Clephas

That's a waste... though stringing his fans along for over twenty-something years is going a bit far anyway. There is a good reason why Robert Jordan's fans held a grudge against him for dragging the Wheel of Time series out for so long.

Unmei Senjou no Phi is one of several kusoge LoS has produced in the last ten years. For some reason, for every excellent game the company puts out, they get some weird ideas and put out at least one steaming pile of bad-smelling game. Mayoeru Sekai is a relatively poor-quality chuunige done in classic Lass style... which means it retains most of the flaws of early-era chuunige without really improving on the formula or doing anything exceptional. I rated this as an average-quality game for a reason. Hakoniwa Logic, though I gave it a slightly lower rating than Mayoeru Sekai, is actually a much better game as a whole, when I reflect on it. Like most Cabbit games, it is idiosyncratic, creepy at times, and puts in just enough standard-issue SOL to make you wonder what kind of game you just played. At the time of its release, I didn't play Doshikuro. However, I did play it almost a year later, wondering if I'd missed out on something... and I had. This game is actually a relatively high quality fetish plotge hiding under a charage facade. However, its beginning is off-putting to people like me, who have seen similar beginnings a hundred times before (literally).

Minamijuujisei Renka was Studio Ryokucha's last truly great VN. While some people might have issues with it, it is nonethless a near-perfect example of the good that can come from giving a charage a real story. Sekasuku was one of the last two Agobarrier works made before his death. It is a fairly decent fantasy comedy VN with a tennen protagonist who is a bit overpowered and heroines that fall for him like dominos... you know, classic Agobarrier stuff. Nanairo Reincarnation was my VN of the Year for 2014. I had very good reasons for making it so, because it is the sole kamige of that year. Yakimochi Stream is a kusoge. Kanojo ga Ore ni Kureta mono is Mecha-con's third game. Like all the Mecha-con series, they are true harem-ge where the protagonist forms a harem early on due to a law that requires people above a certain financial tier to have larger families to spread out their wealth and fight the collapse of Japan's population. The whole series is pretty fun to read, even if they aren't the best of games in general.

