The Artistic Value of the Visual Novel

[Newton]

Each medium of art comes with its own caveats and working methods and they all serve the purpose of expressing the story as best as possible through this medium. Thus, each medium has its advantages and disadvantages. A traditional book is usually strong in viewing the story through a highly personalized view and/or making statements that may break the strict confines of our perception of reality. A movie's strengths lie in its ability to directly replicate the world as we experience it and to stand outside of a particular character's viewpoint and watch him/her from the perspective we would have were we actually there.

So, I come to my main point. I enjoy visual novels quite a bit and I'm glad that I can be one of very few people to experience this niche medium but I wonder...why do I enjoy them? Is there something intrinsic to the medium which allows it to engage an audience in a way that no other medium can? Many of the aspects of visual novels are co-opted from previously existing mediums: voice-acting, painted images, music compositions, sound effects, etc. And, of course, since VISUAL novels are meant to be watched, would there be anything lost or gained if the same story was told with equal prowess as a episodic show e.g., an anime? Many movies based on books are disappointing not necessarily because they left out parts of the story (although that can certainly be the case) but because the makers of the movies couldn't find an artistic justification for converting this particular story to a seen format.

 

The visual novel is under-examined by those who know about it and most people aren't even aware of this medium's existence so there're no good references for me to review and I'm busy at the moment so I don't have the time to engage in a "shot-by-shot" analysis of a particular work. So I'd like to ask members of this community what their examinations might reveal. If you have any insights that can be backed up by example and reasoning, I'd be happy to hear them.

 

Cheers.

[jibzoiderz]

Well for me i enjoy visual novels because its kinda like a mixture between a light novel and anime. In a visual novel you get the sounds/scenes just like an anime would while on the other hand see what the main character is thinking like what you would see in light novels....... thats why its named visual-novel

[solidbatman]

Is this the thread where we finally discuss the artistic value of the nukige and how it adds to the discussion of art as a whole through history?

[Zodai]

While I'm a bit busy at the moment, and thus can't give the topic the full attention it deserves, at its core I think the answer lies somewhere between what we've seen from Novels and Games.

 

On one hand, they're games with enough of a text emphasis to engage in the same strengths that novels have - modern games, for all their budgets, can only appeal to Visual and Sound senses, aside from the mechanics themselves, to transport the player to the world.  Books on the other hand, while they lack mechanics in the way games do, can transport a number of senses - the cold texture of a wall, the smell of a bakery, or the thundering of an explosion shattering the ground beneath, and a cold shrill creeps through your spine like a demonic claw reaching out to your soul.  With sufficient writing expertise, these can be much effective in delivering on a feeling than standard game graphics can, as language itself is much stronger at transferring those particular senses than modern systems, as those only focus on visual and sound transference.

 

This is what makes them different than say, Mass Effect or The Walking Dead, as the use of text allows them to approach a scenes interpretation from every level of the human body, appealing directly to the mind itself and crafting a strong enough illusion to place the character in the world, rather than relying on simply the visuals and sound to create that illusion.

 

On the other hand, while strong descriptions can more than make up for all the AAA graphics and sound design money can buy, doing this incorrectly can often result in a weakness rather than a strength.  Depending on the pace of the scene, spending too much time on description can make the story slow to a crawl.  Games are stronger in this respect, since they can appeal to both the visual, audio, and mechanics at once, whereas text can appeal to all but only one at a time, though this can be improved and blended together with skilled writing.  VNs have this easier than traditional novels, though the text is still the primary source of interaction with the audience.

 

Often when this occurs, writing steers more directly towards a characters emotions and describing what's necessary in order to keep the pace of the scene flowing.  Appealing to the reader/player's emotions is something games can have an advantage in, as they're interacting more directly with the person on-screen than VNs are, even if you include the concept of choice, but it isn't something impossible in either case.

 

There are other points to bring up, but that's the only one I'm approaching at the moment.

