AdventuringAtelier

That used to be my mindset as well, and it kinda ruins the value of which route you prefer. When I pick up this VN in the near future, I'll only chose one girl based on how attached I become to them.

Honestly, I'm with you there. If you have little to no interest, forcing yourself through those routes can make the score sharply drop by the end or even ruin your overall experience. It's not like you have get every ending/quest/item/line of dialogue in a game to say you "finished" it. One ending is way more than enough in my book (I would argue about skipping your whole way there, but eeeeh I'm biased against speedruns in general so I can't really provide arguments).
People experience games the way they find the best. You either finish enough of it as a masterpiece or play long enough for it to become kusoge. Routes should be DLC tbh then I could buy only the ones I want.
Signed: a completionist that grew out of it because it's damned unworth it.

Welcome to weeb land o/

It would maybe seem like a good fit, but all of the anime I listed are actually nothing like toradora and the discussion here had to some extent shifted towards romance in general, which is why I just threw some examples out there of romance anime which tackle different angles of the spectrum rather well. (In contrast to toradora which was mentioned here as well)

Was this intended for this thread?

Things will get very bloody indeed.

Was this intended for this thread?

You have fine taste in anime my friend! Aside from Gosick. The Book of Bantora is also a underrated and a anime that is almost unheard of... Its a story of people dying and turning into books instead of dead bodies... Pretty Interesting Story... And when you read someone's book, you'll able to witness someone else's memories.....  

Good choice! That anime is such an underrated gem really worth watching for its engaging narrative, lore and character development.

Likewise. I have a bit of experience with VNs in the past and would like to share that experience with people here.

The height of SOL sales in JVNs was 2008-2015.  Since then, there has been a gradual decline in the numbers of such games produced, their sales, and their quality.  This is due to a change in demographics as well as changes in the average consumer's financial situation.  The increase in the sales' tax has also induced otakus to be more careful about which games they buy this last year or so (though this is a marginal effect overall), meaning that the more borderline SOL-only companies have gone silent or are producing only slowly with contractor employees only.  
Companies that have a more varied lineup seem to be doing fine, but the companies that only do SOL high school romance aren't doing well.
Edit: As a side-note, more and more, you have companies with no real writing talent that try to make plotge or add plot to their SOL games... and it tends to be wince-worthy.
Edit2:... because they don't follow through.

Well, the market has seen a lot of those, and everyone's mileage varies. As for mine, I'm ok with high school romance just as long as it's not blatantly done for the sake of fanservice and wish fulfillment. VNs are a story-telling medium after all, so a good romance narrative is a given.

Hello there. I'm eager to get into visual novels because I'm striving to go to Japan to become a journalist, covering all sorts of media over there. I'm also a traveling artist, hence my username.
Pleased to meet you. Other miscellaneous stuff about me include a love for Touhou doujin music.