This is the second game in Hulotte's Yabai trilogy. It is also, by far, the highest quality of the three. Like the other two, it is a harem-ge/charage with slight rom-com elements. Where it differs from more modern charage/moege is that it is more of an issue of 'who' he picks rather than falling in love in the normal way. The why of this makes sense (and not in totally forced way) within the setting and story, so that isn't necessarily an issue. The protagonist, Ashihara Daiki, is the descendent of a local mountain god, possessing immense power, and one day he has a precognitive dream about a potential wife whose face he can't make out. His sister, Kirino, points out that it likely involves the Yagami family, whose daughters are the only girls of his age he has had contact with and even then only in his early childhood. Because of this, he ends up going to a larger town where the Yagami family lives to discover who his promised wife is. Now the thing you need to keep in mind is that most of the heroines are straight-out attracted to him to one degree or another from the beginning. They aren't 'deredere' but because of his inherent honesty, they are aware that he is looking at them that way, so there is none of the usual awkward obfuscation common in these kind of situations (except with Kirino). As such, when the shift to the heroine paths occur, it feels surprisingly natural, unlike many such shifts. The seven heroines (yes, there are seven heroines) are: Kanna, the middle sister with the soft manner and kind heart; Mihono, the eldest of the three Yagami sisters, a generous young woman with a strong mischievous side that is something of a school idol; Serika, the shy but cute youngest Yagami sister who loves animals; Nanaka, the mysterious senpai who gives advice freely while tempting Daiki; Kirino, the protagonist's brocon (though she hides it) sister; the young fake loli teacher, Shindou Meika; and the ojousama waitress classmate Tamano Yui. I need to say that replaying this VN opened my eyes to one of the sadder realities of the industry in Japan... the fact that more modern SOL games were a drastic drop in quality compared to this era. It was gradual enough that I didn't really notice (because I was playing so many), but the quality difference between charage/moege of this era and ones even four or five years later is almost ridiculous to contemplate. While my burnout undoubtedly contributed to my negative feelings about latter-era charage/moege, the fact is that most of it was just a general fall in quality. Kanna Kanna is the most straightforward of the seven heroines. She is sweet-natured, has a strong jealous streak, and she can generally be trusted to react in an adorable manner, even when she is angry. While she is essentially passive by nature, when she falls head over heels, she is one of the more aggressive of the heroines. Due to a lock on the routes, you have to do her path first. However, that isn't really much trouble, since the romance and ichaicha here stays just inside the lines between 'cute' and 'annoying'. Her path has some drama due to her past with Daiki and Daiki's nature, but the drama is resolved relatively quickly (though not as abruptly as later-era charage tended to be). Her epilogue is just extensive enough to satisfy, meeting the 'graduate' line in my mind. Serika Serika is the youngest of the three Yagami sisters, a shy animal-loving girl who quickly develops a crush on Daiki that falls on the line between 'imouto' and 'romantic love'. While her speech is generally slow and halting due to her shyness, this only makes her cuteness a perpetual aspect of every interaction with her. Like Kanna, she is also very kind by nature, subtly acting to try to help those she cares about without caring for recognition. As a heroine, Serika is about what you'd expect from a shy heroine in a JVN, save that she has moments where she becomes surprisingly aggressive. Serika's path's drama is a lot more serious than Kanna's, and the couple have a great deal of trouble resolving it... thus making their victory all the more poignant for what it cost them. However, I think the epilogue is significantly weaker than Kanna's. Mihono Mihono is the eldest of the three Yagami sisters and something of a school idol. She is something of a 'mischievous older sister' character, with a side of 'mimidoshima' (a Japanese term referring to young women who talk about love and sex without any personal experience). Like her sisters, she too is kind-hearted, but her tendency to want to tease her sisters and Daiki can cover that up at times. Mihono's path is the weakest of the three Yagami sisters. I say this because Mihono's character's limitations become really obvious once you get onto her path. While she is reasonably cute, she pales in comparison to her sisters when it comes to the ichaicha love stuff, and it felt like they pushed the drama into the story solely for the sake of drama, thus making it feel weaker than it should have been. This is because the reasons behind the drama were less solid than those of Serika or Kanna. The epilogue was probably the best of the three, but that doesn't make up for how weak the path was. Nanaka Nanaka is available in the 'second round of heroines', along with Mihono and Serika. While she takes an advisory role in most of the routes due to her cool manner and mature personality, her real personality is that of a desperately lonely young woman with a powerful need to find a place to belong that accepts her for what she is. Despite her manner, she is easily the most ero-obsessed of the heroines, openly telling Daiki she wants him from the first time they talked. In her path, the full reasons behind her behavior are revealed, though she does her best to maintain the 'aura of mystery' wherever she can. She is one of those rare heroines who is difficult to read because she is so used to obfuscation, and as a result, it is easy to misunderstand her. She is one of those heroines that make it extremely difficult to pick any other once you've played the game once, because she is the one that needs the protagonist the most. Of the paths up to this point, this is the only one that made me cry outright... and that was relatively early in the path. This path is really emotional, but it also has a lot of funny moments, mostly because Nanaka keeps showing unexpected aspects to her personality through the ichaicha period. While there is drama, the drama is actually less impactful than watching her overcome her past. The epilogue in this path is the longest so far, with the most extensive after-time (four years, marriage, child, etc). Honestly, if I play this game again, I'll probably just use the save file to play Nanaka's path again. Kirino Kirino is Daiki's little sister, a young woman with immense power (particularly reading minds, the past, and the future). She loves her big brother but she also loves teasing him almost as much. Her role in the other paths is supporting, with her usually popping up right before the drama starts. As such, she gets less character development in the common route and other heroine routes than any other heroine, including the two sub-heroines, Meika and Yui. She is something of a mischief-maker, but whenever he falls in love, she serves in whatever role is necessary to bring about her brother's happiness. Now this should be apparent from above, but Kirino is a serious brocon. She is subtler about it than most, but the fact that her first obsession is simply helping her niisan says everything. So it shouldn't surprise anyone that her path begins with an almost literal explosion of brocon energy, lol. Kirino's path splits off at the beginning, for reasons that become obvious when you get onto it. Typical of paths like this the VN world over, Kirino's path is full of foreboding even in the happiest of moments. If I say that one of the paths in Aoi Tori was inspired by this path, those who played it would probably get the point. In any case, this is a high quality path, though I hesitate to call it a true path (since apparently the harem ending is the true path). The epilogue is cute but isn't as extensive as Nanaka's, which was something I was puzzled about, since you have to play the other four heroines to get this route. Yui Yui is Kanna's best friend, a cheerful girl who serves as a waitress for the cafe that serves as the school cafeteria (dressed as a maid, for some reason). She is actually one of the cuter of the heroines even outside her path, which made me question why she wasn't given a stronger path instead of the classic 'side-heroine shuffle'. There isn't a ton of detail to her path. It is essentially a 'we worked together and realized we loved each other, so we got married' sort of path. Sadly, this means that this path is short and doesn't have any real drama. Meika Meika is the protagonist's homeroom teacher, a loli (yes, a loli) who is apparently of adult age. Like Yui, she plays an excellent supporting role in all the other paths, but she isn't given much of a path of her own. This path is almost identical to Yui's path, in that it lacks any real drama and is basically a smooth road to marriage. As such, there really isn't a whole lot to talk about here. Harem The harem route... is pretty much a nukige harem ending with slightly more story to it. This is considered to be the 'true' route in the sense that this is the result the routes were working toward (for reasons that will make sense once you've played Kirino's route). However, it isn't really much beyond a bunch of h-scenes. Conclusion A high quality game that set the stage for Hulotte's post-Yabai games. Like those, it has just enough fantasy and a strong enough plot to keep you interested, while romance SOL still lies at the center. I recommend this to people who like the old style of charage where drama was actually present and something that needed to be overcome for the characters' happiness (instead of the essentially smooth sailing that became common as the genre began to rot).

