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This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Capturing The Action When visual novels wants to enhance the drama and impact of a particular narrative beat or intimate character moment they turn to Event CGs. These large and intricate graphics depict these key moments with a vivid detail which the character portraits are no capable of replicating. Each one has such a profound effect on the player due to the infrequency of their use. In the majority of games they only exist for important moments so the title does not to deviate from the expectations set throughout the rest of the play time. Alongside the detailed Event CGs sit those in the super deformed style and these are one of the most impactful tool for comedy or slice of life visual novels to sell their lighter tone. While many CGs are shown on screen in full and simply remain there for the entire time, some games utilise camera tricks such as zooming and panning to breathe an extra level of life into these images. How do all these different uses of Event CGs manifest in practice? Let’s snapshot a heroic pose and find out. Standard Use Cases For the vast majority of titles, Event CGs have one common form and this is as tools to emphasise key moments within the game. The way this is used varies from visual novel to visual novel, but broadly the graphic is simply presented to the player in full with some type of impactful screen transition. This way each CG is given an immediate presence and pushes the player towards experiencing the emotions intended by the developer. Enhancing the emotional impact is the way the CGs differentiate themselves from all other elements of visual presentation found in visual novels. They are single monolithic and direct images rather than the multiple moving parts, from portraits to particle effect, which compose the vast majority of the game’s content. Through this contrast a heightened sensitivity is given to the ideas and actions presented in the CG can be achieved as it becomes a memorable moment of a player’s experience of the title. It is also an extremely flexible framework where the developer can slot in whatever imagery they need to express a specific moment and ensure its importance and message is understood from the correct angle. A romance story can use them to block out every other thought and make the focus solely on the pair in love which titles like Giniro Haruka achieve through intimate kiss CGs capturing the height of their emotional ride. On the opposite end of the spectrum, in a horror visual novel CGs can provide a sense of the impending danger in every corner of the game’s world as Death Mark does with its carefully framed images of its monsters and the destruction they can cause. Almost every genre and title can benefit from the broad expressiveness offered through this standard use of Event CGs given its neutral and easily adaptable nature. The only exception would be games where the entire point is the deliberate lack of visual input, where instead they want the player’s imagination to do all the heavy lifting which is a valid approach when used in a coherent artistic fashion. Super Deformed CGs It is worth separating out and looking at the style of Event CGs featuring super deformed characters from the rest due to their overall different implementation. Super Deformed CGs are fundamentally tied to a specific style of comedy and a light hearted tone due to their exaggerated and cute leaning presentation. As such this heavily restricts the kind of visual novels which can utilise them and where it is appropriate to place them to not undermine the mood of a scene. Despite this seemingly limited usefulness, they are wide spread throughout the medium with many being found in titles which are otherwise entirely serious. The reason they are valued by so many games is the way they can quickly and easily establish a moment of downtime between the drama and action. Coupled with this ability to swap tone is the flexible appearance of these CGs. They can appear in the standard full screen view of other Event CGs, but they can also be presented in a small window overlaying the background and portraits already in the scene and not obscuring them to create a link between these elements. In this ability to shift to the needs of the developer can be seen the impact Super Deformed CGs have due to their flexibility originating from their exaggerated nature. This means they does not have to be the sole focus of attention and can instead be used to highlight a broader mood without needing to be on screen for long. The 9 -nine- series provides a good example of how this works in practice due to way it shifts smoothly from high octane action and drama into low stakes comedy and slice of life. Here the Super Deformed CGs act as a dividing line between the supernatural danger the characters face and the comfortable familiarity of their everyday lives. Each one is used to sell value of these small moments and frame them as something worth fighting to protect while contrasting against the monstrous actions of those who are attempting to disrupt them. They also work to stimulate player empathy through cute and humorous imagery which aims to make them smile in order to give them an emotional reason to cheer for the success of the characters. At the same time they do not contrast too much with the rest of the game’s narrative tones through sticking as close to the original art style as possible and making their appearance on screen brief so they can maintain their impact without undermining the real world nature of the setting. CGs As Dynamic Objects Adding motion to a scene can completely change the way it is perceived by its audience. As such it should come as no surprise that Event CGs benefit heavily from this technique due to their static nature. This movement comes from a variety of camera tricks such as zooming in on specific key areas of the image to match what is being described in the narrative or slow panning across a landscape to establish the location of the upcoming events. These offer a means through which an Event CG can be reused in multiple contexts with only a change in its framing and acts as a way for a game with limited resources to get the most out of every CG it produces. While they do provide a lot of flexibility in presentation, this dynamic movement is not suitable for every type of visual novel and favours a more action and drama orientated title rather than something aiming for a subdued slice of life tone. There is also the issue of how these camera tricks can easily be overused if the developer is not careful and they can actively harm the pacing where the player feels as if they are constantly waiting on overly flashy movements to finish rather than actually playing the game. Conclusion Nothing in the medium has quite the same impact and utility as Event CGs and as you would expect this means almost every title has at least one. In their most standard form they work to emphasise key moments in the story through the contrast they provide with the rest of the presentational tools available for the game. By adding dynamic elements, such as camera tricks, an Event CG can be provided a sense of motion and excitement its otherwise static nature would not normally allow. Super Deformed CGs offer a more flexible and lighter tone version of what a standard CG can do and can work wonders to create clean divides in mood without feeling out of place. If you are creating a visual novel you are likely already planning to include some Event CGs, but it is worth considering how you implement them as they can offer a lot more to your game if you are willing to put the effort into properly utilising them.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Pixel Hunting Creating a sense of immersion within a fictional world has always been one of the greatest strengths of visual novels so it is only natural they would end up paired with a style of gameplay about interacting with the details of that world in the form of Adventure Games. These are titles which involve clicking on elements of the environment in order to solve puzzles or meet certain objectives and they use this space to fill in the details of people’s lives to contrast with whatever threat hangs over them. As such Adventure Games can make use of the character centric nature of visual novels to help sell the connection between the characters and the world they inhabit. It can leverage this to create mysteries and puzzles which span both halves to improve their connection to each other. There is also an aspect of role-play found in this hybrid whereby the player gets to act out the actions of the protagonist and fully put themselves in the character’s position. Let’s repeatedly click on an object and find out exactly how such a harmonious merger of gameplay elements can work so well together. Environmental Interaction In its focus on the world around the player, Adventure Games present it as tactile place filled with the objects of function and mundanity that define our lives. The way every detail of these items is presented and their role in progression helps them take on an intimacy by being a physical window into this familiar yet alien place. This is in many ways a prefect partner for visual novels due to the way they concentrate on different aspects of intimacy so, while the Adventure Game half can handle the world, the visual novel half can deal with the characters. Through this combination a player can be brought into the experience and provided reasons to emotionally invest themselves in the outcome of the journey they are being guided down. They are shown a constant stream of empathetic ideas and people from each half of the game which offers a variety of perspectives on their lives so the player is on the edge of their seats waiting to see what happens to them next. What prevents this barrage of elements from becoming emotionally draining is the constant forward momentum provided by new areas to explore and new drama to witness that keeps the player on a ride of fresh experiences so they invest just enough for the desired effect without wearing themselves out. The backbone of this harmony is the way a visual novel element can easily and quickly be overlaid on top of Adventure Game sections in order to smoothly link the narrative to the items being examined which reinforces the connection between the two. Last Window: The Secret of Cape Wast demonstrates how this harmony of intimacy can be used to sell a location as lived in with history etched into every wall. The entire game takes place in the titular Cape West, a set of apartments containing various tenants including our protagonist. As such the player will naturally become familiar with the spaces within the apartments and the game uses its Adventure Game half to have the player interact with everyday objects in order to solve puzzles. This draws parallels between the location and the player's own life making it easy to come to understand it as somewhere inhabited by grounded people. The visual novel half of Last Window furthers this link through humanising the people who live within the world built by the Adventure Game sections. Over the course of the investigation the player will interact with the residents and come to know this snapshot of their lives while also getting a sense of how they relate to the protagonist who many have as their neighbour. The closeness afforded by the way the visual novel sections frames the character interactions is immensely personal and supported this sense of Cape West as a living place where people the player knows spend their time. Narrative As Role-play Perhaps the most interesting interaction present in this type of hybrid is the way the narrative and the mechanics frame each other. Due to how Adventure Games promote extensive examination of the environment, it can create a sense of role-playing as the protagonist given that these interactions are often a direct reflection of the character's actions within the story. This is a favoured element of visual novel integration for mystery or detective titles where engaging with clues and crime scenes can be made a key part of both styles of play. Leaning into this role-play provides a cohesion to the experience such as with Danganronpa and its investigation sections. These aspects ask the player to engage with the Adventure Game mechanics through a narrative context which focuses their mind into the same space as the protagonist. The act of picking through the crime scene and interviewing suspects takes on a new emotional resonance and draws the player into the experience through blurring the line between the game and reality with role-play. Without the visual novels to give a personal connection to the events surrounding the mechanics, this role-play would be a cold affair where the player would not be invested in the stakes of investigation and instead merely see it as a simple puzzle to be solved. Puzzles On Two Levels Presenting the game on two levels offers an opportunity to engage the player’s mind from different angles and help maintain interest in the long term. To achieve this effect the two halves of the title lean into a puzzle style element to give the player something to chew on. The visual novel and Adventure Game aspects do this through the differing time-frames they operate under in order to direct the overall experience. Given the narrative centric nature of the visual novel, the puzzle tends to take the form of a greater structural reveal or long term mystery as with titles like YU-NO. Here the game presents a mystery and then feeds the player a steady stream of clues hidden within the story to help them construct theories on the truth. This means they are constantly reevaluating what they thought they knew so there is always excitement when a new fact is shown to them. YU-NO utilises this method by encouraging an exploration of its wide narrative structure, time travel ideas and the way each of the routes drops new hints as to what is going on overall and in previous and future routes. This lends it a feeling of interconnectedness which its Adventure Game elements can rely on to form the backbone of the long term engagement. The area a visual novel aspect can fall short is in the moment to moment sense of forward momentum and it is here the Adventure Game half can flex its muscles. If there is one thing that Adventure Games are good at it is offering lots of small victories as the player finds the right item or place to interact with in order to progress. This simple loop provides just enough motivation to continue to the next small dose of progression that it can work to keep people moving forward. Take the Somnium sections in AI: The Somnium Files, these are a constant parade of small rewards where even the wrong choice for an item or place still gives some amusement for the player such as in the form a joke. This helps alleviate the feeling of tension provided by the time limit and support the long term mysteries of the visual novel half of the game. Conclusion In many ways the Adventure Game and the visual novel come from the same end of the video game spectrum with a focus on a similar mechanical tone through differing angles. They have complimentary elements of intimacy which they hold as important to their presentation, environmental and characters, which work well together to sell a sense of place and this world as something close to the player’s own experiences. Puzzles also play a large role in keeping people invested with the two halves offering complimentary short and long term mysteries and engagement to keep a sense of forward mementum. Alongside all these elements there is a strong undertone of role-play in the way the player can act out the actions of the characters both through actions as well as the narrative which surrounds them. Adventure Games are worth considering if you are making a visual novel, or vice versa, due to this exceptional compatibility and the potential it holds for interesting and moving titles to be made.