[Pudding321]

 

modern games, for all their budgets, can only appeal to Visual and Sound senses, aside from the mechanics themselves, to transport the player to the world.  Books on the other hand, while they lack mechanics in the way games do, can transport a number of senses - the cold texture of a wall, the smell of a bakery, or the thundering of an explosion shattering the ground beneath, and a cold shrill creeps through your spine like a demonic claw reaching out to your soul.  With sufficient writing expertise, these can be much effective in delivering on a feeling than standard game graphics can, as language itself is much stronger at transferring those particular senses than modern systems, as those only focus on visual and sound transference.

 

This is what makes them different than say, Mass Effect or The Walking Dead, as the use of text allows them to approach a scenes interpretation from every level of the human body, appealing directly to the mind itself and crafting a strong enough illusion to place the character in the world, rather than relying on simply the visuals and sound to create that illusion.

 

On the other hand, while strong descriptions can more than make up for all the AAA graphics and sound design money can buy, doing this incorrectly can often result in a weakness rather than a strength.  Depending on the pace of the scene, spending too much time on description can make the story slow to a crawl.  Games are stronger in this respect, since they can appeal to both the visual, audio, and mechanics at once, whereas text can appeal to all but only one at a time, though this can be improved and blended together with skilled writing.  VNs have this easier than traditional novels, though the text is still the primary source of interaction with the audience.

 

 

This reminds me of the 'hot and cool media' Marshall Mcluhan suggested. Allow me to take this approach.

 

Even though books stimulate only one single sense vision and may appear to be a hot media, they are in fact a cool media because they require the user to fill in gaps and demand more participation.

 

Games on the other hand are hot media which need less gaps to fill and demand less participation (even though it does stimulate different senses like a cool media). 

 

Of courses there were no visual novels at Mcluhan's time, but I would say visual novels are an even cooler media than books on this scale, since there are many gaps to fill and it extends more senses in human.

 

Here is a rough scale.

 

Hot                          <<<<<<< Games,  Books, Visual Novels   >>>>>>>>> Cold 

Less Participation       <<<<<<< Games,  Books, Visual Novels   >>>>>>>>> More Participation

 

So visual novels are not in between games and books according to this model. It is in fact something that requires even more participation—not only our imagination from the text, but also from the sound and the graphics. For games I refer to those with high definition and realistic that we need to fill in less gaps, like GTA or fighting games with super smooth animations. But so far we don't have realistic visual novels but instead nukige or moe girls that demand our imaginations. 

[Zodai]

I'm going to object to the participation model in terms of games, as they completely ignore the mechanical aspect of games, though seeing as how the man died in 1980 I suppose that's to be expected.

 

Games, in their nature as an interactive medium, require more participation than other media.  While the gaps are indeed filled - books require the audience to interpret the scene in their own mind as opposed to it being handed to them, the games have that participation in that the path to be taken must be chosen by the player, as opposed to the participation being in the drawing of the map itself, where the destination has already been pre-fulfilled by the author of the work.

 

Therefore, games would actually be on the coldest length of that bar, whereas its piece at the hottest is more attributed to something like television or movies.  Though this in itself is a severe generalization, as the amount of participation required for any medium depends on the work itself.  It's like saying your average moege requires the same amount of concentration as say, Umineko of Dies Irae.  It depends far too much on the work itself to be accurate.

 

That said, this leads to the result being--

 

Hot <<<<<<< Television,  Books, Visual Novels, Games   >>>>>>>>> Cold 

 

As opposed to the key described above.

[Pudding321]

I'm going to object to the participation model in terms of games, as they completely ignore the mechanical aspect of games, though seeing as how the man died in 1980 I suppose that's to be expected.

 

Games, in their nature as an interactive medium, require more participation than other media.  While the gaps are indeed filled - books require the audience to interpret the scene in their own mind as opposed to it being handed to them, the games have that participation in that the path to be taken must be chosen by the player, as opposed to the participation being in the drawing of the map itself, where the destination has already been pre-fulfilled by the author of the work.

