Clephas

I recently got the impulse to go back and replay Eien no Aselia, which sat at the top (mostly by inertia and alphanumeric reasons) of my vndb votes for so long. Eien no Aselia was one of the final games I played in English before I took the dive into Japanese untranslated VNs, and I hadn't replayed it since, though I played Seinarukana within a year of entering the labyrinth. Eien no Aselia is one of those few 'oldies' I found hadn't lost anything vital in the years since I last played it. I still immensely enjoyed the story (which is only mildly different in Japanese), and I still fell in love with Aselia on first sight (I'm a sucker for bloodstained fushigi-chan girls with big swords). I empathized with Yuuto's struggles as he went from a somewhat whiny standard-issue eroge protagonist to a fully rounded out human being with a lot of admirable qualities. Eien no Aselia is one of those rare hybrids where the gameplay is something you can pick up easily even though you haven't played it in almost a decade. Oh, there were aspects I had to remember through trial and error, but I was using my old clear save, so I didn't have to bother with leveling or building anything other than ether gates... which made things a lot simpler. I remember just how much pain I suffered on higher difficulties to get those maxed levels... and why I never went back after finishing all the heroine paths, hahaha. The game is long, though it isn't nearly as long as Ikusa Megami Zero or some of the other strategy VNs. Playing it from beginning to end seven times was more than enough for me in the past. A few aspects of the game have aged poorly (though not really the visuals, which were great for the time it was made). The aspect that bothered me the most was that more effort wasn't put into developing the non-heroine spirits that you fought with. While you could access scenes that did develop them somewhat if you made the right dialog choices and didn't let them die in battle, there is definitely a sense that the writers considered them disposable, despite giving them really distinctive personalities that came out on first meetings. Replaying Aselia made me remember why I was so eager to see a third Eien Shinken game, and I'm still eagerly awaiting the day when the TBA on the vndb page for Shinyaku Eien no Aselia turns to a real release date.

Komorebi no Nostalgica Hapymaher Nanairo Reincarnation Semiramis no Tenbin Dies Irae Vermilion Bind of Blood Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier Evolimit Bullet Butlers Chrono Belt Tiny Dungeon series Devils Devel Concept Akeiro Kaikitan Houkago no Futekikakusha Silverio Trinity and Silverio Vendetta ... and the list goes on and on

Yeah. Of the games that came out in the last two years, Sakura, Moyu probably has the best soundtrack. Indeed, I fell in love with Kuro during the first scene... and I think that was the point. The way the first scene is handled is specifically designed to bait us into loving her.

First, keep in mind that sales of underage (which was under sixteen for females until a recent change in the law) hardcore (actual sex acts) porn has been illegal over there for decades. The issue was the loophole in the law that a lot of people exploited (again, until a more recent law banned it) involving pornography not involving sexual acts. Also, VN girls aren't people under the law, much less victims, so the law doesn't consider it a crime unless the fact they are underage is confirmed specifically in the text (something that just doesn't happen anymore). The key point is pornography laws and ordinances in Japan require the existence of a victim (the person whose pictures are being taken) and Vn girls don't fall under that, at present. That said, the main reason the industry has traditionally (at least for the last sixteen years) mostly done its best to say they aren't under eighteen even though they are has to do with the Japanese concept of 'face'... as long as they put up some kind of facade, the authorities are less likely to smash them out of irritation. This is also why I get pissed off whenever a dumbass localization company localizes a lolige... foreign pressure is one of the few things that gets the authorities over there to make serious noises about regulating the eroge industry. I don't want to lose my precious plotge just because the company that made it happened to be a subsidiary of one of the companies producing those toxic lolige and charage... Edit: Incidentally, we are getting off-topic, so let's drop this issue for now. I can just see the next few posts completely derailing the topic in my head...

For English localized VNs that were based off the psp or vita, I'd go ahead and get Playstation TV, which essentially allows you to play their games on the television, rather than on the systems; is somewhat cheaper; and can play anything with a digital version on the psn store. You can still find it on Amazon, I think. I never regretted getting it.

Almost always 'gakuen' (academy) rather than 'koukou' (high school).