This is a condensed version of the full review which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Genre - Sci-fi, Mystery, Thriller Play Time - 18 hours Developer - Spike Chunsoft Steam VNDB Split In Half Where do you go with a story after all the lose ends of the original have been tied up in a nice neat knot? This is the dilemma which nirvanA Initiative faced and the solution it chose was to split its play time between two new protagonists. Indeed the idea of division permeates every element of its structure and narrative from the way the murderer splits their victims in half to the way the new characters come in pairs. There is a well thought out consistency to the presentation of the game’s themes and ideas allowing for the creation of a compelling mystery where everything appears to have significance. However, this transition has not been without issue as the older cast members inevitably get under explored and there are some questionable plot twists which seem to exist for the sake of having them. Is nirvanA Initiative able to balance these weaknesses or does it forever live in the shadow of the original title? Let’s dive into the subconscious and find out. A Tale of Two Detectives – Narrative and Themes Choosing to have two protagonists opens up a variety of opportunities for interesting narrative presentation and differing angles on the same information which nirvanA Initiative takes full advantage of during its play time. On the one hand you have Ryuki and on the other Mizuki, each one offering their own thoughts on the mystery while showing the consequences of past actions and foreshadowing future revelations. Binding them together is the Half Body serial killings where only one half of the victims body is found at a time posed in a twisted fashion. The shear oddity of these murders instantly captures the player’s attention and maintains the uncertainty right until the big reveal. Focusing on dual perspectives helps this along through adding an additional layer to the reliability of the information the player is being given as Ryuki spirals wildly down a deteriorating mental path and Mizuki is having to pick up the pieces in the aftermath of his failure. As the game progresses it is careful to give out just enough breadcrumbs for theories about the truth to be formed and yet it never truly shows its hand until the moment the curtain is pulled back. It is the same delicate dance of anticipation which defined the original title and is alive and well here in its new form which will delight returning fans while existing in a new context so as to not alienate any new players. Character drama has a far more important role in nirvanA Initiative than it did in the original game. Both titles are character centric, but, where the original used them as a means to supplement and enrich the narrative, nirvanA Initiative relies of them to maintain the player’s interest over the length of the story. Part of this difference is due to the majority of the victims of the murderer being people who are framed in a negative light or have appeared suspicious and so there is little reason for their deaths to hold any interest outside of the mysterious circumstances of their demise. As such the emotional tension has to be generated from other sources or else the player will rapidly become detached from the events in front of them. The method nirvanA Initiative chooses to combat this shortcoming is a strong through current of character drama. Each one generally involves a pair of characters who somehow relate to the protagonists and the game follows them as they wrestle with their emotions under the strain of the murders going on them around them. Their arcs all deal with the theme of the characters being half of a whole and it is only through overcoming their doubt and fear to be honest with each other that they can be happy. In doing so they lean into the idea of division the game pushes and it puts them on the opposite end of the spectrum to the murderer with their obsession with pulling people apart. A player’s overall enjoyment of nirvanA Initiative will rely heavily on how much they find these dramas interesting as a fairly large amount of time is spent focusing on them. It has been a while since there has been a game with a plot twist which are so elaborate and yet completely meaningless as this one. The twist is so complex that the title feels the need to break the fourth wall and sit the player down to explain it to them in detail through a sequence where all sense of immersion is broken. There was clearly some fear on the part of the developers that the player would not be able to properly understand the twist if it told to them in universe so they took them aside to talk them through it. As a result the revelation feels irrelevant to the plot itself and the characters who are living it since it only really matters on the player’s end and the characters are the same both before and after its reveal with no meaningful change resulting from it. In general it is just an odd choice as once the story resumes it is fairly easy to forget about what is meant to be a major element of the narrative given nobody talks about it and the game immediately moves on to its action packed climax without so much as a backwards glance. Maybe the developers felt the need to include a big twist because the original title had one and they wanted to recapture the magic of those big moments, but lacked the proper space within the story to so. This does mean that it is relatively inoffensive and is not likely to effect the player’s overall enjoyment of nirvanA Initiative since it is such a once and done affair. However, for those invested in the build up to this reveal it might be a betrayal they cannot tolerate. Divided Personalities – Characters To further the idea of two halves which nirvanA Initiative pushes as its central motif, the new characters all come in pairs. Kizuna and Lien, for example, are joined by a common uncertainty about the future and a concern that they will never be more than they currently are which they can only overcome through their combined strength. This quality is a trend among all the new cast members and the changes they undergo between the perspectives of the two protagonists reinforces both their connection to each other as well as the gap between their hearts. Many of the routes focus in on one of the pairs in order to dive into their relationship while giving the player a sense of who they are at their core. These are careful to place the cast into situations specifically tailored around their weaknesses in order to ensure they have the chance to express what defines them in a sympathetic manner. Despite this intimacy the developers still manage to maintains the possibility that any of them could be the murderer in order to keep tension high in the player’s mind as they are torn between the humanity they have witnessed and the suspicion in their mind. It is through playing this line that nirvanA Initiative crafts such a memorable new cast to fuel the mysteries around them. When it comes to the returning characters there is a much wider divide in terms of quality. The majority of them are static for the duration of the story since their arcs have already reached their conclusion and as a result they feel shallow when standing next to the new cast. In order to avoid drawing too much attention to this fact, the game makes sure to never focus on them for too long and ensures the player is never given an opportunity to compare them side by side. They exist as a nod to the events of the original that can satisfy old fans while not causing new players to be confused by their sudden appearance. Only two exceptions exist to this level of quality and they are Mizuki and Date. Mizuki has been promoted from secondary character to protagonist and as such gets the improved characterisation and development expected from that role and it enhances an already strong personality with the depth needed for it to easy to place oneself in her shoes. It is clear a lot of thought went into how a more adult version of the Mizuki from the original game would behave and the result is a believable and human character who can pull at the heart strings. On the other hand, Date is a manifestation of everything wrong with the original’s sense of humour. As part of his personality he has always been him being somewhat of a pervert which is where a lot of the original game’s jokes came from, but it was always kept in check by the serious nature of the murders he was involved in as well as the character arc he went through. In nirvanA Initiative all of that nuance is gone and what remains is a series of gags about how much of pervert he is and this quickly becomes irritating and repetitive. He is a shadow of the person he was at the end of the original and it feels as if the nirvanA Initiative wastes his old characterisation just for a cheap laugh. In Dreams And Reality – Visuals, Audio and Technical From an audio and visual standpoint there is a continuity with the original game’s near future sci-fi aesthetic and tone. Many of the areas found in game are reused with just enough new ones to give nirvanA Initiative its own identity, but integrated cleanly so as to appears as if they were always a part of that universe. The music is a similar story as it has a new soundtrack which mixes parts of the original’s sound with the tang of fresh material to balance out the flavour and remind people that this is its own title. As a sequel it only has a little room to manoeuvre in terms of what unique aspects it can bring to the table. It still manages to make these elements stand out through leaning into a glitched universe style to contrast with the otherwise clean and familiar spaces which make up the world. There is the obvious manifestation of this as a part of the Somnium sections where these errors reveal more about the people involved, but it is also taken further with it leaking out into the real world and creating a visual sense of uncertainty designed to unsettle the player. Combined these elements ensure there is no mistaking nirvanA Initiative for the original game while allowing it to utilise what made the original tick in a new and exciting way. Conclusion As a sequel to a complete experience, nirvanA Initiative does its best to live up to that legacy while carving out its own identity even if you can feel it struggling at times. The use of dual protagonist allows for the game to offer vastly difference angles on the murders while casting doubts on the reliability of each of their testimony. Couple this change with the increased focus on the new cast and their pairings and the result is a very character centric narrative where everything takes on a personal quality. There have also been some important additions to the gameplay and aesthetics side with a leaning into a glitchy presentation and crime scene investigation sections which help give the game its own style. It is a shame how much it is undermined by the main twists of the story being so irrelevant to the narrative and instead existing only on for the player rather than for the characters in the world. Even with this issue there is more than enough to enjoy about nirvanA Initiative to make it an easy title to recommend to fans of the genre. Verdict – nirvanA Initiative is a riveting murder mystery which keeps you guessing from beginning to end while it hooks you with its fun cast. It is brought down only by its reveals being weak and some odd character choices. Pros - + A compelling mystery split across two vastly different perspectives. + Focusing on character drama gives the narrative a personal feel and resonates with the player’s own experiences. + The pairing of new characters reflects the central themes and ensures strong character dynamics. + Maintains the high quality visuals and sound design of the original while adding its own glitched aesthetics. + Crime scene investigations sections add some much needed variety. Cons - - The big plot twists are ultimately meaningless as they lean so hard into the meta level they become irrelevant to the story itself. - Older characters are a mixed bag with some getting the space to shine while others are left showcasing their worst traits.