What are you playing?

[Canicheslayer]

I'm reading/playing it too. 30 hours on it (All that remains is the "true route" part) ...I absolutely adore the art, the music, most of the characters (Mayumi ), the cyberpunk universe....and the narration is terrifically interesting. But you have to read/play it little by little. Because, it's so exhausting (route C or D were more or less OK. However my poor brain wasn't prepared to Route E)

Edit : Indeed, It's too bad we can't find I/O's OST

[Turnip Sensei]

Tokyo Babel is pretty swell. I already read Raziel's route, I just couldn't stop partway.

Here's some random non-spoilery impressions, partly because I'm tired and partly because I feel it's important to hype good new VNs.

• Tokyo Babel is damn cool. Character and monster designs, chuuni dialog, fight scenes... Tension, excitement and "Hell Yeah"-feelings are really strong most of the time.
• The music is really good, both the melancholic pieces and the high-tension battle music.
• It's surprisingly humorous. Some amount of humor is always expected, but Tokyo Babel manages to be really hilarious at times, and in a way that doesn't distract from the serious parts.
• The setting is really fascinating in Tokyo Babel and so are it's themes. Since the setting is based on Christian mythology it should come as no surprise that it's filled with religious themes, but at times Tokyo Babel managed to still really impress me. Without going to too much detail, there's some pretty intriguing stuff about topics like faith, immortality, and of course reason for being -- "raison d'être".   
• Oh yeah, the translation is top notch too. It sounds very natural during normal conversations as it should, and more importantly suitably theatrical when it needs to.

So yeah, it's great. I can't wait to see what the other routes have to offer.

[Suzu Fanatic]

2 hours ago, Turnip Sensei said:

Tokyo Babel is pretty swell. I already read Raziel's route, I just couldn't stop partway.

Here's some random non-spoilery impressions, partly because I'm tired and partly because I feel it's important to hype good new VNs.

• Tokyo Babel is damn cool. Character and monster designs, chuuni dialog, fight scenes... Tension, excitement and "Hell Yeah"-feelings are really strong most of the time.
• The music is really good, both the melancholic pieces and the high-tension battle music.
• It's surprisingly humorous. Some amount of humor is always expected, but Tokyo Babel manages to be really hilarious at times, and in a way that doesn't distract from the serious parts.
• The setting is really fascinating in Tokyo Babel and so are it's themes. Since the setting is based on Christian mythology it should come as no surprise that it's filled with religious themes, but at times Tokyo Babel managed to still really impress me. Without going to too much detail, there's some pretty intriguing stuff about topics like faith, immortality, and of course reason for being -- "raison d'être".   
• Oh yeah, the translation is top notch too. It sounds very natural during normal conversations as it should, and more importantly suitably theatrical when it needs to.

So yeah, it's great. I can't wait to see what the other routes have to offer.

I'm in love with it mostly, too. My heart hurts seeing it have such a weak reception.

 

If I had an issue (besides some pacing problems), I'm not really into how MG conveyed Sorami's manner of written dialouge - it feels "off" compared to her voiceactor. Plus cheesy things like "gosh darn"...I mean, WHO SAYS THAT?! Might be because she was also Tohsaka Rin (I think? sure sounds like her VA), so some of the re-imagined dialouge is a bit jarring.

 

I'm ok with the rest of the localization though~

[Mr Poltroon]

4 hours ago, Eclipsed said:

What's I/O about? Is it just mindscrew after mindscrew after mindscrew Retro Sci-Fi style?

I couldn't stand it. After about half an hour the narration irked me so much I ragequit. I don't think I even gave it a fair chance.

[CatSoul]

I'm playing Yume Miru Kusuri at the moment. It's sort of a mixed bag.

The protagonist is a douche, but the girls are sweet. The eroge is well-written, but gratuitous at times. And why is there no route for the little sister? The protagonist is spending all this time building up relationships with the girls, meanwhile he has like a nukige level of sexual tension with his little sister. And then she just kinda fades out.

[Turnip Sensei]

18 hours ago, Suzu Fanatic said:

I'm in love with it mostly, too. My heart hurts seeing it have such a weak reception.

 

If I had an issue (besides some pacing problems), I'm not really into how MG conveyed Sorami's manner of written dialouge - it feels "off" compared to her voiceactor. Plus cheesy things like "gosh darn"...I mean, WHO SAYS THAT?! Might be because she was also Tohsaka Rin (I think? sure sounds like her VA), so some of the re-imagined dialouge is a bit jarring.

 

I'm ok with the rest of the localization though~

I actually really like the way Sorami's speech is portrayed in the translation. She already says weird things in Japanese and in strangely energetic way, so in my head the 'gosh darn' blabbering Sorami is perfect match for her voice acting. 

