Clephas

On the request of several individuals, I replayed Sangoku Hime 3 (previously I had only done the Wu route) with Shu. Previously, I gave this game a god-awful review... and with good reason. The Sengoku Hime games are a bit of a slog through tedium as time goes on as well, but not quite to the degree of this game. The big problem is that they basically tried to attach the Romance off the Three Kingdoms strategy series' worst aspects to a VN at the hip. There are tons of castles to conquer (144), generals to recruit, and lots of disasters to enjoy as they ruin your day. Bandits are by far the worst, as they can drain your money virtually to nothing on normal mode inside three turns if you aren't careful... and even if you are, since they randomly get past your 'peaceful' areas defenses every dozen turns or so. For this reason, unless you love torturing yourself, ALWAYS play this game on easy, so you can have the nice beginning war-chest and can go through the game relatively quickly (relative being the key word, as you'll learn if you play this game). If you were to actually just skip all story aspects of the game, starting from Wu, Wei, or Shu... think 90 hours. With plot, it goes to about 102 hours. Normally, with a strategy game, this wouldn't be that offensive... but the fact that the prose in this game tends toward the dramatic and is actually rather interesting makes the utter slog they turned the main game into unforgivable. The artwork (for males and clothing, anyway) is beautiful and detailed, the characters are interesting and likeable (as long as you aren't dealing with personal events, which Gesen sucks at for some reason), and the music is almost-godly. But, like I said... all that good stuff is ruined by the sheer length and monotony if conquering China castle by castle... not to mention building up the forces to make it possible. The battle system would be good... if there were only fifty or so major strongholds to conquer... but after a while, it gets to be simple grunt work (attack during battle phase, strategically kill off the enemy to let you attack the castle walls, break the gates, take the castle). The prologue is just godly overall... the protagonist being an imitation Lu Bu... and the fact that the overall quality of the prose stays constant in the main story (like I said, the personal side-events tend to suck donkey shit) is a huge attraction. Unfortunately, to get to that prose, you have to dig and dig and dig and *Clephas falls asleep in mid-keystroke* Overall? I still can't recommend this, even with the new content (which makes the process somewhat easier by letting you change general unit types). The two new paths added on... one is even harder than Lu Bu's route (which is basically insanity mode even on easy) and the other is basically working with one of the most annoying of all the characters in the game constantly (at least Cao Cao and Sun Ce are generally awesome characters). I do find it hilarious that in both Koihime and this game, they made Yuan Shao an unbelievably annoying ditz, lol.

Ok, I'm going to be a bit of a buzzkill here... 50% of VN opening quality is your personal tastes, another fourteen percent is technical excellence, twenty percent is matching the rhythm of the visual aspect to the musical aspect, and fifteen percent is visual beauty/aesthetics. The last percentile is the magic and genius of the person who actually played the song in the first place. Edit: Here are some examples of openings that left me stunned. Now what did you see (bearing in mind that ALL of these are colored with my personal tastes, only Hapymaher's being within the original request of moege-relation)?

Shin Koihime is significantly better than the original... but yeah, it isn't a kamige or anything. Edit: Still, I've played much worse games story-wise... really, it is the Shu path that sucks. The Wei and Wu paths are both relatively high quality, but it isn't the main story itself that attracts, as such... it is the process. It is basically a moege with the trappings of historical action and gameplay.

Batman is the only cool superhero... and even then only when he actually goes through with killing the Joker rather than letting him survive to cause problems again, lol

*Clephas offers Nayleen a rather large cloth bag full of jerky marked "Honey Teriyaki Flavor" in handwritten brown-red characters, failing to mention what it came from*

https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/3493-for-love-of-vns-for-beginners/ Read the stickies, they are there for a reason. My personal recommendations from this list for moege beginners are... Sakura Iro Quartet Akabanzu Chuning Lover Ichiban Janakya Dame Desu Ka (comedy)

It is no problem. A lot of people who think they just want action really want chuuni. There are some love-comedies that have really good action... but are singularly boring if what you are wanting is a good chuuni experience. If you can understand Japanese, I suggest you hit Hello, Lady, as it is my personal favorite under the recent releases... if you can't, I suggest Ayakashibito, for being the best of the chuuni currently translated. Edit: I do love Comyu... but I mostly love Comyu for Hisoka's and Kagome's paths, whereas a lot of other people just like Mayuki, lol

Last non-vn that made me say 'wow'... probably Oblivion when it first came out. Nothing since, certainly. Skyrim was pretty but they didn't improve any on the storytelling (if anything, the storytelling was even more opaque in some ways). Gaming has been pretty weak for the last few years...

About 5-7 through most of it.

Try Madou Koukaku if the tl ever gets done...