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Recording Your Progress Almost every game has some form of system by which the player can save their progress since a developer cannot expect them to complete the title in one sitting. How this manifests varies wildly from the freedom to save as many times as the player wants to a single save slot only available at designated intervals to an autosave system out of the player’s hands. Yet people do not often consider how this pervasive element of game design shapes the titles it is a part of and visual novels are particularly influenced by this factor due to their longer length and choice based nature. The structure of the visual novel has to be considered when choosing a type of Save System as the aim here is to prevent the frustration of having the replay content while still shaping how people engage with the game. It is this tension which makes the Save System such an important element to consider within the overall theming and presentation of a visual novel. Let’s save our progress and examine the ways Save Systems change the foundations of a game. Freely Save By far the most common type of Save System chosen for visual novels is the save anywhere and at anytime style with no restrictions. The reason for its popularity stems from the convenience it offers the player as it lets them dictate their own play experience around the time they have available. Player control is at the core of this type of system and this philosophy is generally extended to the rest of the game through a variety of choices for the player to explore. Due to the prevalence in the medium this Save System has become what player’s expect from visual novels and the majority of them adhere to this preconception since it has a high degree of utility for them. As a genre slice of life and romance visual novels are the prime example of this trend, such as title like Aokana or Riddle Joker. This is due to their flexible structure stemming from the way each route acts in a self-contained fashion and few of them use negative outcomes to their choices, which means they do not care if what order the player engages with their content. Autosave Only On the opposite end of the spectrum there are visual novels which forgo any form of manual Save System and instead take this function out of the player’s hands entirely through autosaves. This is where the game will save of its own accord at intervals set by the developer and the player is forced to wait for them if they want to preserve their progress. From this system a power dynamic favouring the developer’s intended pacing and interaction appears in which the player is funnelled into specific lengths of play section. A risk exists in this approach that the player might lose interest in the title or become frustrated by this restrictive autosaving due to them feeling as if their limited time is not being respected. The result of this need to balance the desires of the two side has led to this style of Save System being limited to games which are either forced into it by technical limitations or those possessing a segmented structure where saves are frequent. As evident from these two extremes, autosaves are not popular in visual novels as player agency holds a great importance in the mind of developers. However, when they do appear they allow for some no standard narrative structures and mechanical elements not normal found in the medium. On the one hand take ALTDEUS: Beyond Chronos, a VR visual novel, where the nature of its chosen platform demands the inclusion of an autosave system. Navigating menus in VR is awkward at the best of times and so asking the player to constantly be moving in and out of them to save their game would not be conducive to a pleasant experience. As such the autosave ensures the player's focus can be on immersing themselves in the events in front of them, which is VR’s greatest strength, rather than constantly reminding them that they are standing in the middle of their living room with a pair of TV’s strapped to their face. On the opposite end we find games like 428: Shibuya Scramble, where the title is constructed on lots of distinct smaller sections for easy and frequent autosaving points. These saves are often enough for the player to be able to have their desired length of play section without the developer losing control of the game’s pacing since it is determined through the length and content of each section. It also helps that the game leans into this modular nature in its structure with it expecting the player to jump around between scenes and perspectives and this makes the autosaving feel natural due to the convenience it offers by allowing for this distinctive method of traversing the narrative. Single Save Slot In between the extremes of the free save and the autosave sit Save Systems where the player is provided with only one slot to save in and must choose to override the previous save in order to preserve their progress. Presenting the player with saves as limited resources where they have to trade one for another creates a scarcity dynamic which encourages saves to be seen a valuable. This creates some interesting behaviours during play with some players saving at every opportunity presented to them while others may choose to see how far they can get without saving as a sort of challenge. It is difficult for a developer to control what kind of reaction they get out of a player since there is still an important element of control in the player’s hands. As such this style of Save System is not common in modern visual novels for exactly this reason and is instead a historical relic present in older titles due to hardware storage limitations. Take visual novels on the DS as an example, the majority of these employ a single save slot system since the DS cartridges had extremely limited space available on them. We can see this in the DS era Ace Attorney games where the structure of the title gives specific narrative pauses for the saves to occur in and also they have a linear progression so the player does not feel as if they might need an old save to redo a choice. The remasters add a standard multi Save System, but it feels odd when put alongside the game’s structure as it is clear that this a later addition due to how unnecessary it feels to use more than one save slot. Linearity and designated save intervals were common features among DS visual novels and resulted in them having a somewhat similar overall feel to them. Conclusion Saving progress is a key system for both players and developers and this is especially true for visual novels due to how influenced they are by even the smallest change in their structure. The most common type of Save System employed in visual novels is in the save anywhere kind due to the convenience it offers the player, but at the same time is can make controlling the pacing and overall experience difficult. An autosave system on the other hand gives the developer the ability to precisely dictate how the visual novel should be played at the cost of potentially alienating players who only have limited time. Between them sits the single save slot system which gives saves a feeling of scarcity and encourages the player to consider the importance of when to save. Each type offers something different for a visual novel developer and they are worth considering as you design your own titles.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Until There Is Nothing Left As a species we have a strange obsession with the inevitable demise of everything we have built in the face of sudden and uncontrollable disasters. There is a kind of catharsis at seeing this scenario play out in a fictional setting and witnessing how the characters attempt to adapt to the end of the world as they know it. This genre of Apocalypse stories covers everything from the collapse itself to the survival immediately afterwards to the world rebuilt from the ashes. Many visual novels like to take this genre as a kind of background element to a greater narrative while others make it the primary focus, but both sides still share the ruin which echoes through every aspect of the game from visuals to character motivations. It is easier for this medium to lean into the personal tales of the end times than many more mechanically complex games due to its much more grounded and direct presentation of characters which interacts in various ways with these tales of demise. Let’s watch the world burn and find out exactly how visual novels play with this genre. At The Heart Of The Maelstrom From the angle of dramatic tension, there are few settings more potent than having the end of the world. Nothing is quite able to get the pulse pounding like watching the things we hold affection for be torn apart by the uncaring march of an unstoppable force. It is the immediacy of the conflict that visual novels can take advantage of in order create an action or thriller narrative. They present the apocalypse as a personal story of people swept along as they try to deal with the calamity any way they can. Often this involves a large amount of interpersonal conflict or disputes between groups who cannot see eye to eye even as everything around them burns. Taking an angle like this is necessary in an apocalypse story as the actual disaster itself is normally inhuman in nature and so does not make for an interesting focus for a long form game. Visual novels lean heavily into this through the importance they place of the protagonist’s reaction to the events and people they interact with during this decline and in doing so they can easily keep things in on a personal level the player can understand. It also gives them room to comment on the themes and ideas tied up in the nature of their apocalypse, such as an environmental disaster, through what the characters witness from their small slice of this much larger event. Perhaps the most iconic visual novel featuring an ongoing apocalypse is Muv-Luv Alternative and its Beta invasion pushing humanity to the edge. Here the Beta are a constant threat and yet they only act as a motivator rather than the central focus due to their monstrous nature making them incompatible with any form of narrative complexity. This mantle is taken up by the political and personal conflicts with the alternative universe versions of characters the protagonist knows. Each one has their own agendas and even in the face of their demise they cannot let go of their desire and differences. This reveals them to the player at their purest, where the end of the world causes them to drop the masks they wear and be true to themselves regardless of the consequences for everyone else. Alternative pushes this as the main angle for its drama and uses it to put pressure on the protagonist and have something for them to overcome on the moment to moment level since the Beta exist beyond the scope of what one individual can hope to challenge. This way the inevitable threat of the Beta can hang over the events of the game and provide a tension as they creep ever closer to overwhelming humanity while still having a human focus. After The End Another common kind of apocalypse story is one set in the immediate aftermath of the destruction and follows those people who remain. For visual novels there is a common trend to instil a sense of quiet and a calm after the storm in which the characters pick through the remnants of their old lives, literally or metaphorically, and try to find some kind of meaning from the chaos. Leaning into this angle is how they manage to make this style of narrative distinct from those similar to it since the emphasis becomes a dual one of personal struggle and a greater sense of the world around them. Now that there are so few human spaces left it adds an extra layer of importance to those which remain or those created by the characters afterwards and these places often represent the trauma of the disaster and the longing for those past days which echoes through the people. This makes for an engaging feedback loop where in order to move on from their pain and accept what happened they must reshape the spaces around them or abandon those that symbolise their past. From a visual angle this allows for the game to play with dramatic shifts in colour and tone for those places alongside scenes of exodus framed with the importance they embody for the characters. In Tokyo Babel the remnants of humanity from various different universes, demon and angles have all lost their homes and gather together in the last place left to them where they reside in a school as if attempting to recapture the spirit of what they have lost. While they do not use the buildings for its intended purpose, there is an underlying sense of trying to relive a lost youth be that either one stolen from them by this apocalypse or the memories of one which provide a comfortable space to retreat into. It is telling then that the characters must leave behind the school in order to reach for the promise of a new future. They shed the place symbolising their past as well as the place of temporary calm to find the will to overcome their collective trauma and move beyond the event which has upended their lives. While the seemly safe and warm locations and memories of the world now gone might seem enticing, it is ultimately clinging onto a phantom which no longer holds value and the people within it slowly decay in their pain rather than trying to build something of their own. Into Tomorrow The final type of apocalypse setting is that of the world rebuilt after the event and yet still fundamentally shaped by it. While on the surface the people of this new age might seem to have returned to a state of normality, there is still an undercurrent of instability present as the scars of disaster live just out of sight and threaten to return if given the chance. Such worlds often remain mostly uninhabitable with humanity living in limited, but prosperous safe zone they have constructed and this makes their existence a tenuous one surrounded by danger. In the context of visual novels these elements manifests as an underlying tension where the player and characters are both made intensely aware of how much of balancing act the current peace is to maintain. As such when this existence is threatened there is an immediate sense of danger provided to the situation to help fuel exciting plot twists as the context of what is at stake has been established. There are less humans in these settings adding weight to every life lost as a serious blow to humanity and this allows for a more personal narrative since the cast hold a greater significance to each other’s survival than in a modern day setting. Conclusion Nothing else carries the same power over the human imagination quite like an apocalypse and visual novels love taking advantage of this trait to push their stories in interesting directions. By placing the player in the heart of an ongoing world ending situation they can lean into the protagonist’s reaction to events and push characters to extremes in order to reveal their true colours. In a world rebuilt after the apocalypse, visual novels present the scars of the calamity and juxtapose this new world’s brilliance against its precarious existence to create an underlying tension. Those using the immediate aftermath tend to present the calm after the storm and a clinging onto the past of places now in ruin while showing how the characters need to move on to truly rebuild. Leveraging such an emotionally resonant genre can offer a developer a variety of different tones and themes even within a similar design space and this is something worth keeping in mind as you create your own titles.