 

Therefore, games would actually be on the coldest length of that bar, whereas its piece at the hottest is more attributed to something like television or movies.  Though this in itself is a severe generalization, as the amount of participation required for any medium depends on the work itself.  It's like saying your average moege requires the same amount of concentration as say, Umineko of Dies Irae.  It depends far too much on the work itself to be accurate.

 

 

You are entirely going against Mcluhan's model despite using his words like 'cold or 'hot'. Television is a cold media, and it was Mcluhan's starting point in his model. I would encourage you to redefine these words or use your own words. 

 

Also, I would like to point out again that participation is filling out the gaps in interpretation. A book or a manga is more cold because we need to interpret it along with our imagination, which would make the experience very different among different people. On the other hand games are cold because it demands less imagination for us to interpret it, and so gamers would more likely share similar experiences. 

 

Television is cold, while films are hot (unless you sit down and watch through a film on your 'television set'). This is because of the technical difference in television programs consisting of ads, breaks, and user experience where the user would walk away, have a cup of tea, come back, and even switch channels . One thing wonderful about anime on TV when I was a child was that I often missed episodes and parts of episodes, but I could still follow on and get the gist. 

 

I would like to part from Mcluhan here in the sense that I believe the content also defines whether it is hot or cold. To Mcluhan, a personal computer would either be hot or cold, or print would either be hot or cold (fitting his famous quote 'the medium is the message'). So I do not consider games as a medium that dictate whether it is cold or hot, but that it contains content that lean more on the hot side. For games I would like to refer to 3D commercial games like SIMS, GTA, or fps games. Even though on the other hand we may have 3D models in visual novels like zero escape, it is clear that the former is more realistic in terms of graphics and sound.

 

Regarding mechanics and user feedback in games, they are contained and programmed within the game. Sure, there are mods and people trying to brick the game, but the gaming experience is under control. The player does not generate extra meaning within the game. John Fiske proposes three levels in codes of television: reality, representation, and ideology. Both novels and games can achieve all three levels in coding, but games can achieve representation more fully through graphics and sound. This reduces the diversity in meaning generation. For a hot media like games, users are more concentrated and involved in receiving the message rather than producing meanings on their own. 

 

Are games interactive? Absolutely. Do games require a lot of participation in interpretation? Probably not. 

[Zalor]

@Palas You made a lot of good points, and your comment on nukige was particularly interesting. I never really thought about the relationship between how we experience visual novels and how that relates to the prominence of nukige in this medium. But I think your point about how this is a slightly interactive experience and a lonely one makes the medium perfect for pornographic uses. Also, I already said this on your thread, but your thread on The Writing in Visual Novels was brilliant.

 

 

The reason Visual Novels are my favorite storytelling medium is because they require the isolation that books do (as Palas already pointed out) but they don't feel lonely. When I read an actual paper book, I feel the loneliness, but it's kind of unsettling. The good point about this, is that the isolation (when reading a book) demands strong attention. Therefore a writer that is truly talented can really immerse you in their story. But nonetheless, you still feel lonely. VNs have the pros of books (in that the narrative style can really immerse you in the story), but the music and visuals also serve to immerse you in the tale. At this point, the story is dominating your senses (vision, hearing, and intellectual thought). When I read a VN, I feel like I am in the story. Whereas when I read a book, I feel like I'm just observing the story. So yeah, my last 2 sentences probably best summarize why I love this medium so much, and even prefer it to traditional books.     

[Newton]

In a visual novel you get the sounds/scenes just like an anime would while on the other hand see what the main character is thinking like what you would see in light novels.