And I just really like how Sorami talks in general. Some of my favorite lines from Tokyo Babel so far came from Sorami blurting out something really heavy in really mundane and natural way, like it would be the most obvious thing in the world.

[Vorathiel]

12 hours ago, Canicheslayer said:

I'm reading/playing it too. 30 hours on it (All that remains is the "true route" part) ...I absolutely adore the art, the music, most of the characters (Mayumi ), the cyberpunk universe....and the narration is terrifically interesting. But you have to read/play it little by little. Because, it's so exhausting (route C or D were more or less OK. However my poor brain wasn't prepared to Route E)

Edit : Indeed, It's too bad we can't find I/O's OST

It's decoded in 'BGM.arc' file, but sadly I couldn't extract it with any program I have.

I also play it little by little. In last few days I watched whole House Of Cards season 4, whole Heroes Of Might and Magic campaign on youtube (around 45 hours), and read maybe 6 hours of I/O... but I still feel, that I/O cost me the most. But it's great, I love how focus demanding it is.

And yeah, keep me in fear of route E. Can't wait to see that!

I don't really like structure though. Although it fits with setting moe straightforward aproach than all those 1.0 and 0.1 ending and then also routes " ' " is just...unnecessary.

[Arcadeotic]

Replaying Dracu-riot! a.k.a my most favorite moege, period.

Starting with Rio's route, and it still has the best ichaicha I've ever seen

The heartburns are real, and I can't stop smiling

This fantastic

[Canicheslayer]

8 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

I also play it little by little. In last few days I watched whole House Of Cards season 4, whole Heroes Of Might and Magic campaign on youtube (around 45 hours), and read maybe 6 hours of I/O... but I still feel, that I/O cost me the most. But it's great, I love how focus demanding it is.

Good. You're wiser than me. I did make the mistake to read, without a real pause (and so I neglected Gahkthun), routes B, C, D (0,1 & 1.0) and E

Quote

And yeah, keep me in fear of route E. Can't wait to see that!

Prepare the aspirin and don't lose your sanity

Quote

I don't really like structure though. Although it fits with setting moe straightforward aproach than all those 1.0 and 0.1 ending and then also routes " ' " is just...unnecessary

Yes, their intentions were good. I really love originality but It's more confusing and frustrating (seriously, Route A or B 0.1...) than anything...I Hope Root Double will be different

10 hours ago, CatSoul said:

I'm playing Yume Miru Kusuri at the moment. [...]And why is there no route for the little sister? The protagonist is spending all this time building up relationships with the girls, meanwhile he has like a nukige level of sexual tension with his little sister. And then she just kinda fades out.

I read somewhere it was a question of budget for the developer, rúf.

[john 'mr. customer' smith]

So I finally finished Sekien no Inganock. it was satisfying, beautiful, but still probably too complicated and allegorical for me to truly appreciate it outside of its art

[CatSoul]

I ended up finishing Shiraki's route in Yume Miru Kusuri last night by staying up until 3:30 in the morning. Totally worth all the BS. Without spoiling much, the last hour or so of reading was top-notch. Overall, I'd give it a 7/10, primarily for its rough start.

[Fred the Barber]

2 hours ago, john 'mr. customer' smith said:

So I finally finished Sekien no Inganock. it was satisfying, beautiful, but still probably too complicated and allegorical for me to truly appreciate it outside of its art

Maybe I'm just too dense to notice it, but I don't think there are any "big" allegories or complications that you should be looking for or be worried about, in Inganock. My feeling from both Inganock and Gahkthun was that the Steampunk series is actually about telling rather simple stories about human emotions and motivations, using a big, fantastic setting and somewhat complicated plot to really bring out the most of that emotional impact.

At any rate, fiction is a work of art created by an author and a reader - so don't let me or anybody else take away from it what you found there

[MrBanballow]

Finished off the first portion of "ef - the first tale", but probably gonna set it aside for a few days before I go back to finish it. In the meantime, I got a few new HCs in from JList, so I'll probably give either Hanachirasu or Raidy III a look.

[the_dive]

Finished the Partial translation of dracu-riot. Plot is pretty meh, the whole vampire plot thing's been overdone so I found noble works better. Also the plot is more predictable than shyamalan's The Visit

Translation is definitely australian. Also memes.

Gonna read tokyo babel now. Have high hopes since its by the same dudes who did ayakashibito.

[Vorathiel]

Grisaia. Amane route. I'm right after the rain 

Spoiler

felt for a first time during retrospectin, I also had a scene, where Amane was playing cards with other girls, and betting chocolate against some candies.

How long till this segment will end? Everything without Makina is just booooooring, even if idea is interesting (and that segment had great ideas behind it!), writting is dragging on so much, it just kills pacing.

