What are you playing?

[Stormwolf]

Kara no shoujo 2.. Well i am quite disappointed so far. Started somewhat good and delved into a super lengthy backstory of sorts which was very boring. And now we're back to current times and it's just filler so far. Too much protagonist swaps, making friends, friends playing with friends boobs... Gonna take a break as this is just not fun atm feeling so unfocused and disjointed.

[Eclipsed]

On 12/10/2020 at 1:29 PM, Eclipsed said:

I'm on my second loop now, will be interesting what kind of plot twists the writers conjured up to keep things spicy (because obviously after the first loop, you know who the wolves are etc etc)

Because obviously I'm a dumb dumb and that was a silly assumption to make. Everyone who read the VN already and then that comment of mine was probably like LOL

Finished Raging Loops. Overall enjoyable. Here's the fav bgm:

Honestly most of my enjoyment from this VN came from the Feasts, and that's mainly from my personal bias of loving group-battle-of-wits-discussion type scenarios ala Danganronpa. 

The endgame reveals were unfortunately kind of a big yawn. Waaaay too much last minute background history infodumping and kanji reordering wordplay reveals when you just wanna get the show over with. Getting the final 5 keys was about as tedious as Link having to fetch all of the Triforce shards in Windwaker. And it doesn't even ultimately end in with a big bang, just a matter of fact kind of resolution. Anticlimatic.

(SPOILER) Random thoughts to various revelations (SUPER SPOILERS)

Spoiler

Second Loop: 
-Knew Chiemi was gonna be one of the wolves, she went from relatively active participant in First Loop to nonexistent in Second Loop. Also felt the initial disappointment in her with the exact same Haruaki "thought you of all people would reject becoming a wolf" thoughts, though it does make sense considering the overall story.
-Thought it was kind of cheap though how the wolves can just go "fk it, let's kill everyone" if they lost.
-Liked Chiemi's 1v1 endgame kill on Haruaki. Haven't really had a murdercrazy heroine for me in a while.

 

Third Loop:
-REALLY loved the premise of getting to be on the Wolf side, disliked that Kaori's motherly instinct consistently won over the supposed undying wolf faith displayed by Tae and Yasu in the First Loop and was a constant "welp, the wolves are screwed". Also Meiko being a useless badger. Writers were probably out of gas and didn't want to waste anymore brainpower crafting an interesting scenario.
-Also thought it funny how easily Haruaki accepted wolf duties but overall found it underwhelming how wolves are indoctrinated to be absolute faithful to their duties. A lot of it truly is just blind faith but yeah, underwhelming.
-Hashimoto was a cool guy. I would've liked scenarios where he was the wolf, or was on Haruaki's side. Also would've liked Haruaki x Chiemi wolf side.

^Though, tbh there were times where it felt cheap that Hashi was able to deduce the whole fake snake thing. 

-Haru's "Oh the god persona was just a fake persona and all her mind reading was coincidental" "reveal" that got reversed 5 seconds later was pretty lol-what-was-the-point-of-that-tier. Try harder, writers.

 

Revelation Loop:
-Completely glossed over the possibility of Chiemi also being a looper. That should've been the first thing you thought when you saw her on the second loop and she teared up and I totally did think something along those lines but I think I just brushed it off as one of those tragic side character irrelevant deja vu moments. Even though I complained getting the final 5 keys was tedious, Haruaki x Chiemi duo loop murder segment was another highlight of this VN.

^I started to think about the grand scale of looping over billions of years over and over and had to stop before my mind popped. It's like when you start comprehending just how big the universe is and it gets overwhelming.

-So you're telling me the Old Man Who Cried Wolf was able to take out Chiemi / Haruaki in over 100+ loops as the supernatural undefeatable werewolf ggez even though Chiemi had a SHOTGUN? That's probably the biggest legit plothole, cuz there's no way Chiemi in Loop 3 "Oh i just shoot the dogs that's why I was able to be outside to do my suicide trick, but overall no matter what I always die when the werewolf comes". You would think she would be able to cap him in at least one of those loops. Also the fact that noone decided to tail him and find out the secret tunnel.
-I completely skipped over Fujiyoshi/Yasumizu history + kanji reordering/Ookami/Shin'naisama/WhatisGod?  infodumps, I don't think I ever outright SKIPPED through any VN text I've read this year like this lol. Might be a sign to take a break. So I'm still slightly confused on some of the God's roles in this whole ordeal but ehh.
-Overall there's just a lot of dialogue inconsistency reveals that are hard to catch, like "Oh Rikako in Loop 2 was given away that she retained her memories because she claimed to see Haruaki behind a rock, when in Loop 1 the first time you saw her was behind leaves etc. They relied on those inconsistencies for reveals a bit too much imo.
 -Knew they were gonna go for "The Feast is a manmade, not supernatural, phenemenon", but didn't conclude that that they simply used cameras / electronic locks, and overall that type of reveal fell flat and was just like "oh. that's it?"
-They did another one right after via Rikako being the dreamer lmao:

^NGL, when Haruaki was doing his Ookami speech I totally didn't realize Rikako wasn't there. To be fair at this point it's probably more of a failure on my part for reading on autopilot rather than the VN doing bad reveals huh lol.
-Was actually thinking Chiemi would be the dreamer and you'd have a looper vs looper battle. That'd be some true Naruto Izanagi vs Izanami funtime. But nope.
-Rikako spider lore went in one ear and out the other, so don't fully understand how she was able to dream loop everyone and summon the monster just because she banged everyone, but ehh. Cuz overall the VN looked like it was trying to decide whether it was purely realistic, or purely supernatural, and then they went half and half (Feast ended up being manmade based on superstition, but God exists, along with Rikako's powers).
-Reason why I think the endgame is weak is that Haruaki was able to end hundreds of years of tradition and superstition with just a bit of talk no jutsu. Now that was some god-tier "That's it?" 
 

