What are you playing?

[onorub]

6 hours ago, Dreamysyu said:

It gets worse.

Meh, i don't think so. Aries' route and the first half of 2048 were the really bad parts.

Anyway, finished Da Capo. I was thinking about doing the whole trilogy, but with only 3 out of 7 routes being decent, it's gonna take a while until i try the second one.

[Flutterz]

37 minutes ago, onorub said:

Meh, i don't think so. Aries' route and the first half of 2048 were the really bad parts.

Anyway, finished Da Capo. I was thinking about doing the whole trilogy, but with only 3 out of 7 routes being decent, it's gonna take a while until i try the second one.

For what it's worth, I found Da Capo 2 to be WAY better than the first one.

[cro-mag]

2 hours ago, onorub said:

Meh, i don't think so. Aries' route and the first half of 2048 were the really bad parts.

Anyway, finished Da Capo. I was thinking about doing the whole trilogy, but with only 3 out of 7 routes being decent, it's gonna take a while until i try the second one.

As a bit of advice, try 2nd one anyway. Imo it's better. Although i have to say that i don't care about 3 out of 6 routes in the game (if i remember correctly, that's what you have in the original version, they added more later, but it's in japanese only). But other 3 are good, depends on your preferences though. And i have my most favorite girl here among all Da Capo VNs. Want to read Da Capo 2 Spring Celebration so much, but, again, japanese only... Such is life, unfortunately.

[Benji Price]

3 hours ago, onorub said:

Meh, i don't think so. Aries' route and the first half of 2048 were the really bad parts.

Anyway, finished Da Capo. I was thinking about doing the whole trilogy, but with only 3 out of 7 routes being decent, it's gonna take a while until i try the second one.

Do not take DC 1 as reference for DC 2 and DC 3, those are way better as @Flutterz mentioned. 

In my case I started backwards, from DC 3 > DC 2 > DC1 , and honestly, i just played sakura's route out of respect. 2 and 3 are worth the time.

[Ranzo]

I put Hatsukoi on the back burner and I might return to it at some point, but I dunno. 3:10 to Yuuma is just so annoying to me I can't deal. 

 

Moved on to Shadows of Pygmalion and it's nice having a protag I don't want to smash through a plate glass window.
The story is getting pretty interesting so far so I'm content.

[adamstan]

Yesterday I finished Kazoku Keikaku (Family Project). Man, that was heavy... definitely not moege  

I read it in order suggested by walkthroughs - Matsuri, Chunhua, Masumi, Jun and Aoba, throwing bad ending somewhere in between. Hard to choose best girl, but as of route ranking, I think that Aoba was definitely the best, thanks to her development, followed by Jun and Matsuri, then Chunhua and at the end Masumi - her route felt the weakest for me. However, all routes have good after-credits epilogues.

Protagonist also changes in a good way - at the beginning he was sometimes unbearable.

Sometimes the drama felt little over the top. However, this VN gave me again some food for thought about relationships etc - big plus.

The game itself has some quirks - for example

Spoiler

Both Jun and Chunhua have their H-scenes during the common route (Chunhua actually at the very beginning of the game - that took me by surprise)

Art and music was OK - nothing to write home about, but nothing horrible either. Backgrounds were good, and most character sprites too. Variable title screen was nice touch - at the beginning there is just empty house, but as you complete character routes, they appear on the title screen and when the game is completed it looks pretty lively

 

Unfortunately - translation is total mess I remember reading about it in reviews, but it starts out OK and it keeps that decent level up to ~3/4 of the common route. Then it falls apart and turns into unedited mess, that often is hard to figure out - lots of typos, some missing lines, mismatched tenses, pronouns and particles etc etc. Often sentences seem to be translated out of context, which results in mismatched subjects. Knowing something about Japanese grammar I was able to somehow reverse-engineer it and figure it out (like, stripping the sentence of subjects and other things which are often omitted in Japanese and then trying to put it in context), but that was quite a chore.

It looks like they ran out of either time or money for editing during the production and left last part unedited. Mind you, I read patched version - reportedly it was much worse in the first version.