It needs to be said that many truly awesome games that are untranslated are also underrated on vndb... My example is the kamige: Komorebi no Nostalgica, which has a rating of 6.83

All-ages VNs in Japan are primarily limited to otomege and the occasional console port. Exceptions are games like Chaos;Head and Steins;Gate, where the games were primarily designed for console as nearly non-gendered plotge (most VNs are male-oriented, with otomege being oriented to brainwashed females and yurige/BL primarily being marketed to males and females respectively, due to the weird fascination the opposite sex seems to have in Japan with the same-sex relations of the other sex, lol) are very small in number and have big budgets behind them. The financial risk of producing male-oriented non-ero VNs in Japan can be seen in the extremely slow release rate of Key's games since Little Busters, despite the company's long-lived popularity on both sides of the ocean (most VN companies produce something at least once every year and a half to two years, even if it is a short game or a fandisc), as well as Type-Moon's shift in focus from VNs to the console and mobile gaming market (not to mention anime, manga, and other media) after the release of Mahoyo. Also, there is a certain type of company that simply is suspicious of Westerners in general (Akabei Soft has become infamous for its suspicion of localization companies over the years and has gone to extreme lengths to IP block foreigners from even looking at their sites, though they are still allowing Hello, Lady to be localized).

It is relatively rare for Japanese VN companies to pander to Western audiences. I say 'relatively' because Pulltop has made a nice side business out of doing just that in the last four years or so, and Front Wing has been actively dual-releasing their games here in the form of the Grisaia Phantom Trigger series. However, it pays to keep in mind that these cases are exceptions to the rule, rather than the standard. To be blunt, for every company that is happy to have its games' localized, there are three that are either wary or outright terrified of the idea of exposing their material to Western audiences through legitimate means. There are a number of reasons for this, but in a lot of cases it has something to do with the sexual content. For better or worse, most non-nukige Japanese VNs are based in a school setting, and this means that a lot of the content involved is questionable by western standards.

While the current vndb says that it is a 30-50 hour game, I'm pretty sure that for most people over here it is going to fall into the 70-100 range. Considering that the common route took me seven hours, each of the non-true heroine paths another seven, and the true route nine... and I've yet to meet anyone who reads as fast as I do in this community. Of course, part of that is I took the time to thoroughly relish the writing, so I probably could have cut six or seven hours off that time by reading in my usual fashion. However, the fact remains that this game is big...