*a gate into a horrific realm full of tentacles opens in response to your greeting, a single orange eye observing you, every moment the gate is open the bugs scratching at the inside of your skull, looking for a chance to get out* Welcome to Fuwanovel... *Clephas closes the gate so he can go back to toying with the foolish mahou shoujos that thought his rabbit avatar was a cute familiar*

First it needs to be said... when I hit this month, I badly wanted to play Sougeki no Jaeger, so when it was a total kusoge, I finally gave into the realization that Propeller was doomed without Higashide or Shumon Yuu. Dekina Watashi ga, Kurikaesu is a nakige by Akabeisoft3 that borders on an utsuge at times. I cried a lot for this game, enough that I usually recall it when someone asks for a VN that can make them cry. Primal Hearts... is the epitome of a comedy erotic charage (I emphasize erotic because the H in this game is ridiculously good for a relatively unknown charage). The game is amusing in general, but it is more a group of friends style game than a true romantic drama or anything like that. Satsukoi... Satsukoi is a very unique game. Especially since the main heroine needs and wants to eat the protagonist to live. One of the characters in this game is actually present in Kanojo wa Tenshi de Imouto de as the mother of one of the main heroines.

Haha... everyone keeps getting the same ones wrong.

Look on the bright side, you can agree with someone even if you have no idea what he is like, lol. Edit: I was bored, so I ripped off Ange too. https://buddymeter.com/quiz.html?q=322ibmY

Amayui is middle of the road quality for games outside of the IM series (which are inevitably higher quality than Eushully's other games). It has a relatively easy to understand gameplay system, a decent to good quality story (meaning that the good points are good but the rest tends to meander), and a good cast of characters. However, it falls well short of Fuukan no Grasesta or even Soukoku no Arterial, both of which had better gameplay and story. A lot of it is that the game can't seem to decide whether to go with a happy-go-lucky atmosphere or the grimmer atmosphere that tends to poke its head up on a regular basis. Eushully is usually at its best on the grimmer side of things, so Fia's personality often makes the game lighter than it should be. The other issue is that the main conflict of the story is just a little too on the obscure side for a strong emotional investment in it. I found the main antagonist of the story uninspiring, whereas the protagonist side was a bit too goofy much of the time.

AstralAir no Shiroki Towa was an excellent game by Favorite. As per Favorite's style, it is a serious nakige with a cast of moe heroines. Honestly, if it weren't for the makers being lolicons, I could praise most of this company's games unreservedly. GIB (girls in black) is another VN that illustrates Whirlpool's gradual collapse into mediocrity. I stalled on Hoshi Ori Yume Mirai due to my hangups about nameable protagonists and the fact that the game is so frigging long. I did finish one path, and it was very, very good. Unfortunately, it also caused me to overdose on SOL romance so I couldn't do any more. Love Revenge is what I have frequently called 'an idealized form of the rom-com charage'. If you want a feeling of what classic charage were like at their best, Love Revenge is an ideal game to play. Neko Masshigura... the fact that I only gave it a 7, despite the nekomimi, really says everything. Shin'en no Hitomi is a game that couldn't decide where it wanted to go and thus was a horrible read as a result. I dropped it toward the end of one of the paths.

Astro bailed and then Ittaku redid the entire translation on his own before handing it over to the Neko people.