However here's the strangest thing about this. In the transition between common route and character routes there are some scenes/lines that repeat in each route - however in the script they are treated separately, as "skipping read text" doesn't pick them up. AND IN EACH ROUTE THEY ARE TRANSLATED/EDITED DIFFERENTLY! Ranging from almost decent to incomprehensible gibberish. WTF? At some lines it falls down almost to the level of infamous original translation of Agehas route in Konosora.

 

So to sum it up - nice game, not exactly pleasant read but engaging. Unfortunately it loses points due to editing, as fighting with translation somehow dampened emotional impact of the routes. 7/10  (later raised to 7.5/10)

 

Now I definitely need something lighter. I think it's finally time for Fureraba.

Edited January 29, 2020 by adamstan

[Nandemonai]

As far as I know the patch literally changed only a few lines, one of which was (I believe) an 'over 9000' meme.  What I heard was that they were considering doing more, but would have had to go back to the company to make any such patch, and the company was like 'we gave you a patch already, go away'.

[adamstan]

I think I probably could try to re-edit it into something more readable, but there are two problems.

1) I don't know/have the tools to extract script and then put it back into game
2) Probably there aren't too many people still interested in reading (or re-reading) such ancient VN.

[Dreamysyu]

2 hours ago, adamstan said:

2) Probably there aren't too many people still interested in reading (or re-reading) such ancient VN.

I don't know, the author is pretty famous, so there might be some interested people, though I'm not sure how many. Personally, I'd definitely be interested in reading it if the translation was better.

[adamstan]

Well, I tried to extract scrpits using ArcTools, but it only exctracted dialogue lines, ommitting everything else (narration, character names above spoken lines etc etc), so I got bunch of files with content like this:

:: word wrap line after, characters=50 ::

- <7B79, 0006> "......"=
- <8296, 0006> "Ai ya~"=
- <8458, 0006> "..."=
- <8948, 0006> "Hey, are you alive?"=
- <89B2, 0006> "...mmm..."=
- <8DA7, 0006> "Hey, what's wrong?"=
- <8E89, 0006> "Are you okay? Can you get home by yourself?"=
- <8F23, 0006> "..."=
- <902D, 0006> "Ah..."=
- <9109, 0006> "... Wo ... xiang yao ... yi bei ... shui."=
- <923D, 0006> "Ai ya..."=
- <92EF, 0006> "Hey."=
- <94A9, 0006> "What happened?"=
- <9A31, 0006> "Damn it."=

There isn't much I can do with it I've googled "Ikura GDL script tools" but aforementioned Arctools is the only one that does anything. AE can extract files, but cannot decompile them into text format, as its script module isn't working - they stay as binaries, so unworkable too.

If translation team had to work with something like this, I'm beginning to understand why it's such a mess

Edited May 25, 2018 by adamstan

[Inorin]

19 minutes ago, adamstan said:

Well, I tried to extract scrpits using ArcTools, but it only exctracted dialogue lines, ommitting everything else (narration, character names above spoken lines etc etc), so I got bunch of files with content like this:

:: word wrap line after, characters=50 ::

- <7B79, 0006> "......"=
- <8296, 0006> "Ai ya~"=
- <8458, 0006> "..."=
- <8948, 0006> "Hey, are you alive?"=
- <89B2, 0006> "...mmm..."=
- <8DA7, 0006> "Hey, what's wrong?"=
- <8E89, 0006> "Are you okay? Can you get home by yourself?"=
- <8F23, 0006> "..."=
- <902D, 0006> "Ah..."=
- <9109, 0006> "... Wo ... xiang yao ... yi bei ... shui."=
- <923D, 0006> "Ai ya..."=
- <92EF, 0006> "Hey."=
- <94A9, 0006> "What happened?"=
- <9A31, 0006> "Damn it."=

There isn't much I can do with it I've googled "Ikura GDL script tools" but aforementioned Arctools is the only one that does anything. AE can extract files, but cannot decompile them into text format, as its script module isn't working - they stay as binaries, so unworkable too.