Sakura, Moyu is the latest game by Favorite, the producers of Hoshimemo and the Irotoridori series. For those who aren't yet familiar with Favorite, I should tell you that there are three things this company is known for. For one, they produce first-class 'nakige' in a unique style full of pastel colors and manipulation of visual and narrative perspectives. Second, they are known for their excellent stories and characters, regardless of which writer they have on the job. Last of all, they are known for being lolicons (lol). No, I'm not kidding. The fact that every one of their true heroines at least looks like a loli at first glance says everything, hahahaha. Sakura, Moyu was written by Urushibara Yukito, the same writer as the Irotoridori games. As such, it should surprise no one that the setting is layered and complex and the story not at all what it seems on the surface. It should also surprise no one that there is a lot of emotionality in this game... but I don't think anyone was expecting just how emotional this game is. To be blunt, I spent roughly 80% of this game either on the verge of or in tears. Considering that the game is one of the longest games I've ever played (at least partially so because I so thoroughly relished Urushibara's writing style), that's a lot of tears... and a lot of tissues *glances at the overfull wastebasket next to his pc and the empty tissue boxes lying around it*. However, there are some issues with this game that need to be mentioned to get them out of the way. Few games are perfect, and this one is no exception. To be specific, Urushibara has always been mediocre at the romantic elements of his games. Unless the romance exists at the end of a path full of suffering and despair or occurs in an incredibly stressful situation, he can't seem to write it very well (in other words, he is good at dramatic love but only a bit less than average at everyday love). As a result, the romance in the first two paths (Chiwa's and Hiyori's) feels abrupt and forced... not to mention the fact that the beginning of Chiwa's path is so at odds at first with the game's atmosphere that I had to put the game down for two days to get past the emotional disconnect it created. Hiyori's path is somewhat less problematic but still feels forced and abrupt, so I'm basically saying that readers who have high hopes for romance in these two paths will probably be disappointed, at least to an extent. One other issue that always nags at you as you play the numerous paths is the treatment of Kuro, the game's true heroine... to be blunt, like all of the Favorite true heroines, the story is set up so that if you aren't on her path, she gets screwed over to one extent or another. Now, if you don't instantly fall in love with Kuro during the opening scenes, like I did, this might not be a problem for you, but one reason I spent the end of every path in tears and couldn't empathize with the characters' happiness was precisely because of this. This game is very much a story of self-sacrifice... to the extent that it feels like every time you turn around, someone is sacrificing something for the sake of someone else. The creatures of the Night (the underworld-like dream realm the characters fought in ten years before the story's beginning) are, as is openly stated, driven to feel unconditional love for humans, and as such, their excessively kind hearts spend much of this game suffering as a result of human actions and the tendency of humans to disregard their own happiness at the oddest of times. This is also a game full of loneliness... to a degree that 'loneliness' or 'lonely' (さみしさ and さみしい) are the two most common words in the game by an exponential level. All of the main characters in this game suffer from loneliness to one degree or another at some point. Some take it on of their own will, others have it inflicted upon them, and yet others endure it because it is their fate. As such, there are very few points outside of the relatively few standard SOL scenes (compared to the game's over length) where the game isn't somber in atmosphere. This game is also unbelievably layered and complex... so much so that it reminds me of games like Harumade Kururu and Ever17 in retrospect. It has been a long time since a writer managed to keep me so thoroughly in the dark about so much of the game's general story for so long (the last time was Bradyon Veda), and, in that sense, I'm grateful for this game's existence. I do, in fact, like how it all (the main story) ends, and I even liked how each of the individual paths ended, taken by themselves (If i ignore how Kuro gets screwed over). I also found myself to be completely satisfied once I finished the game... to the extent that I don't think I'll ever be able to replay this game. This game was very high stress in the sense that I was constantly being bombarded with the characters' emotions, and as such, it isn't a game that would be easy to come back to any time soon. The sheer length of the game also adds to this. In conclusion, this is a game that is worthy of the legacy of Favorite as a company, worthy of being the first mainline project since the release of AstralAir in 2014. It has problems and the game is probably one that is emotionally stressful. However, for catharsis addicts, it is a worthy addition to their collection of nakige and utsuge, lol.

I've been brainwashed by my Stockholm Syndrome to love mosaic. If there is no mosaic, I can't fap.

Tokisaki Nanao from Floral Flowlove Hoshii Seika from Suisei Ginka Hitotsubashi Benio from Ojousama no Hanbun wa Ren'ai de Dekiteimasu Tokitani Shinobu from Soshite Hatsukoi ga Imouto ni Naru

