstract and ambiguous moral ones, and the reason for that is simple. It's to allow the route structure to function. I'd probably go as far as to say that this structure will allow you the most freedom you'll ever get from an interactive story - in the usual visual novel, you have a common route and several branches splitting from there, each completely different than the other, with an ending or two of its own. Now, compare that to western games that focus more on moral choices - what do you get there? Most of the choices are either completely fake are momentary, with the only large effects on the story appearing at the very end as a different ending. Sure, you might get some variations along the way, but it's still just a single story. No different routes, just slightly different outcomes. From games that flat out lie to your face about the freedom of choice (Telltale games, where the result is generally same no matter what you pick, yet it acts like every single dialogue option changes the universe) to games like Infamous, which might have two different sides of it, but eventually just force onto you their own morality (their own concepts of good and evil), removing your very own choice in some way or the other anyway. In that way, I think VNs offer much more freedom - even if it's just characters in the end, you're still getting much more variable content in the end. Let's also not forget what happens when you push the choice-making so far that the main character becomes a blank slate - I remember rather vividly a fuwa thread about how much everyone hates those.

Subarashiki Hibi has plenty of yuri and comedy. I swear it's all just funtimes!

Goodbye, OELVNs.

Finished the third chapter of Senshinkan - the chapter of infodumps. Lots of interesting points were revealed, quite some terms finally explained, but at the same time some stuff got even more confusing. Time, how does it work! The chapter did get back into the combat near the end again, and I have to say that I've probably enjoyed this one the most so far. It was absurd for sure, but it finally went out of its way to explain what the hell was actually even happening, which made for a very entertaining read. You'd think fights in dreams would get stupid really fast, but they're introducing some really interesting and fresh mechanics that could add a whole new layer to ridiculous chuuni fights. Really curious where they go with it - with such a setup at the end, it seems like chapter 4 and onward is the real deal. Oh man, I feel bad for the main characters already. Haha, honestly there are times when I don't manage, like when they go crazy with the Buddhism terms and such. Oh god, calm down, author! Though if you make it through the prologue, the VN gives you a break for quite a while - it's not nearly that bad all the time. This VN sure makes you appreciate the limited space of a textbox sometimes.

If the OP ruins the mood, then it is a bad OP. I actually prefer OPs placed after some sort of a prologue, no matter ho long it might be. It can serve like a nice marking point to let you know that the real story is starting, so to speak, showing you a bit of a preview of what's to come.

That very much depends on the placement and quality of the OP, I suppose. Though I can't say I ever felt like I had the VN spoiled by an OP, so I either like them or am indifferent - there isn't really an OP that I would hate.

Finished the first two chapters of Senshinkan. That sure went from dream fun times to horror and death quickly. o.O As cool as everything is, I have to say that fight scene in chapter 2 was so long and absurd that it was downright exhausting. I know a lot of it is on purpose, and that having difficulty with the complicated language is my own fault, but it doesn't change the fact that it was tiring.Considering the purposes of that scene, I hope they tone the fights down a bit from now on - or, explain them better, would probably be a better way to put it.Either way, I'm curious where the story goes from here... probably not anywhere nice, that's for sure.

Well, it took me forever, but... it's happening. ( ^ Just an image. )

Well, finished the first "route" and actually got to the real starting point (???) of Ushinawareta Mirai wo Motomete. The road there, uh, to be honest, first I was amazed by the bad third-rate evil judo club, then bored to death by below average romance drama, and when the (predictable) twist finally came, I had to double check if I suddenly wasn't reading Kimi ga Nozomu Eien instead. That said, with the real concept now at least partially laid out, I can see this getting better... that is, if the route structure starts making any sense. Yay for fake choices!

That play was used so well in the story, I might have to read it eventually as well. ;_; SubaHibi mainly just really got me interested in actually reading some of the philosophy books, instead of just dully learning about philosophy itself like I did up until now.

How was Muramasa not mentioned yet? I'm disappoint. http://youtu.be/Le2zxWrD294

There is an English patch for the first arc as far as I know - they're actually almost done with the whole translation already, but you can read the prologue arc first if you want, it's pretty stand-alone.

You can't blame people, that joke was too realistic. Still hoping for Chaos;Child to be timed exclusive.

Started Ushinawareta Mirai wo Motomete in hopes of getting a better time travel story than TIME TRAVELERS, which frankly shouldn't be that difficult to get. I've just read a bit, so there is not much going on yet, but at least some of the characters seem likeable, like Kaori. And unless I'm hearing things, Airi has the same VA as Yuki from SubaHibi, which automatically makes her best char of the VN regardless whether I actually like her or not. I'll slowly continue, with my expectations at the minimum.

Finished TIME TRAVELERS. I could write up several paragraphs about how stupid that VN is, but it'd be a waste of time. The plot is like just a bunch of scenes the writer thought would be cool on their own, but ultimately they make no sense when they're all put together. It's all just really badly written, this is definitely not the go-to time travel story. The 'gameplay' is equally bad too, maybe except for the second to last chapter, where it finally stopped holding you on a leach and let you tackle a time stop on your own. It was the highlight of the entire VN - you had to make correct decisions for all the protagonists at the same time, with each of them having their fail state you wouldn't know about until you got stuck with everyone else. If the entire VN was this, maybe it could've been great - but for what it was, a weak 6/10 from me, with bonus points for the nice OST and furigana everywhere for stupid gaijins and kids.