 

Perspective and medium aren't the same thing though. There are many books which are first-person, where you know what the main character is thinking, and many that are third-person where you're on the outside. That visual novels are usually told in first-person is just a convention of the medium, not a necessity, and probably exists as a result of the format's roots (and severe extent) in pornography, in order to enhance the personal sense of sexual gratification. And there are many times in first-person novels such as Fate-Stay Night or G-Senjou no Maoh where the narration changes to third-person in order to give the audience necessary information or background that it wouldn't make sense for the main character to have.

 

Under this reasoning, we can see that first-person and third-person perspectives are not essential to the medium as either are acceptable. If a particular consistent perspective is not essential to the visual novel, then what is?

 

 

 

 In itself, a television is just a screen and a box; cinema is just a room with a really big screen where a predetermined sequence of static pictures is displayed; visual novels are just an interface.

Television sets and movie theaters are not mediums but the method by which mediums are received; interfaces as you put it. But the shows on the TV set and the movies in the theaters are the mediums, in this case, visual images presented in such a manner as to simulate motion. To equate a visual novel to a TV is to equate a play to the constructed stage on which its presented or a novel to the paper and ink that it's published with. The interface of a visual novel is, of course, the computer. The interface is not an essential part of considering the medium as many people read novels on their tablets now instead of physical copies, and watch Netflix instead of going to the movie theater.

 

 

This is because even kinetic novels have an intrusion element to them, a notion that the story is only happening because you're there to move it forward, even if it's just a matter of pressing a button repeatedly, that is absent in books and movies, for example.

What about the auto-read function that's present in so many visual novels? Does turning that on diminish the experience? (I personally think so for the reason that you said, there's a sense of participation involved, even if it's just clicking a mouse). What is there were no such option and they proceeded like movies? And, of course, "clicking the mouse" is equivalent to "turning the page" in books so they require the same minimal participation too.

 

 

 

 

The experience of visual novels, and this is a lot more important, is lonely. You have to take your time and isolate yourself.

This is neither exclusive to visual novels, as traditional novels involve the same form or participation, nor necessary, as you can very well read a novel with somebody and it can enhance the enjoyment.

 

Maybe I should reframe the question.

 

What is essential to the visual novel that other mediums of art do not possess and if there is or is not anything essential, what is the reason for our specific enjoyment of the form?

 

Most art forms proceeded under the limitations of technology of the time and their perceived artistic value was derived later as they came into competition with one another. Paintings were still images because it wasn't possible to produce moving ones. Dramas were enacted on the stage because it wasn't possible to portray the actions as or how they were presented to happen in the "real world" or record them for everyone's viewing.

 

My gut is telling me that there isn't anything essential to the medium though I could be wrong. I'd just like to know the methods by which it produces emotions. Like most people here, I was pulled into the famous VNs like Ever 17 and Fate-Stay Night. But when I realized that Fate-Stay Night is pretty much a conventional anime plot (various magical beings and high school students fight in a contest for a Macguffin), I knew it had to be the presentation that had pulled me in and elevated the plot above its meager status. As a filmmaker, I'd like to know if there's any lessons I can take away from this medium in order to enhance people's enjoyment of me own works.

 

As always, any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. 

 

Cheers.

 

 

[Pudding321]

Let's admit it: visual novels are only storybooks for adults but with hentai. 

 

 

Think not about the nature of the media, but about the nature of the experience of the media.

 

[Newton]

 

 

Like I said before, trying to find an ontology to visual novels - or to any other form of expression - is futile. We are never going to find anything exclusive to any form of anything, because what we enjoy in what we enjoy comes from a multitude of non-exclusive factors. Gameplay isn't exclusive to games and games don't have only gameplay, for instance.

Exactly what I mean when I say that there might not be anything exclusively essential to visual novels. 

 

 

 

Playing Solitaire with a physical deck of cards is clunky, unusual and no one really knew about the Klondike variation. The virtual deck of cards made it the single most-played game of all time. Why is that? The support changed even though the rules didn't. The experience changed and this is what matters.