Kind of want to just move onto another VN instead of reading the POST GAME ADDITIONAL REVELATION SCENES (there's a friggen' lot of them!). But will definitely check out scenes involving Wolves perspective though. Especially Chiemi's

 

[Stormwolf]

Spoiler

 

Yeah, i didnt get why exactly they started murdering like crazy as wolves either. I mean, they only had to kill people in order not to die and they made quite weird excuses for why they had to make salami slices and other crazyness out of their victims. Falls to reason that Chiemi shouldn't be exempt from the curse when everyone else, including our MC also becomes insane when turned into wolves. 

But at i really like how it ended and i did enjoy Chiemi and Harukai's dynamic in the first route. "Chinemi explaaain." "yaaaay". Was entertaining, but sadly we didnt get much good times from them after the first route and just got that happy ending.

 

 

[fuyopon]

On 12/11/2020 at 1:41 PM, Stormwolf said:

Kara no shoujo 2.. Well i am quite disappointed so far. Started somewhat good and delved into a super lengthy backstory of sorts which was very boring. And now we're back to current times and it's just filler so far. Too much protagonist swaps, making friends, friends playing with friends boobs... Gonna take a break as this is just not fun atm feeling so unfocused and disjointed.

Yes, it doesn't start with the exciting stuff right off the bat, but that "boring" part (I didn't find it boring, but maybe that's because I liked the mood) is very important for the plot later on. I mean, if you want to feel confused, you can just skip it LOL (btw, there will be another flashback, but this one is shorter). About the protagonist swaps - they exist because there are two mysteries and the friends part... I mean, c'mon it's just SoL pfft- take it with a grain of salt, but it's good for Yukiko (again, you'll understand why later on). But hey, if you are not liking it, who am I to force you to read it! 

[fuyopon]

Alrighty, one more finished! This time, I finished all the endings left from The Nonary Games.

Ending 6

• Spoiler

  • Bruh, no matter how many times they go through a numbered door and I know they won't die, I still get anxious, aaaagh!
  • Oof, when Akane mentioned the Titanic and the curses... that was already bad but the fact that I do believe in curses doesn't help T^T

   

Ending 4

Spoiler

Okay, I don't remember a lot from this ending since I had not written anything down about it. Buuut, I just want to mention one thing: how many bullets do you need to die, Snake? Like, bro, that's a big anime moment-

True Ending 

Spoiler

 

Ok... this ending... I did not like it. I mean, it wasn't bad, per say, but it was very confusing, to the point that I couldn't enjoy it as much. I like a good mindfuck, as long as I can somewhat follow it.

• I still don't get how Junpei was able to connect to Akane. He wasn't in the Nonary Games, he wasn't related to her, he was only her friend. Seriously, are we gonna justify it with the fucking doll??? lmao
• I like the idea that Seven was lying about his memories and helped Santa and Akane with everything I mean, the only way I can think that Akane was able to do all this is through Santa, because of the stock market thingy.
• Finally, I just found it so ridiculous that an egyptian priestess would just walk around Nevada. Like, I understand the "ice-9" part and stuff, but how was she able to be unfrozen if the coffin didn't leave the building? I- I'm so confused lol

 

Overall, it wasn't a bad game, not at all. I mean, I loved discussing it with my peers, especially when it came to the mystery!

Paranoia: Deliver Me

I started playing this one today and I plan on finishing it this week! 

First Impressions

Positives:

• The art and the soundtrack is beautiful, as it should be, since the game itself is about music lel
• The mood can be very spooky and me likey

Negatives:

• The translation is awful and it kinda breaks my immersion and overall enjoyment of the vn...
• Also, the voice acting isn't that good; I'm not sure if it's because I'm not used to listen to Chinese, but they all sound like they don't care about what they are saying and don't really feel the character they are playing
• The choices are damn weird, the fuck... How am I supposed to know what to do? And there's no walkthrough available out there [cries]
• THE SKIP ISN'T WORKING AAAAGH—!

Spoiler

So far, the plot is interesting enough to keep me reading (well, I'm also reading this for my reading club, so that's another reason) and I did like the "meta loop" gimmick after the Game Over I got haha

Well, this is all I've got for the week! 

[alpacaman]

2 hours ago, Leonor said:

Alrighty, one more finished! This time, I finished all the endings left from The Nonary Games.

True Ending 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Ok... this ending... I did not like it. I mean, it wasn't bad, per say, but it was very confusing, to the point that I couldn't enjoy it as much. I like a good mindfuck, as long as I can somewhat follow it.

• I still don't get how Junpei was able to connect to Akane. He wasn't in the Nonary Games, he wasn't related to her, he was only her friend. Seriously, are we gonna justify it with the fucking doll??? lmao
• I like the idea that Seven was lying about his memories and helped Santa and Akane with everything I mean, the only way I can think that Akane was able to do all this is through Santa, because of the stock market thingy.
• Finally, I just found it so ridiculous that an egyptian priestess would just walk around Nevada. Like, I understand the "ice-9" part and stuff, but how was she able to be unfrozen if the coffin didn't leave the building? I- I'm so confused lol

 

Overall, it wasn't a bad game, not at all. I mean, I loved discussing it with my peers, especially when it came to the mystery!

