Joyjason

You sir, are baws. Yurikago was on my list for a while, but I was pretty much busy with the new releases (that I didn't like), and was like, "Hey! Clephas might be able to help!" Thanks for the suggestions!

Dang! Independent translations! I wanted to do that previously, but not only did I not have any knowledge about hacking, I also had something called college being in my way. (And translation in general). Welcome aboard. Hope you have fun

Something I haven't played. ... ... ... I jest. Seriously though: I'm looking for a VN that hopefully meets the all or most of the following criteria: 1) Consistent theme throughout the entire story 2) Has a relatively hard-to-spot foreshadowing to the conclusion of the story 3) Genre does not matter, so a suspense novel seems to fit #1 and #2 well (noI'mnothintinganything) 4) A clearly defined antagonist 5) A story where "non-chosen" heroines do not just "disappear" 6) Has a definite moral lesson (optional, but a big bonus) 7) Consistent plot across routes (Let's see if you can suggest one for me that fits all 7! x3)

Kinda late on to this thread, but I'd like to offer "weak" support for this idea. Why am I against giving full support? Because it'll be abused by some "trolls", as well as the fact that there's a similar system on VNDB that doesn't really work out well. Seriously, I know of some individuals who will just rate a game according to whatever score has the highest votes just to "increase the number of titles played" on their records. That's disgusting. My Thought: Ratings should only be given by those who can use logic and reasoning to justify and present their thoughts in an organized manner, which corresponds to the numerical value they assigned for the game that determines its overall quality. Simply put: Don't let idiots vote. (Yes, America. I actually refer to you when I say this)

Visual Novels are essentially Light Novels + Sprites and more pictures + Voice for me. No more, no less. I mean, what other definition is plausible? XD

I put a vote for "It doesn't matter". Glad you're taking up our humble suggestions though. I hope your experience is as good as ours.

I beg your pardon, but I DID understand the plot. If you're talking about the plot FLOW (yes, they happen to be different things), then you may be right. I've read both the manga and the anime series, I happen to be an avid eroge player, as proven with my review site on my blog. On that note, let me notify you that each "heroine route" as well as their respective story in the manga are very short; not enough to actually recreate the exact events on a static game like a VN. How do you expect the endings to occur for each respective heroine? Insert a kiss scene here and there and see if that'll attract people? That's very naive. I should have you know that creating a game from anime or vice versa is not an easy task, even if the same story is used. Finally, please do allow me to criticize your arguments with the fact that not only you pointed out the captain obvious element of an "eroge" with your post, you also left out the implication that unless there's really something different from the game and the anime and the manga, people are not going to support the game. Both the manga and anime isn't finished, so how would you expect to create a "finishing" game that people will actually like? I again beg your pardon as I ask for your experience with Eroge (or even Visual Novels in general) From what I hear as of this moment, I make a hasty hypothesis that you have not played many titles, or haven't played the games most similar to a "dating sim" This post leaves out all the criticisms I have for TWGOK's original story line as well, for the sake of saving reader's eyes from pain.

Oh, another person saying TWGOK is amazing... Well, you're entitled to your own opinions, but the anime itself wasn't that amazing... It introduces a lot of elements, but doesn't really do anything to connect each of its series together. I mean... why are there suddenly goddesses being introduced to a story where the protagonist is supposed to be "capturing" girls? Shouldn't this series end with him "capturing" a girl who he actually comes to like, so we can have dynamic characters as well as a nice climactic ending? Otherwise, this title really becomes your next "really-long-title-that-doesn't-seem-to-have-an-end" type of story.

I guess I'll participate for teh lawls 1) Do you like routes in Visual Novels where the protagonist ends up with their sibling? Why or why not? I'm staying neutral on this, because it really depends on the scenario. Some "sibling" routes are very nice (such as Sakuno's route from Mashiroiro Symphony), but a large majority of them sucks balls and do not even discuss or imply the taboo (from the top of my head, I can think of Sakura no Reply). While it is arguable for me to stick to the "I generally hate it" side due to my larger experience with crappy sibling routes, I still can't trash the good ones I've seen until now (Astraythem is another one... I'm thinking them as I type this XD) 2) Do you think it's okay to portray such events in these fictional works that are considered taboo/crime in most countries/societies around the world? What's going to happen? At least in 'murica, straight up porn is available freely, and you're allowed to do essentially anything unless it harms anyone. No one's being harmed by a story that does not have to be read, so I don't see why it's a problem anywhere.