I feel the need to clarify my statments about the rpg system since this comment has made me realise I came across far harsher on it than I intended. The rpg systems of Death End Request 2 have a fundimentally soild design and there is a reason Compile Heart has stuck with it for so long. It is a smooth experience to play and demands a resonable amount from the player without overstepping its bounds (with the exception of the final boss difficulty spike). On its own this is a jrpg system the developer's target audience are likely going to appreciate and enjoy. My issues with its stem from its odd relationship with the series gimmick and the way the recycled systems do not fit their new shell. Firstly, the gimmick, this being the bouncing around of enemies by the player, is not really used in any way beyond what is initially introduced. You will never have to use the gimmick to achieve anything, it just exists and happens by accident during the battle. It is so oddly unimportant that it is strange it is still here in the second game despite neither of the Death End Request titles really seeming to know what to do with it. Then later in the game as heavier enemies get introduced you can easily forget the gimmick exists at all since the enemies will barely move when hit which is doubly true for bosses. Overall, it feels like a system the developers thought was cool, which it is, but could not decide what to do with it after adding it to the game. Then we have the matter of if the systems fit within the game. In the original Death End Request the combat all took place in the game world so having rpg systems made sense within its narrative and tone. However, the second title no longer has this link between setting and systems and so the question must be asked, is this combat suitable for what is at its core a horror game? There is a certain tonal clash between the humour of knocking your enemies around like bowling pins and the horrific deaths going on next door to it. Am I meant to feel fear in the face of the dangers or feel power as I smash through swarms of enemies? Perhaps I am being too harsh on Death End Request 2 given I do not know what an rpg system which blends well with horror would look like, but the general point still stands. I hope that this slight extension of my thoughts of rpg systems helps future readers understand the thoughts expressed in my review.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Making Yourself Desirable Many outside the visual novel space often make the mistake of referring to romance visual novels as Dating Sims and at a glance it is easy to see why given their shared focus on pursuing a chosen heroine or hero. The two types of game have had a long and connected history with Dating Sims utilising visual novel elements to sell their story sections and building up a sense of who the player is romancing. This leads to some interesting interactions between the two aspects as the emotive narrative is placed next to the cold stat checking without either coming across as out of place. Both sides carry themselves with an understanding of how they fit together to form the final product where the pursuit of love is quantified but never detached for the character’s humanity. Let’s plan out our day and discover what this hybrid brings to the table. Common Pursuit of Romance Presenting a believable build up of love between two people is always a challenging prospect and this is even more prominent under the restrictions of Dating Sims. The event centric structure found in them could lead to the execution of the romance feeling bitty and uneven if the pacing is not controlled with a proper escalation in their frequency near the climax. Using visual novel elements for these events helps alleviate these problems by promoting a focus on the scene in front of the player with a personal perspective on the intimate moments of this blossoming love. These scenes also tend to increase in length over the course of the game to simulate the growing time the pair are spending together and this allows for a showcasing of their compatibility from both a mechanical and a narrative level. From moment to moment, there is an effort made to shape a unity between the player and player character via an aligning of the protagonist’s emotions with the intent of player in order to close the perceived gap between the two. Together the two styles of gameplay form a concise reward loop for the player that provides them with the advertised love story without negatively impacting the stat management side which Dating Sims are well known for. Quantifying Love Numbers define how a Dating Sims interacts with its themes of love and relationships. They are by nature an attempt to systemise the process of dating and romance which presents a unique blend of opportunities and consequences due to subjects being highly emotional rather than detached like many other sim type games. It is difficult to feel the love between two characters when you are doing the equivalent of your dating tax returns. As alluded to in the previous section, the addition of visual novel elements helps to return a human touch to the game’s tone and progression. These events are not as entirely detached from the number based nature of the Dating Sim as they might at first appear. Take Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side as an example, here the building up of stats by the player is often acknowledged through making the unlocked event be somehow related to stat milestones, a related location or through characters talking about the changes in the protagonist. While each one does not amount to much more than a simple nod on their own, in their totality they form a feedback loop that communicates to the player how the stats they have been working on have a meaningful impact on the shape of the narrative. This acts as a powerful motivator to continue to push towards the requirements for future content as they know it holds some meaning within the context of the protagonist’s personal story. On the flip side it provides a connection to the player character through the process of self improvement they undergo with your management. It can also feel like you are shaping the protagonist to match the preferences of the heroines and through this demonstrate a commitment to them. This link with the player character is further reinforced in the visual novel sections such as in Love Plus where they utilise the unbroken protagonist perspective to sell the idea that the heroines are talking to the player and lower the barrier between the game and reality. Achieving this requires the abandoning of more intricate narrative trappings like complex introspection or scene descriptions and instead adopting a streamlined approach, much like the Dating Sim itself. This is done in order to remove as many distinguishing features as possible and give the player a large space to insert themselves into and by extension bond with their chosen heroine. A romantic fantasy such as this is at the core of the Dating Sim’s appeal and other forms of event presentation would lack the needed intimacy for the desired results. Stat Checks and Deadline Love is not all fun and games when it comes to romance in Dating Sims as the player will have to pass certain stat tests and milestones to process or risk losing their chance to impress their chosen heroine. This is how much of the difficulty is implemented in order to provide a pressure to the time management element of these games while still focusing on their stat based nature. In doing so weight is added to the narrative events by presenting the possibility of failure and allowing it to hang over the otherwise bright and upbeat atmosphere. Rather than undermining the visual novel sections it instead helps support the sense that this romance is genuine through the hardship and risk that exists on the path to its ending. This form of mechanical dramatic tension is key for the pacing of Dating Sims and how it escalates alongside the growing demands for higher stats. Sunrider Academy provides a good example of this practice through its mixing of club and stats management. Here the player is assaulted on two fronts for stat checks with the clubs demanding ever growing members while the personal stats demand upkeeping in order to pass the various tests the game throws at you and this is all before considering the pursuit of a heroine. This creates a sense of frantic progress which peaks around each deadline and sells the intimate moments with the heroines in the visual novel sections as a breathing room valued by both the player and the protagonist. Through this lens the relationship between the pair is contextualised as an important but fragile thing in the face of the chaos around them and invests the player in ensuring it blooms into something more concrete. Conclusion Given the close relationship between visual novels and Dating Sims it is no surprise that the two have developed many interesting interactions to complement each other. Their common focus on romance allows the event centric nature of the Dating Sim to avoid feeling narratively disconnected by constantly presenting a consistent core tone which meets the player’s expectations. Deadlines and stat checks offer tension and a fail state in order to give a sense of consequence that is reflected in both halves of the game and helps invest the player in the value of the relationship when it is threatened. The quantifying of the romance inherent in Dating Sims is played by the visual novel sections as a manifestation of the player’s achievements so a connection can be formed between player and player character. As natural bed fellows there is much for an aspiring Dating Sim developer to gain through integrating visual novel elements into their game and maybe you too can achieve the heights of the titles showcased here.

This is a condensed version of the full review which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Genre – JRPG, Horror, Mystery Play Time – 16 hours Developer – Compile Heart/Idea Factory Steam VNDB Hack The World There are two ways to make a squeal, either you stick close to what was established in the first game and provide more of the same or you take the basic ideas of that original title and reinvent them in a new form. Death End Request 2 takes the latter path by shifting the series from being about people trapped in a video game into a tale small town horror with a vastly smaller scale of narrative. The core tension and RPG integration remains as the solid foundation around which its new vision can develop. Not everything it inherits is for the best with issues about the use of the titular Death Ends being ineffective and the combat system long having reached its limit, all of which the game makes no real effort to solve. Does this reinvention breathe new life into the series or does it undermine what made the first game good? Let’s get trapped in the countryside and find out. Digital Horror – Narrative and Themes In choosing to embrace small town horror as a core part of its tone and content, Death End Request 2 invokes the genre tropes associated with it. The game does not simply play them straight instead choosing to lean into them from interesting angles or using them in unexpected ways all in service of creating tension. Take the almost cult like religion which dominates the town, its followers range from normal believers to insane fanatics, but it is often unclear who falls into which camp or what involvement they actually have with the mysterious monster appearing at night. On one level the player is expecting the religion to be the source of what is going on so will be jumping any time something related to it appears on screen. Meanwhile the seemly innocent believers muddy this gut reaction lending a sense of paranoia as the game places enough doubt for questions to form about if they are genuinely uninvolved or so far gone that they cannot see how wrong their actions have become. In a small town everyone knows each other and the player is rapidly introduced to the majority of the important cast and thus unknowingly to all the enemies and allies they will be interacting with over the course of the story. Due to their close proximity the characters’ lives and emotions, these people become well known to the player and come across as reasonable people with their own issues and dreams. As such when the curtain is pulled back and their true nature is revealed it furthers the established feeling of paranoia as the characters whom the player thought they knew turned out be hiding their true face which causes the player to reevaluate the rest of the cast. Gone is the stark divide between the visual novel and RPG halves present in the first game and in its place is an emphasis on the personal nature of the game’s mysteries. The cast members remain constant through both sections as does the location they take place in which lends a sense of continuity between the two sections and avoids the disjoined feelings prevalent in the original title. When night falls the familiar scenery of the town is warped and twisted into monstrous forms and seemly safe spaces take on a sinister shape and it adds to the already unsettling setting established in the daytime. As the night is the RPG half of the game it is home to the monsters which form the backbone of the supernatural mystery elements surrounding the town. Events that occur within the night effect the town as a whole even during the day creating a sense of interconnectivity from these consequences. Having the main cast remain the same between the two halves allows all of the threats faced on both sides to take on a personal angle as they are pulled backwards and forwards by the challenges each presents. Without the grand conspiracies of the first game, this intimacy is necessary to maintain the player’s interest and leads to a highly character centric narrative where placing them in danger contributes a lot to plot progress and a slow escalation of stakes. As a series Death End Request has always had a problem with how it handles its signature feature, the Death Ends, and this continues in the second title. The game seems actively ashamed of them and fearful that a player might accidentality stumble into one so it signposts them aggressively. Manifestations of this can be seen in how the choices have a very clear bad option leading to the Death End or have the characters more or less spell out which option is the correct one to progress the story. This removes any impact the surprise of choosing one by accident might have had since the game removes any element of uncertainty and by extension any threat. Death Ends themselves lack any interesting content to justify going out of your way to experience them. The majority are simple violent deaths for the characters with no substance to them and there is only so many times you can see people die horribly before it becomes familiar and boring. A good bad ending reveals a small hint about the plot or some interesting character morsel for the player to chew on and keep them coming back for more. There is no such draw to most Death Ends and so they ring hollow as a narrative device. New Found Family – Characters A tight focus defines the core cast with it only consisting of three characters whom the game follows consistently throughout its entire duration and it rarely leaves their perspective. Couple this with each one of the trio having distinctive personalities which compliment and contrast with each other and what forms is an entertaining group dynamic. Due to this small main cast each of them get a sizeable amount of screen time in order to humanise them and in doing so provides room for them to bounce off the other characters to reveal more about themselves. Take the protagonist Touyama Mai, she suffers from trauma and self loathing from having murdered her abusive father, but rarely does she openly and directly express this and instead it is communicated through her social awkwardness, frank answers to people’s questions and her general rejection of those who treat her kindly. Yet there is a kind side to her that she cannot suppress especially when it comes to children and these two halves balance themselves out in a subtle manner resulting in a well rounded character. The rest of the cast are similarly layered and react to the ongoing horrors around them in an organic way which helps the player form a bond with them as they share a similar emotional state and knowledge. Everything about them is a carefully harmonious mixture of contrasting pieces that works to keep the characters feeling fresh. Corrupted Normality – Visual, Audio and Technical The visual and audio style of Death End Request 2 inherits much of the glitchy and data corruption styling of the original title, but here they are recontextualised as a perversion of the real world rather than of a game. As such it has toned down the more fantasy themed elements from that first game in order to keep the parts of the town the cast visit at night still looking recognisably like their day time equivalents. It plays off this combination of two familiar and yet vastly different aspects to create a sense of unease since these mundane places are similar to those the player likely sees every day and yet they all wrong. During the day time sections when only the normal town is shown it adopts a brighter visual and audio style to show the warmth of the orphanage and the girls which the cast interacts with. However, even this takes on a darker undertone as the truth behind the town is revealed without the need for any dramatic changes and this compliments the subtle build up the game is based around. The resulting mixture lead to a feeling of texture to the world beyond the direct narrative being presented to the player and it works on them in a subconscious level to push them into experiencing the desired emotions. Compile Heart has a RPG combat system that they have been using since Hyperdimension Neptunia MK2 and the Death End Request series uses a variant of it focusing around knocking enemies into one another. While it is never not satisfying to hit enemies around liking bowling pins, it was always a limited gimmick pasted over an ageing battle system which has long ago reached its limit. The symptoms of this stagnation are clear