VN reading club - June 2015 (Yume Miru Kusuri)

[Fred the Barber]

Read Kyrt's post, two up from yours - it answers exactly this question. In a nutshell, it's because of historical reasons, more so than how it stands up against currently-available English-localized VNs.

[Vorathiel]

So only because it was first official translated title?

[Nosebleed]

>Why is it so popular?

Because people like it...? I think most who have played this game enjoyed the story and themes, I don't know why you think that's strange.

[Deep Blue]

I love ymk because of how realistic everyone behaves (yes yes it does have some fair amount of bs I know, but still). How two persons that are lost in life can find a way to help each other and find a way to solve their problems, this could be monotony or not having a purpose in life, bullying, drugs..

Don't asume that is liked just because it was one of the first vns translated in a particular genre, I have read a fair amount of vns already and I still think is one of the best I've read so far and I would love to read something similar again (sadly there isnt anything close to this novel out there or I haven't found it yet)

btw the "historical reasons" argument falls apart when you see this for example

http://erogamescape.dyndns.org/~ap2/ero/toukei_kaiseki/game.php?game=6298#ad 

中央値 80 <---- average score

データ数787 <--- total votes

 

 

 

[Vorathiel]

7 hours ago, Nosebleed said:

>Why is it so popular?

Because people like it...? I think most who have played this game enjoyed the story and themes, I don't know why you think that's strange.

Hey, I'm not saying it's not good or something. But besides Muv-Luv 1 is only one VN in the top popularity ones, that had a <7.6 average on vndb.
So I would say that's pretty phenomenal popularity.

[Fred the Barber]

Yep. I'm also not saying it's not good, just that its relative popularity is substantially higher than its relative rating.

Here, data:

Go to VNDB, sort by rating - YMK is in the middle of the fourth page, which puts it somewhere around #175 by rating. Now sort on VNDB by popularity - it's #14. There are certainly some outliers with high ratings from a small number of people, but it's nowhere near enough to account for that kind of gap.

And if you look at the distribution of votes for YMK, it's not bipolar or anything, so it's not like it's a highly divisive game. It's a fine VN. But it's more popular than its rating alone would merit.

[Vorathiel]

And that's where my question came from. Why is that gap so big. But now I know, it was from historical reasons, so case closed.  

[Stormwolf]

 

Spoiler

I just finished Aeka's route, and i must say it was mostly good. It did suffer from some weird writing now and then. Hilariously silly when his mother was going to check his phone when he got those 256 messages and she was speaking every thought and action in past tense instead of it being written in first person. The bullying was so badly overproportioned that i couldn't do other than sigh at the whole situation. Guys giving a fuck about girl bullying and allowing girls to order them around at school.. Yeah, right. And that whole class must have been nothing but psychopaths. Sniggering at Aeka in the bad end, that ending was in bad taste especially considering the protagonist. Protagonist made me wish someone would murder him at certain points, but fortunately he got a lot better. And way to make the players despise absolutely every side character other than the gay guy during a single route. Quite the feat if i must say so. The ending was pretty damn satisfying though. Although if they went trough with it i pretty much wouldn't mind either way. 

As for the weird writing. I found it really confusing at the end of the route where his father says he needs to bring Aeka home and introduce her when he had that serious speak about the future. Then almost the next scene when they walk along the river it's stated that she started living with them right after the school incident  This played out like everything was on the same day *racks brain*

Well, it had it's ups and downs. Overall this route was a fun read!

 

[Deep Blue]

27 minutes ago, Stormwolf said:

 

Hidden Content

 

if you think the bullying was ridiculous and unbelievable on YMK you haven't read subarashiki hibi xD

[Stormwolf]

 

Spoiler

Done with Nekoneko's route now. And that was a pretty bad route to be honest. What the heck was up with that bad ending? did it turn into fantasy genre all of a sudden? I expected her to think she was climbing the stairs and then fall to her death, but she just vanished into that castle. Ridiculous. Good ending was good until i noticed she had gotten off drugs and become a bigshot at a theme park in the span of 2 measly years, and that they decided to bring back Nekoneko in the final scene. Was extremely weird and completely unnecessary. Nekoneko and Hiroko was supposed to be two separate personas. It was never clear if she had multiple personalities or if it was just her personality when she was under the influence of drugs. But what was clear, when she was off drugs she forgot everything. Well, for most of the scenes. And now suddenly she was brought back with no drug influence. I think the route suffered from really bad writing.

That leaves only Mizuki left. I wanted to save her for last as she seemed most interesting. 