Semiramis no Tenbin has a unique place in my heart, not the least of which because no other VN I've ever played has had such a unique story or atmosphere. For fanatic weaboos, this can be a painful VN to read, because it is brutally honest about Japan's societal flaws. Harvest Overray is the only non-Baldr Giga game I honestly thought might have been VN of the Month worthy (in another month). Giga is famous for high visual production values, but their teams' talent for SOL VNs hovers in the range of permanent mediocrity. Kagami no kuni is a kusoge. The end. SakuSaku is a translated nakige of relatively high quality... so I'm not going to bother making any comments on it. Love Relation is a low quality charage not worth mentioning. Ore ga Yamata no Orochi nara is a really poor attempt at mixing charage with Japanese mythology that became a total mess. Reminiscence RE:Collect is an excellent sequel to the original Reminiscence, with a strong plot and a major extension to the setting. The only downside is that there wasn't a third game, lol. Scramble Lovers is another kusoge.

Draculius (true path is harem, and Zeno is sorta-kinda yandere) Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier (The non-True History paths are all threesomes) Ryuukishi Bloody Saga (harem all the way) Gun Knight Girl (two yanderes, one self-harming, one harming others) Tiny Dungeon series (about as harem as it gets) Yome Sagashi ga Hakadorisugite Yabai (harem)

Clannad, Air, and Kanon are all obvious choices. Key was the company that created nakige, and all of their games are moe. Haru to Yuki Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no Koi suru Doll to Omoi no Kiseki Sakura, Moyu Dekinai Watashi ga, Kurikaesu Hoshimemo Astralair no Shiroki Towa Irotoridori no Sekai Tamayura Mirai Hapymaher (though this one's style might not fit your views on moe, depending on your preferences) Kin'iro Loveriche Natsuyume Nagisa Floral Flowlove Hana no No ni Saku Utakata no Bokura no Sekai ni Shukufuku o Realive Sakura, Sakimashita Kono Sekai no Mukou de A pretty decent list, if I do say so myself... Kinkoi, Hapymaher, Hoshimemo, and the Key games are translated. Haruka ni Aogi is being translated.

Golden Marriage was one of Ensemble's better - yet still stumbling - attempts at making a good ojousama-ge. There are so many ways this game could have been tweaked to make it better and give it more depth, but Ensemble, as usual, managed to botch it, at least partly. That's not to say this is not a good VN (it is), but it suffers from issues with the endings and some rather forced-feeling plot twists. Houkago no Futekikakusha is a VN I recommend to people who want a 'hard' utsuge. This game is all about despair-related catharsis. The situation the protagonist in is one of the worst, emotionally, that it is possible to imagine, and he is already broken when the story begins. I still don't understand why anyone bothered to translate the surrealist mess that is Majo Koi Nikki. While I normally endorse plotge getting translated, I make this one an exception, because it never manages to escape that 'dreamy' atmosphere that kept me from connecting with any of the characters. Sakigake Generation is easily one of the best charage of 2014. I say this because, like most Clochette games, it maintains an extremely high level of base quality despite the company's reputation as existing solely to encourage otakus to go out and have children with busty girls (seriously, I'm pretty sure there are subliminal messages in these games). This is a prequel to one of the company's classic games, Suzunone Seven, taking place two generations before the events in that game.

One path in Konakana centers around a terminal illness hospice. Tons of nukige. Nurse fetish nukige are a dime a dozen.

With self-insert protagonists, it doesn't really matter to me. My only question would be what type of VN it was. As long as the writing is good, I like the subject matter, and the protagonist is someone I can escape into, I'm happy.

*Clephas emerges from a gaping hole in reality as a mass of pulsating tentacles, a single massive orange eye glinting in the infinite distance as it focuses on you* Greetings and welcome.

Love Sweets is a below-average charage with nothing unique to recommend to it. Racial Merge is one of Axl's fantasy SOL games. It is decent but unfortunately doesn't reach the level of being excellent. Sora Tobu Hitsuji is... well, it is hard to describe what it is. It's a fantasy VN with a silly concept and silly characters that is moderately amusing but rather lacking in content. Tenbin no La Dea is the remake of the original Ikusa Megami by Eushully. It is about what you'd expect from Eushully when it was at its height, a high quality gameplay VN with a solid story and multiple - greatly varying - endings. Umisora no Fragments is a mediocre plotge that is primarily memorable for what it didn't manage to do... which was fascinate me or impress me.

I get frustrated when the series ends without being completed. Depending on the series, when it is truly concluded I tend to have a mix of various emotions, ranging from satisfaction, to loneliness, to absolute rage.