Venus Blood Hypno is by far my favorite Venus Blood game. There are a number of obvious reasons. The story itself is the deepest and most interesting, it is emotionally powerful, and, if you follow the Law route, it is possible to avoid sexual corruption issues entirely. However, the true reason I love this game is because of Leonhardt and Anora. Leonhardt and Anora have one of the most powerful, deepest relationships I've seen in any type of VN, ever. The emotional bonds between them are literally inseparable, and the trust between them is literally unbreakable. They have had innumerable horrible experiences, which have left them bitter and cynical, but their love for one another, while having a strong element of mutual dependence, is nonetheless untainted. It is unselfish and giving, and, while no sane person would ever envy them their lives, it is hard not to envy their love. Leonhardt and Anora were once members of the Arknoa royal family, a human (sort-of) kingdom that lay at the lowest level of Helvetica, tasked with protecting the seal on the demonic races, but considered to be tainted and cursed because of the unique abilities the family often displayed. Anora, because her abilities were particularly strong, was feared and generally distanced from most of the family. Only her older cousin, Leonhardt, was close to her from the beginning, and when the seal broke and the demons flowed forth, it was Leon who carried her as he sought to escape certain death. Unfortunately for them both, Calvia Karlsefni, the Demon Empress who destroyed their family, was waiting... and in exchange for Leonhardt begging shamelessly for their lives, she made them her toys. Leonhardt and Anora were used in an experimental procedure to create a weapon to get around the weakness of demons to divine power, fusing a different soul into that of another living being, transforming them into something that was neither human nor demon. Of all those who underwent the procedure, less than one in ten thousand survived, and many of those went insane or burned out soon after. They became what is referred to in the story as a 'Reisu Unit' (which refers to the fact that they use the soul fused to them and their own soul as fuel for their power). Incidentally, none of this is spoiler, really. Now, down to the setting, one of the other reasons I love this game. Hypno's setting is dark, even for a Venus Blood game, where tentacles about and most of the main characters have demonic blood. In the events leading up to the game's beginning, the demons, who had long been confined to an underground world where there wasn't enough energy to sustain them, much less keep them powerful, overcame this problem in a way that was both simple and terrible... they used a new technology (called Laugraphia) to transform people's souls into crystals called Tactica, that could be used to power their magic, thus allowing them to break the seals and emerge back into the surface. The demons went to war with the forces of angels and humans led by the Goddess, and the Great War began. Using the Reisu Units, the demons forced open the teleportation gates to the floating continent from the other surrounding continents, and Calvia killed the Goddess, transforming her into a Tactica. Now, the Empire, which is the most powerful of the four demonic nations, rules the central floating continent and the southern continent of Brookheart. It converts large numbers of humans to Tactica on a daily basis, using any excuse such as criminality, religious activity, or simply being in the wrong place at the right time. All four nations are reliant on Tactica technology, at least partially because they are all afraid to give it up, lest the others rush in and overwhelm them using that power. As a point of reference, each of the four demon lords possesses at least one Myorne Class Tactica, which is a Tactica containing the equivalent of more than a million souls. It is common for most mid and high level commanders to possess a Ten-thousand soul Tactica, and most soldiers with potential have one that contains a hundred or more. Worse, Tactica can be 'used up' if their power is abused, meaning that huge numbers of souls are being burned like fuel on a fire on a daily basis. As a setting, it has both depth and darkness, two things that I can't help but like. Hypno, like most games in the series, is split between Law and Chaos paths, but with a slightly different twist, there is a true Law ending that can only be accessed under specific conditions on a third playthrough after you've been through the Law and Chaos paths once each. This is the True Law Anora ending, and it is, quite obviously, the single best (or at least the happiest) of the game's endings. I cried, lol.

Unfortunately, it is a machine translation, so it isn't good at all.

The reason I suggest taking this approach is that many good tlcs are also burnouts (experienced but tired of translating), so they won't reliably commit for long projects, but many of them are good people, so they'll probably be willing to answer questions or make suggestions on problematic scenes/lines in a private chat. Also, I'd suggest having a tlc solely go over the combat/battle of wits scenes to make sure they are actually consistent, since that is the place where most tls will trip up in Shugotate (miss the direction/vector of an action, miss who is actually doing what, etc).

Just a suggestion... but you might want to make your thread titles less generalistic. 'VN/anime/manga/doujinshi' with consensual droid sex' would have been a better title and wouldn't have people like me looking at this even though we don't have a terrible lot of suggestions. Hello, World by Nitroplus

Just ignore their BS. Translations get bashed. That is the default. The only real thing you need to keep in mind is internal consistency and readability. If something doesn't make sense to you based on the character reactions or previous lines (when editing), don't be afraid to ask advice from a translator who might not necessarily have time to do a full tlc of the game.

Nanairo Reincarnation.

Yes... eight years is a long time though. lol

A few recommendations based on the writing style... the narration portion is voiced to an extent, and it is presented in a way similar to a fairy tale would be. To me, this was an irritant, but if you are fine with that kind of thing, there isn't much to recommend against the game.

Natsuiro Kokoro Log Gurenka Kanojo ga Ore ni Kureta Mono. Ore ga Kanojo ni Ageru Mono Saint Estella Gakuin no Shichinin no Majo I'll be honest with you, the only one of these I can recommend strongly is Gurenka, though Saint Estella is probably closest to what you are looking for, situation-wise. I generally don't go for the jukujo stuff, probably because of bias built up over almost a decade of regular bishoujos...

