What are you playing?

[WinterfuryZX]

1 minute ago, Lucius said:

Not sure I'd be able to remember that far down the line (since I'm still on ep vi, and might take a before ep vii). But I'll try to keep in mind. 

Many things are explained there witb more details, and it's a manga exclusive chapter.

[ChaosRaven]

6 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Finished Kanon. Not a fan. I loved common route, loved humour... But when any route started, suddely humour was completly halted.

Well, it's a Key VN - everything is about feeeelings! 

Their common route is always about comedy and then makes place for the drama in the individual routes. That's their typical formula. And the weakest heroine being the main heroine is also kind of tradition. 

Your heroine ratings are kind of comparable to mine since Mai and Nayuki were my favorites. You should give the Kanon anime a try if you haven't already, it's worth it.

Spoiler

 

[Vorathiel]

Why there is english voices in your link? I can't watch it. It's painful. ;d 
Also - faces in anime looks even more 'unhuman' than in vn. Also - I don't watch anime. And if I would I wouldn't watch Kanon just for 'filling gaps' in VN, there is much more better anime to watch.

[Lucius]

27 minutes ago, Vorathiel said:

Also - faces in anime looks even more 'unhuman' than in vn.

Tell me about it.

[ChaosRaven]

4 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Why there is english voices in your link? I can't watch it. It's painful. ;d 

So you can understand Japanese?!

All animes have Japanese language versions with English subtitles, so that shouldn't be an issue anyway.

4 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Also - faces in anime looks even more 'unhuman' than in vn.

Hmmmmmm, but you ARE living on earth, are you?!

But yeah, Kanon faces in general were always a bit borderline...

4 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

there is much more better anime to watch.

Tell me just one from post 2010!

[Lucius]

8 minutes ago, ChaosRaven said:

Tell me just one from post 2010!

Madoka Magica. But that's just my opinion.

Also, One Punch Man.

Or if we're talking about VN-adapted anime, Fate/Stay Night reboot.

[ChaosRaven]

1 hour ago, Lucius said:

Madoka Magica. But that's just my opinion.

Also, One Punch Man.

Or if we're talking about VN-adapted anime, Fate/Stay Night reboot.

Good choices, I didn't see One Punch Man yet, but I liked Madoka Magica (Can't say the same for Psycho-Pass which is from the same writer I think). And Type-Moon is still one of the rare studios that consistently produce top quality animes, which can't exactly be said about Key anymore.

Still, the amount of good animes past 2010 feels rather low in contrast to the time before... 

[Lucius]

26 minutes ago, ChaosRaven said:

but I liked Madoka Magica (Can't say the same for Psycho-Pass which is from the same writer I think).

IIRC, Gen Urobuchi only wrote a few episodes of Psycho-Pass, or even less, I think. Then again, I dropped the anime only after a few episodes because of how pretentious and edgy it is. I know I used the word "pretentious" a lot to criticize things that it barely means anything anymore, but that truly sums up Psycho-Pass very well - pretending to be more intelligent than it is by sprouting pseudo-philosophical musings that don't really mean anything other than generic super villain platitudes.

In short, it's style over substance.

Oh, and the moeblob sucks.

 

26 minutes ago, ChaosRaven said:

Type-Moon is still one of the rare studios that consistently produce top quality animes,

Well, technically, ufotable's the one responsible for the anime. Type-Moon is responsible for the VN.

 

26 minutes ago, ChaosRaven said:

Still, the amount of good animes past 2010 feels rather low in contrast to the time before... 

I agree. It's one of the factors that led me to stop watching anime. I know that there were incredibly flawed anime before 2010 too, and it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows back then either, but...

Here's the thing. It's easier to find quality titles when you're first introduced to a medium because everything is brand new and fresh. You wouldn't know which anime is shit because you have nothing to compare to. But when you've seen all the classic quality titles, it's a logical inevitability that you're going to come across myriad amount of mediocre titles among the 'currently airing anime'. Quality stories don't just come around every month or even every 6 months. It takes a long time for someone talented enough to produce something rich and truly innovative. Thus, there comes a mentality that "all modern anime sucks" even though the truth is more like, "We've already seen all the quality shows that were piled up from decades of anime production, ranging from something as old as Cowboy Bebop to something as new as Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood." Thus it grants us the illusion that there were more quality anime in the past even though that 'past' is comprised of decades, not just the seven years from 2010-2016.

At least that's how I feel as an explanation why most modern anime feel mediocre as opposed to the 'classics'. I'm sure that during the two years FMA:B was produced (2009 - 2010), there must have been loads of terrible titles produced alongside it as well.

Then again, the truth might not be as simplified as I try to make it sound like.  I'm sure someone more savvy about the anime industry could explain the technicalities in further details.

[pual]

I started reading Tsukihime and it's interesting so far (currently at 8 - Death). Really like how the characters are drawn, they look alive and confident.

3 hours ago, Lucius said:

Tell me about it.

