What are you playing?

[Ranzo]

Finished playing Sound Of The Drop and I have to say that I quite liked it though I wasn't blown away by it. A lot of the horror seemed a bit goofy and the ending wasn't mesmerizing. What I think is remarkable is that they were able to improve so much with Fatal 12.

 

Also this marks 100 vns I've managed to play so far it's kind of hard to believe that I took this long to get there(Though I was on a long sabbatical from the genre.)

Edited February 26, 2019 by Ranzo

[r0xm2n]

Playing ISLAND....

Spoiler

I make ONE incorrect choice, and I get stabbed to death in a sudden bad ending! WTF!?

 

...... yep, I can see that this is made my the same makers as Himawari (and even set in the same universe). That VN loves making you very paranoid too.....

[littleshogun]

Seeing that I still didn't play anything yet, I figure that it's about time to continue with Paulette's route in Maitetsu. Once again let's see whether I can finish it or not.

[Seraphim]

I'm an hour-or-so into Rewrite and I'm already sick of using the map. It's beyond me how anyone could think it would be a good idea to force the player to move the mouse cursor over basically every pixel on the map in order to find hidden map points. This isn't the right way to implement gameplay elements in a visual novel.

Are any of these map points actually required to get quests and whatnot, or can I safely ignore them without missing anything else than some additional dialogue?

EDIT: I just got a friend addition from one of those map points, so it seems some of them are mandatory in order to fill out the memory list, meaning I'll actually have to scour the entire map in search of them.
This VN has given me a pretty terrible first impression. I sincerely hope there aren't any other tedious elements I'll have to endure.

Edited February 27, 2019 by Seraphim88

[Fred the Barber]

1 hour ago, Seraphim88 said:

Are any of these map points actually required to get quests and whatnot, or can I safely ignore them without missing anything else than some additional dialogue?

EDIT: I just got a friend addition from one of those map points, so it seems some of them are mandatory in order to fill out the memory list, meaning I'll actually have to scour the entire map in search of them.
This VN has given me a pretty terrible first impression. I sincerely hope there aren't any other tedious elements I'll have to endure.

Yeah, if you want to truly complete everything (and in particular, if you want to get the joke ending) you have to do literally everything... but I dunno how feasible that even is on your own. I basically did what you said you're doing, and I still missed a bunch of things. You've got two reasonable options:

• use an online guide, which will suck all the joy out of it
• accept that you don't need to see everything and that the game tells a whole and complete story without needing to see the joke ending (this is what I did)

And I suppose a third option where you first do the second bullet point, and then do the first bullet point because you feel you really need to see the joke ending.

[Ranzo]

3 minutes ago, Fred the Barber said:

Yeah, if you want to truly complete everything (and in particular, if you want to get the joke ending) you have to do literally everything... but I dunno how feasible that even is on your own. I basically did what you said you're doing, and I still missed a bunch of things. You've got two reasonable options:

• use an online guide, which will suck all the joy out of it
• accept that you don't need to see everything and that the game tells a whole and complete story without needing to see the joke ending (this is what I did)

And I suppose a third option where you first do the second bullet point, and then do the first bullet point because you feel you really need to see the joke ending.

There is a forth option and it is to download a 100% save after they have finished the vn and get it that way. That's what I did since there was no way in hell I would jump all those exhausting hoops.

[Dreamysyu]

3 hours ago, Seraphim88 said:

I'm an hour-or-so into Rewrite and I'm already sick of using the map. It's beyond me how anyone could think it would be a good idea to force the player to move the mouse cursor over basically every pixel on the map in order to find hidden map points. This isn't the right way to implement gameplay elements in a visual novel.

Are any of these map points actually required to get quests and whatnot, or can I safely ignore them without missing anything else than some additional dialogue?

EDIT: I just got a friend addition from one of those map points, so it seems some of them are mandatory in order to fill out the memory list, meaning I'll actually have to scour the entire map in search of them.
This VN has given me a pretty terrible first impression. I sincerely hope there aren't any other tedious elements I'll have to endure.

If you are feeling irritated, you can safely skip those imo. There are some hilarious scenes that you can only see if you look for these markers, but they aren't required for the main story. And you can't even find all of them if you don't complete all routes of the game beforehand.

As for the joke ending, I personally never got that. It's supposed to be the best thing ever or something, but to reach it you literally need to find absolutely every marker in the game, so I just didn't bother with that (and I was too stubborn to just get the 100% save file).

[Seraphim]

Thanks for the answers! I've decided to not worry about it too much for now and just do whatever stuff shows up on the map while I'm heading for my destination. If I have the patience for it, I might use a guide to go back and do it all after I'm done with the main story, or maybe I'll just pick up a 100% file by then to watch that ending you've mentioned.