First, I should note the reasons why I keep playing Venus Blood games, despite not being fond of tentacles in general and rape in particular. The first reason is that the story and characters in each game have been exceedingly interesting, which is a good enough reason in and of itself. However, the second reason, and the one that makes this series stand out, is the sheer depth of the gameplay most games in the series since Frontier have displayed. I played Empire and Abyss first, and, to be honest, they aren't really that impressive as games go. The stories were good and I liked the characters, but if you were to ask me if the gameplay was all that memorable, my answer would be no. However, it was with Frontier that I first experienced the need to truly delve the depths of the series' system of skills and unit building (as opposed to just randomly gathering units that seemed to go together and relying on the hero characters, like i did in Empire, lol). This system is one where you are rewarded for putting together good combinations of units, rather than randomly putting together a force of OP units. Most units have a role they are particularly suited for, and there are dozens of different factors to take into account when picking what units to recruit and put in a squad. Venus Blood Lagoon came out at the end of last year, and it is already being billed as the hardest game in a series known for high difficulty levels (as opposed to the impossible ones frequently present in SofthouseChara games, where the gameplay is frequently unmanageable altogether). If you have played a VB game before, I suggest that you consider normal difficulty to be the hard difficulty of most other VB games, at least in part due to the limitations of the hero units this time around. Most people who just like to play VB games once or twice (to get both paths or different endings) develop a habit of building all their units around their hero units. Part of this is because Hero units in past games have been more than powerful enough to form the core of a central squad each, meaning that it is perfectly workable to rely on them at least up through hard difficulty. Lagoon, however, punishes this tendency at times. Part of the reason for this is that this game has a ridiculous number of dragon units compared to previous titles. As a result, you get a lot of units that have half-assed builds that don't stand out when compared to late-game recruitable units. There is a lot of crossover between unit types, creating a tendency toward all-rounders in a game where it is generally better to specialize in a single role (which is why Zahack and Tia stand out, since Zahack is DPS all the way and Tia is a perfect tank). A classic example of this is Ain, who, for all that he looks cool, is actually fragile and weak in comparison even to mid-game units, at least in part because they made him too much of an all-rounder without giving him the stats and skill levels to pull it off. Eden also stands out in the same way, turning out to be a decent tank, even though her skillset and stated class say she should be DPS. Despite the class names, there are really three major roles and a few sub-roles in this game. The main roles are Tank, DPS, and Support (not used in-game). Tank units should be kept in the first slot and possibly the second to serve as a wall between the rest of the unit and enemy damage. Ideally, they should have a nice set of skills that make them hard to damage or hit (there are a number of such skills) and/or allow them to retaliate with something nasty when someone does attack them (counter-tanks and passive tanks are the two types you can pursue in this game, dependent on skillsets). DPS units generally have high attack (duh) stats as well as skills that make them more effective at dealing damage, such as skills that reduce enemy defenses, boost their own damage, or allow them to spread damage across multiple units. Support units are units that exist to provide boosts, defenses against bombardment, and healing. The rule of thumb in all VB games is to abuse the 活性 and other booster skillsets to create units that have massively boosted stats to deal disproportionate amounts of damage to the enemy. While this tactic isn't quite as effective as it has been in previous games, it is still the most important basic element of building a squad. The major sub-role you should keep in mind is the Treasure-Hunter squad. This type of squad has a different role than the average 'smash and invade' squad type. To be specific, all units in such a squad should have boosted loot-related passive skills and equipment to increase the amount of drops after a battle. Ideally, you should pair such squads with more powerful smasher squads to maximize loot gain and minimize the possibility of the treasure-hunter squads being wiped out. If you want the resources to build up your army on your first playthrough, doing without Treasure-hunting squads is not an option. Now, down to the meat of things... this game channels Hypno's system down to the letter. The Legion system, which allows you to move and deploy up to three units in a single battle, has returned... meaning that tactics have become more advanced and you are faced with a need to create far more squads than is the norm in most games in the series (I had fifteen squads fully formed and leveled by the end, with three on the back burner to make a full eighteen). Part of this is that you can't avoid creating a wide battlefront in this game if you want to get high after-battle ratings. Another part is that some units just do horribly against certain enemy squad builds. The Main Route This game's story begins with Tia's homeland of Elysses being destroyed by Gashel, the High Priest of the Divine Dragons (which included Elysses and its mostly human subjects). Tia's brother, Julian, sacrifices his life and resurrects the Demon Lord Zahack, the powerful being that once faced off against the Original Dragon, Eden. Zahack, even weakened by his long sleep, manages to get Tia away, and he forms a contract with her to help her get her revenge against Gashel. Now, the main story of the game is focused on Tia's journey to gain revenge, but I should note that there are a number of points that differ from previous titles, story-wise. First, the protagonist, Zahack, is an assistant and ally rather than the overall leader of things. Zahack is a demon to the core, and his focuses are on the fulfillment of his contract, sex, and fun in general (not necessarily in that order), while Tia is an idealistic young woman constantly at war with herself as her idealistic nature and compassion conflict with her burning desire for revenge and growing addiction to tentacle sex (lol, yes, that is an issue, as it usually is in VB games). To be blunt, in most previous titles, this protagonists tended to relatively easily force the heroines into submission (even the story battles tended to end with the heroines on their knees in relatively short periods of time once the protagonist's plans were complete). However, this game is one where nothing ever goes perfectly and plans frequently have to be adjusted or abandoned entirely due to circumstance and the fortunes of war. Tia is a good leader, but she is very clearly the one at a disadvantage from the very beginning. While she desires revenge, she is also kind by nature and not naturally pragmatic or ruthless as VB protagonists generally are. Zahack is generally willing to go along with her, as her struggles amuse him, lol. The Law Route I managed to get the true Law ending on my first try (happily), so I can honestly stay that the Law route has a lot to recommend to it for people who like more classic 'not evil' paths (calling the characters 'good' when most of them are mass murderers or using their own children as weapons of war is a bit of a stretch). There is an enemy worth defeating, a goal worth reaching, and the actual writing is perhaps the best in the series outside of Hypno. Zahack himself grows somewhat (though Zahack is Zahack, lol), and Tia grows immensely as a person as she gets past her dark desires and finds a new path in life. The other characters also find themselves renewed as they face the new threats they had no way of knowing about at the beginning, and I actually found myself surprised at the antagonist, even if it followed the usual VB path of being a somewhat standard/archetypical choice in retrospect. This is also the first game in the series where I honestly couldn't find a connection with another game that has come out before, so I have to wonder if they are intending on creating a time-distant sequel at some point... I will play Chaos eventually... but tbh, it took me sixty hours to complete this game (about eighteen hours of that was just thinking about then building units and squads), so I think I'll put that off for a while.