ArNosurge is the second half of the somewhat unknown prequel to Ar Tonelico. While it does provide some interesting background information the main series was lacking, as a story it is only just above average. Alia's Carnival is the first in a series of charage by NanaWind that manages to make fantasy boring. Oh, there are signs of potential all throughout this game, but it never really evolves into something memorable. Baldr Sky Zero 2 is the conclusion of the duology, adding in two paths, including the true one. As should be expected, it reveals everything the first episode concealed, but I should warn you that it is also even longer than the first half. In addition, while the first episode's paths could be loosely connected as a true prequel to Baldr Sky, both of these paths are absolutely and completely 'alternate universe' material. Clover Day's... really Ittaku would be a better person to assess this comedy charage, as he was the translator. However, I'll mention that I was unimpressed, though I'm aware this VN has become something of a classic in the eyes of charage/moege fans. Endless Dungeon, the harem epilogue to the Tiny Dungeon series is basically a nearly pure-comedy extension of the original series. Typical of Agobarrier, more heroines are added to the harem and things are about as crazy as you'd expect from him. Hello Lady is a VN I love, though I love its final version the best. This version is fine... but the extra true ending and the paths for Hishiya and Mitori make all the difference. Narita Shinri is a great protagonist (reminds me of Lelouch, except even more self-absorbed) with a justified arrogance and a pervert's heart. Hikoukigumo no Mukougawa I primarily recommend because of the Eiri path. You can ignore the other two paths entirely, because Eiri's path is so much better than either of them that there is literally no possibility for a fair comparison. Juukishi... to be honest, I never realized that moe could even make guns boring. Koisuru Natsu no Last Resort... well, since it is translated, I'm sure many of you have already played it. However, I should point out that it is an outright copy of the concept for KamiShino without the sheer brilliance and quality writing (for the main school heroines).

The first VN I should recommend here would be the Hapymaher FD. Hapymaher is the sole VN that Purple Soft has made an FD for since the company actually started making a name for itself, and for good reason. Hapymaher's FD is more of a true extension than anything else. The core story is a direct sequel to the true path of Hapymaher, with branches off to see the results of what happened after the other paths. This FD provides an actual path for 'true Alice' and a true conclusion to Tooru's 'Nightmare full of Happiness'. Baka Moe Heart is that rarest of things... a true comedy VN. While many VNs have comedic elements, almost none are truly devoted to their comedy. Koi Suru Doll to Omoi no Kiseki is a powerful nakige with yandere elements. I honestly enjoyed this one both times I played it. Good catharsis. Hachimyoujin... is the first of two games in Masada's most boring series. I'm going to come out and say this... this game isn't replayable for me. While I enjoyed my first playthrough, I found that Yoshiya just wasn't a good fit for me as a protagonist and that this game tried to draw too much from Dies Irae's atmosphere without creating characters of equal quality. While Masada's writing is still very high quality, I felt that this game had no need of a sequel (in fact, the sequel ruined things for me in retrospect). The antagonist/villain is a much higher-quality character, even if he is somewhat of a caricature who draws too much from Reinhardt Heydrich's personality. Oddly, the best 'protagonist side' character in the game is Mizuki, whose internal conflict defines so much of the game, whereas Yoshiya never really manages to escape that really trite and boring personality type of his.

Aisare Roommate is a kusoge. 12 no Tsuki no Eve is a halfway-decent VN by Minori. Like all Minori VNs, it has extremely high visual quality. However, their love of messy romances was the big downer for me with this and most of their other VNs. Technically it is a fantasy VN (though it doesn't seem like it until the true path). Kimi to Boku to no Kishi no Hibi is a weird plotge VN with a concept that was all over the place. That's not to say it wasn't a good VN, but I honestly felt that they didn't know what they wanted to do with this game. Shin Shirogane is easily the worst Soleil Game. I say this up front, because all of the Soleil games have some kind of issue that keeps them from kamige level, but this was the only one that I thought fell below a certain baseline level of quality. First, the pacing is godawful... for a good portion of the game, there are these rapid shifts in tension that feel forced. Another issue is that they went out of the way to confuse you with the relationship to the original Shirogane. Yes, there is a relation, but it is difficult to parse at best. Last of all, it was obscure to the very end. Bradyon Veda is undeniably the jewel for this month. It is a high-quality chuunige with its own unique visual style, as well as an extremely good plot that is just multi-layered enough to make you seriously think without leaving you confused to the very end (the key with mindfuck elements is to never make them so obscure as to be incomprehensible even to the end). I'm not going to delve into the characters, because this is one of those games where romance/love bears only the most limited of influences on the progression of the story. The problem with this game for many is that it is a very difficult read, requiring a great deal more base knowledge of concepts (not just the language) than is normal. If you didn't get at least decent grades in science, you are probably going to be looking stuff up constantly.

There is also the issue that more modern VNs use more RAM than they should. I say this because there is absolutely no reason a game devoid of actual gameplay should need 6GB of RAM to function.

Anime spin-off vns are 90% crap. I don't understand why they still make them.