[PrincessOfFinch]

I've been playing Subarashiki Hibi all day. I've only just got to It's My Own Invention but man, this VN is amazing so far. I'm in love

[ittaku]

So after playing VNs for 20 years with heavy emphasis on moege and charage, I finally gave in and purchased Fruit of Grisaia after being told by so many people how good it is in terms of story, writing and how solid the localisation is. The first thing that struck me is the game is wordy... long.. I mean real fucking long. Huge passages are spent on exposition with lots of what the MC is thinking, his take on the world at large, plenty of backstory that continually fills in as you progress and how it fits in with the route as you're playing it. The writing is solid indeed and thought provoking. The heroines are all reasonably interesting, though after having played so many VNs, there was nothing new in their personalities I hadn't seen before. The localisation is indeed solid; on my rating it almost reaches a 9/10. The only reason I wouldn't give it a 9 is that I know enough Japanese to see certain less than ideal choices in translation though none of them are massive fails, and all nuance was captured, so it's easily an 8.5 (This is my localisation rating, not my rating for the game itself.)

So I planned to start out with Makina's route since she was the least appealing heroine to me (I always go from least to most favourite heroine) but it took forever to get past the common route. It went on and on and on. I struggled to read much every night as it would make me sleepy after an hour or so of reading close to the end of the night. This was a bad sign for me. Anyway I soldiered on because of all its redeeming features and finally branched into Makina's route. I kept reading and reading and reading and waiting for that moment where it grabbed me and I simply couldn't let go of the story. 3/4 of the way through Makina's route, and many sleeps interrupting the story later, it never happened... I realised I'd lost the fight. I just didn't care about what was happening, found the endless tirade from the MC tiring to read, and didn't warm to anyone or anything. I starting mashing the ctrl key during the MC's thoughts, and then randomly through what looked less interesting. I got tired of the endless strategy scenes. Finally I gave up and mashed ctrl to the end of the route to at least see the end, which I didn't like. Since I liked the other girls much more, I then downloaded a full save game to check out the H scenes of the other heroines, some of which were pretty appealing, but not enough for me to wade through another trillion lines of story to get through, and I was mad at myself for paying money for a localisation that had not been decensored. The only thing I could think of by the end was the translator Koestl deserves a medal for translating so much fucking text, though if he actually enjoyed the game I could see how he managed to do it.

Sorry guys, I failed. I'm still only interested in charage and moege with significant romance as the primary part of the story. I'm just too old to get excited by dark themes and bad shit happening to people. I lived through gen X and depressing us as teenagers was like shooting fish in a barrel. Most of us got over it. As a middle aged man I've seen more than my fair share of actual bad shit happen to people I love and care about, and I only want mild drama and then serious happy escapism as my reward.

[Mr Poltroon]

2 hours ago, ittaku said:

So after playing VNs for 20 years with heavy emphasis on moege and charage, I finally gave in and purchased Fruit of Grisaia after being told by so many people how good it is in terms of story, writing and how solid the localisation is. The first thing that struck me is the game is wordy... long.. I mean real fucking long. Huge passages are spent on exposition with lots of what the MC is thinking, his take on the world at large, plenty of backstory that continually fills in as you progress and how it fits in with the route as you're playing it. The writing is solid indeed and thought provoking. The heroines are all reasonably interesting, though after having played so many VNs, there was nothing new in their personalities I hadn't seen before. The localisation is indeed solid; on my rating it almost reaches a 9/10. The only reason I wouldn't give it a 9 is that I know enough Japanese to see certain less than ideal choices in translation though none of them are massive fails, and all nuance was captured, so it's easily an 8.5 (This is my localisation rating, not my rating for the game itself.)

So I planned to start out with Makina's route since she was the least appealing heroine to me (I always go from least to most favourite heroine) but it took forever to get past the common route. It went on and on and on. I struggled to read much every night as it would make me sleepy after an hour or so of reading close to the end of the night. This was a bad sign for me. Anyway I soldiered on because of all its redeeming features and finally branched into Makina's route. I kept reading and reading and reading and waiting for that moment where it grabbed me and I simply couldn't let go of the story. 3/4 of the way through Makina's route, and many sleeps interrupting the story later, it never happened... I realised I'd lost the fight. I just didn't care about what was happening, found the endless tirade from the MC tiring to read, and didn't warm to anyone or anything. I starting mashing the ctrl key during the MC's thoughts, and then randomly through what looked less interesting. I got tired of the endless strategy scenes. Finally I gave up and mashed ctrl to the end of the route to at least see the end, which I didn't like. Since I liked the other girls much more, I then downloaded a full save game to check out the H scenes of the other heroines, some of which were pretty appealing, but not enough for me to wade through another trillion lines of story to get through, and I was mad at myself for paying money for a localisation that had not been decensored. The only thing I could think of by the end was the translator Koestl deserves a medal for translating so much fucking text, though if he actually enjoyed the game I could see how he managed to do it.