They are missing fins and gills.

[ChaosRaven]

44 minutes ago, pual said:

They are missing fins and gills.

Is that really from the 2006 Kanon anime? Because I don't remember the faces being that bad.

But I've probably seen it 8 years ago so it's quite some time. The animation was amazing for that time though.

But there was a shorter Kanon anime a few years before which was apparently a lot worse. I've never seen it though.

[Lucius]

19 minutes ago, ChaosRaven said:

Is that really from the 2006 Kanon anime? Because I don't remember the faces being that bad.

But I've probably seen it 8 years ago so it's quite some time. The animation was amazing for that time though.

But there was a shorter Kanon anime a few years before which was apparently a lot worse. I've never seen it though.

Yep. It's from the older Kanon anime, not the 2006 remake.

[john 'mr. customer' smith]

Behold,  Kanon 2002

You can probably guess which studio this came from coughtoeicough

Also, @ChaosRaven there's been a lot of great anime movies since 2010 imo

[ChaosRaven]

53 minutes ago, john 'mr. customer' smith said:

Behold,  Kanon 2002

*Visual abomination*

You can probably guess which studio this came from coughtoeicough

Mother of god, that almost requires a NSFS spoiler. 

(NSFS = Not Save For Sanity)

[Fred the Barber]

The Kanon 2006 anime is by KyoAni and looks fantastic, if you like moetacular things. It's also a much better-told story than the VN. I actually was confused about what happened in the VN while reading it, but everything makes perfect sense in the KyoAni adapation, despite (or perhaps because of) their adapting the VN routes into one single storyline. That said, you should probably take my opinions with a grain of salt, since I also love the English dub and always watch that version, though it does have one flaw: Sayuri's VA is pretty bad.

Anyway, as for me: currently playing Harmonia, though I haven't played any since last weekend. So far it's fine, but unremarkable. I need to read the rest of it, really; I'm only through the first few chapters, while they're still establishing characters. On major comment so far is that, at a micro scale, I hate the writing, which I'm pretty sure is mostly the translation's fault.

 

[akaritan]

20 hours ago, Lucius said:

Tell me about it.

Spoiler

 

Finished ef. It was pretty great, but had major pacing issues. The first tale was nothing more than "alright", but the latter tale was absolutely fantastic; all of the plotlines were much better imo. The art was absolutely ridiculous (more CG than sprite on background, or at least it felt like it), and the ending cut scene was especially gorgeous. The VN got to be very emotional towards the end, and one could easily start crying while reading it. In a lot of its aspects, I felt that it was comparable to Clannad, but was much more mature as a whole;

Spoiler

no deus ex ending. As opposed with an ending that saves the characters from grief as a whole, the characters in ef accepted and moved on from their grief at the ending.

The plot twists towards the end could be a bit hard to buy at times, but the foreshadowing was good and nothing really took me out of it too much. Some of the characters in the first tale were subpar (and there's a special place in hell for love triangle plotlines), but the latter tale made up for it by a long shot.

[bogdankl]

I dropped kamidori during emilitas route, after 200+ hours of grinding I was just... so... fucking... tired of it, after that i went and tried I am setsuna since I still craved some jrpg action and when I saw it I was all like this looks cute adorable and fun... I wasn't so much wrong in a long time... <that ending broke my heart so hard>, now I don't really now what to read, I think I'm finally gonna read Steins Gate or finish Rewrite, or maybe I nned something lighthearted and funny, maybe i should finish Ikkikoi first... so many possibilities...

[akaritan]

I started Dead End Junction and a lot about it was quite nice, but it wasn't really my cup of tea, and I'm not in the mood for it in general, so I'm dropping it and I might get back to it later. Harmonia sounds alright, but I've had enough romance/drama for a while from ef, so I'm playing Danganronpa. I haven't met my dead kid quota this month and when that starts to get really impatient with my VNs and have trouble reading. Hopefully Danganronpa will more than fulfill my dead kid quota and it will be a good time in general.

[Decay]

2 hours ago, bogdankl said:

I dropped kamidori during emilitas route, after 200+ hours of grinding I was just... so... fucking... tired of it, after that i went and tried I am setsuna since I still craved some jrpg action and when I saw it I was all like this looks cute adorable and fun... I wasn't so much wrong in a long time... <that ending broke my heart so hard>, now I don't really now what to read, I think I'm finally gonna read Steins Gate or finish Rewrite, or maybe I nned something lighthearted and funny, maybe i should finish Ikkikoi first... so many possibilities...

Honestly, Kamidori is unplayable without a trainer.

[Lucius]

So, I'm still in the midst of reading Chapter VI of Umineko - taking my sweet time, as I always do - and there are two things I feel I should bring up, less I forget about them during my final review of the novel.

1. There seems to be a lot of repeated expositions in the narration. A trivial detail that someone said 10 seconds ago is repeated again for several more passages, as if we're autistic 8 year olds with comprehension problems. This is one of the reasons why the VN is as lengthy as it is - repeated expositions.
    
