Darklord Rooke

Hmmm ... okay. Moege are moe games, moe games are mostly about the ‘cutesy’ factor, being ‘cute’ is a form of ‘beauty’, ‘beauty’ as we all know is only skin deep, the thickness of skin is not very much at all which means it’s obviously shallow, when you dive into a shallow pool you are (in effect) giving yourself an uppercut, and so everyone who buys moege like Princess Evangile are (in effect) giving themselves an uppercut. And who wants to do that? So obviously, and more importantly objectively, Gahkthun is better.

Regarding Spanish TLs, I have no sympathy for guys who willingly get exploited then turn around and complain (and strike) because they got exploited. If you want to be that stupid, that's your problem. They weren't harmed in any way, and I hope they learned a valuable lesson. Regarding Steam being a waste of time, the fact it provides many, many times more sales than localisers used to get pre-Steam means it most definitely isn't a waste of time. Even with the 'discouragement', even with the 'stupid assholes' (which Steam is well-known for and thus are usually ignored) pre-Steam titles were struggling to reach 2,000 copies and now they can easily break 5 figures. Because of this basic fact, because there wasn't enough people in the eroge community willing to actually buy the damn games, you will have to live with Steam because that community does buy games in large numbers. Don't imply the Visual Novel community in the West know about great visual novels, at least not with a straight face. When you have quality games like Gahkthun, Cartagra, KnS, KnS2, all struggling to sell, and shit like 'Boob Wars' and the like selling mountains of copies then obviously it's not just the Steam crowd who don't know a great visual novel when they see one ...

http://blog.mangagamer.org/2016/02/22/beat-blades-haruka-release-date-change/

http://blog.fuwanovel.net/2013/02/the-unstoppable-downfall-of-the-bishoujo-ge-industry-interview-with-nbkz-producer-at-minori/ All common sense points. I should point out, that while TWD and Life is Strange aren't technically VNs, they are VERY close, adopt the points mentioned above, and have sold a bundle. Episodic content is probably where we're all headed toward.

Actually it's the other way round - it's super expensive in Japan, like most things actually. (Japan is well known to be a pricey place, it historically protecting its markets from competition is one of the more well known reasons.) The average VN costs about 300,000 dollars US to make. The indie game, Divinity: Original Sin cost many times that. Both are indie studios. The average VN is priced close to a hundred dollars US in Japan, Divinity was priced at half that. So it has little to do with expense. It has little to do with 'amount of time spent within the game' because Skyrim, Fallout, all offer a lot more. Voice acting isn't an excuse because everybody has voice acting in their games. There is really no justification for these games to be priced at 80-100 dollars American, other than possibly 'hardly anybody wants to buy them', and the natural counter-argument for that is maybe 'nobody buys them BECAUSE it costs an arm and a leg.' I also tend to blame the inefficient manner in which Japanese devs tend to go about the creation of their games, but that may not apply to VNs specifically (other than some studios habit of creating an engine for each game they release. Needlessly.)

I wonder if the high price contributes to the super-niche status of these games. Anyway, this is one of the reasons why voice acting spoils games. They greatly increase the development cost of the game (more in Japan than in the West,) which therefore requires the studios to move more units, it can also increase the price, the studio needs to play it safer to appeal to a wider audience, it can limit the amount of writing in a game, it limits the flexibility of the writing (because now if you want to add a line it must be recorded) - all in all I'd prefer games WITHOUT voice acting. But yeah, VNs are definitely VERY expensive, and if they ever want to succeed as a storytelling medium then that price will need to come down. Some people try to rationalise away the niche status of the industry by saying 'people don't read anymore' but that's actually not true - the amount of readers isn't decreasing. The price of VNs, however, lands it well outside the typical reader's market and so VNs end up appealing to ... other audiences.

There has been complaining. A fair amount of complaining. The complaint is 'the desire to create a strong female lead has caused Disney/LA to make a character who is all-round too perfect.' She can do a LOT of things without training, and that hasn't escaped people's attention. But she's popular and she entertains people and that's what counts in the end.

I thought that might happen. If you miss a single opportunity to connect with Ryoji, you'll miss out on maxing the social link.

Like every writing rule, it's not so much a 'rule' as it is a guideline for beginner writers who aren't sure what they're doing. As people above have said, Gary Stus and Mary Sues limit the opportunity for character development, limit the opportunity for tension within a story, limit the opportunity for growth, that doesn't mean a person can't still write entertaining stories but obviously you are limiting the tools available to you. Beginner writers, bereft of these tools, will often write incredibly boring stories and therefore people have reacted by telling them 'stop creating Gary Stus and Mary Sues' but it's not an iron clad rule. James Bond used to be a Gary Stu (the new movie was supposed to change this, but that doesn't change the fact that he spent decades being a Gary Stu,) Jack Ryan is a Gary Stu, and these are very popular characters from very popular stories. Even Atticus Finch from To Kill a Mockingbird, a piece of literature, has been said to be borderline Gary Stu (and even if he's not, he's awfully close to being one. Yes his daughter's point of view and all that, still, awfully close.) There are plenty of examples from many successful novels, so obviously you can work a perfect character into your story if you wish. Doing so and creating a compelling story is harder though which is something you need to take into account, and you should really know what you're doing. They can easily bore readers but I wouldn't call them all 'bad' right off the bat, Gary Stus and Mary Sues can also be very entertaining.