You mean 999 though? Its sequel Virtue's Last Reward is part of the bundle that is The Nonary Games. About the true ending:

Spoiler

One of the major twists gets kind of lost in translation, or rather port from Nintendo DS to PC. In the original the screen the narration appears on changes and through the way the scene with the sudoku is narrated it is revealed that the text on one of the screens has been told from young Akane's perspective all along. The idea is that the bond between her and Junpei is so strong the two of them can create a time paradox in order to save her life. What I personally like about this ending is it doesn't just do some Deus Ex Machina happy ending* but acknowledges how what Akane went through changed her as person, making the kind of innocent relationship she and Junpei had as children impossible. Which is why she flees while Junpei still basically chases the idea he has of her.

*also the game establishes the idea that the way how people perceive things shapes "objective" reality from early on and runs with it, so the twist doesn't even completely come out of left field. I think the priestess appearing in the desert is rather a playful nod to this overarching theme than something you should think too deeply about on a logical level.

 

[Eclipsed]

Guess what I'm reading now!

Hint: it deals with ninjas

Hint2: it's an otome

Hint3: It's Nightshade / Hyakka Hyakurou Sengoku Ninpou-chou

It's actually fascinating how many otomes are getting localized in the west... I've read some big otome titles like Code;Realize and CollarxMalice and they've always excelled at having a mature, interesting story with high stakes and Nightshade looks to be another contender

You play as female protagonist (first) Enju Ueno, a 16 year old shinobi who is the symbol of peace between two once long-feuding-but-are-now-united shinobi clans, being the daughter of the clan heads. She's the coming-of-age modest, naive, "I'm a princess but please treat me like a normal person" type who's eager to prove her worth, but everyone insists on pampering her:

 

The first tag listed on VNDB is "Life and Death Drama", this oughtta be interesting...

[fuyopon]

23 hours ago, alpacaman said:

You mean 999 though? Its sequel Virtue's Last Reward is part of the bundle that is The Nonary Games. About the true ending:

  Hide contents

One of the major twists gets kind of lost in translation, or rather port from Nintendo DS to PC. In the original the screen the narration appears on changes and through the way the scene with the sudoku is narrated it is revealed that the text on one of the screens has been told from young Akane's perspective all along. The idea is that the bond between her and Junpei is so strong the two of them can create a time paradox in order to save her life. What I personally like about this ending is it doesn't just do some Deus Ex Machina happy ending* but acknowledges how what Akane went through changed her as person, making the kind of innocent relationship she and Junpei had as children impossible. Which is why she flees while Junpei still basically chases the idea he has of her.

*also the game establishes the idea that the way how people perceive things shapes "objective" reality from early on and runs with it, so the twist doesn't even completely come out of left field. I think the priestess appearing in the desert is rather a playful nod to this overarching theme than something you should think too deeply about on a logical level.

 

Yeah, the first game. And yeah, I know about the twist thing, I've actually discussed that with my book club peers haha it's a cool thing to know!

[Inorin]

Currently playing Aselia the Eternal right now, and I'm stuck at the Kyouko/Tokimi routes. Tried the Dakkodango guide; didn't work. Tried the guide on Steam which claims that it fixes the errors in the Dakkodango guide, but I still keep seeing Uraka in Turn 10 of "Mission 14: Defend Ransa". Is this normal, or should I be seeing someone else instead? If not, who should I be seeing in Turn 10?

The choices I made are the ones required for the Kyouko/Tokimi routes, plus the first 3 choices for Lesteena (excluding the last one so that I can quickly switch over to Lesteena's route once I'm done with Kyouko's and Tokimi's routes). Could this be causing the problem (having made Lesteena-specific choices)? I've completed the first 3 routes by the way.

[Eclipsed]

Got two routes done in Nightshade, Hanzo and Gekkamaru.

So far this VN builds off of common ninja tropes such as "the client/mission always takes priority over everything else," even over your friends and family, hell, it takes it to the max in that if multiple opposing clients hire from the same ninja clan, they'll actually have no problem fighting each other:
 

As Naruto's Kakashi once said, "Those who abandon their friends are scum, but those who abandon their mission are worse than scum." ............no wait-

Naturally most of the drama in this VN will revolve around this outdated mentality, where Enju and co. will have to choose whether to follow their shinobi pride or screw it all and follow their heart in the name of friendship and love:
 
Wait 'til Enju learns that the only reason Gekkamaru has been a loyal bodyguard servant to her since she was a baby was because offfffffffffsdafkjlsdfj


The bad ends are tragically romantic. You kind of have to go out of your way to get them, since it requires you to be, uh, rather unreceptive, to the Hero for the majority of his route. I particularly liked Hanzo's bad end. He was the absolute badass perfect ninja type who slowly started to learn how to care, and to love:

...But if you don't max out them feelsies:

Spoiler

I might be sadistic or something, but I liked the bad end over the good end. The CG above is just too beautiful. Tragic, yes, but so damn beautiful..

~~
A glaring weakness with this VN however is that, two routes in, it doesn't seem like the writers created different scenarios for each Hero route. You basically get the same core conflict scenario, and just copy paste the Hero to accompany Enju and change up the confrontations. Revelations about Enju's ninja clan, the mastermind behind the conflict, are reused although explained in varying degrees based on Hero relevancy, etc. Unfortunate.