There is the original, then there is Megami no Shuuen. Megami no Shuuen is a sequel based off the true end of HHG.

With HHG, if you stick to the main story paths, the SOL takes a back seat to the story. Tenshi no Hane is not genre-bound, so I suggest you try it before asking people if you'll like it. The protagonist is generally capable and intelligent. The protagonist of Ojou-sama no Hanbun wa Ren'ai de Dekiteimasu is an ambitious spy/agent working for a syndicate that has been running Japan for decades, at the very least. While the main game is SOL, what he is doing is interesting enough that it doesn't bother my SOL rejection instincts. Ojou-sama wa Gokigen Naname- The protagonist, Hajime, is an all-around capable guy whose objective in life is protecting his mistress... but his years working with some really psycho and corrupt people have made him seriously cynical. As for Caramel Box, you shouldn't feel that way. Takaya Aya is one of the best writers in VNs, capable of writing anything from SOL to chuunige with sublime skill. His characters are inevitably interesting, and his stories are great. Kikan Bakumatsu is a first class game (My VN of the Year for the year it came out), and I seriously recommend you at least try it. Re;Birth Colony is one of those games you shouldn't judge by its cover. The SOL isn't the point or objective of the story, which is both deep and dark. Hello, Lady's protagonist is highly intelligent (Genius-level, even) but he is also generally OP against most opponents.