[Kawasumi]

18 hours ago, Stormwolf said:

 

Hidden Content

 

I see nekoko's route as one big metaphor for drug addiction and especially that bad end is just so strong if you see people that have been sucked in completely which I have and it captures that feeling of never getting these people out of the drug induced fairyland so greatly.

[Tyr]

On 27.6.2015 at 8:58 PM, kyrt said:

Before fan translating ever really took off visual novels were primarily only able to be bought via JAST USA, (Mangagamer had not yet come into existence) and fan-translations were in infant stages with even Fate/Stay Night only being in trial stages and the only real fan-translated visual novel available for reading being Tsukihime.  Kana Little Sister had issues when it was released, Ever 17 while brilliant had translation errors, censorship, and a few other small problems thanks to Hirameki, and really there were very few story emphasized visual novels at this time. YMK is the visual novel that changed that as far as company translated visual novels went. Yes it may have had a ton of ero scenes but they were done in a way that helped emphasize the overall plot. JAST really went out on trying to push the title and even tried to emphasize that this was a classic from Japan and a much more plot driven title. The game released in April of 2007 in english  so the visual novel is quite old compared to what a lot of people have read and has not aged overly well in the advent of the rise of fan translations and better titles released since then but when you look at it in the context of what else was released prior to it you realize that YMK was a pretty good title for the time of its release. 

I know this is old but, uh, I think you're forgetting G-Collections.

Back then, G-Collectiion was the big vn publisher for us, not JAST. Because at that time JAST was still thinking that nukige are the way to make money, while G-Collections tried to give us something more, beginning with Kana Little Sister. (Which btw never had issues when it was released. The "issue" was that the crack wasn't easy to apply and most pirates didn't get the game to run, haha)
Well, not everything published by G-Collections was good, especially later when they decided to go more nukige, but still... this was definitely the most important English publisher for visual novels in the beginning of this century.

Also, this thread makes me sad. For me, Yume Miru Kusuri is one of the "newer" visual novels... And you guys are saying it's already old ;_;

 

On 18.1.2016 at 1:20 AM, Vorathiel said:

- Developers and scriptwriters never did anything big and well known.

Are you sure you know what you're talking about?

[kyrt]

1 hour ago, Tyrosyn said:

I know this is old but, uh, I think you're forgetting G-Collections.

Back then, G-Collectiion was the big vn publisher for us, not JAST. Because at that time JAST was still thinking that nukige are the way to make money, while G-Collections tried to give us something more, beginning with Kana Little Sister. (Which btw never had issues when it was released. The "issue" was that the crack wasn't easy to apply and most pirates didn't get the game to run, haha)
Well, not everything published by G-Collections was good, especially later when they decided to go more nukige, but still... this was definitely the most important English publisher for visual novels in the beginning of this century.

G-Collections, Peach Princess, and JAST Densetsu are actually all subsidiaries of JAST USA. 

[Tyr]

Just now, kyrt said:

G-Collections, Peach Princess, and JAST Densetsu are actually all subsidiaries of JAST USA. 

No, JAST bought G-Collections sometimes later.
At first, it was an English subsidiary of CD Bros while JAST USA was a subsidiary of .. well, JAST.

[Vorathiel]

3 hours ago, Tyrosyn said:

I know this is old but, uh, I think you're forgetting G-Collections.

Back then, G-Collectiion was the big vn publisher for us, not JAST. Because at that time JAST was still thinking that nukige are the way to make money, while G-Collections tried to give us something more, beginning with Kana Little Sister. (Which btw never had issues when it was released. The "issue" was that the crack wasn't easy to apply and most pirates didn't get the game to run, haha)
Well, not everything published by G-Collections was good, especially later when they decided to go more nukige, but still... this was definitely the most important English publisher for visual novels in the beginning of this century.

It's good to read some VN history, nice.

3 hours ago, Tyrosyn said:

Are you sure you know what you're talking about?

Well, in terms of 'VNs popular in the west', then pretty much - yeah. 

[Stormwolf]

6 hours ago, Kawasumi said:

I see nekoko's route as one big metaphor for drug addiction and especially that bad end is just so strong if you see people that have been sucked in completely which I have and it captures that feeling of never getting these people out of the drug induced fairyland so greatly.

Yep, i get some people are beyond hope when it comes to drug addiction, but i certainly did not expect her to actually go into this "fairyland". It was weird as hell.