[Fred the Barber]

Having finished Steins;Gate, I'm back on Fruit of Grisaia, resuming Sachi's route (my first route). It's enjoyable so far (I'm in the middle of a very long flashback sequence), but there's a small part of me that agrees with this:

3 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Everything without Makina is just booooooring

For me, Makina and Michiru are the spices that make everything else in Grisaia better.

[Funyarinpa]

Just now, Fred the Barber said:

Having finished Steins;Gate, I'm back on Fruit of Grisaia, resuming Sachi's route (my first route). It's enjoyable so far (I'm in the middle of a very long flashback sequence), but there's a small part of me that agrees with this:

For me, Makina and Michiru are the spices that make everything else in Grisaia better.

Grisaia's common route is top tier banter and Amane's route is great

Yuuji is great

Yumiko has some p. great sex scenes

Didn't care much for the rest of Grisaia tbh

Should read Makina route sometime

7/10

 

[Vorathiel]

17 minutes ago, Fred the Barber said:

For me, Makina and Michiru are the spices that make everything else in Grisaia better.

Michiru is overloud with her non stoping screams, but while I didn't liked her at beginning, I started to feel sad for her in Amane route and now I just can't not sympathize with her. Poor thing.

15 minutes ago, Funyarinpa said:

Grisaia's common route is top tier banter and Amane's route is great
Yuuji is great
Yumiko has some p. great sex scenes
7/10

Grisaia is another Sharin no Kuni for me. Overly praised, one of the worst written, rarely funny, cancerous, with sometimes bad ass protagonist (who is just shit as any other protag when comes to things that matter), overly stupid in terms of cast and events and also boring things I've ever read. I disagree with everything you have wrote here. Although haven't read Yumiko route yet, Amane's h-scenes were disasterous. So far her route is around 2/10, and her retrospection is around 3/10. Sigh. (Common was between 5-6). But I will manage and finish it. Maybe routes written by somebody else (Michiru, Yumiko and Sacchi) will be better.

[Kawasumi]

4 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Grisaia. Amane route. I'm right after the rain 

  Reveal hidden contents

felt for a first time during retrospectin, I also had a scene, where Amane was playing cards with other girls, and betting chocolate against some candies.

How long till this segment will end? Everything without Makina is just booooooring, even if idea is interesting (and that segment had great ideas behind it!), writting is dragging on so much, it just kills pacing.

I dont agree with you on the writing, just the pacing lol

[Vorathiel]

Just now, Kawasumi said:

I dont agree with you on the writing, just the pacing lol

What I mean by writing is that this writer tends to focus on unimportant stuff, leaving the better parts in some short summary.
There was a scene in common route. Michiru and Amane were making gyoza dumplings. Scene was around 15 or more minutes long. There was nothing but talking about making food. Preparing ingredients, choping the cabbage, etc.
Then came Makina and said she wants some too. ... and then came starry sky background with narration from Yuuji: 'after that he and Makina went to other girls to persuade them to came to his room for gyoza party, then gyoza party was happening, everybody was throwing in their favourite leftover ingredients, making a lot of intersting tastes, etc. Then there was a lot of funny dialogues, laughter, and party lasted till late night.' End of scene.

So he focused on making food, without any meaning to this, and left interesting character interaction part completly untouched. And there is A LOT of scenes like that. Even in this retrospection in Amane route:
 

Spoiler

long scene about dog's race and why he can't drink water directly from the river. Instead of showing group dynamics in this terrible situation, which would be really interesting (I love the lesbian couple characters in this, want more about them!), whe have 15 minutes long pointless dog oriented scene.

And so on, and so on and so on and I'm asleep. Thankfully this retrospection is better than 'proper' Amane route, which was annoying (Yuuji actions towards Amane), iritating (Amane bahaviour) and sad (Michiru situations).

[Fred the Barber]

1 hour ago, Vorathiel said:

rarely funny

I knew you and I had different tastes, but damn. The Grisaia common route was approximately the funniest thing ever. Different strokes for different folks, though.

[Vorathiel]

2 minutes ago, Fred the Barber said:

I knew you and I had different tastes, but damn. The Grisaia common route was approximately the funniest thing ever. Different strokes for different folks, though.

Obviously.

But I have a theory why humour rarely worked on me here. In Majikoi, or even MuvLuv Extra I was in constant 'happy' mode, jokes were appearing just one after another, one laughter was providing another, and so on. Chain reaction almost.

While in Grisaia was like that: boring-boring-boring-boring-joke-boring-boring-joke-joke-boring-boring-boring-joke, etc. There was no constant time of laughter, every funny scene was [abruptly cut, but this is a matter for different post] between a lot of boring stuff, and my 'laughter metter' was just down to zero, and one joke can't make me laugh in an isntant. I must have a good humour, and boring stuff i nGrisaia common route was just draining me of my humour.