Sca-ji's currently writing his next work (although it's been stalled since even before SubaHibi's creation), Sakura no Uta. He says supposedly that it'll be "better than Subarashiki Hibi." U-uhh... let's not get too ahead of yourself Sca-ji, but... how can you top SubaHibi?! xD Jokes aside, he probably has something up his sleeve from what the information on the official website has to say. There's also... something else... but let's not get into that because it's really bad, an ancient relic of the long-forgotten age that should stay forgotten. Oh yes, I've been wondering about the English patch for a while before... and I ended up asking a whole bunch of people who've read the leaked patch then read it myself to find out if it was any good or not. I can safely say that it's quality, (only with the occasional typo instead of a mistranslation... which is even outside proper editing, QCing, and whatnot) and all the others who've read it said so, as well. SubaHibi isn't really that hard to translate to begin with, and the translator has relatively high level English to boot. The simplistic but poetic text is getting some good treatment afaik, with only maybe the last chapter possibly suffering... that's where the writing gets more complicated after all. Hm, seems like I will be stalking Sakura no Uta now! Are those sneaky cameos in the pictures, or do some of the characters just unintentionally look similar? I'm also doubtful if it's even possible for Sca-ji to top himself, but if he does... dear god, we will spend the rest of our lives analysing his works. And very nice to hear about the English part, as many people as possible should be able to enjoy this masterpiece.

Decided I should finish the VNs I've started on the Vita before I read any more PC ones, so I'm continuing TIME TRAVELERS. Pretty disappointed so far. Seems like something made by the David Cage of Japan, full of lies and promises that fall right on their face thanks to the story that makes hardly any sense at all. Well, maybe it will get better - from the VN's 18th hour, it lets you pick the main character you like and continue the story onwards, instead of getting forced to read everyone's perspective in small intervals. This also introduced a new mechanic of "time locks", which basically just prevents you from advancing too far, I guess...so it's probably just more stuff that's just supposed to deceive you into thinking you have any control over the story. So far all the time stops were incredibly easy to solve, as they only require you to either go back one scene and pick a different choice, or siply continue the story with a different character that has an influence over the scene where you got stuck... way to cheap out on something that could've been a cool mechanic. I'm not really getting any hopes of that improving from now on, either.

Regarding the story: One final thing: About SubaHibi I was really impressed by Sca-Ji's work. Writing a story this complicated and well thought out is one thing, but intertwining in so many literature references and parallels from a very wide range of fields and countries is something I've never seen done this well before. Has he written any other VNs? I might have to start stalking him as well. Believe me, you might get more than you're asking for in that regard. The patch is coming~! Hopefully it's good ^^;

Subarashiki Hibi Vndb Just finished Subarashiki Hibi. I'm speechless, I honestly don't know what to say. 11/10, best VN, end of post No, but really, I was blown away. At first, I wasn't entirely sure how the endings worked, so I only got one - I was pretty happy with it, seemed like a fair way of ending it, but I still felt like something was missing. After all that I've went through with this VN, I knew it wouldn't be that simple... and I was right. I reached that ending, and... I don't even know if my mind still existts, but it surely isn't in one piece anymore! This is a gem amongst VNs, and I think everyone should read it. Even if you can't read Japanese, just wait for the English patch and read it then. Sure, this isn't a story for everyone, and the unusual amount of h-scenes doesn't help that either, but I would have to be absolutely crazy to hold that against it. Even if you despise h-content from the bottom of your heart, just know that they all do play their part in the story, and if they were to be removed, large parts of the story would have to go with it, and that'd be a huge shame. If I had to compare this VN to anything, I'd probably put it next to Umineko no naku koro ni. It might not look like that at first, but it does share quite some parallels with it - saying which would obviously be a spoiler, but if you enjoyed Umineko, and are a fan of stories that require you to think instead of spoon-feeding you every single detail, you have absolutely no excuses for skipping this one. That, and it wouldn't be much of an overstatement if I said the OST is on a similar level - it's probably only the second VN after Umineko where I can say I really like every single track on the soundtrack. In short, Subarashiki Hibi is an amazing visual novel that anyone who likes good stories should read eventually. I'm so amazed that I don't even feel like starting anything else.

For some reason, the Vita version of Fate/Hollow Ataraxia is for free (for a limited time if I understand it correctly?) on PS+, so I'm trying that. Not sure if I'll actually read the whole thing since I don't care much for Fate, but I'll try to go through it if only for the voice acting. Got really excited by that first part, only to realize it was just a joke. Bleh, I'd rather read ghost stories the whole time than what came after that. .-. Also almost done with SubaHibi, about halfway through Jabberwocky 2. I will comment more on it when I finish, but it continues to be really amazing. <3