I could not agree more. Everyone has their own pace of reading VNs, and mine just happens to be around half the time it takes others to read it (because of eye training from SATs). This is why I really hate players who use numerical values to label the length of a VN (although I do that on my review site LOLDATHYPOCRISY). In addition, I feel like any "good" VNs are generally too short, while the crappy ones are generally too long. I'm sure someone out there agrees with this statement.

Already made my list of 10 favorites, and is still crying at the fact that I left some out. On another thought, I kinda want to participate in the poll, but the number that I'm around (400-500) is not present. What2do?

Great idea, since "groups" with private forums or custom titles are pretty common in other forums. Doesn't have to be anything big; have like a group called "Touhou" and its members can choose a title: "Resident of Gensokyou" if they wish. Nothing big. Just needs a bit of work here and there...

In addition to the fact that a large majority of the community cannot readily view untranslated novels, I would have to go for another vote on "No". I have a review site in my siggy. I tag all the "potentially good" titles with "Recommended by Joyjason". I think that's good enough. To elaborate on your idea, though, why don't we make a team of 10-20 members who regularly play untranslated games, and have them "vouch" for a title? So when we make a "recommended list", it'll look something like this: Title 1: Genre: Suspense | Recommended by (A, B, C, E, F, I) Title 2: Genre: School Life Romance | Recommended by (G, F, I, J) and you get my point. Go a step further? Let's say I was the letter "J" (lol Joyjason). I'd probably hyperlink the letter (the part that's bolded) to my review site on my blog. Just one person "recommending" a title isn't good, but having an entire section dedicated for recommendations seems to be overkill. Doesn't the idea above seem like an in-between?

Damnit, I need to watch that series. Stupid Exams QQ

Is that so? When I had the impression that some players are limited to translated novels, I assumed that they would play Ever17 because it was so readily available. I guess I was wrong... o-o;; All I know is that many VN players have already experienced this title, and it happened to be their first one. There's always the exception. You should feel special instead xD

Me: Alright, here goes my own list of 10 titles that I painfully selected (while crying bawling tears for the ones that were not selected), from the ones I've already played. Obviously, being the beginner to VNs in general as I am, there are many titles better than this, and if someone suddenly has the thought, "Oh! Joyjason might enjoy X-title!" based on these that I present, PLEASE tell me. I'm always looking for new titles that turn me on (if you know what I mean), and am always open to suggestions. Due to my naturally lazy habit, I've randomly listed the following titles in no particular order (inb4 flames that say I should've placed them alphabetically) 1) Fureraba A silly (?) story about a guy who says he wants a girlfriend, Fureraba is probably one of my favorite titles just because it's the perfect example of a "dating sim". Other titles seem to stray from that particular word, which is usually the English term used to describe VNs in general. It also helps that the characters are adorable :3 2) Amairo Islenauts The most recent release from Yuzusoft, I'm afraid to say that for this game, there was only one route that I found to be "good", which is Shirley's route. Other than that, I wasn't too pleased with the other routes. The reason why I like Shirley's route for this game is because both the heroine AND the protagonist benefit each other. Usually, in many games, it's just the protagonist doing something to earn the affection of the heroine, and there's rarely anything coming back from the heroine except "affection". 3) Tayutama Probably LoS's best game over everything else (Yeah, Magical Charming sucked, unfortunately), Tayutama's plot that "matched" up a heroine (except for Mashiro) with a certain Tayutai corresponds directly with the "relationship between Humans and Tayutai" that's presented in the beginning of the game. 4) Ever17 Pretty much the first title that everyone comes across with Visual Novels, I think this title gains its popularity because it's so good. 'nuff said. 5) Sharin no Kuni One of the best translated novels I've read, AkabeiSoft2's games are all DAMN good. However, above all the titles, I think Sharin was the best series because it greatly resembles the best-selling book "1984". Although the game isn't as extreme, it's still a questioning of the term "government" and its responsibilities in the modern era. (While having various elements on morality) 6) Astraythem The "underrated" game from this list, Astraythem is created by ChuableSoft, and is considered a kinetic novel due to having a central heroine and -almost- insignificant subheroines that do not seem to play much role in the overall story. Filled with courage, sacrifice, and love, this title was infinitely enhanced by Natsuki being voiced by Mai Goto, and the entire story having a very nice finish as well as small "Oh by the way..." elements that doesn't really cause ambiguity, but rather makes the reader want a sequel instead. 7) Mashiro iro Symphony There's a reason why this title has a translation project going on. I'm pretty sure the other players who know of this title can vouch for its quality and complexity. My personal "role-model" is based upon this title's protagonist, and despite being a "visual novel", many elements from this game relate back to our daily lives or modern ideals. Little Busters From all the KEY titles, LB has to be the best. All the other games are very nice, but only LB seems to have a very consistent theme supported with lots and lots of symbolism while having a conclusion that's "hinted" throughout the entire game. Perfect Edition/Ecstasy includes a Saya/Haruka/Sasami routes, which are also of great quality, and even as the mentioned 3 heroines have little to nothing to do with the actual LB group, some of it was pretty DAMN hilarious (Saya happens to be my favorite character in LB, with her AH-HAHAHA laugh) 9) SINCLIENT A dark suspense title, this title isn't heard of by much of the community mainly because its producer, Boost5, is also not well known. The main reason why I choose this "suspense" title over other "scary stories" like Higurashi and Umineko is that in this story, there are other themes such as family, betrayal, and love that's not portrayed to this extent in the latter mentioned titles. It also helps that SINCLIENT makes various references to the Christianity beliefs, and offers bone-chilling events in every chapter. 10) Suzukaze no Melt My favorite game from Whirlpool, this title has themes of fantasy (Captain obvious, since all of whirlpool games have some form of fantasy), but also contains a strong theme of "history" or "past". The stories even suggest the theory of reincarnation, and similar to Tayutama, there are mystical beings that are paired with each heroine (with the exception of one of the heroines).