Or maybe i'll write it right here - jokes in Grisaia are abruptly cut. There were a few really nice scenes. Nothing super funny, nothing laughter idicating, but nice. I was smiling, the hype was building, everything was going to really funny climax of the scene... but it never happened. And I was left dumbfounded and almost embarassed that I'm smiling. It was a few times. I remember now one example - scene with nicknames. It was funny scene, started funny, laugh meter was rising, Makina was super funny, and Yuuji finally 'snaped' and started giving everybody ultra simple nicknames (it was  Sachin, Makin, Aman, or something similiar) and.... Boom, another scene. Nothing happened, no conclusion, no 'joke'. Just buildup. And where is build up and no pay off - that's a failed attempt at comedy, it really is depressing, because you're preparing yourself for laughter, you want to laugh, and you're left with nothing, and it just depress you, draining humour meter to almost zero.

Another thing - I don't like to laugh when dumb people doing dumb things. Or when people are clumsy. That's why I started to sympathize with Michiru. Scene when they were making a clay figures, and she did a horrible undoggy dog, was just sad. She was trying her best, and everybody were cruely laughing at her. Not funny at all.

[kingdomcome]

38 minutes ago, Vorathiel said:

She was trying her best, and everybody were cruely laughing at her.

There seemed to be a bit of this in Grisaia; bullying pretty much. It had the same effect on me.

It think the VN that gave me the most smiles and audible chuckles was Princess Evangile.

[Vorathiel]

I didn't read the spoiler in your post.
But sort of agree with you - this is not a bullying per se. It's just mocking. Laughing at stupidity of one, procuring situations in which the stupid one would be even more stupid. Contrast is strong, situations are often ridiculous, so objective obtained.
Maybe that's fun for some people. For me - not much. It seems to me like Adam Sandler type of comedy - stupid people doing stupid stuff.

5 posts above I wrote about bad writing in Grisaia, giving one example. Now I found second, much stronger one.

Amane route spoilers.

Which is better? Decide for yourself (but please excuse my pooor grammar and vocabulary. that's not the point)

Version 1:

 

Spoiler

Then Hirooka thanks Amane for wiping, we're back in 'present time' and scene ends.

Version 2:

 

Spoiler

"That white spots on her body... it was mold. And it was itchy.
I dropped the moderately hot towel against Hirooka sans body, and began to wipe. The mold came off cleanly, but underneath, there were innumerable angry, swollen red welts, where fingernails had dug into her flesh.
'You really need to try not to scratch, remember?' I said to Hirooka, while looking at her fresh scratch wounds.
'...I'm sorry... I just... couldn't... stand it...'
I finished wiping Hirooka san's body. It seemed to her like a blisfull experience.
'Amane, thank you.' - she said with a delicate smile on her sunken face. Freed from unmanagable itchiness, she quickly fallen asleep.
(...)
'Kazuki, we need to talk' I said quietly. 'It's about Hirooka'.
'Spit it out' - Kazuki encouraged me.
'When I wiped mold of her body, I found that she was scratching herself nearly to blood. Her whole body is swollen and red. I told her to stop doing this, but she said that her itchines is too strong for her to bear. I'm afraid that she will harm herself.'
'Scratching makes mold spread across her body much faster.' Kazuki answered with troubled face. 'That's a problem. For tonight we can try restrain her hands and just look how it went tomorrow'.
Hirooka was still asleep, when we tied her arms to tent's posts. We left her some loose, but not enough that she was able to reach her body.
(...went to sleep...)
DATE CHANGE, 4:22 A.M.

'AAAAAARRRRRGHHHH!!!'
Sudden scream woke me up instantely. I looked up on Kazuki's face and saw in her eyes that she also already knew. She knew that this scream was our fault.
Without even second of hestitation we run to our hospital tent.
'GHYYYAAAARGH!!!'
It was Hirooka. Her itchiness was such a torment, she was wirthing her hands against her restraints, and scrathing her injured body against hard ground.
Her face was almost unrecognizable. Gnarled in agony, with tears flowing across her cheeks, and her teeth bitting her lips in short pauses between her terryfying screams.
'Hirooka!' I shouted while trying to immobilize her.
'Keep her down Amane, I will boil a water and bring fresh towels' Kazuki shortly said and left the tent.
(...)
'I'm so sorry Hirooka san' I wept while wiping her body. She was so exausted from all the screaming and writhing, that she nearly felt unconscious.
'I'll promise that I'll come to you as often as possible, and wipe you whenever you'll need it.
(...)"

The end of scene.

And that's why Grisaia just angers me. They make good, possibly blood pumping situations...non existent. Instead we are getting a lot of fillers.
But I must add I started to really like this segment. No VN ever made me feel creepy disgust and literally itchiness. That's great.

[andzalot55]

Trying to play Koi Senkyo to Chocolate but I'm too distracted with Conception II.