Exactly what I meant in the first post. Comparing the books of Harry Potter to the movies, most people will tell you that the books are better. The story didn't change but the medium did. What if Harry Potter were a series of Visual Novels? How would the experience change then? I questioned whether or not there might be something essential to visual novels that would determine the change in experience and it seems like there's not. So then, what determines the change? What turns a rather generic plot like Fate-Stay Night into something sweeping and even moving? Is it something intrinsic to visual novels? Could you have done it in another format and elicited the same emotional result in people?

 

Maybe in asking this question, we force ourselves to evaluate individual works instead of the medium as whole but that seems wrong as The Big Ones (KS, FSN, MVA, GSNM, EV17) utilized the same medium in nearly the same ways with varying levels of quality in each element (higher resolution, more detailed backgrounds, larger aspect ratio, etc) and were able to produce nearly the same emotional effect. After finishing one, I felt like I'd had a great experience and wanted to move on to the next after which I felt the same way again. After MVA, though, it seemed like I'd depleted all the interesting ones and now what awaited me was a never-ending torrent of high school students, gratuitous sex scenes, anime-styled characters

[Newton]

, dating scenes, and kawaii. They seemed to be of a much poorer quality than the others. Had I been only fooling myself? Were the previous ones really as good as I thought they'd been or was I just caught up in the thrill of the reading, like a person addicted to a TV show and then comes back and realizes that it wasn't very good in the first place?

 

So, that's why I'd like to figure out the artistic value of the medium, how it produces emotional effects and why we respond. That's all.

 

Eager to hear your reasonings.

 

Cheers.

[Pudding321]

 

But clicking the mouse isn't the same as turning a page. It would be if you couldn't measure or at least guess how far into a book you are by turning pages. When turning a page in a book, you feel one page closer to the end. You're depleting it. In visual novels, you feel one textbox further from the beginning. You're building it - because it's impossible to measure or even guess how many "pages" there are. So you feel as if you're progressing in it without a definite end.

 

 

inb4 Mr. Newton gives an example about how you may not know the number of pages there are in an ebook, or you may already know the amount of juice left in a visual novel  when you play it for the second time. 

 

 

 

Like I said before, trying to find an ontology to visual novels - or to any other form of expression - is futile. We are never going to find anything exclusive to any form of anything, because what we enjoy in what we enjoy comes from a multitude of non-exclusive factors. Gameplay isn't exclusive to games and games don't have only gameplay, for instance.

 

I can see why mr newton thinks otherwise though. There is something called genre, and there is something called interpretive frames. Politicians used to political discourse employ particular linguistic strategies in public speaking. One reason why fervent visual novel readers has an experience different from a person reading the visual novel for the first time is that readers used to this genre can quickly pick up visual novels through accessing their cultural toolkit. For example you may already have a particular habit in saving before flags, turning on or off the auto-read function, or probably you may recognise that the abrupt H-scene has nothing to do with the story and you can just skip it.

[Pudding321]

 That there are routes, that their order is enforced, that they are structured in such a way that you end up doing what the game wants or dying, that it's told in first-person - none of these features are exclusive, but together they do provide an experience that only a visual novel could provide.

 

Then these features can be strategies that are exclusive to the visual novel as a genre. Not in the sense that every visual novel has to use the same strategies, but that only visual novels have the capacity to execute them. Most novels won't be be able to provide routes, not to mention other features that make f/sn a great visual novel. 

[Pudding321]

 

Culture plays a big part in our experiences, sure. This could be why we sometimes associate visual novels to routes and routes to characters; or expect conventional choice systems. None of these are essential, but we are familiar with them and they are part of what we expect from the medium. It takes time to change that and sometimes they crystallize to the point it doesn't even matter anymore - one example would be our reading order. We assume we should read from left to right and from top to bottom. If you think about it, it doesn't need to be like that, but why break this convention?

 

I am actually used to reading from right to left in Japanese novels...