Oh my gosh my sides are being killed by this thread. Bakatest: An idiot with his love triangle Sora no Otoshimono: Flying underwear

Raw 720p. Uploaded usually the earliest... (and that's the only reason pleasedon'tthrowrocksatme)

I'll take your word for it and follow Kill la Kill. If it's considered good, I watch it. If it's overrated, I'll bash it after I watch it. Win-Win But in all seriousness, Rokyubu SS, Kaminomi S3, and LB (main series) was a great disappointment to me, although I kinda had the highest hopes for those titles. (and explains my desperate (?) attempt to find a good title)

Nipponsei is the easiest for me... You also find some good singles too, you know... Like Sleeping Butterfly from "Kawaru Mirai" (Kamisama Memo) or some title that I forgot (It can't be that good if I forgot, right?) that was paired with "Straight Jet" from IS I don't have the patience to find flac formats online. (hue)

Got referred to this thread by Tay, and holy shit there are so many titles I'd like to play just from Clepha's posts. Kinda also gives me a realization that even as I've been writing reviews for about a year, I'm still a beginner. I appreciate the suggestions, Clepha!

Oh cool! Thanks for the link! Although it's 2AM here and I'm probably not going to say anything important in my half-awake state. I'm going to just hit the sack for the day, go to classes tomorrow and see if I can make some good contributions to that thread when I'm actually conscious. It's a pleasure to see you again! I'll also see if I can get on the IRC (although my school tends to block it).

I'm just in your typical Pharm D program (6 years) (and because I'm cool like that) It's getting difficult though, since I'm "technically" in my professional-years, and I have an exam on Friday holycrapwhatamIdoingnotstudying? Oooooh Med School! You have to take MCATs! I hear that's freaking hard, so wish you the best of luck! (I didn't have the balls to go in that direction, lol) ... ... ... (mfw I realize that VN players have a tendency to be relatively intelligent o,.o) I'm also still playing my VNs. Although I tend to aim for the newest releases recently... It's really cool that fuwanovel changed a lot. I sure am liking its community already (It's so unlike some of the ignorant kids on MMO forums *insert happy tears here*). Any good titles you know of, that I might have missed?

A lot of great opinions have been presented in this thread. I'll keep mine short and sweet: 1) "Child pornography" does not actually correlate to real-life sexual assault of a child. 2) I'm a lolicon. However, I feel more disgust at "children" in real life rather than in anime, because they're really stubborn, annoying, loud, inconsiderate, selfish, and the list goes on. The "children" that I find favorable are pretty much nonexistent, impossible or even unreasonable (xD) 3) Nosebleed is dead-on with his quote: "As stated in several stances most of these individuals are "attracted to the aesthetic of cuteness in the characters rather than the age of them". That, my good sirs, describes me perfectly. 4) I know my limits, and when there are "games" that explicitly imply child pornography (whether 3D OR 2D), I'm disgusted by it. When the character is a loli, then that's fine. 5) The Japanese government created anime for the sole reason of "soft power" after WWII. As far as I'm concerned, they pretty much set themselves up for this kind of mess... It's human nature to see how far they can go, and with "art", that "limit" is pretty much non-existent. (Like, you don't see many sex scenes or vulgar elements in K-dramas, since it involves real people with lives of their own... Don't ask me about JAVs, because I'm totally ignorant with them) tl;dr. Keep 2D separate from reality, and you're fine.