from its lack of meaningful mechanical escalation to enemies who do not encourage the player to engage with the unique selling point of the gameplay. Alongside this is the recurring problem in Compile Heart’s games in their inability to balance difficulty properly. At about the half way mark there is a dramatic escalation in the health pools of enemies with little to no other changes resulting in the fights taking longer to complete without actually becoming more challenging. This makes the latter sections of the game feel like a slog to complete which really hurts the player’s ability to enjoy the other elements of the game. To top it all off the final boss is such a massive jump in difficulty due to its insanely damaging attacks compared to anything else beforehand and it would perfectly reasonable for the player to rage quit in response. Conclusion Death End Request 2 is a game defined by when it inherited from its predecessor and by how it shapes this into something uniquely its own. It takes the glitch and data corruption visual, audio and narrative elements and reshapes them into the context of a small town horror story in order to provide an unsettling atmosphere. The more personal focus and smaller cast also contribute to the claustrophobic and paranoid atmosphere where the player becomes intimately familiar with both the main cast and also the people who will reveal themselves to antagonists. Not everything it inherits is of such a high quality, it continues the first game’s inability to properly utilise the titular Death Ends and old cast members feel out of place in this new tone and setting. On top of this the RPG systems have long ago reached their limits and can bore or infuriate the player over the course of the game. However, none of these issues are enough to undermine what is one of the strongest examples of RPG horror. Verdict – A sequel which is not afraid to take the series in a new small town horror direction and create something distinct to great effect. It is only held back by being shackled to an ageing RPG system. Pros - + Excellent utilising of the small town horror genre to create a tense and compelling experience. + The smaller focus and scale contribute to make the game feel intimate while promoting paranoia in the player’s mind. + A small main cast allows each of the characters to be properly fleshed out and given the subtly and humanity they need to make them likeable and interesting to watch. + Glitches and data corruption pervert the mundane world of the town creating a distinctive and unsettling visual and auditory identity. Cons - - Death Ends continue to be poorly utilised, overly signposted and uninteresting to engage with. - The returning cast members feel out of place in the new setting and tone while not receiving any development of their own. - Compile Heart’s ageing RPG combat system is unable to produce interesting encounters consistently over the course of the game and is balanced poorly.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Pressing Fast Forward A simple feature like a Skip Button might seem too minor to be worth covering in any detail, after all most visual novels have one so they must be a normal part of them, right? It is only when it is taken away that its impact, both on how the player interacts with the game and their perception of it, becomes clear. Presenting the option to skip content is always a double edged sword for a game as it offers player convenience at the risk of them skipping over something important to the narrative and in a game so focused around story this can be a major issue. Then there are the different types of skip functions from the standard skipping text to skipping between scenes to skipping to the next choice. A common bed fellow to the Skip Button is the auto play setting where the player can let the visual novel progress at a pace set by the player without their input which presents some odd design considerations. Let's speed through the game and discover how skipping influences visual novels. The Standard Skip Of all the types of skip functions found in visual novels, the skip read text and the skip unread text are the most common and shape how the overall experience is perceived. Skipping text the player has already seen is the easier of the two to understand the impact of on the game. It is a simple quality of life feature to enable a smoother transition from one route to another without boring the player with repeated content. With this their interest can be maintained while allowing for an unimpeded exploration of the choices and endings on offer. This reduced barrier does have a slight drawback in that it brings the player onto a system level engagement with the game rather than an emotional and personal one making it damaging to the impact of key moments which the player is suddenly thrust into after some detached skipping. Take a game with a long common route like The Fruit of Grisaia as an example. Here the length of time it would take to reach another route would be an unreasonable amount to ask the player to put themselves through and so letting them skip the text they have read is a basic method of avoiding tedium. By doing this The Fruit of Grisaia runs into the issue of the player’s attention wandering as, even with the ability to skip, it can take a long time to reach new content and thus their interest in continuing to play drops. The more expansive the visual novel, the worse this problem becomes and there is no way to properly balance it without introducing new content into the common route based on routes completed, but this expands the scope of the game and takes a lot of time and resources to implement. Sitting right next to the ability to skip read text is the option to skip unread text, meaning lines or scenes the player has never interacted with before. The role this occupies is as a means for players who have already played the game before to skip to whatever part of the game they want to go to without having to reread the whole title on a fresh install. It also serves as a means for the player to skip sections they might be finding uninteresting so the game can maintain their engagement rather than having them put it down and stop playing. Of course this comes with the ever present risk that they could accidentality skip past a big revelation or key character moment without which they will not properly understand later events. This matters significantly more in visual novels which rely on plot as their primary driving force since a twist can come out of nowhere if its foreshadowing or setup has been skipped. It also further takes control of the experience out of the hands of the developer since they cannot account of any amount of skipping the player does and so have to assume that they are engaging in good faith in order to pace their game. However, the convenience offered to the player is seen as the worth the trade off and so its inclusion has become a standard feature in the medium. Jumping Between Scenes And Choices In a large visual novel even skipping the text might still result in long wait times where the mind might wander to what other games could be played instead of watching text fly by. The solution many titles reached was to allow the player to jump to either the next scene or choice. This bypasses the issue of wasting time and quickly puts them exactly where in the game they want to be in order to progress down a new route. Jumping features like these are essentially the logical end point of the convenience of the text skipping options and so exist to promote a smoother flow of the narrative and keep the player engaged. As such it suffers an exaggerated version of the same weakness in its system level interaction drawing people out of the experience. Using jumps inherently leads to an element of confusion as the sudden shift between scenes is disorienting and it takes a moment to remember what happened there. In this moment the player is made acutely aware of the artificial nature of the game and it impacts their perception of the title by distancing them for the immediate and personal strengths of visual novels. Auto Play While an auto play function is not a type of skipping, it does operate on the same axis of player utility and often influences them in a similar manner. This option allows the game to progress through the text at a set pace decided by the player before it starts. No further input is required once it has started outside of choice selection and it will keep going until the credits roll. The main advantages of this feature are twofold. It presents the visual novel in manner where the player can do something else at the same time and lightly engage with it or simply to make it as relaxing as possible. Alongside this is the role it has in making the titles more accessible as not everyone can repeatedly click a button and having the ability to let the game perform this act allows them to be included among its players. However, there is an interesting design problem introduced with auto play and this is how it contrasts with the way a person progressing under their own steam since they do not do so at a constant and even pace. This is mainly due to the way a game has fast and slow paced scenes and a player’s progression through each generally matches the style presented to them and designers can use this knowledge to fine tune the experience to keep the player engaged. Since auto play moves forward at a constant speed all of this subtle control is lost and it can in fact be damaging since its original purpose has been undermined so might feel odd when viewed at the wrong pace. Due to its wide spread nature just about any visual novel can serve as an example of this feature, but its issues are most noticeable in title focused around action like Sorcery Jokers. The extremes of emotion that the games based around action rely on stem from a control over the narrative pacing to express these ideas to the player in a compelling fashion. Auto Play completely irons out those peaks and drops into a flat line making their presence feel awkward and distracting. As such developers have to keep this possibility in mind and try not to make the visual novel’s pacing mechanisms obvious when view outside of their intended speed in order to account for the players using this feature. Conclusion Giving someone the option to skip the content in a visual novel is necessary for convenience and yet it can indirectly harm the overall experience when not properly considered. Skipping read text is the most basic tool to avoid wasting the player’s time while skipping unread text can be a useful feature for returning players to get them into the action. An expanded version of this is the ability to jump to the next choice or scene which allows for faster traversal of the game at the cost of drawing the player completely out of the game’s immersion. The auto play function exists as a complement to the skip button and offers the ability to customise the pace of progress in order to make the title more accessible. Overall the skip feature is important part of the visual novel and so should be properly considered when you are making your own game.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Of Robots And Sorcerers At first glance sci-fi and fantasy might seem incompatible with one another since the first focuses on extrapolations of concepts from our scientific present while the other deals with impossible events and powers. However, behind these differences they share a common desire to explore the nature of humanity through situations as distant as possible from our everyday lives. When combined with this angle in mind their union forms the Science Fantasy genre. For visual novels this marriage is formed of several different approaches which characterise their similar material in distinctive lights. Maybe it is an exaggerated reflection of our own world, often it is the rule of cool which decides how things go and sometimes it is just an extremely tight and interconnection web of concepts that brings the package together. Let’s find our wand and phaser as we look at what this hybrid genre brings to visual novels. Reflecting The World A common trend among Science Fantasy visual novels is their tendency to have present day settings. Here the sci-fi element is founded in an exaggerated version of modern science and used to justify many of the common elements of Urban Fantasy through which the narrative tells its more dramatic elements. This union focuses on sticking to the familiar parts of a present day setting and using them to create a bond of empathy with the characters as they go through the mundane realities of life. Yet at the same time the fantastical events give a framing to those mundane actions which draws out their artificial nature and the absurdity when placed alongside a life and death struggle. The sci-fi half keeps the fantasy from causing the player to disassociate from events on screen by tickling their sense of vague familiarity with modern science and keeping the magic and superpowers firmly in a grounding of the known world. By adhering to all of these elements the Science Fantasy can present ideas about the present day through a lens detached enough to allow for a proper consideration of them without being so far away as to prevent them from having the emotional resonance necessary for their desired impact. Take Chaos;Head for example, here a scientific conspiracy is mixed with teenagers possessing superpowers in order to take a look at what the modern world does a person’s psychological state. The sci-fi elements here focus around the human psyche and how the conspiracy seeks to take advantage of it for their own gain. It includes a lot of familiar scientific and pseudo-scientific terms the player is likely heard about even if just in passing and so registers as vaguely realistic which allows it to serve as a basis for the fantasy half to bounce off of in order to better serve its core ideas. On the other side, the superpowers work to enhance the sense of being detached from the real world which alongside the protagonist’s unreliability questions the effects of the modern social features, such as internet forums, introduced through the sci-fi side. The Rule Of Cool Sometimes the choice of Science Fantasy as a genre in visual novels is not in service of some grand presentation of themes and is instead due to the developer thinking it was cool. This originates from the way the genre takes the familiar trapping of each of its parts and puts them through a new lens in order to make them fresh again. Having a strong sense of novelty provides a means of keeping the player engaged over the course of the game and creating a visual and narrative style completely owned by the title. This brand of Science Fantasy tends to lean into a specific aspect of one half while the majority of the rest of the experience is focused around the other. For example of one extreme there is Deus Machine Demonbane. Here is a game leaning heavily into its fantasy elements with magic and lovecraftian powers shaping events and forming the bulk of the reoccurring elements. With one large exception being the titular Deus Machine which is a giant mech, something generally found in a more sci-fi setting. Obviously this is passed through the fantasy filter in order to justify its existence, but its out of place nature makes it memorable and this in turn creates a unique texture to the game that remains in the minds of many even to this day. Stronger Together So far the uses of the Science Fantasy genre shown have placed various kinds of clear divides between the two halves or put an overwhelming emphasis on one over the other. However, there are a group of games under this genre which use it precisely because the challenge of balancing these distinctive parts results in a potent and memorable experience through how they link to one another. For this union to succeed the two parts need to hold a similar thematic purpose within the narrative while also justifying their place within the wider world, so their existence does not stand out too much and disrupt the player’s sense of immersion. In return for this delicate work, the game can provide a unique sense of place for its setting which serves a directed purpose of pushing the core themes and ideas of the story in a way simultaneously in the player’s face and also subtle enough to seep into their minds through continual exposure. An approach like this is only effective for visual novels where there are complex or emotional elements to explore rather than something aiming for clean and clear messaging for common themes which need no introduction and where the game not expecting them to be considered deeply. This can be seen in seen in the fault series where the technology level of the world is both higher and lower than our own to organically integrate it into the areas of people’s lives which magic is not used in order to sell them as complimenting elements. It is through their subtlety that the power of drawing the player’s attention to them originates since being made aware of something previously in the background reshapes the understanding of the elements surrounding it and lends to a clarity of messaging. Utawarerumono takes this approach to its logical extreme by using the presence and absence of each half of the genre to highlight key narrative beats through the divide between the world of the ancient past and the one of the present. Conclusion As with many hybrid genres, it is how the union of the two halves manifests and interacts with the visual novel format which makes them an engaging experience. Science Fantasy succeeds on multiple fronts due to how well sci-fi and fantasy play into each other’s strengths. It can mix the fantastical with the mundane to offer a frank representation of the modern world and its issues. The unity can be so coherent and well thought out that the themes and ideas are communicated without needing to say a word or through clever highlighting of key elements. On the other hand, sometimes it just about the rule of cool and the strength comes from impressing the player with spectacle and keeping them amused. There is no denying the flexibility and narrative power found in Science Fantasy and it is a genre more titles should consider branching out into.