[adamstan]

So, finally, I finished Sakura Strasse.

Nice moege, but not the greatest one, and not without flaws. The biggest one was, like I stated in my first impression, a bit annoying and unrelatable protagonist. Even though VN is narrated from MCs POV (as usual), I had hard time, not even self-inserting, but just immersing. I was watching from the sidelines, like I'd watch a romcom anime. That's why completing this VN took me so long, since I had sometimes week- or two weeks- long breaks between sessions.

But when I actually read it, I enjoyed it. It's packed up with comedy, and I personally found it funnny. Heroines are cute, and while I didn't care much about MC-kun, I cared about them. Also, MC is at his worst at the prologue and first half of common route. Later on he luckily improves a bit. The only thing that doesn't change, and made me cringe and facepalm is his donkanness. LB!'s Rin was "legendary no-con", and Harumi is "legendary donkan".

As for routes themselves, I went in order Marie (main heroine) > Yuuka > Karin > Lulli.

Marie's route was nice, but ending was rather over-the-top, so it suffered from "watching from sidelines syndrome" I described earlier. But still enjoyable.

Yuuka is a (rather violent) tsundere. There are some interesting reveals in this route, and I think I perhaps enjoyed it more than main (Marie's). Also, it was amusing to see Yuuka taking lead in the H-scenes

Karin is MC's overly childish osananajimi. Her route however doesn't follow all usual osananajimi tropes, and for me it was the best one. It also made realize what bothered me about protag - he was also too childish. But in this route both he and Karin undergo quite a bit of character growth. If all routes in the game were of the same quality, overall score would be much higher.

And finally Lulli. Marie's companion and

Spoiler

actually a cat. So this is route for catgirl fans. And Harumi is mortally afraid of cats due to past trauma. This is going to be fun

Weird, but nice route. Compared to other routes, here first H-scene jumps out rather suddenly, but, interestingly, the writers actually thought about an excuse for it

Spoiler

A catgirl (who is actually a cat) in heat. Not the greatest excuse perhaps, but points for trying

Ah, yeah, H-scenes. I actually have to praise this VN for its approach to the H-content. All scenes have proper build-up (well, except first Lulli's scene ), and there's lots of love in them - in dialogs and characters attitude. I genuinely smiled through most of the Yuuka's first scene, and second Karin's scene was totally heartwarming. This VN really succeeded at showing during H-scenes how much characters care about each other. Also, somewhere during every route protagonist stated (in narration) that the greatest thing about sex for him, overshadowing the physical pleasure itself, was the feeling of unity, intimacy, being connected with each other. So, while it isn't flawless, it was perhaps one of the most wholesome eroge I've read so far (even if that might sound contradictory )

Art, music and voices were good, no complaints about that. SD CGs served well to enhance comedy parts.

So, after all, just as I predicted, it ends up with 7.5/10 score, which is kind of my base score for good, but not exactly outstanding games (or the great ones that have some annoying flaw). It was long road, but I enjoyed it, and don't regret buying and playing it.

****************************************************************************************

And now I think I'm going to read latest Konno Asta's game - Ano Hi no Tabibito, Fureau Mirai, which is kind of sequel to the Sora to Umi ga, Fureau Kanata (Adventure of a Lifetime). It is set in the same place, but features new set of characters (again MC and two heroines). The premise from the official summary sounds interesting to me, and I enjoyed previous part, so I decided to get it, since it doesn't seem like Pulltop is going to translate this one - perhaps the previous one didn't sell as much as they expected? And since anyway Pulltop's TL quality is very random, it was perhaps safer option to get original  

 

[littleshogun]

As for Pulltop's new all age VN (Anofure), I'm kind of wonder which Coldplay song that Pulltop would like to use if they decided to localize it. As for the chance of Anofure to be localized, I believe that Pulltop already prepared it with localization in mind although of course pandemic change everything so perhaps their initial plan for localization is halted for now. That said I hope that Pulltop will localized Anofure in the future, because it would be better for them to localize all age and that it looks nice.

PS - It's just too bad that Umikana is quite underrated, but I guess they're under impression that it's not as long as other localized Pulltop VNs.

[adamstan]

7 hours ago, littleshogun said:

As for Pulltop's new all age VN (Anofure), I'm kind of wonder which Coldplay song that Pulltop would like to use if they decided to localize it. As for the chance of Anofure to be localized, I believe that Pulltop already prepared it with localization in mind although of course pandemic change everything so perhaps their initial plan for localization is halted for now. That said I hope that Pulltop will localized Anofure in the future, because it would be better for them to localize all age and that it looks nice.

PS - It's just too bad that Umikana is quite underrated, but I guess they're under impression that it's not as long as other localized Pulltop VNs.

I just started reading it. The music is wonderful - you can instantly recognize that this is Pulltop VN Or rather, that it's TWO-FIVE's music. General feel and sound is similar to Konosora. I love that.

[Dreamysyu]

On 12/17/2020 at 5:43 PM, Inorin said:

Currently playing Aselia the Eternal right now, and I'm stuck at the Kyouko/Tokimi routes. Tried the Dakkodango guide; didn't work. Tried the guide on Steam which claims that it fixes the errors in the Dakkodango guide, but I still keep seeing Uraka in Turn 10 of "Mission 14: Defend Ransa". Is this normal, or should I be seeing someone else instead? If not, who should I be seeing in Turn 10?