Sorry guys, I failed. I'm still only interested in charage and moege with significant romance as the primary part of the story. I'm just too old to get excited by dark themes and bad shit happening to people. I lived through gen X and depressing us as teenagers was like shooting fish in a barrel. Most of us got over it. As a middle aged man I've seen more than my fair share of actual bad shit happen to people I love and care about, and I only want mild drama and then serious happy escapism as my reward.

That's bound to happen. The main reason I like Grisaia is for the comedy, which not everyone likes. Whenever I think back to it I recall that the routes really weren't much fun most of the time. I rather feel like skipping a fair bit of them. But I'm all over the common route.

[ittaku]

1 hour ago, Mr Poltroon said:

That's bound to happen. The main reason I like Grisaia is for the comedy, which not everyone likes. Whenever I think back to it I recall that the routes really weren't much fun most of the time. I rather feel like skipping a fair bit of them. But I'm all over the common route.

For what it's worth, I did find the comedy amusing, chuckling out loud when it was there, but it was pretty rare and got rarer as the story went on. Perhaps that's why I survived the common route despite its absurd length; it was more slice-of-life and character development and less melodrama and tragedy.

[Fred the Barber]

Much like Mr. Tiag of Poltroon, the main thing I liked about Grisaia was the common route... in fact, that's so true that I only ever played one route (Sachi's, basically just because it was the first option), which I didn't like, and then I've never gone back to the game since. The common route comedy consistently delivered for me, and I laughed out loud a lot, but then when I actually saw a route, I just got nothing from the game anymore. I keep telling myself I'll go back and play more, because the girls were fun, but it's been a few years now, and it doesn't seem likely to happen at this point...

[Stormwolf]

4 hours ago, Fred the Barber said:

Much like Mr. Tiag of Poltroon, the main thing I liked about Grisaia was the common route... in fact, that's so true that I only ever played one route (Sachi's, basically just because it was the first option), which I didn't like, and then I've never gone back to the game since. The common route comedy consistently delivered for me, and I laughed out loud a lot, but then when I actually saw a route, I just got nothing from the game anymore. I keep telling myself I'll go back and play more, because the girls were fun, but it's been a few years now, and it doesn't seem likely to happen at this point...

Well, its sad so many developers fail with routes. Mostly its either too much side cast in the routes, which sufficates both the reader and the bonding between the mc and chosen heroine, or they vanish entirely almost as soon as the route starts. The best is to keep the dynamic going, but making sure we get a good amount of bonding moments as well. 

[Fred the Barber]

7 hours ago, Stormwolf said:

Well, its sad so many developers fail with routes. Mostly its either too much side cast in the routes, which sufficates both the reader and the bonding between the mc and chosen heroine, or they vanish entirely almost as soon as the route starts. The best is to keep the dynamic going, but making sure we get a good amount of bonding moments as well. 

Yeah, it does seem to be a really fine line to walk... Honestly, I've recently found that I prefer kinetic novels, or at least non-traditional route structures. It kind of makes sense to me that it's just hard to tell five distinct, compelling stories with the same cast of characters, each of them focusing around a different one of them, vs. fitting together one really, really good story around your whole cast.

[Stormwolf]

7 hours ago, Fred the Barber said:

Yeah, it does seem to be a really fine line to walk... Honestly, I've recently found that I prefer kinetic novels, or at least non-traditional route structures. It kind of makes sense to me that it's just hard to tell five distinct, compelling stories with the same cast of characters, each of them focusing around a different one of them, vs. fitting together one really, really good story around your whole cast.

Its a fine line, but not really difficult. I mean, when you're doing a romance route and wonder if they've even been on a date then its a bit lacklustre. A sky full of stars hikari is for me a good example. Maybe its the cut content, but it felt more like a friend route.

[Stormwolf]

Majikoi S

Still entertaining to read, but i'm not too happy about the new characters that's been introduced.

Spoiler

 

The new characters for the most part are just better than the previous cast, perhaps just to get some "oomph" to their character. I didn't like that tbh.

Tatsuko route was pretty decent. Good job Yamato!

Kokoro was cute as expected. Missed having a route with her when i played the original.

Monshiro - lolicrap. When she was introduced she was said to have skipped grades, but later the writer tried getting across the message that she was as old as them. Well, can't help having an idiot for a writer i guess. Although some scenes in the "continued" part was heartwarming even though the problem was solved way too easily. I can't fathom such an issue as blood relation problems being so easy to solve.

Margit - Was OK i guess, but it could have reigned in the h scenes a bit.