 

What I am saying is that our expectations about culture and visual novels can be picked out, extracted, and generalised. We can expect a choice here; we can expect a dead end here; we can expect an H-scene here. It becomes so routine that we might be able to find formulas in visual novels! It doesn't really matter if there are one or two outcasts who read them differently, or whether there are divergences here or there. As long as there is a dominant trend, we can pick up dominant features. In reverse, visual novels that play with these expectations succeed because these expectations are rooted in the reader. 

[Newton]

I just read your review of Fate/Stay Night and I enjoyed it, Palas. Following that link to "Tender Scenery" definitely stirred something in me. It seems evident now that there are no exclusive elements to a visual novel but rather what is exclusive is the particular combination of these elements, the meta-element, you could say. 

 

I'd like to know if there're any lessons of artistry that I could take away from VNs and incorporate in films to elicit the same responses in my audience. 

[Pudding321]

I guess mr Newton is trying to find out certain formulas in visual novels that do the magic differently from other media forms. But... 

 

 

I'd like to know if there're any lessons of artistry that I could take away from VNs and incorporate in films to elicit the same responses in my audience. 

 

I'm not sure how you can take something directly from a book and throw it into a film. The resources you can use in a film are really different than a visual novel. 

[Newton]

I guess mr Newton is trying to find out certain formulas in visual novels that do the magic differently from other media forms. But... 

 

 

I'm not sure how you can take something directly from a book and throwing it into a film. The resources you can use in a film are really different than a visual novel. 

 

I'm afraid that that goes against what we've been saying, that there aren't exclusive elements in VNs and films but what is exclusive is how these elements are utilized. 

 

I suppose the topic of the thread should shift now. How do the various non-exclusive elements in VNs combine to produce an experience that is exclusive to the medium?

 

By the way, I don't want to come off like I'm shooting you down, Pudding, I appreciate your input.

[Pudding321]

I'm afraid that that goes against what we've been saying, that there aren't exclusive elements in VNs and films but what is exclusive is how these elements are utilized. 

 

 

No, that's what I thought what you want. 

 

And you have misunderstood what I meant by formulas in visual novels. Reread what I said about genres and things being exclusive to a VN but not things that are a necessity in a VN. 

 

I have something to talk regarding the absence of voice in the first person. Sometimes they do have a voice, some other times they don't have a voice only to deceive the player like zero escape, and most other times they just don't. The general proposition is that players are more likely to identify themselves with the first player; others say that a male voice destroys the game. I think either explanation is reasonable. This is something you cannot do in films and hence exclusive to the subject we refer to as visual novels. 

[Newton]

 

No, that's what I thought what you want. 

What I wanted was to see if there are any exclusive elements that visual novels possess as compared to other mediums and that doesn't seem to be the case.  

 

 

I have something to talk regarding the absence of voice in the first person. Sometimes they do have a voice, some other times they don't have a voice only to deceive the player like zero escape, and most other times they just don't. The general proposition is that players are more likely to identify themselves with the first player; others say that a male voice destroys the game. I think either explanation is reasonable. This is something you cannot do in films and hence exclusive to the subject we refer to as visual novels. 

But you can! You can absolutely have a character who does not speak. Perhaps he/she is mute. Perhaps he/she is psychic. Perhaps he/she just doesn't like to talk. 

 

Or maybe it's even a silent movie. People talking in movies is a convention that we take for granted just like characters in games/VNs not talking. It's a reasonable convention that mimics reality much more closely but it's not at all an ironclad rule. And the concept of a male voice destroying the game is just an example of the horrid sexism implicit in this medium, that women are meant to be objectified and the main character is only there as an avatar for the audience to project male power fantasy. 

 

 

For example: in VNs, special people are very special. They have the privilege of appearing. It's uncommon for a VN to show figurants. They may even talk, but you know someone's important because this someone has sprites. And an intrincate design. It's common in 16-bit RPGs to make protagonists stand out with their unusually elaborate sprites, which makes them stand out. Also NPCs hardly ever walk as fast or as fuildly as you. Not because they can't, but because it makes you feel special. This kind of logic - important people get A LOT of attention whereas everyone else gains no attention at all - might be applied to film, although it would be quite the aesthetic experiment.

