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Posted
5 minutes ago, littleshogun said:

Well a certain people would surely malding about the mosaic, although obviously the joke won't work if the mosaic was removed in that CG

Of course, the mosaic is the whole point of this gag :D (There's normal version shown before, and then mosaic gets introduced, and Kou's thoughts wander into dangerous direction ;) )

6 minutes ago, littleshogun said:

Also there're several nice CG from Damekoi PSP, although obviously Mangagamer can't easily add the CG into their version for legal reason

It would be nice if they did the same thing as with Princess Evangile - release port of console version as an separate all-ages edition.

Posted (edited)

Or actually they can do what White Album 2 translation team did in that they add PS3 CG into the patch, although perhaps it would be too much bothersome for Mangagamer there (That, and probably Valve would likely has several problem if Mangagamer did attempt to release PSP port into Steam thanks to the premise despite the absence of sex scenes).

Edited by littleshogun
Posted (edited)
On 12/22/2021 at 1:08 PM, littleshogun said:

Or actually they can do what White Album 2 translation team did in that they add PS3 CG into the patch, although perhaps it would be too much bothersome for Mangagamer there

Yeah, because those are not just CGs but whole scenes. And it could also pose licensing problem, since PSP version has different voice for Himeo (and much better one actually ;) ). That's why I suggested separate edition, like with Princess Evangile.

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

As for my current read -  '&' - Sora no Mukou de Sakimasu you ni -

Yesterday I reached the OP, and I think this was the end of common route. So far this VN is great. I see lots of parallels to Nine, and I wonder if Nine's writer was inspired by it, or if both games have common source so to speak.

Also yesterday I encountered kind-of easter egg - when Kuichirou was giving names to the "artifacts", for some he used names taken either from mythology or fantasy.

For example, four of those names were taken from Tolkien's books:

Spoiler
  • Urara's bell has been named Ringil - I guess because of the "ring" part ;) Originally Ringil was Fingolfin's sword he used when he fought Morgoth.
  • Yae's block of chalk has been named Elessar - and I have no idea why :P "Elessar" is Aragorn's elvish name.
  • Maki's walking stick has been named Grond. That's actually pretty clever. Grond was Morgoth's warhammer, and he used it in the duel with Fingolfin. And in the past Maki has been always quarreling with Urara, so to name their respective artifacts with the names of two enemies' weapons is quite amusing idea.
  • The gloves were named Kamlost - it means "empty handed", and it's Beren's nickname he gave to himself when he lost the Silmaril.
Edited by adamstan
Posted
On 12/21/2021 at 3:02 PM, adamstan said:

Today I started PS3 version of '&' - Sora no Mukou de Sakimasu you ni - .

I played for 3 hours so far (I'm still in the prologue), but I'm loving what I've seen up to now. It looks beautiful, the music is great and characters are, how to say it... it's all engaging right from the start, at least for me.

Initially I chose this game because of "reuniting childhood friends with a bit of supernatural thrown in" premise - a bit like Amber Quartz which I loved. According to vndb's plot summary it also seems to feature some kind of "artifacts", so that brings 9 -nine- to mind. Nice combo, if you like such things, that is :)

As for the minor things - I really like the look of font this VN uses.

And group of friends in flashbacks! ;) (It's right from the prologue, so it shouldn't be that big of a spoiler)

BLJM61131-screenshot-2021-12-21-13-13-14
BLJM61131-screenshot-2021-12-21-13-20-30

 

I really like the artstyle of this artist. Wish for example comyu made more sense than i feel it does. My head is just swimming with questions about its grandiose language too deep for my non english ass to understand.

Posted (edited)
5 hours ago, Stormwolf said:

I really like the artstyle of this artist. Wish for example comyu made more sense than i feel it does. My head is just swimming with questions about its grandiose language too deep for my non english ass to understand.

There are two options. Either comyu is really written in such way or the translation is shit.

 Since it has been translated by ixrec, both are equally possible 😛

I've heard somewhere that the style of the writers responsible both for comyu and for "And" can be hard, but so far the japanese used in And seems pretty normal to me most of the time.

Edited by adamstan
Posted

Well who knows in regard of Comyu there, although if anything else at least one should have easier time to understand Hello Lady if the problem in Comyu is indeed because of Ixrec because Hello Lady here has different translator, and yes Hello Lady will be released by Nekonyan at January later if all goes well.

For the artifacts, perhaps Kazuki Fumi here may be inspired by And seeing that the writer here is quite experienced with writing chuunige, and two of their (Yes there's two writer that write And here) other works are the aforementioned Comyu and Hello Lady. The writer also continuing the usage of literature theme naming in Hello Lady, although as for what's the literature I'll leave it to you to find out. If anything else, at least you can play Hello Lady Steam version later if you prefer to read it without the sex scenes.