Tsubane - What an absolute fucking cunt. This heroine does not belong as a main route at all. Holy fuck. She took advantage of Yamato and his friends and didn't even like him when she confessed. Just do the first route where she takes control and you can see what an absolute despicable manipulating ass she is. That's not a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship at all. That is more master and slave, and Yamato is way off character as well. Not so very sorry for manipulating Yamato and his friends at all it seems. The proper option would be to tell her to "fuck off" in her confession scene and get the route tagged as finished. The second route was better, but well, she's still that despicable ass, just that Yamato really has to stay on his game to keep her in check. And i didn't like that she took over Yamato's role as both an intellectual and a strategist, making him redundant. I myself did want to see Momoyo defeated so that part wasn't the worst. I like Momoyo, but she was a bit too cocky.

Afterstories are crap though, as expected. But i'll suffer through them to get to the meat of the story! 

But throughout S i can't help but think that Yamato has been rendered completely useless. Even more so than the original game with it's routes. I wish he wasn't just sometimes quick witted, but actually had a decent role in the events that happened. Oftentimes here he's just the wimp who runs away, and that's that.

 

 

Edited March 2, 2019 by Stormwolf

[ittaku]

On 02/03/2019 at 12:05 AM, Fred the Barber said:

Much like Mr. Tiag of Poltroon, the main thing I liked about Grisaia was the common route... in fact, that's so true that I only ever played one route (Sachi's, basically just because it was the first option), which I didn't like, and then I've never gone back to the game since. The common route comedy consistently delivered for me, and I laughed out loud a lot, but then when I actually saw a route, I just got nothing from the game anymore. I keep telling myself I'll go back and play more, because the girls were fun, but it's been a few years now, and it doesn't seem likely to happen at this point...

Oh dear, someone with exactly the same experience as me then. Looks like it wasn't necessarily the fact it was a heavy drama novel after all responsible. It was the shift in tone and execution at fault. If you went in expecting nothing but drama (and enjoyed or preferred that) then it probably would have been fine. Looks like I'm relegated to only playing charage and moege for the rest of my life, and that doesn't bother me one bit. Might even be good news for people who want stuff like that translated that other translators are not interested in tackling, as I might.

[Seraphim]

Oh My God, that Yoshino music video in Rewrite might be the single greatest moment in a VN so far for me.
Does anyone have a translation for the lyrics? I'm worried I might stumble over some spoiler if I try to Google it myself.

[Larxe1]

Replaying some parts of White Album 2. I normally don't like acoustic songs but when I listen to the acoustic version of Todokana Koi and thinking about it's story makes me emotional. The raw emotion that song can make me feel even after I finished reading it a long time ago is an achievement by itself. This game is probably the only game to make me not want to play one route because playing that just made me felt too bad (Kazuza's route in Coda). Setsuna all the way

[ArgentstR]

7 hours ago, Seraphim88 said:

Oh My God, that Yoshino music video in Rewrite might be the single greatest moment in a VN so far for me.
Does anyone have a translation for the lyrics? I'm worried I might stumble over some spoiler if I try to Google it myself.

Here's a subbed video, only thing you might have to look out for would be related videos I guess.

Spoiler

 

 

Edited March 3, 2019 by ArgentstR

[Seraphim]

Thanks a bunch! I just watched the embedded version of the video here, so there were no related videos shown and thus no risk of spoilers!

[gunzenburu]

i've playing death end re;quest since its released 19 feb, this game is very good, story is a mixture of SAO and corpse party with thriller story. Art, especially character design and environment is very beautiful since they're using Kei nanameda (mugen souls series, trillion god of desctruction) and huke (steins gate and black rock shooter) as illustrator, if you know. In this game you can trigger bad ending anytime if you choose wrong decision. this game is worth to play, but if you can't play it for some reason you can just watch this walkthrough.

This guy is the only one upload with japanese voice and english subtitle, since i love japanese VA.

[ittaku]

After attempting to play Fruit of Grisaia and failing miserably, I've started playing the very light and fluffy moege offering from Purple Soft, Chronoclock, which many say is their least interesting game. Unsurprisingly I'm enjoying it 1000x more than Grisaia so far. It's easy to see what I play VNs for, and I should stick to what I know works...

[Dreamysyu]

So, finished Nozomi's route in Seinarukana. And that the hell is wrong with this ending? To be honest, kind of looks like the terrible ending to start with. I guess, I should've started with Satsuki. So, going for her next, and then Narukana.

Overall, I see why people call the story in this VN disappointing when compared to Aselia. Overall, it's basically the very definition of dumb fun. It's fun to play, but it's obvious that this VN could be so much more.

7/10 so far, even if the ending almost made me lower it. We'll see if the true route brings anything more. (I understand that this VN is most likely just as linear as Aselia, but we'll see).