It takes months, possibly half a year, to get used to the DVORAK. Muscle memory is learned memory, which just means time and application to learn a new way. The switch is mainly advised for people who type a lot and start developing RSI, Dvorak tends to reduce (and in many instances gets rid of) those problems. Mainly because while the claims may be exaggerated, they’re based off many truths. Your fingers will travel about 40% further on a QWERTY, that can be the equivalent of many miles (depending on how much typing you do,) and this builds stress (and reduces speed.) So writers, for example, I know of quite a few writers who made the switch and never looked back[1]. But many people will need to start experiencing RSI problems before they’ll be convinced of the benefit. 40% may be lower than the figure stated, but once you start experiencing health problems that 40% is a pretty large figure indeed. Obviously if you don’t do much typing then there isn’t much point, especially considering QWERTY is used everywhere, but looking (for example) at the figures on this blog here[2], the build up of stress and accumulation of miles is significant for those who do a lot of typing. [1] http://hollylisle.com/dvorak-a-me-three-months-later/ [2] http://patorjk.com/blog/2009/07/12/typing-distance/ I have a small feeling this one may be my fault. It's only a small feeling though ...

Many sites do this and it works really well http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=10176 (the review with a link down the bottom to the comments) http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/rpg-codex-review-undertale.106038/ (the comments is a thread on the forum) The same happens with other news articles. It's a pretty neat design.

and strangle somebody

The layout. If you've ever used a manual typewriter you'd know if you type too fast it jams the pins. It's one of those things which makes manual typewriters so annoying to use. To semi solve this problem a long time ago, they decided to mix the keys up and place the most often used letters far away from the default position. In other words, they wanted your hands to travel further to slow you down. This design is known as 'QWERTY', it's slower and makes your hands travel a very long way which can lead to RSI problems. All the cool kids use DVORAK. It's a design which places the most used letters closest to the default position, which speeds you up and places less pressure on your wrist.

Palas makes a valid point. There's two reasons not to use them. Reason number 1 - Mousepads were necessary back in the days of the old 'ball' mice, the ones which needed friction to roll and you had to take the ball out and clean regularly. With optic and laser mice they are no longer necessary, tables or any flat surface is fine. Of course if you're trying to move the mouse on a bit of carpet or your bedspread, you'll likely need a mousepad of some kind, along with a swift kick in the nuts for being lazy and not sitting at a table. Using mousepads are unnecessary like Qwerty keyboards are no longer necessary. I haven't used one for a long time. Reason number 2 - Your wrist will benefit with a large surface area to lean on. Ideally you should be resting your entire forearm on the desk and moving the mouse, it cuts down the pressure and prevent stress injuries.

It's not really important or anything, but IIRC you may find it advantageous to spend every possible opportunity with Ryoji if you wish to max the social link.

Good VNs tend to be pricey, in some instances almost the cost of a AAA game. Gahkthun is 45 American dollars which makes it incredibly expensive in people living in certain countries. It puts it out of the price range of readers (who will choose to buy 3 books for the price of one VN,) and makes it compete with games like 'Witcher 3' which costs a mere $5 more on Steam. Be honest now, if you had a choice which would you choose - Witcher 3 for $50 or Gahkthun for $45? To be honest, the Witcher 3 gives an all-round better experience imo. This is exactly why Sekai's idea of offering a half-price version sans voices is such a good one. It offers an almost complete product, but most importantly gets their product out of a price range where they just can't compete (imo.)

Would probably have made the top 5 on MG all together (1st party and 3rd party.) If I remember correctly, the TL community on /jp/ were getting real bitter with how well the EVNs were doing on the MG site compared with the translated VNs. But that's been the case for a long time now, every since Christine Love's VN topped 30,000 units sold. This bitterness probably contributes partly to the ill-feeling toward Tilley and Winged Cloud.

Well written stories does not equate to larger sales. Many ‘great’ VNs don’t do fantastic in Japan, the success of Sakura Spirit in the West speaks for itself, and although literature are usually excellently written novels they usually lose out to genre fiction in terms of sales. ‘Entertainment’ is what moves units, and great ‘entertainment’ can be synonymous with ‘bad stories’. In short, Tilley is one of the more successful VN developers in the West, so why should he change anything just because some people don’t like him? Money talks much louder than almost anything else.

Sounds like something retarded, which makes it decidedly uninteresting. I'd wager reading Ren's complaint is more compelling an experience.

Yes. A small one in the car and a large tome for home :3 But that takes effort and I'm a lazy, lazy man

Ah. I didn't realise they were for display purposes.

'Oppai' mousepads should never have been a 'thing' in the first place. Similar to 'gel' mousepads they may actually contribute to wrist pain, and that they shorten the actual mousepad itself is never a good thing. Of course there's always the 'you dirty man' aspect, but that's of secondary importance ...

The art is fine, it's less 'toony' than your typical VN from Japan. I especially like the muscle definition on the lady, and the normal proportioned weapons they're carrying. Tilley doesn't tend to be criticised for the artwork (even though the art style in High School Romance might not appeal to some people.) Generally speaking the art is of a decent quality, easily at the forefront for OELVNs. Their storytelling needs work though. They get criticised for their lack of depth in the writing, and their pandering to the lowest common denominator audience (*looks at Beach Bounce*) That doesn't mean everything about his games is horrid, though.

Interesting! I hadn't actually, but I might in the (medium-term) future. Definitely food for thought in any case

A fairly obvious conclusion. Considering for several years the Western scene was the primary place Western otome fans could get their fix, due to translators refusing (for the most part) to localise otome because they want to localise fap-worthy nukige crap instead, you're also being a little unfair. Most Western VNs (apart from the obvious) are otome because most translators refused to bring those sorts of games over, and thus a budding industry formed because there was a gap in the market.