Posted (edited)
14 minutes ago, littleshogun said:

If anything else, at least you can play Hello Lady Steam version later if you prefer to read it without the sex scenes.

Yes, I'm definitely going to pick up Hello Lady as well. And it seems that NekoNyan's edition will also include Japanese text, so that's nice :)

Yesterday I finished first route in And.

I loved it, and I think anyone who liked Nine would also like And. It's like Nine, but with group of childhood friends - there's also a bit of Little Busters' mood there. I'm looking forward to other routes :)

Apart from childhood friends theme, the other difference is that And is (even) less focused on romance than Nine.

As for sex scenes, it seems that, at least for Riko's route that I finished, console version just skips the sex scene itself, but the scenario isn't rewritten, and so characters are having sex, just off screen. BTW in the PC version of And H-scenes are marked by the momentary blackout and textbox changing color from blue to pink - and then another blackout at the end. So the all-ages version just skips the part between the two blackouts ;)

Edited by adamstan
Posted (edited)

Trying to start on reading on good old VN's starting with Duelist x Engage.

https://vndb.org/v6334

Read Clephas' review first and the one thing he mentions that I really agree with is the setting is crazy weird that you have to suspend your disbelief a lot.  Crazy settings are fine when the game plays it off but it was actually used quite seriously in the game. An example of the crazy stuff background setting is the existence of mithril. Mithril seems to be an exclusive resource on the main heroine's country. It is apparently an extremely strong metal that her forefathers wore riding cavalry charges against machine gun barrages, seriously? A lot of some serious stuff is hooked into that mithril stuff too so you really have to suspend your disbelief a lot. The backstory of the country to is kinda iffy but yeah people shouldn't try to think too much about the setting and enjoy it for what it is and a charage not an amazing world-building vn. 

Also is it just me, or oldie VN's have more donkan protagonists. While there are donkan protagonists in recent VN's it seems that they're starting to be replaced by more less dense but still dense. Yukito in this VN fucking grinds my gears a lot, he is pretty much a symbol of what I hate about donkan protagonists, naive and dumb. A child would have noticed how much the girls liked him but he just kinda doesn't notice. It doesn't help that he is dumb too being manipulated all the time and just kinda being swept by the story, Yukito doesn't have much agency aside from what he does in the ending. He's just kinda there like a walking plot device attracting flags. 

While I have a lot of negative things to say, I did like the game for what it does which is having a coherent story structure and attractive heroines. I liked Violetta and Tsubaki a lot. They're character archetypes I like a lot and there is a lot of plot in their routes which makes it compelling but I do admit I skipped some text here and there on some parts I found tedious. Game isn't like the usual charages which there isn't a speck of plot to be found. This charage has a coherent plot that doesn't get forgotten and is compelling in of itself.  8/10

Thinking of starting moshimo ashita ga hare naraba next

Edited by Larxe1
Posted (edited)

I've started reading The House in Fata Morgana this week and I'm absolutely LOVING IT :abipog: 

Chapter 1 was a wild ride, I loved the pacing of it

Spoiler

The broken Portuguese intro song was something else lmao I am Portuguese and even I couldn’t understand it.

Opening the game a few times already, I love the title menu soundtrack, it’s so good and creepy!

HOLY FUCK THAT WHOLE LAST PART WAS AMAZING(LY TRAGIC), I LOVE IT— I actually did guess what Nellie would do to the girl’s hair but I did not expect them to be all siblings, woah there. Fuck, I am so glad I’m reading this and that I’m starting off the year with this gem.

I'm still not done with chapter 2 but so far it's really good!!

Spoiler

man, tales of a beast becoming more compassionate and soft over a human who treats them right is a weakness for my heart; I also do respect how they didn’t make this sexual or romantic, just like a found family (which is a trope dear to my heart)

Anyways, I should be done with chapter 2 by Sunday so I'll probably mention it in my next post! Next week I want to read both ch. 3 and 4 :watame: I now can see why this vn is so well-regarded within the community!

Edited by Fujoneko
added one last sentence
Posted

(just a little update on chapter 2 of Fata Morgana)

Spoiler

Okay, the Bestia just saw the girl naked and mentioned her smile, so theory time: is... is he the merchant guy? Idk, he was murdered, but at the same time, I’m very confused about everything LOL

... Holy moly I was right, AGAIN. :pyacchan:

Ok, Yukimasa is going to buy some oranges at the village... it would be a shame if the guy who brought Pauline was to recognize him, HMMM?