This is a condensed version of the full review which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Genre – Romance, Fantasy, Mystery Play Time – 35 hours Developer – FAVORITE Steam VNDB Coming To Know Love Everyone has a wish they want fulfilled before they die, this can be anything from unrequited love to becoming rich to seeing the world. However, the world is a harsh place and many of these wishes go unanswered as people pass from the moral coil. It is the value of these wishes that forms the core of Irotoridori No Sekai’s themes and how they intertwine with the idea of learning to love is key to their lasting appeal. There is a delicate balance struck between the procession of the story and the journey of its characters. This is a game concerned with the dramatic emotions of its characters. The other worlds are brought in to provide additional stakes or push home a key narrative beat. The issue of this approach appears when the title cannot properly pay off the tension it has built up and resorts to deus ex machina in order to get it out of the corner it has written itself into. Do these inconsistencies undermine the core message of the game? Let’s set the basement clock and find out. Answering Your Wishes – Narrative and Themes Other worlds are by far Irotoridori No Sekai’s most immediately distinct element and how they play into the narrative build up burns them into the player’s mind. Each one is a representation of the vastly different wishes of humanity and how the circumstances surrounding them can dramatically alter what they desire. Sometimes these places are never shown but is it quite clear what effect their unique environments have had on the characters from them. These in turn reflect the heroines who are associated with these worlds and allow a view of their actions or wishes through the unique factors which shaped them. Having the ability to lean into fantastical elements provides room for the exploration of the individual heroines in varied fashions to keep things feeling fresh. At the same time most of the actual otherworldly events happened before the game even begans so the game can play with them without losing the grounded setting it has established as a place where the characters can be themselves. Take Toumine Tsukasa’s route, it invokes certain elements from her original world in order to sell the danger while being firmly planted in the town and its community where the people she works with are a large part of her life. Striking this balance is key to holding the player in suspense without losing sight of the reason they are invested in the character’s journey in the first place. Hanging over the entire game are the duel mysteries of the recurring dream and the ghostly Shinku. These act as a constant throughout each route and do a good job of making the title feel like it is a cohesive experience which is building towards a greater ending. Their intimate relation to the protagonist, Kanoue Yuuma, means they have an impactful screen presence where they shape how he sees the world and people around him and by extension the key heroines. Such an approach gives the small bread crumbs of truth a greater sense of importance while not taking the limelight away from the stars of each route. It also helps that the pay off from all of the build up is and exceptionally strong final route where the themes and ideas the game has being presenting are tied up in a nice bow. The characters are provided a similar resolution within this revelation as each one has a victory lap where we get to see the traits we fell in love with on full display. Altogether this route is excellent to the point at which it is worth playing the entire title just to experience it which is a testament to how effective the mysteries are at capturing and holding interest. When it comes to how this story is presented to the player there are noticeable cracks in its implementation. Chief among these is the game’s tendency to have the characters explain their past through narrated flashbacks using Yuuma’s magical powers rather than through organic reveals or by being placed in the character’s shoes. It leads to extended dry sequences where the character in question tells the protagonist the feelings and events of the past in a way which lacks impact and instead comes across as if they are talking about someone else. If this was done sparingly it would not be an issue, but the flashbacks occur in every route and sometimes multiple times in a route which massively disrupts the flow of the narrative. Being told about events is a quick way for the player to lose interest, especially in a game so focused around the emotions of its characters where it would make more sense to keep the player in the current tide of feelings rather than taking a sudden turn into telling them about the past. On some level Irotoridori No Sekai realises this is an issue as it has intermissions in the middle of these flashbacks where the characters in the present briefly stop the telling their story and share a few words. This is a clear indication of the developers' concern that the player might become bored with their narrative. Flashbacks are not inherently a bad thing as there is an example of how to do one properly within the game’s final route where the player gets to experience the events of the past first hand rather than simply being told them. It is strange then that the Irotoridori No Sekai choses to deliberately damage itself with every other instance of flashbacks. Girls Falling From Lighthouses – Characters A colourful cast is something the game always presents front and centre. Each one has a strong and easy to identify personality, from Kana’s constant flirting to Tsukasa’s innocent energy, which helps sell them and make them empathetic. Their wishes are worn on their sleeves, but these desires are never what they first appear, there simple nature is picked away at throughout their routes until a complete picture of them comes out. Doing this gives these characters a sense that they are layered and complex beyond their initially presented personalities and works to keep the player on the edge of their seats as they can never be sure they truly know a character. Backing this up is the interactions between the heroines and Yuuma with each heroine having their own memorable dynamics with him. This is extremely important given how much emphasis the game places of these individual pairings and isolating them from the world around them. Without their strong and varied banter the sections solely dedicated to them might prove dull, but instead they are some of the most vivid scenes in the entire game. By far the strangest choice when it comes to the characters is how they do not really interact with each other or share a group dynamic. They might appear on screen together but they will often talk solely to Yuuma and not really engage with the other people present. The few scenes where characters are allowed to form their own bonds are undermined as they are either completely forgotten about, as in the case of Mio and Kana’s rivalry, or simply used as a plot device to motive one of the characters, as in Kyou’s route with her friendship with Tsukasa. Absent from these is any sense of an organically growing dynamics and it instead feels like they exist purely to serve whatever narrative needs Yuuma has without any proper regard for other characters. The result is the dorm feeling somewhat mechanical in nature where the characters are pieces in a plot rather than a warm place where friends live together. It is fortunate that outside of Kyou’s route the game tries to not emphasises the characters’ relationships and so mostly avoids this making this a large issue through focusing in on their main pairings to compensate. Shattered Moon – Visual, Audio and Technical As you would expect from a game so focused around other worlds, there is a distinctive visual style in play which is backed up by a keen understanding of how to use colour to invoke emotions. The everyday lives of the cast are shown through the standard images of mundanity the player expects from a romance visual novel which are used here as a clever baseline to contrast with the more fantastical angle. Once the characters step through basement doorway the art style takes a noticeable shift into a more abstract and emotive presentation where clear objects give way to vague shapes. It is clear what kind of place each is without having to spend a single word on its background lore and this works well given their role as conduits for characters and narratives rather than as fleshed out spaces. Even the normal world is not without its own eye catching imagery, the shattered moon hanging over the town is a constant reminder that even this world is not quite like our own. Colours not only play a role in creating distinctive feeling worlds, but also using the emotions associated with colour to empower the key dramatic moments. Deep oranges and blues are contrasted with blacks and reds to keep the player in a sense of suspense as they are buffeted by the roller-coaster of each heroines’ route. Conclusion Capturing the complicated emotions caught up in wishes and love is what Irotoridori No Sekai is about and through them showcasing just what a colourful world we have within ourselves. It leverages its other worlds as a core driver for the plot and this allows it to more freely explore its themes, even if it can stumble at time while doing so. The strong uses of distinctive art styles and colours for these worlds and key moments also plays into the game’s ability to invoke emotion. An overarching mystery keeps the player hooked through the various routes and offers a great pay off for the ideas which the title has being presenting. Add to this the distinctive characters and excellent dynamics with the protagonist and the result is a well rounded experience that uses the romance visual novel as a means to express greater ideas of the value of wishes and desires. Verdict - An emotional examination of what it means to wish for something seen through characters who know what it is to have that snatched away. It is only held back by some strange choices in narrative presentation and character interactions. Pros + The other worlds are a strong narrative device which gives the game room to present its ideas with greater freedom. + Each character sells themselves in a believable way and plays off the protagonist in an engaging fashion. + Overarching mystery helps maintain interest while providing a suitable send off for the core themes and ideas. + Strong art styles and impressive use of colour sell the emotions and otherworldly nature of the story. Cons - Overuse of dry flashback scenes where the player is told rather than shown important information. - Characters have no group dynamic and often feel like a strangers to each other. - Does not commit to the other world concepts completely which leaves them feeling hollow or misplaced.