I'm afraid that this is already implicit in movies, it just goes unnoticed because it's so naturally conveyed. Using mainstream examples, when all the stormtroopers in Star Wars have the same faceless, interchangeable outfit but Darth Vader gets a unique voice and costume, special-ness has occurred. When all the human-like characters in Guardians of the Galaxy look the same but Peter Quill has a moniker, Star-lord, and gets to wear a mask, special-ness has occurred. When important characters never get hurt very badly except in plot points, when bullets never hit them, when people fall in love with them for not much reason, you've witnessed special-ness.

[Pudding321]

Okay, maybe I didn't write it clearly. I meant the main character, you, as the first person in the visual novel doesn't have a voice. You also speak through the textbox; other characters in the game respond to you, but you don't have a 'voice' unlike them. It doesn't mean you are mute or psychic and have powers to speak to people without opening your mouth. It is only natural and of the norms for a visual novel to have the male protagonist muted. No further explanation is needed. If you have a muted main character in a film, you would need to have a good justification. You don't need this justification in a vn. That's why this makes it a specific element in a VN.

 

I can hardly think of any film that has this specific 'element'. Correct me if I am wrong. 

 

And I know there are visual novels with no voice. It isn't a necessity. 

 

And we shouldn't jump to any conclusions about gender issues. I'm pretty sure there are otomes where only the girl protagonist does not have a voice. 

[Newton]

 

 

Okay, maybe I didn't write it clearly. I meant the main character, you, as the first person in the visual novel doesn't have a voice. You also speak through the textbox; other characters in the game respond to you, but you don't have a 'voice' unlike them. It doesn't mean you are mute or psychic and have powers to speak to people without opening your mouth. It is only natural and of the norms for a visual novel to have the male protagonist muted. No further explanation is needed. If you have a muted main character in a film, you would need to have a good justification. You don't need this justification in a vn. That's why this makes it a specific element in a VN.

Fair enough. That's something that intrigues me. 

 

 

And we shouldn't jump to any conclusions about gender issues. I'm pretty sure there are otomes where only the girl protagonist does not have a voice. 

No doubt, but the fact that we can't name any is troubling. The majority of VNs are male protagonists involving themselves with women. I'll cut the gender discussion short right here, it's something best suited for another thread.

[Chronopolis]

So, I come to my main point. I enjoy visual novels quite a bit and I'm glad that I can be one of very few people to experience this niche medium but I wonder...why do I enjoy them? Is there something intrinsic to the medium which allows it to engage an audience in a way that no other medium can?

You can look at someone's face. Hear them speak. Feel that they are looking towards you (the MC, but even without self-insert it's a similiar perspective). Gape in shock at a scene, while at the same time having lines of inner narrative passing by.

[Newton]

 

You can look at someone's face. Hear them speak. Feel that they are looking towards you (the MC, but even without self-insert it's a similiar perspective). Gape in shock at a scene, while at the same time having lines of inner narrative passing by.

True, true. There's a proximity of emotion, a lingering pace to the scenes as you seem to pay more attention to what characters say and how they say it. 

 

How to replicate this in film? Most movies just watch but some make us feel like we're living with the characters. What's the technique?

[Clephas]

Mmm... some VNs can be said to qualify as art, though most are just pure entertainment.  Dies Irae, for instance, would qualify as both, in that it tries and succeeds at satisfying the reader on a much deeper level than is the norm through poetic turns of phrase, deliberate exploration of narrative prose, coordination of musical themes, and visual art.   In a different way, Konata yori Kanata made could be considered a work of art for its honest exploration of the themes of death and parting.

 

However, most VNs are just entertainment... and they should be thought of that way.  Determining that a VN is art is usually done well after the fact, entirely in hindsight after the initial heat has died down.