The choices I made are the ones required for the Kyouko/Tokimi routes, plus the first 3 choices for Lesteena (excluding the last one so that I can quickly switch over to Lesteena's route once I'm done with Kyouko's and Tokimi's routes). Could this be causing the problem (having made Lesteena-specific choices)? I've completed the first 3 routes by the way.

I only used Dakkodango guide, and I didn't have any problems getting into any of the routes. It's been a while and I don't really remember, but I think it's okay that Uruka appeared in that scene. The game will make you follow Uruka's or Lesteena's route before the battle of Mallorigan, but after that you will switch to Kyoko or Tokimi if you did everything right.

[Inorin]

18 hours ago, Dreamysyu said:

I only used Dakkodango guide, and I didn't have any problems getting into any of the routes. It's been a while and I don't really remember, but I think it's okay that Uruka appeared in that scene. The game will make you follow Uruka's or Lesteena's route before the battle of Mallorigan, but after that you will switch to Kyoko or Tokimi if you did everything right.

I actually found out my issue, and it was that I didn't use New Game+ -- I had loaded a save on the prologue of my very first playthrough, which was a big no no for Tokimi/Kyouko. I had looked up the Steam guide which said that New Game+ wasn't required, which was why I thought loading a save would be fine. Turned out it wasn't fine at all LOL

Edited December 19, 2020 by Inorin

[Dreamysyu]

1 hour ago, Inorin said:

I actually found out my issue, and it was that I didn't use New Game+ -- I had loaded a save on the prologue of my very first playthrough, which was a big no no for Tokimi/Kyouko. I had looked up the Steam guide which said that New Game+ wasn't required, which was why I thought loading a save would be fine. Turned out it wasn't fine at all LOL

Yeah, that makes sense. I'm not sure if New Game+ is required, but you definitely need to restart the game from the very beginning, since these routes buid upon some scenes that only show up on your second playthrough.

I should probably also add that I've seen people having problems with gameplay in Kyouko's route. I think some unique battles in that route are basically unbeatable if your units aren't high enough level at the start of the game. At least, if you play in the hard mode.

[Stormwolf]

On 12/18/2020 at 9:17 AM, adamstan said:

So, finally, I finished Sakura Strasse.

Nice moege, but not the greatest one, and not without flaws. The biggest one was, like I stated in my first impression, a bit annoying and unrelatable protagonist. Even though VN is narrated from MCs POV (as usual), I had hard time, not even self-inserting, but just immersing. I was watching from the sidelines, like I'd watch a romcom anime. That's why completing this VN took me so long, since I had sometimes week- or two weeks- long breaks between sessions.

But when I actually read it, I enjoyed it. It's packed up with comedy, and I personally found it funnny. Heroines are cute, and while I didn't care much about MC-kun, I cared about them. Also, MC is at his worst at the prologue and first half of common route. Later on he luckily improves a bit. The only thing that doesn't change, and made me cringe and facepalm is his donkanness. LB!'s Rin was "legendary no-con", and Harumi is "legendary donkan".

As for routes themselves, I went in order Marie (main heroine) > Yuuka > Karin > Lulli.

Marie's route was nice, but ending was rather over-the-top, so it suffered from "watching from sidelines syndrome" I described earlier. But still enjoyable.

Yuuka is a (rather violent) tsundere. There are some interesting reveals in this route, and I think I perhaps enjoyed it more than main (Marie's). Also, it was amusing to see Yuuka taking lead in the H-scenes

Karin is MC's overly childish osananajimi. Her route however doesn't follow all usual osananajimi tropes, and for me it was the best one. It also made realize what bothered me about protag - he was also too childish. But in this route both he and Karin undergo quite a bit of character growth. If all routes in the game were of the same quality, overall score would be much higher.

And finally Lulli. Marie's companion and

  Reveal hidden contents

actually a cat. So this is route for catgirl fans. And Harumi is mortally afraid of cats due to past trauma. This is going to be fun

Weird, but nice route. Compared to other routes, here first H-scene jumps out rather suddenly, but, interestingly, the writers actually thought about an excuse for it

  Reveal hidden contents

A catgirl (who is actually a cat) in heat. Not the greatest excuse perhaps, but points for trying

Ah, yeah, H-scenes. I actually have to praise this VN for its approach to the H-content. All scenes have proper build-up (well, except first Lulli's scene ), and there's lots of love in them - in dialogs and characters attitude. I genuinely smiled through most of the Yuuka's first scene, and second Karin's scene was totally heartwarming. This VN really succeeded at showing during H-scenes how much characters care about each other. Also, somewhere during every route protagonist stated (in narration) that the greatest thing about sex for him, overshadowing the physical pleasure itself, was the feeling of unity, intimacy, being connected with each other. So, while it isn't flawless, it was perhaps one of the most wholesome eroge I've read so far (even if that might sound contradictory )

Art, music and voices were good, no complaints about that. SD CGs served well to enhance comedy parts.

So, after all, just as I predicted, it ends up with 7.5/10 score, which is kind of my base score for good, but not exactly outstanding games (or the great ones that have some annoying flaw). It was long road, but I enjoyed it, and don't regret buying and playing it.