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. The Many Faces We Wear Upon booting up a visual novel, the first thing the player will see is the main menu. Over the course of their play time they will pass through it countless times and come to memorise its details. As such altering this key feature will immediately be noticed by the player and the more dramatic the change, the greater this impact will be. A wide variety of visual novels utilise this approach and it has become a staple to underscore some kind of narrative progression in order to signal an upping of the stakes. It can also go a long way to set up a tone shift even before a single word has appeared on screen and helps maintain it for the duration of what remains of the game. Sometimes the change occurs after the entire title has been completed and communicates all that the player has achieved. Let’s transition to a new frame and find out what Multiple Title Screens provide for visual novels. Indicating Progress By far the simplest implementation of the Multiple Title Screens is to tie them to key milestones in the forward momentum of the visual novel. This is commonly seen in games with an unlockable true route or other such route and the menu change reflects it becoming available to the player. Here the intended effect is twofold, to communicate to the player that more content is open for them to experience and to sell them a sense of progression as a means of rewarding them. People like to feel that their actions have meaning and the natural forward momentum of games is an easy way to take advantage of this emotional response. The larger the signal of progress the better and there is nothing larger than the menu the player will see every time they load up the game. It shows them that their hard work pushing through the game is being acknowledged and acts as a form of encouragement to keep going into the last section of the title. It has even become an expectation for many of those familiar with the medium and acts as a comfort blanket to reassure them that they are moving in the right direction. Take Irotoridori no Sekai for example, this game has a main menu change after all of the main routes have been completed and the final route has been unlocked. Initially the main menu shows a brilliant blue sky and later it transitions into a deep orange evening sky. This communicates two things, firstly that something has changed and the player should investigate to uncover what it is and second that this marks the final section of the game. The evening sky makes the player think of the coming night and since the night is the end of the day so to must this new content be the end of the game. All of this is conveyed without the need for a single word and provides a good motivation to continue to the end and a sense of how far the player has come through the main routes. It smooths over what might otherwise be an awkward transition between the major acts of the visual novel in a manner which will leave a strong impression on the player even after they put it down. Setting Tone When the mundane is transformed into the novel, there is something about it which draws the mind away from the past and firmly onto the present moment. We take notice of the change and what it says to us enables a framework from where we can pull how to understand this transition and everything that accompanies it. As such the changing of the main menu can be used to convey a change in tone or ideas without demanding any narrative connection or time consuming scenes. Simply looking at the menu immediately fills the player in on the sort of story they are in for after this transition into the depths of the game. This is important for visual novels as it conserves resources and adheres to their general ethos of high impact uses of limited space and so does not come across as out of place. Setting the tone is most important when the game is seeking to move from a more non-linear route structure onto a single direct pathway and acclimatising the player to this shift is key to keeping them engaged. Hello Lady! showcases this in practice with its multiple main menu changes in the Complete Edition. As an amalgamation of several different version of the title with shifting tonal needs, there is the possibility this change between these sections might take the player off guard if they are not familiar with the game’s history and so a clear divide needed to be established between the parts. The Multiple Main Menu’s fulfil this need perfectly due to how much Hello Lady! already leans into locations and CG’s with strong colours and imagery in order to add impact to its combat so large changes are within what the player expects. Each changed menu offers a distinctive tone separate from the others in order to ensure there is never any confusion about what these shifts mean for the tone of the game. A Constant Reminder The final major use of Multiple Main Menus is as a monument to all that the player has achieved and witnessed over the course of the visual novel. This type appear after all the content has been completed and are generally the first thing the player sees after the credits have rolled giving them a greater emotional impact. They also remain present whenever the title is revisited and will stay regardless of what part of the narrative is revisited and so act as a constant reminder of how this is all going to end and a monument to the player’s success. Generally this type of Multiple Title Screens comes in two flavours, a wholesale shift in the imagery being used or the addition of key characters to the existing picture. Fate/Stay Night is an example of the first kind with its menu shifting into something bright and hopeful from its formerly darker or more conflict orientated original. What this larger shift achieves is to communicate the key themes and ideas the title has been building up to in a simple fashion which will inform the player’s future playthroughs and cause them to have a greater sensitivity to them. This is an especially desirable trait for games which lean into plot and themes as it can give the player something new to unveil in old material rather than feeling as if it is something known by heart. Conclusion The effects of Multiple Title Screens cannot be underestimated as the power of such a sudden change and its constant exposure have a profound impact without the player realising it. It is often used to indicate progress within the game’s structure and provides a sense of accomplishment and motivation to continue onwards. Selling a tone plays a large role in the strength of these title screens as they can communicate a shift in the game’s story without having to say a word and help smooth over any possible confusion. Once it has changed the new title screen acts a constant reminder of all the player has experienced as well as key thematic or character elements that can recontextualise any subsequent playthroughs. Integrating a change in the main menu may be something you want to consider for your visual novel especially if you are planning a longer game with unlockable routes.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Fight Start! As a style of gameplay Fighting Games are at once wonderfully expressive and yet incredibly restrictive and so combining them with visual novels make for an interesting hybrid. The primary feature which binds the two together is their heavy focus on characters and invoking strong emotions through their expressiveness. Visual novels offer the chance for fighting games to expand on those characters in a direct narrative where they can be explored in more depth than just before battle conversations. This is especially true for Fighting Games which are spin-offs from a story heavy game series and need to meet the audience's expectations for storytelling while merging smoothly with the combat on offer. Let’s allow the wheel of fate to turn and see how these two gameplay styles are able to form a harmonious hybrid. Selling The Characters Larger than life personalities define the Fighting Game. Since the characters have so few chances to show the player who they are, these games make the most out of each second of it. However, on the flip-side this also makes them feel flat and lacking the depth and emotions needed to pass as a believable person. To compensate for this weakness the visual novel can provide a means of expanding on the characters established by the Fighting Game in an environment where their personalities can be shown off while not feel out of place. This is due to how visual novels naturally lean into character centric stories and it allows the conflicts depicted in each section to blend together through how they focus on the same key notes of a story with differing levels of details. On the reverse side a Fighting Game can express events in a much more direct and player interactive manner and so it can create a more intimate experience by punctuating key moments of the visual novel with these combat encounters. They act as highlights which increase tension and allows the visual novel to focus on the surrounding events without having to spend time depicting complicated fight scenes. Having the two form a hybrid helps sell the characters which are the main attraction of both in a more holistic manner than either could achieve on their own. UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH provides a good example of how this shared focus on characters enhances what each part has to offer. Its modern fantasy setting where people possessing unique magical powers clash is a perfect breeding ground for the mechanics of a fighting game and the drama of a visual novel. The powers match the expressiveness of the characters allowing them to maintain a sense of continuity between combat and story through the way they frame the characters and expand on different elements. By jumping backwards and forwards between the two halves and their magical powers, the game can keep the characters fresh and provide a means for the player to feel what it is like to be them from an immediate and an emotional perspective. There is also a level of narrative tension offered by the player's direct involvement as they feel a desire to help the characters they have come to love through the story and might choose to continue to play them after it is over. Substitute For Another Style Of Narrative Sometimes the hybrid is born because the game is a spin-off of a series known for its narrative focus. Here the visual novel elements act as a substitute for the storytelling style of the original titles while not being invasive to the core Fight Game when compared to something like a full blown RPG. A spin-off aims to offer the fans something new without challenging them or investing too many resources into the game’s creation and so the visual novel is a cost effective and easy to understand stand-in for what their audience expects. This is often a tightly told narrative where the characters get a chance to show the traits the player has come to love without changing over the course of the game so the main series does not have to deal with the events of a spin-off. Battles seek to express the characters in the same expected way by showcasing their unique skills through the combat moves they have been given with each one being a nod to their original appearance. Working in tandem, this simulates the titles it is based off and provides a dose of something new for the players to inject life into their love for this world and its characters in an organic manner. Choosing a more complicated system of narrative expression than a visual novel could alienate or confuse the players as they have would to grapple with a disconnect between story and battle mechanics while a visual novel provides a clean and clear method of storytelling designed here to be as modular as possible. Narrative Ambition Not all Fighting Games are satisfied with being just an expressions of their characters where the gameplay is the only attraction. There are a subset of them which have grander narrative ambitions with a desire to utilise their many characters to tell a sprawling tale. Merging with a visual novel is an option to achieve this approach which is at once flexible to their needs and simple and cost effective to implement. Visual novels can present the complex narratives the designers want while keeping the character focus of the Fighting Game front and centre. Compared to other methods of storytelling like an RPG or Cinematic style cutscenes it lacks the more immediate strength of their impactful moments due to its more abstract nature, but in exchange it can easily express intricate ideas and engage in route based stories. So rather than simply being the best option for a merger with Fighting Games, it is instead a narrative style which offers a specific toolbox that a subset of Fighting Games lean into due to their desire for intimate and complex storytelling. We can see an example of this with the Blazblue series and how it handled its story over the course of multiple games. As the series has developed each entry has tried to push the visual novel element in a new direction to fit their extensive use of narrative. Calamity Trigger experimented with an open structure and Continuum Shift offered a wide range of character stories and this variety was enabled by the flexible and inexpensive nature of visual novel presentation. It also allowed the large cast to act towards their own goals while preventing the player from becoming lost in the web of motivations through the clear divisions between sections. The narrative outcomes even stretched into the Fighting Game sections with victory or defeat having different and interesting narrative consequences which encouraged the player to explore and experiment. Conclusion Adding a visual novel element to Fighting Games creates a hybrid where both sides can showcase what makes them special. Their common focus on characters and expressing them in a distinct and memorable manner furthers this connection by presenting the same traits from different angles. Having visual novel sections in a spin-off title can work as a substitute for an expected type of narrative structure while not being invasive or confusing for the player. Then there is the way it allows for a game with narrative ambitions to express complex stories and routes in a flexible and smooth manner. Overall, Fighting Games are a good partner for visual novels and taking the two together should definitely be considered when designing a title where the larger than life characters need another avenue to express themselves.