2. There's an incredibly disturbing line of dialogue between Beatrice and Battler, where
   Spoiler

   Battler talk about stripping the new Beatrice naked and walk her around with a chain around her neck like the way the old Beatrice did to Battler. This conversation is worsened by the fact that they both referred to the new Beatrice as the old Beatrice's daughter...

    

I mean, don't get me wrong, there are many good things about Umineko, particularly the soundtrack, but it's stuff like this that prevents it from making my top VN ranking.

[littleshogun]

Planning to continuing playing Amane's route soon in Flyable Heart. It's already been delayed for a while there.

As for Kamidori, I think if we just ignoring 90+ dungeon it's not that hard imo. Although the grinding was of course certainly very tiring there.

[MiyazawaLulu]

Currently halfway through Harmonia. Part of me is a happy because the "big spoiler" was exactly what I hoped it'd be, but I'm also a little bit sad because it didn't surprise me... let's see how this ends.

And I kind of expected it looking at the screenshots, but the translation, even though it's not bad, sounds a little bit mechanical (no pun intended) IMHO.

[Eclipsed]

I/O's pretty enjoyable, though it's probably cuz I haven't read anything in while + I've been more enthusiastic listening to character dialogues since I'm learning JP

But I'm moving at a massive(tiny?) snail's pace, only been able to read like an hour a day this week  , so this may take a while.

~~

Currently Route A, in the middle of Hinata trying to crack the PW to his sister's computer. The glimpses of an overall greater mystery going on are nice way to keep things interesting as Hinata slogs through his days sliceoflife style

Sakuya carries this route pretty well so far, I like her. She's the typical 'always got your back no matter what' concerned genuine childhood friend with a touch of ear-pulling and obvious-but-not-obvious-to-the-MC crushing goin' on, I wanna slap Hinata so much for taking her for granted and being all 'y u so involved with me waaa waaa'.

Hinata himself is very meh, though at least not as bad as Chaos;Head's Takumi - my least favorite protag of all time - with his shutting out everbody-isms. He's getting better quickly though, once he finally sets his mind to his objectives

Art was a bit off putting at first, but I think it's somewhat charming now.

Music and SFX are good. There's ALOTTTA ambient sounds going on that replace standard BGMs such as footsteps in the intro walkin'-down-spiral-staircase-scene, background chatter during school lunch time, people typing on their computers during class, car engine sounds passing by while waiting at the bus stop... really makes for an authentic environment feel. other VNs probably do this too, but this is the first time i ever noticed all these other sounds going on 

[Vorathiel]

4 hours ago, Eclipsed said:

I/O's pretty enjoyable (...) Currently Route A

Tee-hee-hee. ^^

4 hours ago, Eclipsed said:

Sakuya carries this route pretty well so far, I like her. She's the typical 'always got your back no matter what' concerned genuine childhood friend with a touch of ear-pulling and obvious-but-not-obvious-to-the-MC crushing goin' on, I wanna slap Hinata so much for taking her for granted and being all 'y u so involved with me waaa waaa'.

I almost hated her. ;d And I liked how Hianta didn't care about her. That was nice. Fuck abusive, obnoxious, loud, violent, 'ear-pulling' bitches, who are taking protag for granted and think they can get away with everything, because they are 'childhood friends'. Hate this kind :v 

4 hours ago, Eclipsed said:

Music and SFX are good. There's ALOTTTA ambient sounds going on that replace standard BGMs such as footsteps in the intro walkin'-down-spiral-staircase-scene, background chatter during school lunch time, people typing on their computers during class, car engine sounds passing by while waiting at the bus stop... really makes for an authentic environment feel. other VNs probably do this too, but this is the first time i ever noticed all these other sounds going on 

This so much. I felt in love with this VN first, when I heard wind on school courtyard, without any music. Just the wind sound. This added so much 'reality' to what I was reading. And actually - not that many VNs have ambient sounds. Usually it's only few (footsteps on staircase, school bell, sometimes door creacking) things, played very sparsely. When I as reading I/O, I heard the background chatter probably the first time since my first VN - Katawa Shoujo. At least it was first after Katawa VN in which I noticed background chatter.

[Lucius]

Danganronpa 2. So tiring, the first class trial. Reminds me why I didn't like the first game very much. The logic behind the deduction seems like an ass-pull too IMO.

The confession isn't too bad, I guess. Seems more well-written than those in the first game. The twists are actually more interesting this time round too.

Still, I'm really considering turning the difficulty down because I really don't like this rhythm gameplay. My reaction sucks.

[Vorathiel]

10 hours ago, Lucius said:

Still, I'm really considering turning the difficulty down because I really don't like this rhythm gameplay. My reaction sucks.

After first DGR I turned it down to easy immediately in DG2. Story and game it's too fun to waste energy and nerves on shitty gameplay.