Ok, since there is, as of yet, no torrented release of Sekai wo Sukuu, I'm going to go ahead and name the VN of the Month for September, even though I haven't played all that I was interested in (it is highly unlikely that anything from Rosebleu will be a kamige, so...) VN of the Month, September 2014: Nanairo Reincarnation Current Candidates for VN of the Year: Nanairo Reincarnation; Hello, Lady; Bradyon Veda; Satsukoi; AstralAir no Shiroki Towa; Semiramis no Tenbin; and Houkago no Futekikakusha. Let's hope that I'll be able to add at least one or two VNs from the next few months to that list of candidates. Currently standing at the top are Semiramis; Hello, Lady; Nanairo Reincarnation, and AstralAir. In some ways, this is a much harder choice so far than 2013 because there are so few VNs that I could seriously consider (Hikoukigumo no Mukougawa got knocked off by Nanairo's entry, lol). Houkago isn't really a serious contender anymore because of certain... imperfections that I mentioned in its review relating to the development of the setting, Bradyon Veda is quite frankly unreadable for people unwilling to use jparser (and is thus not suited, despite having a great story), and Satsukoi is - quite frankly - just not quite there, though it is still in consideration.

https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/3046-for-love-of-a-genre-a-list-of-great-chuuni-games/ Check under untranslated.

Problem is, there is nothing to update it with that is worth mentioning... I'd almost say the Baldr games I played recently, but they don't quite fit... Edit: New chuuni games generally only get released by a list of about seven different companies, with others occasionally making contributions. Nitroplus (though they haven't made anything decent in this genre since Muramasa), Light, Akatsuki Works, 3rdEye (though their games are pretty hit and miss), Propeller (though their last two games sucked), Rosebleu (for Tiny Dungeon), and Eushully (for Ikusa Megami). Basically, these you can expect to produce games in this genre on occasion... but most others are just random entries by random companies that are usually mediocre.

Technically, Thousand Arms could be considered my first dating sim... but it is also the reason why I don't like dating sims. The way they are built feels even more contrived than the average rpg... and because the stats don't really make all that much sense, it is even worse. I'm actually glad that sub-genre is dead as a doornail...

*Clephas looks up from his plate, where a Pikachu's screams have recently grown gradually weaker then ceased, the flow of blood and electricity stopped along with the pitiful Pokemon's heart. He then shrugs and goes back to sipping at his Squirtle-soup*

Ayakashibito, though it was made before that.

Evolimit ***huge spoiler Houkago no Futekikakusha ***huge spoiler Hikoukigumo no Mukougawa ***huge spoiler

1 and 4 are nukige. heh

Demonbane is fortunate enough not to suffer too badly from age... Yume Miru Kusuri doesn't really have much in the way of humor though...

I've been playing rpgs since the early nineties (to be specific, 1991), and I had to take a step back and really consider which games I'd played would actually appeal to someone interested in retro-games. Ironically, with the introduction of the smartphone and its accompanying apps, people's graphical standards are actually lower than they were at the beginning of the last generation, so there are more young retrogamers than there used to be, by far. To be honest, I'm still not sure about adding Dark Cloud and its sequel to that list above, because I never really considered them in the first place (both games having been fairly forgettable, at least for me). I crossed out Thousand Arms, which I loved at the time, because everything about it has aged horribly, and VN-players generally don't get along with dating-sim/rpg hybrids, lol. I really and seriously considered not including P4 simply because I hate Teddy with a passion... but I had to admit the game itself was high-quality, even though P3 was twice as good.

I second Grisaia and Ayakashibito... and perhaps Sharin no Kuni.