If translation team had to work with something like this, I'm beginning to understand why it's such a mess

I think you might want to post this under the Game Technical FAQs & Solutions sub-forum instead

[adamstan]

Yes, you're right, this isn't right topic. Or maybe, even better, I should post it in FanTL subforum.

[Inorin]

Just finished Fata Morgana Requiem for Innocence. Thoughts:

 

I never expected the main story of the fandisc to have such a heavy tone to it. I mean, fandiscs are usually meant for fan-service, meaning that they are light-hearted for the most part. But nope, RFI decides to have one hell of a tragic story for the main story (well of course it did; it's Fata Morgana after all). Man, the only other fan disc that I can think of which had such a heavy main story is Sharin no Kuni, and that's not even close in regards to the tragedy in RFI. Well, not that I'm complaining though, since a solid plot with great character development is always welcome. The shared past between Jacopo and Morgana wasn't that much talked about in the original game, so I'm glad the fandisc was able to cover this.

All in all, a 8/10 for me.

Edited May 26, 2018 by wei123

[Inorin]

Reading Little Busters now and apparently there's a seiyuu who's actually voicing 3 characters? 

 

istg if I didn't know about this beforehand, I would have thought these 3 characters were voiced by 3 different people.

Edited May 26, 2018 by wei123

[Turnip Sensei]

I got really into Flowers and I'm now through Summer and Autumn. After the slight mess that was Spring, I can happily say that Summer and Autumn are huge improvements and the series itself is honestly really great. Just about everything is noticeable improved going from Spring to Summer. Spring was in the hard place of building the whole setting for the latter volumes, but Innocent Grey really learned from the experience and it shows. I'm really glad I decided to continue with series.

Flowers -Le Volume sur Été- 
or Summer is, as fitting for the season, a warm and sunny story. Focus is on the budding relationship between Yaegaki and a new student Takasaki Chidori, and everything is built around this. Chapters are less numerous, but more substantial this time and there's some quite excellent high-points even in the middle of the story, as the main pairs relationship grows through shared experiences. 
And a no small part of Summer greatness must also be attributed to Yaegaki's character, which is frankly quite amazing in many ways. Not only is she a really good portrayal of a disabled person in general, but also a quite rare example of a character that is very much in terms with herself. Unlike one would expect or how normally these types of stories tend go, Yaegaki has suffered her existential crisis long before the events of the game. She knows her flaws and how she has to rely on others because of her disability. Because of this rather than just Yaegaki herself growing as a character she's more there to help others grow. A nice kind of supportive protagonist!
Not to mention her lovable sassy and cat-like personality, which creates some amazing interactions with other characters. Her way of thinking also shows nicely in the mystery sections as well, since compared to the "Classical detective" of Souh, Yaegaki's approach is more of a post-modern. I would honestly consider her as one of my favourite protagonists.  

So yeah, for those looking forward the English release, be happy because Flowers Summer is honestly great VN! Just hoping the translation and the general quality of the release won't be as lackluster as in Spring... Flowers deserves more than that.

Flowers -Le Volume sur Automne-
Autumn, featuring everyone's favorite aloof senpai, Yatsushiro Yuzuriha, is in good contrast to Summer very melancholic. Yuzuriha is actually the most sentimental of the protagonist in the series so far, and her worries and uncertainties pour over to the narration creating a somber and somehow refined atmosphere. The fantastic piano soundtrack does wonders as well.
Flowers being a mostly character focused series means Yuzuriha's character and development is what carries the story, and that it does really well, as Yuzuriha turned out to be even better character than I hoped. Struggling between the expectations of others and her inner-self, a good part of the game is spend in Yuzuriha's head. Acting strong to hide own weakness and playing around to escape from worries. The gap between how she behaves and what she really feels is almost painful sometimes, partly because it's so relatable. The story about Yuzuriha's complicated relationship with Nerine and their past is touching, and I really enjoyed their bittersweet tale.

Next, Winter! I have high hopes for you!