Oh wow, it didn’t even get to that huh. Man, this whole story was tragic but Yukimasa is such a jerk, he didn’t deserve any of the girls :disgust:

Tbh, I do prefer the first chapter to this one, but this one was pretty dope as well; they are all so tragic, I love it :iamslain:

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted
On 12/27/2021 at 12:57 PM, adamstan said:

I think anyone who liked Nine would also like And. It's like Nine, but with group of childhood friends - there's also a bit of Little Busters' mood there. I'm looking forward to other routes

Okay, yesterday I finished '&' - Sora no Mukou de Sakimasu you ni -, and while it was good, I have to say that Nine was better ;)

Main themes of And seem to be friendship and the nature of wishes.

The routes can be divided into few groups.

First there are three "introductory" routes - Riko, Tsukasa and Maki. What surprised me is that each route tells completely different story - after finishing Riko's route I expected that this is the gist of the main plot, and now other routes will just fill in the gaps or reveal more, but it was nothing like that. Of course, each route features some kind of trouble related to artifacts, but that's the only thing that connects them.

Those routes mostly let us know the characters more, and provide lots of background info, and also bits and pieces of information about artifacts. I enjoyed those routes, and even though romance isn't the focus here - it's treated like in some action-adventure games or movies - but it was still nice to see MC getting closer with a girl ;) I also laughed often, both in common route and in character routes - and Riko's little sisters are one of the cutest and moest things I saw in a VN for a long time ❤️.

Moving on to the next level, there is Yae's route. It featured very amusing, almost RPG-like adventure with lots of action and kind of set the ground for the true route, introducing some of the important threads and characters. And Yae herself is very interesting girl to be around :)

Completing aforementioned four routes unlocks Urara's route, which is over twice as long as the other ones, and serves as a true route, tying up together all bits and pieces from other routes, and revealing the truth behind the artifacts and wish-granting tree that spawned them. Relationship between MC and Urara is also a bit more developed than in other routes, but it still isn't the main focus. Nevertheless I found this route to be very good, especially since I liked Urara, so I have no problem with her being the main heroine.

While the finale wasn't as epic and emotional as Nine's, it was still very good. And I think the game should end right there. However, there's more - and perhaps that's where they overdid it a little.

First, completing true route unlocks mini-route for Seira - cute girl who's the first character we meet in the VN, right in the prologue. It has a bit of fandisc-feeling, presenting kind of light-hearted what-if alternative to the main story. Seira is cute, her story was fun, but nothing special.

And then console version adds one more route - which seems to be half-joke one, but it was a huge letdown for me :( The main problem was that the "heroine" of this route is a trap Juri. The story in this route was pretty absurd, wandering into Majikoi territory, and while it was supposed to be about restoring the severed friendship - kind of an answer to one of the other endings - it was packed with weird lewd undertones that didn't sit too well with me, so I finished the whole VN with kind of sour aftertaste 😕

Like I mentioned before, I played All-ages PS3 version. It is the "lazy" kind of all-ages version - which might be considered both good and bad, depending on the point of view and implementation. It doesn't alter the story or give any replacement scenes - it just skips the porn, but the characters are banging off-screen. Almost Steam-ready ;)The only additional content in PS3 version is the abovementioned Juri's route - which sadly I didin't enjoy too much. I'd prefer to have Shouko's route if anything - she appears in many other routes, and with her backstory it could make for pretty interesting route, perhaps in the YMK vein...

So, to sum it up...

 This VN looks great - I really loved the art, although it would benefit from some more backgrounds and CGs. Music was also nice, although it got a bit repetitive after some time. Main story was quite engaging. So, considering all that, even though by the time I finished the game I was a bit disappointed, I still think it deserves at least 8/10.

PS While I didn't find it overly difficult to read, it would be a bitch to translate, because it often features kanji puns or creative furigana usage, that would require long-winded explanations in English in place of the few words used in JP.

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

My next read will be probably Tenshin Ranman, since I recently grabbed newly released all-ages PC port from DLsite :)

 

Posted (edited)

Playing Hello, Goodbye, the english translated ver.