One thing with retro-gaming... most old games just didn't age well, either visually or in terms of narrative. A lot of this is, of course, the limitations of the systems involved... but in some cases, it is just a difference in overall charm and quality. So, I thought I'd write you guys out a retro-rpg-gamer list, for those who are interested. All the games and series on this list are pre-PS3/360/wii era games. For now, I won't bother listing them by console, as I don't have time for that, lol. List of Games/Series Suikoden I, II, III, and V (Suikoden IV was the original cause of the series decay... the series as a whole is not a 'world-saver' type, but rather a political, military, and personal story) Grandia I-II (best turn-based battle system... the original has a great story but suffers from somewhat overly goofy-looking main characters... the second is just overall awesome) Chrono Trigger (obviously, this game still holds all its charm almost two decades later... even newbies can't help but love it) Chrono Cross (while it suffers in overall comparison to its predecessor, its musical score is timeless and the story is excellent) SMT: Digital Devil Saga (the best SMT story, period, so far... and still beautiful visually today) SMT: P3-P4 (obviously fan favorites, having been reproduced dozens of times) SMT: Nocturne (one of only two main-series games to come to the US, it is a dungeon crawler+demonic Pokemon, with a side of post-Armageddon) FFVI, IX (these two suffered the least from age and have the strongest long-term appeal, though some might argue to include X in there) Tactics Ogre (the game that FFT stole ALL of its major ideas from... has an even more brutal story, as well as letting you choose the outcome and path to it in detail) Dragon Force (My first intro to the Sega Saturn...an immensely addictive conquest strategy-rpg) Panzer Dragoon Saga (perhaps the weirdest of all the games I played from the Saturn/PSX era... and one of the best) Lunar Silver Star, Eternal Blue (Lunar is rpg junk food at its best, with a wacky Working Designs localization) Growlanser Generations (contains II-III from the series... these games have aged very well, and the way your actions in battle allow you to alter the ending is very nice) Tales of Destiny I-II (My intro into the Tales series... storytelling is almost identical to more modern entries into the series, in general atmosphere... perhaps a bit more traditional-rpg) Legend of Dragoon (yes, it suffers visually... but in terms of sound and overall style, it is hard to match even today) Arc the Lad 2 (The best entry in the series as a whole... a truly excellent game with a unique approach to the 'save the world' theme) Shadow Hearts I-II (interesting gothic fantasy rpg set in the early twentieth century... visuals do suffer but overall game is still high quality) Ar Tonelico I-II (junk food for fans of Gust... Gust at its best) Atelier Iris 2 (best game in the entire Atelier series, even now... or at least it seems so for people who aren't interested in endless fetch and gather quests) Skies of Arcadia (one of the most unique turn-based rpgs I've ever encountered... exploration is unbelievable, for obvious reasons) Dragon Quest VIII Star Ocean II Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth Xenogears Xenosaga Dark Cloud 1 and 2(tbh, I never went back to these after I beat them, so I don't know if they aged well) Breath of Fire 3 (IV suffers from being too short, and it has a horrible localization) Radiata Stories (unique game, overall... glad I repurchased it after accidentally trading it in way back when) Disgaea: Hour of Darkness Lufia 2 (nice to see someone besides me remembers this... though that action-rpg remake sucked donkey balls) Wild Arms I-II (3 and later all suffered from various major issues that made them difficult to enjoy overall... mostly going too far down the western path - or choosing really weird story themes - and losing some of the charm of the originals - not to mention Filgaia should have died long ago, considering how devastated it was in the first two games) SaGa Frontier Romancing SaGa (duh, this game was awesome... showed the SaGa series potential) Alundra (Zelda knockoff in terms of basic game concept, though the story is far less surreal in some ways) Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits (despite the fact that I really enjoyed this game, I still can't help but see it as the graveyard of the series, considering what came after) Zelda Ocarina of time (Zelda before a series of annoying sequels and Windwaker ruined everything) These will do for a start. If you ask me for my reasons for excluding a particular entry (FFVII, for instance) it is probably either because I forgot it, or because it aged horribly enough that playing it now could only be an unpleasant experience for a younger gamer. Edit: FFVII has still aged horribly, and until I see a complete remake, I can't recommend it for newbie retrogamers. Vandal Hearts has great gameplay (use of environment elements, such as bridges, dams, and the like to kill enemies in groups, etc.). However, its aesthetic is... aged even as psx games go. Vanguard Bandits suffers from an excess of stat customization without the ability to reset them, an easy cheat in the battle save, and way too many endings for a game with no new game + stat carryovers. Baten Kaitos' card battle system is its best game-killer and the reason I avoided card battle systems like the plague for years after. Persona 2 IS I haven't gotten around to playing (I have it on my psp), but I did play the original, as well as Eternal Punishment. Tbh, while the two of the originals I played have a lot to recommend to them in terms of story, the first-person viewpoint during dungeon exploration was annoying as hell, and the encounter rate in the first one was way too high considering how few 'safe' areas there were... Though, I did overall enjoy the plot of both. Fire Emblem is a bit too harsh for the average modern gamer... especially considering most people fail utterly at thinking strategically on their own and become reliant on the battle walkthroughs (I wanted to puke when I saw my friend pulling that crap).

Since it just came out, Killer Queen is a good choice. The series as a whole has a lot to recommend to it for psychological horror, lol.

I played the prequel(s). The early prequel stopped at 'good', but the most recent remake put it up higher. Flat's bad habits were still present, though.

Mmm... my main reasons for not being pained by this particular use of the 'silent protagonist' is because I've experienced dozens of rpgs that used the trope over the years. Some were mediocre (the Suikoden series' use of it) and others were awesome (Growlanser III), but there is no essential problem with the trope... the problem is that most of the early games that indulged in that particular habit tended to make the protagonist a true nonentity, rather than using your reactions and speech options to make them something resembling a real person. Slayn, from Growlanser III, had his personality literally altered if you made certain choices early on, changing what choices you could make later. Earthes doesn't take it to that level, but being able to frame him as a humorous or earnest being (that's your choice, most of the time) definitely places him in the upper ranks of the silent protagonists. Edit: Before a fanboy comes on and bashes my Suikoden remark, the fact is that Suikoden is one of my favorite series out there for jrpgs (even though it is essentially a dead series because of Konami's bungled handling of the IP). It is definitely in my top three, along with Grandia (the first two), and Shin Megami Tensei (though most of the SMT games qualify as dungeon-crawlers rather than jrpgs).