[Dreamysyu]

5 hours ago, wei123 said:

istg if I didn't know about this beforehand, I would have thought these 3 characters were voiced by 3 different people.

Yeah, neither would I. They sound completely different. It's quite amazing how well some seiyuu change their voices.

[Mr Poltroon]

1 hour ago, Dreamysyu said:

Yeah, neither would I. They sound completely different. It's quite amazing how well some seiyuu change their voices.

Hold on. Let's not go too far, here. Saying Riki and Rin sound particularly different is something of an abuse of language.

[Dreamysyu]

9 minutes ago, Mr Poltroon said:

Hold on. Let's not go too far, here. Saying Riki and Rin sound particularly different is something of an abuse of language.

Well, I was mostly talking about Rin and Sasami. I don't really remember Riki's voice, it's been a while since I read LB.

[adamstan]

Riki's voice appears much later - in parts of Refrain AFAIK. Before that we only hear his screams and whines during baseball and battling minigames.

But Rin and Sasasasasami - yeah, that was good, as they often appear in the same scene.

Edited May 26, 2018 by adamstan

[snowbell55]

1 hour ago, adamstan said:

Riki's voice appears much later - in parts of Refrain AFAIK. Before that we only hear his screams and whines during baseball and battling minigames.

But Rin and Sasasasasami - yeah, that was good, as they often appear in the same scene.

Hahahahaha. I really wonder how the voice recording sessions went, but it does go to show how well she can switch between them. I had no idea she did so many voices. The dynamic between Sasami and Rin is really excellent, too, with Sasami being all prim and cultured (and doing the OHOHO laugh even :D) and Rin constantly butchering her name and not caring at all :D. 

SA-SA-SE-GA-WA SA-SA-MI!

Little Busters spoiler

Spoiler

Man but her route though. That route hits like a ton of bricks and there are a lot of chopped onions in that route. *shudders quietly*

 

Edited May 26, 2018 by snowbell55

[PiggiesGoMoo]

Reading Cartagra. Nana looks like harry potter. She's also very annoying. These two in combination make her a very unlikeable character 

 

[littleshogun]

Finished both of eden and Sono Hanabira 11 (Will comment more on those later), and right now I'm fiddling with Amayui here with the interface patch help (Once again good luck to the translation project). As for the next plan, I'll resume my Fureraba playthrough at June later.

Edited May 27, 2018 by littleshogun

[adamstan]

Yesterdeay I started Fureraba

It looks promising for something light and fluffy, however they tried to discourage me from playing by revealing the shocking truth right at the beginning

Spoiler

 

[r0xm2n]

Quite a few people reading Fureraba. I just got Yuzuyu's affinity up high enough, and choose the Confess option. I'll see how the date goes tomorrow. She's probably best girl for me, even though I know nothing about the other girls....

For some reason, I almost always like the Tsundere types. Basically, Michiru (Grisaia) and Yuzuyu tie for my favorite Tsundere types.

Then there's Kei (ef), Kotori (IMHHW), and Kyou (Clannad), are also characters I like. Even though Kei seems like a Tsundere/Kuudere hybrid (if that makes sense)...

[Ranzo]

Still playing Pygmalion and I'm still enjoying it I gotta say, but man it's kind of confusing sometimes. They keep trying to hit me with these weird bombshells. I've got one of the endings so far and I guess there are three to go?

I've also played through two routes in Ace Academy which I enjoyed much more than I thought I would. The humor was decent and I liked that it didn't take place in a fucking high school. It would have been even better if they didn't base it in Japan like so many other OVENS. The voice acting is alright though they pronounced alias wrong. I don't care for the timed response things as it makes skipping through text a chore. The abrupt ending is also pretty lame. Still it's solid and I like the fact that the sprites had abundant amount of clothes to wear. That's pretty surprising since most vns barely bother with more than one change of clothes.

I also completed Wolf Tales which was a fun romp and even though it was real short I didn't feel unsatisfied. You jus gotsta luv dem Wolf Girls mang!

Edited June 1, 2018 by Ranzo