****************************************************************************************

And now I think I'm going to read latest Konno Asta's game - Ano Hi no Tabibito, Fureau Mirai, which is kind of sequel to the Sora to Umi ga, Fureau Kanata (Adventure of a Lifetime). It is set in the same place, but features new set of characters (again MC and two heroines). The premise from the official summary sounds interesting to me, and I enjoyed previous part, so I decided to get it, since it doesn't seem like Pulltop is going to translate this one - perhaps the previous one didn't sell as much as they expected? And since anyway Pulltop's TL quality is very random, it was perhaps safer option to get original  

 

While the mc sounds like a woman regarding sex, this vn sounds very interesting actually. Would like a read.

[adamstan]

27 minutes ago, Stormwolf said:

While the mc sounds like a woman regarding sex,

Perhaps indeed this approach is more popular among women than men, but I actually like it, and I feel similar - although it's still purely theoretical in my case. BTW Harumi, during one of his internal monologues also said something similar - while pondering how the sex has meaning only with the loved one, and how he wouldn't like to use it just to "release the tension", he also added something like "Perhaps it's just the virgin in me speaking, but that's how I feel".

27 minutes ago, Stormwolf said:

this vn sounds very interesting actually. Would like a read.

Yeah, it has some interesting points. But if the MC managed to annoy me with his donkan-ness and emotional instability, I suppose after a while your head would hurt from all the facepalming you'd be doing Well - it's Palette's VN, and we already have some of their titles translated, so maybe one day it will get translated - who knows?

Although when it comes to Palette's untranslated VNs, I think Mashiro Iro Symphony should be done first.

Edited December 19, 2020 by adamstan

[Stormwolf]

3 hours ago, adamstan said:

Perhaps indeed this approach is more popular among women than men, but I actually like it, and I feel similar - although it's still purely theoretical in my case. BTW Harumi, during one of his internal monologues also said something similar - while pondering how the sex has meaning only with the loved one, and how he wouldn't like to use it just to "release the tension", he also added something like "Perhaps it's just the virgin in me speaking, but that's how I feel".

Yeah, it has some interesting points. But if the MC managed to annoy me with his donkan-ness and emotional instability, I suppose after a while your head would hurt from all the facepalming you'd be doing Well - it's Palette's VN, and we already have some of their titles translated, so maybe one day it will get translated - who knows?

Although when it comes to Palette's untranslated VNs, I think Mashiro Iro Symphony should be done first.

 

But that is natural for many virgin i'd think. You know what you want, but you don't know what to expect. Well, i wasn't exactly like that personally. I just wanted to get rid of my virginity and some nasty party skank did the job fairly well. But i understand the notion perfectly.

[Inorin]

Finished Eien no Aselia yesterday. Overall a decent read, but there were several issues which I had:

• The requirements for Kyouko/Tokimi are too complicated
• Main antagonist is as generic as it gets
• Main story doesn't diverge much in all routes except Kyouko/Tokimi and Lesteena. After the first playthrough (with Aselia), I sort of understood the direction which the other routes would take. So I basically replayed the game multiple times just to get a few unread lines in between and a different epilogue.
• Too many battles. Sure, I can just press 'l' to skip the battle, but the fact that there are so many battles means that I had to press 'l' multiple times to skip them, when the skip function should have already done that.

Final rating: 7.8/10

And now on to Seinarukana, the sequel to Eien no Aselia. Honestly, I have no idea how the route order even works, since I can't seem to find any solid walkthroughs in English online. I'm aware that there are 6 routes, and so far I only know of potential 3: Nozimi, Satsuki, Narukana. What about the other 3? In general, I know that Narukana requires NG+, but are there any other requirements for routes which I should know of? Where can I find JP walkthroughs for this? I'm only at Chapter 2, so a route hasn't decided yet, but I read that Chapter 8 is the divergence point, so I'm not sure what to do when the time comes.

[Dreamysyu]

10 hours ago, Inorin said:

• Main story doesn't diverge much in all routes except Kyouko/Tokimi and Lesteena. After the first playthrough (with Aselia), I sort of understood the direction which the other routes would take. So I basically replayed the game multiple times just to get a few unread lines in between and a different epilogue.
• Too many battles. Sure, I can just press 'l' to skip the battle, but the fact that there are so many battles means that I had to press 'l' multiple times to skip them, when the skip function should have already done that.

Overall, yeah, I personally thought that linearity was a bit unsatisfying. To be honest, after finishing it I personally believe that Aselia is the game that you play twice for the story (since New Game+ adds enough new content to make the whole game worth replaying), but you should only aim to finish all the routes if you really like the gameplay. If you enjoy the gameplay, then the multiple route system gives you a chance to play the game more, and there is a bonus that you get some information about the world and the characters only in certain routes. If you don't like the gameplay, then playing one route will give you enough information about the whole story to make replaying really unnecessary.

Which brings me to the next point.

10 hours ago, Inorin said:

I'm aware that there are 6 routes, and so far I only know of potential 3: Nozimi, Satsuki, Narukana. What about the other 3?

There are 6 routes: Nozomi, Satsuki, Narukana, Katima, Ruputna, and Naya. I personally only finished 4 out of 6 routes, and, honestly, I literally don't see any reason to play all of them. There's literally even less difference between routes than in Aselia. Just a few lines and h-scenes here and there, and the last chapter is a bit different, but that's it. The only exception is Satsuki's route which adds some interesting stuff in the middle that you don't get in any other route (and introduces a major plot hole). So, honestly, I'd recommend to play Satsuki and then Narukana and skip everything else. If you really want to finish every route, play Nozomi before Satsuki and other routes after Narukana.