This is a condensed version of the full review which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Genre – Cyberpunk, Dystopia, Romance Play Time – 5 hours Developer – RadiArt Steam VNDB Are These Feelings Real? Dealing with romantic emotions can be a difficult and this is doubly so when the entire world seems to reject what you are experiencing. Such is the situation Cila finds herself in when she develops feelings for the mysterious android Mara as the powers in the shadows will not allow their happiness to last. Synergia is an extended exploration of this pair’s relationship through a mixture of mechanophilia, yuri and dystopia. The result is a case study of their identities which grounds them within a sense of place many longer games can not match. Move outside of this core bubble and the cracks begin to show with the secondary cast lacking proper development and certain plot elements having little substance. However, is this inconsistency enough to undermine the strong foundations of the core relationship and the ideas it explores? Let’s get lost in the neon lights and find out. Mechanical Love – Narrative and Themes No matter how small an element might be, everything returns to being about the romance between the two leads. In making their relationship such a cornerstone of the narrative it forces the player to see the world through the lens of their emotions. Synergia is very much a title which wants people to engage with it on an immediate and visceral level. It puts a lot of effort into placing the player inside the head space of Cila by putting them into her perspective and dragging out the contradiction between her work and her own feelings. This tension is a core part of the underlying momentum that the story uses to keep the slow pacing from causing players to lose interest through the promise of what will happen when she eventually choose what she values. Prospects for the pairs future together are initially presented as bleak given how their world’s views on romance between human and machines. Here Synergia draws parallels between real world discrimination over who it is correct for a person to be able to love, with the most noticeable being the treatment of homosexuality especially since the pair are both female. Through this the narrative can present grounded themes and ideas about the subject without spelling it out in a way that insults the player’s intelligence and adds something solid to all the emotions they have been immersed in. Drawing these elements into a whole allows the game to offer something for every part of the player’s mind to engage with from the emotional to the intellectual and this ensures even after they put it down they will still think about it. Acting as the backbone supporting this focus around the main romance is a strong sense of place within the decay of this cyberpunk dystopia. While we are never given a complete picture of the state this city is in, there is never any doubt this is a civilisation long past its prime with its ailing emperor and oppressive government. It sits on the edge of collapsing into nothing as it totters along and yet it still have teeth to bear against those who stand to oppose its beliefs. In many ways it is a perfect reflection of Cila’s own internal psyche as she remains trapped in the past and slowly rots away in the life she finds herself consigned to walk. Without Mara’s arrival she would probably have sat forever in that pit and so overcoming and moving on from the city which has constrained her acts as both as a literal and metaphorical escape from her own prison. Beyond this metaphor the world works as means to explain why people act the way they do and create a thick atmosphere of melancholy to contrast with the moments of happiness between the two leads. Leaning into this emotional representation of a lived in place gives an intimate feeling to the player’s time there as it offers an easy to grasp idea of place in a way they can draw parallels with their own experiences. When everything is so heavily focused on a single narrative and emotional direction, it makes the parts which go against this route stand out in a distracting manner. For Synergia this takes the form of Cila’s past and in particular her nature as a Daughter of Velta who was created from an artificial womb. This is used to explain Cila’s ability to heal from injuries faster than normal, but does not tie well into the otherwise machine facing narrative nor does it add anything meaningful to her dynamic with Mara since that role is already taken up with Cila’s past love for another android. It is brought up out of nowhere and is dismissed equally as fast creating a sense of whiplash where the smooth tonal flow and pacing of the game is broken abruptly. The only place where is take the spotlight as the core element of the plot is in the second ending where all previously established ideas take a backseat including Mara. However, nothing revealed during this ending is of any real consequence and it mostly just spins its wheels until events beyond Cila’s control allow her move on with the plot. It does not help that Cila has already come to terms with her origins and so lacks any character arc related to them leading to an absence of dramatic tension. The absence of Mara or events relating to her means this ending struggles to justify its existence in a visual novel so focused around Cila and Mara’s relationship. This leaves Cila’s creation feel like an odd inclusion which could have been written out and takes up space that could have been better utilised to expand on side characters or other themes. Of Man And Machine – Characters Above all other characters stand Cila and Mara, it is their individual characters and the dynamic they share which create the game’s compelling hook. Cila is our protagonist and point of view character and she makes for an interesting choice to narrate this journey. She is at once deeply involved in this world through her job and her past, yet detached as she merely meanders through her life without making any meaningful connections. Despite this she never comes across as cynical, she knows how unfair the world can be but even in the face of this harsh reality she can never quite give up on the feels which have defined her. As such Mara makes for the perfect contrast to Cila. As a bubbling ball of curiosity and smiles, Mara acts as an excuse to have the world explained to the player and to communicate just how sheltered she has been from reality. There is an innocence to her actions which disarms Cila and gets her to open up to Mara, but at the same time she not without her own intentions and desires to drive her. For Cila, Mara is a rudder to guide her life towards some kind of future and help her understand her own emotions. This creates an unbalance in their relationship with Mara being the driving force and Cila being dragged along behind and plays into their dynamic for the eventual pay off to their relationship. Our Grimy Dystopia – Visual, Audio and Technical The title’s relatively low budget is clear to see in its lack of the bells and whistles found in larger visual novels. However, this is not something the player will notice in the moment as Synergia knows how to milk every drop from what it does have available. Each part of the visuals and audio works to push a specific sense of what this dystopia is like to live in and the emotional mood of the characters. This manifests as stripes of striking colour in an otherwise dark and muted landscape, their beauty a fleeting reminder of the happy moments of people’s lives and the grim reality which surrounds them. Even at its brightest the colours are always muted as if smothered by the smog of the city’s factories and it adds an almost dreamlike quality to the intimate moments between the cast. The music adds to these vague feelings through its synth tones and it conveys a world of technological brilliance coated in a thick layer of soot out of which only glimpses of what came before can be seen. It leans heavily into promoting this atmosphere to the point that even outside of the context of the game the audio sells the experience of playing it and the fragile mix of oppression and hope it represents. Conclusion Cyberpunk is a genre which has gone relatively unexplored in visual novels, but Synergia provides a compelling case for why more games should make use of it. The wonderfully all consuming romance between Cila and Mara makes for a space where the themes and ideas can be explored freely. Supporting this is a sense of place which paints a bleak picture of the pairs prospects and yet feels alive in its own unique way. It also helps the narrative to have Cila and Mara be such strong personalities with their dynamic being a selling point for the game as a whole. Making sure these parts for a cohesive is the visual and audio which present a vision of this world and its characters without saying a word. Verdict – The seamless blending of engaging themes, strong characters and an atmospheric world make for a highly memorable and immersive cyberpunk story. Pros - + The romance between Cila and Mara wonderfully engages with the game's core themes and ideas. + The grim reality and decay of this dystopia are palpable at every turn. + Cila and Mara’s characters and dynamic is endearing and complex. + Careful and considered use of the strong visual style and soundscape help sell the experience. Cons - - Cila’s past relating to her creation feels out of place with the heavy theming around machines and Mara. - The secondary cast lack development and come across as one dimensional.

This is a condensed version of the full article which can be found on my Main Blog Here. Love In All Its Forms As a genre Yaoi has an interesting kinship with masculinity which leads it down some distinctive narrative pathways. In many ways it is a mirror of its stable-mate Yuri since it also has the two extremes of commercialisation and thoughtful representation. Much of the genre’s output tends to be aimed at a female audience with the characters and relationships setting out please their sensibilities. There is also a smaller group of titles who are more interested in a looking at the realities of a gay romance and the sort of feelings and conflicts it brings. Despite the vastly different reasons these two groups choose to create a Yaoi visual novel, they do share a common element in the form of their utilisation of relationships to provide a unique perspective on the human nature and how it is applied to everyone equally. Let’s find ourself some handsome men and discover what make Yaoi visual novels special. The Female Gaze Much of the output from the Yaoi genre is created with a female audience in mind and seeks to appeal to them through its content. Just as with Yuri, the target demographic is the opposite to the characters’ gender and as such bears little resemblance to how someone of that gender would behave and instead presents an idealised vision of what someone of the fairer sex might think of them. Rather then the purity and almost religious sanctity of Yuri’s presentation of its romance, Yaoi leans towards the ideas of masculinity and the violence and possessiveness associated with it. This is not a negative violence, but rather a playful type like two lion cubs pouncing on each other. It is rare for it to be taken to the extreme of doing meaningful harm to the other person and is a means showcasing their bond in a way which stands out from a standard heterosexual relationship by leaning into the lack of a feminine aspect. Of course this dives into the perception of men being the dangerous gender and it has no interest in the reality of the situation when it can just make this element a source of excitement. It is worth noting the exception of this rule, Traps, which sit in a strange middle ground between Yuri and Yaoi with elements of both purity and masculinity. However, they are such a complicated subject that they deserve their own article and will not be discussed further, but it worth keeping their existence in mind for a more complete picture of the genre. For examples of this female leaning take on masculinity in Yaoi we can look to Absolute Obedience and Tokyo Onmyoji. The prior displays this through its intimate character interactions while the later takes a much broader angle. Absolute Obedience plays this masculinity and the violent undertone to the relationship in a style where everything is taken to extremes in order keep the player on their toes. It a strong implementation of the lion cubs mentality where a lot of what they do to each other is never presented in a manner where it could be taken negatively and instead adds a layer to the mixture which is their relationship. Tokyo Onmyoji takes a much broader method to implementing its masculinity through interactions beyond simply the main relationship and into the more general bonds between the cast. This is partly due to the more openly serious nature of the narrative and the way it has to weave its character beats in between its plot ones without harming either. As such spreading out the violent tension between the male cast serves both to spice up the dynamic and add impact to important moments in the story. Both games present these elements the player as a selling point to be desired and assumes their audience will find it appealing. Sympathetic And Expressive Of course not every Yaoi game is made with the intention of simply appealing to a target demographic for sales purposes and instead there are many titles which use the genre to dive into the emotions and ideas surrounding male homosexual relationships. These paint the romances in a sympathetic light and aim to present them through a lens of the character’s humanity to make it easy to understand regardless of whether you have experienced the same emotions or not. However, the games still have the flavour and feelings unique to a male centric relationship, but rather than focusing on displays of blatant masculinity there is an awareness of the mixed nature of actual male bonds and how they are not so straightforward. Such titles tend to be from amateur or indie groups or individuals who are open to expressing their own feelings on this type of relationship and can accept that their product will not have a mass market appeal. They serve a valuable function in offering an antidote to the exaggerated takes on Yaoi existing in larger visual novels with a more grounded take on the genre, but grounded is not the same as not knowing how to have fun. To see this in action we can look to What Happened The Night Before. This game follows a single relationship between Mikage and Noah which is key to ensuring there is the space to properly paint the bond between them. Having a focus around how relationships change over time, especially when you are young, gives the narrative a common emotional resonance to help build its distinctive romance in a way that appeals to all players. When it comes time to the culmination of their love, the title presents it in a gentle and loving manner where their masculine nature is never taken to an extreme but is instead an extension of the love they feel for each other. What Happened The Night Before shows us how a Yaoi narrative can be sympathetic while still maintaining its appeal. Unique Angle On Our Humanity In our differences we can find the common threads which link our humanity and experiences, but also how those differences can demonstrate the particulars about our nature which would otherwise go unexplored. Yaoi is a genre where this side of human nature can be investigated and put through the lens of this type of relationship. The games utilising this element tend to place the Yaoi in a prominent position, but do not make it the sole focus and instead place it alongside other genres, such mystery, in order to highlight important aspect of one using the other. This allows them to act as mirrors for the characters to explore who they are and in turn express themselves in a raw and honest manner to the player. In particular the heavy leaning into a male centric cast from the Yaoi provides a heavily masculine leaning world view, but in a way where the vulnerabilities of the male psyche are on display and truths relating it to a common human experience can be teased out of the character’s actions. Conclusion Despite not being the most prolific genre in visual novels, Yaoi still offer one of the most distinctive narrative styles of any game. It can create an experience tailored to appeal to a female audience through a mixture of masculinity and playful violence. On the opposite end of the scale there are plenty of games which present a more grounded and sympathetic homosexual relationship to express its value to a wide audience. Yaoi can also be a part of a greater whole where it acts as key ingredient in an examination of human nature through the unique masculine perspective it offers. Overall, Yaoi is a flexible genre which expresses a distinct angle on romance which is not open to a more conventional understanding of love.