I can kinda understand the main criticisms of the game which is the setting has a lot of potential and even could be a good plotge but kinda fizzles out, its a solid charage but contrary to its story-heavy setting it is character-focused. Although yeah I am still at chapter 1 lol after the prologue but I could see the signs. The prologue is kinda weak at the start but there is a really amazing hook at the end which could be the start of something great but after that, you would expect an explosive follow up from that amazing hook but nothing, it just kinda returns to the same old wacky everyday school life. Also I'm just gonna play Natsume and stop since Natsume is the heroine I usually like and what people consider the best one

Edit: Okay I actually finished it that was short as hell. It really is a charage which while I like charages the setting could have been used more since espionage and civil wars really interest me but alas they weren't really the focus, it wasn't much used as a setting. It doesn't help that the MC doesn't do any espionage work, he is just practically a student practically in everything. If you look at it just as a charage it is pretty satisfying but not amazing, Natsume is an extremely cute heroine that I'm gonna remember for some time, with i guess okay drama? It doesn't help that one of the main dramas of Natsume isn't actually fully explained as they obviously try to put most of the details in the true route. All in all a pretty fine game, yes I'm done with the game with just Natsume i'm not interested in any of the other heroines so I have a lot of unanswered questions but im fine with it

Edited by Larxe1
Posted

I just started Tenshin Ranman Happy GO Lucky PC. It looks very nice, has the distinctive Yuzusoft's art style, and seems to be nice charage. UI in this version is indeed updated, and seems to be the same as in, for example, PARQUET, with flowchart, lots of skipping and rewinding options etc :)

I just completed the prologue, and during the OP sequence I encountered one weird bug - videos are flipped in both axes - meaning they're upside down and mirrored 😕 I haven't found the patch online - perhaps it hasn't been released yet. Video files themselves are packed into KiriKiri's *.xp3 archives, so fixing that would probably involve unpacking, unflipping them in some video editor, re-encoding and repacking... 面倒くさい... 😕

Posted

I finished the 100% progress of Dead End Aegis and its prequel. I read this because of a certain magical girl connoisseur and non-school setting. I hope for more diverse science fiction genres in visual novels. Decent soundtrack and great artwork thanks to Ueda Metawo. Despite the dark content, I can stomach it.

Spoiler

I followed this order : Earth > Space > Bad End (including minor routes but same ending).

 

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

[The House in Fata Morgana]

aaa I've finished chapter 7 and I'm a wreck; I haven't posted any updates on the chapters but I will now!!
My comments will reflect my thoughts as I was reading them, not knowing of what happens in further chapters :nyanpasu:

Chapter 3

Spoiler

I don't have the fire I had when I finished this chapter, but Maria can step on me anytime :yes: Anyways, I found this chapter rly entertaining, even if it is one of the poorest ones haha I found the White-haired Girl's clothing so pretty too, aa~ Jacoppo can suck my nonexistent dick-- I felt like the game was trying too hard at the end there for me to empathize with him or find any compassion for his situation but too bad!, he had so many chances to actually talk with his wife but nooooo, what did he do? fucking nothing, what a loser :kyoku: 

Chapter 4

Spoiler

I don't have that much to say abt this one, since my thoughts have been overwritten by the plot twists and explanations of further chapters, but I do remember liking Giselle's character, she was so much fun! Oh, a Michel sure did grow on me haha I do like a tsundere *crys in chapter 7 foreshadowing*

Chapter 5

Spoiler

oh boy,, that rape scene and her breakdown in the forest was painful to read... I almost cried, these things are so infuriating to witness

update: ok, Giselle’s breakdown at Michel after the village bit made me cry, fuck

really, the way the author approaches rape, sexual assault and trauma is amazing, holy shit- I’ve never went through something like that (”only” sexual harassment and that alone was terrifying enough) but as someone with trauma I could really sympathize (and may I say empathize) with Giselle...

Chapter 7 (yes, I skipped chapter 6)

Spoiler

This chapter DESTROYED me :kasumicry: As a nonbinary being who is perceived as female, I can honestly relate to Michel... I may not be intersex or in the exact same kind of situation as him, but the feeling of not being in your right body remains. Aimee can suck it, ffs. And so can Didier, jfc; I want to think Georges was only forced to paint that and did not, in fact, think of Michel was female, but it crushed me seeing the two brothers he still trusted to be the ones who brought him agony and death... I would curse them tbh :ganbarimess:

And now on to the final door!! :ezgif-2-df452814b3f1: LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Posted (edited)

Quite some time since my last update, so I guess it's about time to write a few words before I forget everything.

44108.jpg 44109.jpg

I guess I'm late to the party, but I finally read ~150 hours of Higurashi. I had somehow missed the news that this also got a graphic update from PS3, so I ignored that for quite a while, since I didn't want to be emotionally scarred by Ryuukishi07's drawing skills.

That said I enjoyed the ride quite a bit, at least for the most part. Higurashi is widely considered as *the* classic horror and mystery VN, which I think isn't really accurate. I'd say Higurashi is first and foremost a VN about friendship. And it might well be the best VN I've read about that theme so far. Actually, it frequently reminded me of Steven King's It, which also has a group of friends trying to fend of an ancient evil and which is also a personal favorite of mine (both movies actually - I didn't read the book).