Mizuki

That was one hell of a route. It was really enjoyable ride from the start to the end. If there is something like a main heroine in this game, then this is it. That strangling scene kept me on my toes for sure. Damn, that part was intense. It'd be a perfect ending if they'd shut up about that "boy" and "senpai" thing. Who does that in a marriage? I've seen that in a lot of vn's, anime etc where titles stick from the start to the end. You never see side cast do that, only main characters. I can't understand why. Wife not taking the husband/protagonists name seems to be another unfathomable device to create a small artificial distance in a happy endings, but i digress. In this case it's a minor issue here since i take it as a joke, at least the "boy" thing. Though it's pretty funny how me nodding or not during a footjob had a say in whether or not she'd be poisoned by her own pregnancy, lol. Complete abandonment would have been better, and choices to lead to the bad end should be significant ones. 

 

[Vorathiel]

 

On 1/28/2016 at 4:28 AM, Stormwolf said:

Protagonist made me wish someone would murder him at certain points

Why?  

I just finished Aeka route and I was really impressed. I went here looking for a small VN, with 'around 7' quality, but this route was really damn good written. It had fun, it had a lots of great tension, it had a thrills, lots of variable emotions, it was great. 8.7/10.

But I'm affraid rest of the game won't be that good. I have a trauma from Katawa houjo and I hate going as my protagonist to student council room and that busty girl route seems to be at the begginign nothing but this.
Also I like theme of bullying, I like feel miserable and sympathize with characters, and don't like a drug abuse theme. And I have no idea what's a theme in Student Council route.
So, while first part was great I still keep my expectations in check for the rest of the game.

[Stormwolf]

Because he was such a coward. He promised Aeka to protect her since she was going to commit suicide, yet he did not do shit and looked the other way until it was almost too late. I do admit that when it became good it was good. I liked the Mizuki's route best though. Look forward to it!

[Vorathiel]

I read thorugh most of the common route, focused on Mizuki and I HATE HER. What a annoying person. I hate that type of characters, tossing work on protag, clinging to him, and just simly using him. ANd that horrible first, out of nowhere h-scene. Pure cancer. I am amazed how a great VN after first route can suddenly turn this bad. But maybe it will redeem intself in her route...

[Stormwolf]

Good look finding a protagonist that isn't a masochist though. But her route is good. So many girls are absolute dogshit during common routes, and they either change or you get a different impression during their routes. She did annoy me at times as well for the same reasons, but at the end of the route, hers was the one i liked the best and definitely had the best ending.

[Tyr]

This game would be Kamige if it had a

Spoiler

Antoinette

route. Best character in the whole game. <3

And even more Galaxy Express 999 references would have been cool, too.

[Vorathiel]

4 hours ago, Tyrosyn said:

This game would be Kamige if it had a

  Reveal hidden contents

Antoinette

route. 

Oh yeah, that would be really interesting!

Anyway I finished Mizuki... Worst route I read since Hoshizora. Inconsitent, shallow mess, without any specific theme, with so much plotfarts, and pure WTF moments
 

Spoiler

that trip to HK was just... just HOW?!

also with really annoyingly stupid, spoiled and shallow heroine 

Spoiler

her whole 'drama' was just laughably bad, just go to the psyhologists, god dammnit!

which never redeems herself. I disliked her from the start, (because I don't like things like big boobs, student council work, and people ordering others around, and she had all of those 3), and I disliked her at the end, when she suddenly 

Spoiler

pop up and after months of no contact said that protag has a baby with her, so hurr durr, I'm back

Also - h-scenes were much worse than in Aeka route, cringeworthy and their frequency was just to high.
Also 2 - albeit it's short in lenght, this route kept me bored at few times.

From the good things:

- Aya is really great supporting character. More of them in VNs please. 
- That 'balcony scene'. It was awesome. *But awesomenes lasted from entering the room to the pool, before and after this it was baffling).

To sum up:
If YMK would be a short VN consisting only A Mizuki route, I would rate it 4/10.

 

And it's really bothersome that other routes makes protag a dick towards Aeka. But well, can't help that, so it's minor problem overall.
Onto Nekoko, in which I have a hopes to redeem this game. I hope for a consistent and thematically stron route, cause Nekoko seems to be interesting character.

EDIT:
Oh, and I did a 'regular bad end'. And it spoiled me Nekoko rout, with her being a 

Spoiler

Librarian

thanks a lot authors! -_-'

[Stormwolf]

Her theme would be severe anxiety where she needed something to snap out of it. Not uncommon in real life either im sure. But yes, you make valid points about much of what you say. The sudden trip was silly, but the scenes were god. Still it was the route i liked the best of the three. Aeka would be second. And it feels like they really wanted to create a Aya route, but just didnt do it. 

[Vorathiel]

I can see why people like this route, I was biased towards Mizuki from the begining, so it just didn't 'clicked' with me

Also - omitting probably hilarious scene at the end, when parents came back and see all of them was just sad.

[Stormwolf]

Yeah, wanted to see their reactions as well. Vn's often cut awkward situations :/