10 hours ago, Inorin said:

I know that Narukana requires NG+, but are there any other requirements for routes which I should know of? 

No, every other route is unlocked from the very beginning.

I personally recommend playing Satsuki before Narukana, or you may be a bit lost.

10 hours ago, Inorin said:

Honestly, I have no idea how the route order even works, since I can't seem to find any solid walkthroughs in English online.

I never found one myself. And the problem is that the guides that exist kind of contradict each other. Overall, the route system is more straightforward than in Aselia, so you don't really need a walkthrough.

Basically all you need to know:

• Narukana's route is the easiest to get into. There's a choice in a dream sequence in chapter 8 that only appear on your second playthrough which lets you choose between "Continue watching" or "Reach out for her". If you choose the later, you're locked into her route. That's it.
• All the other routes are decided by the number of affection point you have with a heroine. You can get affection point by:

1. Choosing dialogue options that favor the heroine in some way.
2. Putting her into the the same squad as the MC and using this squad to defeat enemy squads marked with a heart. This is the biggest difference with Aselia where any enemy squad works.
3. Putting the heroine into the same squad as the MC and letting her get an MVP, which means to defeat the highest number of enemies in the battle. I believe, this gives you the highest number of affection points.

• In the end you get into the route with the heroine that has the highest number of affection points. That's it.

Edited December 20, 2020 by Dreamysyu
small correction

[Eclipsed]

Ever since getting my Switch I've been pretty active in checking what the upcoming releases are and whatnot (on the console's news app itself, not browsing the web)
And apparently they did like 0 marketing cuz I didn't see squat about Abyss of the Sacrifice meanwhile Sephiroth DLC for Smash Ultimate is making headlines everywhere

Anyways it just released recently for Steam and Switch with a decently steep asking price of $39.99 (Steam has a 20% off launch deal for you PC masterraces)

Abyss is a remaster of its 2010 PSP version and it's basically a trapped / escape room type VN involving 5 high school girls stuck in some sci-fi-ish underground facility and has typical mystery elements like why are they there, what the facility is all about, etc.

I'm a big Zero Escape fan so I went ahead and jumped the gun, the scary thing though is that this VN is obscure enough that even VNDB doesn't list its length, so I pray this isn't some < 10 hr experience LOL but the game does take up a sizeable 6.2GB so hopefully they got a decently lengthy script to go with all those assets.

The escape room puzzles themselves are nothing too special, typically take only 5-15 minutes, but have a huge quality variance, ranging from standard easy peasy just finding all the necessary items and applying them correctly to the various contraptions via trial and error, to headache inducing mindstopper decoding shit that basically require you be the developer to know wtf they were thinking when they made that puzzle (though I might just suck, for the record though I never had to use a guide for any of Zero Escape's puzzles and already ragequitted one or two of these LOL)

IDK GIRL, JUST GOOGLE IT!!!!

The VN plays in stages/chapters, with each chapter featuring an escape puzzle and heroine specific background lore, with a successful completion returning you to the main flowchart to pick from another heroine to playthrough as the group slowly but surely learns more about the facility and the state of the world:

So far I'm about 5-6hrs in, the group is together and have a few quarrels but overall the atmosphere is neutral-positive. The intro PV does hint at some dark shenanigans happening later though, so that'll be something to (not) look forward to.

Blood:

Spoiler

 

[Seraphim]

2 hours ago, Eclipsed said:

IDK GIRL, JUST GOOGLE IT!!!!

This picture made my mind prepared for hacking. Maybe I should dial down my game time in Cyberpunk a bit.

[adamstan]

I just finished Ano Hi no Tabibito, Fureau Mirai

It was just like its predecessor - short, but good. Although I wouldn't mind, if it was longer. Still, if publishers prefer to release smaller titles, I think I'd rather have such stanadalone short VN over episodic releases.

Almost all characters from Sora to Umi ga, Fureau Kanata reappear as side characters in Anofure as well, so the cast is bigger than in previous game.

The story begins with Yuuri (MC) coming to Chichijima island, looking for Tamaki. Tamaki was Yuuri's girlfriend during middle school when she was manager of athletic club Yuuri was member of. He was great sprinter, and his dream was to win the Olympic Games But after graduation, Tamaki became an actress, and this caused them to drift away from each other, since they went to different schools, and didn't have chances to meet. Then one day she suddenly retired, disappearing from show business world. After learning that she has retreated to Chichijima, he goes there wanting to get some closure, and at least say proper farewell.

On the way to the place where Tamaki is supposed to be staying, he meets strange girl sitting on the side of the road, and doing one-man-show with Hamu-chan, a mascott character from children magical girl anime "Prettier" ("Pretty Cure" reference? ). It's Eri - shy girl, who dreams about becoming voice actress. For that reason, she wants to try working at local radio station "Bonin FM", which is supposed to be at the top of the hill. Incidentally, that's the same place Yuuri is heading to, but as far as he knows, it shoud be "Sunset Station" hotel

It turns out that indeed former hotel has been trasformed into radio station. And that station is on the verge of bankrupcy, since apparently nobody listens to it.

Spoiler

Because, as it turns out later, almost nobody on the island owns a radio receiver

Tamaki is also there, but she's in pretty miserable state, and Yuuri cannot believe, that it's the same girl he used to date.