Along with the friendship goes a lot of slice of life and comedy, which somehow hit a nerve with me. I found the slice of life very entertaining and the comedy freaking hilarious for the most part. Mostly because Ryuukishi07 found a good balance of when he could get a bit over the top and when to get serious. Especially the gaming sessions reminded me of my own youth, even if I didn't cheat that much. I swear! :P

It also has to said that with the graphics update, the VN felt extremely polished. The art style did fit perfectly and the music and voice acting were also top notch for the most part. Ryuukishi07 also has a talent to create powerful scenes by choosing the right music and sound effects to emphasize his writing. This applies for both comedic and serious scenes. On the other hand, he also a tendency of not finding an end. Actually, for people who want to read this mostly for the thrills, this might actually be a rather boring experience, due to the excessive slice of life and comedy. I personally enjoyed it a lot, so I wasn't really bothered by it.

The actual plot is a bit of a mixed bag and I want to split this into two parts.

The first part is the world building, which is imho one of the biggest strengths of the VN. The whole history of the village and the aftermath of the damn conflict on the different characters is really well written. Especially the two Mion/Shion episodes 2 and 5 shine brightly in that regard, finding the almost perfect balance between slice of life, comedy, drama, world building and horror.

The second part is the actual main plot about the repeating Watanagashi murders, and that's the part I wasn't completely satisfied with. First, it takes literally 6 episodes (!!!) until this part actually progresses. Until then, you just get some hints about what could go on, and tons of unrelated side stories. The VN in structured into 4 question and 4 answer arcs, but it's actully more like 6 question arcs and 2 answer arcs. The individual endings also felt a bit lackluster since having one of the characters go nuts for no reason wasn't really that interesting, especially if it's repeated in a similar manner half a dozen times. It's probably best to see episodes 1 - 6 as character routes and the final two episodes as true route, though episodes 5, 6 and part of 7 from the answer arcs felt like they could have easily merged with their equivalent question arcs to get a better pacing and progress.

The final episode which should have been the great show-down was also unfortunately more a huge let-down. The hints in the previous episodes weren't particular difficult to follow, even if you ignore the somewhat obsessive hint sections of each episode, so I wouldn't exactly say I was surprised by the final resolution. However, it was probaby the most boring story resolution he could come up with, bundled with the worst writing of the whole VN. Honestly, you expect a show-down with a great ancient evil and what you get is instead:

Spoiler

Captain Obvious and the evil power rangers vs. Karate Kid & friends. :amane:

Seriously, did he play too much Resident Evil at that time? The only well written parts in episode 8 were the orphanage scenes. Though it already started in the second half of the previous episode with Satoko's overdramatized story arc. And as well as most characters were written, Ryu really has to work on the quality of his antagonists.

Nevertheless, despite its flaws this was overall a very well written story, I enjoyed quite a bit.

Character ranking: I loved the whole group of friends, though Rika, Mion and Hanyu maybe a bit more than the others.

Overall rating. 7.5/10 (Could have easily been an 8+ rating with a better story resolution)

Edited by ChaosRaven
Posted (edited)

@ChaosRaven thanks for your review :)

1 hour ago, ChaosRaven said:

I guess I'm late to the party

I'm even more late to the party, since I haven't started it yet. I got interested in Higurashi after I found out that I liked World End Syndrome (BTW where's the damn sequel!?).

I'm still on the fence whether to read this in Japanese or in English, since it's already veeeeery long, so with my JP reading speed it would take ages to finish. How would you rate translation quality?

Edited by adamstan
Posted
1 hour ago, adamstan said:

@ChaosRaven thanks for your review :)

I'm even more late to the party, since I haven't started it yet. I got interested in Higurashi after I found out that I liked World End Syndrome (BTW where's the damn sequel!?).

I'm still on the fence whether to read this in Japanese or in English, since it's already veeeeery long, so with my JP reading speed it would take ages to finish. How would you rate translation quality?

As a non-native English speaker I'm probably not the best to judge the translation quality, but I personally had no issues with it. And if I remember correctly, MangaGamer did re-translate all episodes from scratch for the Steam release back in the days, which took quite a while. So they certainly spent a lot of effort to get the translation right.

Posted

Started up Tsukihime (finally) after a number of recommendations.  I guess playing Melty Blood pushed me over the edge.

Otherwise, trying to finish up Kara no Shoujo.  Playing a bit of Gnosia here and there, too, as the gameplay lends itself well to short bursts.

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