To protect the place for Tamaki to recover, to help Eri chase after her dream, and to have some place to sleep (since he didn't take enough money to afford proper hotel ) the three start to live at the station and do their own show, in attempt to gather new listeners and drive away the looming shut-down.

The school club or other institution at the verge of collapse. and group of teenagers trying to save it - yeah, that classic Konno we all love (or not ). We've seen it already multiple times - Soaring Club, Stargazing Club, or even the school (and later, whole world) in ATRI, and now Bonin FM station - but I'm still not tired of it  

There are two routes selected through game's only choice near the end of common route.

I started with Tamaki's route.

Spoiler

It turns out that the harsh world of showbiz was too much for teenage girl, and it broke her. She lost herself in acting - doing so not only for the movies, but also acting out the character she thought others are expecting her to be. Suddenly she realized, that she forgot who she really is, and then became unable to speak in front of microphone.

After hiding at Chichijima she spends most of her time eating junk food and playing FPS shooters over the net, swearing to never ever work again.

Later on she confesses to Yuuri, that when they were dating she's also been acting the part of girl she thought he would like.

Tamaki's route's main theme seems to be accepting one's and other's true self, without resorting to acting. And of course it's the story of reunion between former lovers. Nice.

Then there's Eri.

Eri is very shy and has almost no confidence in herself. Her family - especially her older brother Ryouta - keep treating her like a little child who cannot do anything on her own. And her route revolves around overcoming that shyness and gaining the confidence needed to make the dream into a goal, and then reality.

Eri's relationship with her mascott Hamu-chan is very much - almost exactly - like Majikoi's Mayucchi and her Matsukaze - quite funny

After seeing the prologue one could easily think that Tamaki would be main heroine, but I actually feel like Eri's route is more fleshed out, and it has longer epilogue. Still, I enjoyed both.

Recently I've been listening from time to time to japanese local radio stations - which are called "Community FM" over there - and this VN captures the mood and formula of those stations pretty well. There's also one Konosora easter egg/reference:

Spoiler

When one day Yuuri listens to some other local station on his phone, looking for reference, there's message from a listener - a girl using the nickname Habanero Kotorinu

All in all, it was very enjoyable experience, even if a bit short. But no major complaints - 8/10 from me - same score I gave to Sora to Umi ga, Fureau Kanata.

***************************************************

And now I'm actually a bit lost, not knowing what to read next... There are so many titles in my backlog to choose from... Sukimazakura to Uso no Machi? Flyable Heart? Bokuten? Or maybe I should finally tackle Grisaia? Or something else?

Basically, this is my "immediate backlog"

 

Spoiler

 

			Akenai Yoru ga Kuru Mae ni
			Boku ga Tenshi ni Natta Wake
			Boukyaku Shitsuji to Koi Suru Ojou-sama no Memoir
			Brass Restoration
			Clannad - Hikari Mimamoru Sakamichi de
			Corona Blossom
			Cosmos no Sora ni
			Deep Love Diary -Koibito Nikki-
			Dengeki Stryker
			Enigma:
			Eve: Burst Error
			Flyable Heart
			Fu'un to Kou'un to Koi Uranai no Tarot
			Fuyu Uso -Snow World End-
			Gogatsu no Sora.
			Grisaia no Kajitsu -Le Fruit de la Grisaia-
			Grisaia no Meikyuu -Le Labyrinthe de la Grisaia-
			Grisaia no Rakuen -Le Eden de la Grisaia-
			Hachigatsu ga Me ni Shimiru
			Hachigatsu no Nostalgia ~The Summer with You~
			Harmonia
			Hatsukoi * Syndrome
			Himawari
			Hoshi Ori Yume Mirai
			Hoshizora no Memoria -Wish upon a Shooting Star-
			Hoshizora ☆ Planet
			Idol Mahou Shoujo Chiruchiru ☆ Michiru
			Kimi no Nagori wa Shizuka ni Yurete
			Kimi no Tonari de Koishiteru!
			Kimi to Hajimeru Dasanteki na Love Come
			Kisaragi Gold ★ Star
			Koiiro Soramoyou
			Koiken Otome
			Koioto Se Piace
			Koishiki Manual
			Kono Aozora ni Yakusoku o
			LoveKami -Divinity Stage-
			LoveKami -Useless Goddess-
			Lucy - Geunyeoga Baladeon Geos -
			Maitetsu
			Moonlight ~Omoide no Hajimari~
			Nanatsuiro★Drops
			Nora to Oujo to Noraneko Heart
			Pia Carrot e Youkoso!! ~We've Been Waiting for You~
			Pure Love!
			Root Double -Before Crime * After Days-
			Shichigatsu ga Mimi ni Tsuku
			Shuffle!
			Snow Rain
			Snow Rain 2 ~ fragment of the heart ~

			Sono Hana ga Saitara, Mata Boku wa Kimi ni Deau
			Sorairo
			Steins;Gate
			Sukimazakura to Uso no Machi
			Symphonic Rain
			Te to Te Try on!
			Tokimeki Check-in!
			Toradora! Portable
			True Love Story
			Uminomichi
			White Album

 

 

 

 

- what should I choose...?

 

 

Edited December 22, 2020 by adamstan

[adamstan]

Today I started reading PSP version of Kono Aozora ni Yakusoku o

It's one of the VN I found while clicking on random screenshots on vndb front page. The description caught my attention, with the setting and kind of nostalgic mood. Let's see how it turns out.