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Wait, there are people that turn off background music? O.o'

Since this one was released in English already, I'm pretty sure at least a good number of the members of this community have already sampled it. However, this is also the last VN for this month (that isn't a nukige). This has been a month full of short kinetic novels that are parts of a larger story... a setup that I normally dislike intensely. Since this game is only a partial, it isn't actually a candidate for VN of the Month (VN of the Month's rules require that the release in question be a full game that stands on its own, which means individually-released chapters and fandiscs don't count). First, I will say that this game is significantly different from the original Grisaia series. How is it different? For one thing, all of the kids are, like Kazami Yuuji, individuals who are incapable of living a normal life for one reason or another. For another, this game spends relatively little time in the protagonist's point of view, with the first chapter mostly being told from the teacher's point of view and the second chapter mostly being portrayed from the point of view of one or another of the girls. Since this is an all-ages game, this works a lot better than it would with an eroge, where the protagonist's point of view is the one you use to judge the heroines. After the incidents in the original Grisaia trilogy, the agencies Yuuji worked for eventually chose to purchase and reuse Mihama Academy as an assassin and spy training school for kids who, for one reason or another, can't live in the outside world. The story in this game is focused on A Class, which is made up of members of SORD (students who are already working for the organization). The nominal protagonist of the story is Haruto, who, like Yuuji, was part of the organization since childhood (apparently from earlier on in life than Yuuji, though). This guy is a bit more sane on the surface than Yuuji, and he is definitely better at dealing with people. That said, he has his 'black' side, which tends to show at critical moments. Unfortunately for him, he does retain the remnants of a human conscience, lol. Volume 1 Volume 1 focuses mostly on the teacher, Arisaka Shiori, and her encounter with the killer girls in her class. Shiori is a straight-out normal person, whose only black mark is a mother who is in prison (incidentally, this is sufficient reason for her to be refused employment at any other school). She is also a bit cowardly on the surface, but she is definitely a hot-blooded teacher in the old style underneath. That said, the class she is teaching is, quite naturally, a bit beyond what she expected. In this volume, the writer uses Shiori's viewpoint to introduce you to the difference between the girls' viewpoints and that of the average Japanese person, while at the same time creating the conditions that lead to Shiori becoming the only truly normal person who deals with the girls and Haruto. I have to give it to Fujisaki... he did an excellent job in this way, and the way he ended the chapter was excellent, in that it left me wanting more without giving me the voracious appetite that I experienced with Grisaia 2. Volume 2 This chapter focuses mostly on Rena and her issues. Rena is a brainwashed assassin 'purchased' by Haruto at an auction for the specific purpose of making up for his inability to use guns. She has no moral compunctions about killing, and when she is released from the restraints of normal life by Haruto's orders, she is pretty much a berserker, killing everything in her path. The rest of the time, she is a big-eating girl who loves to ride motorcycles and clinging to Haruto. She is aware of her faults, but she is just a little too stupid to be able to fix them. She is also insanely devoted to Haruto, even aside from the brainwashing that created the loyalty bond between them. This chapter deals heavily with Rena's past, which means some pretty nasty stuff that is just as bad - or worse- than Yuuji's, and so it isn't exactly for the faint of heart. That said, it was an enjoyable read, and, like the first volume, while it leaves me hungry for more, it doesn't do that to excess (meaning I can wait for the next chapter with relative equanimity, though if this game goes beyond four chapters, I'll probably get murderous). Overall If their goal was to catch my interest, Front Wing did an excellent job. The first two chapters both stand alone to some extent, and there is no sense that they left you hanging. For a game done in parts, this is about as good as it gets. VN of the Month April 2017 There will be no VN of the Month for April 2017, due to a lack of viable candidates.

Nice to meet you~!

The music. By that I mean thrice the bgm, the actual songs and how "music" is basically the seventh main character in and of itself. Most visual novels (or stories in general for that matter) have a theme, be it coming of age, redemption or plain old revenge and use various settings like highschool demon fighting or getting into a band as vehicles to drive the plot along. Deardrops however, is about music more than anything else. Music goes through every fiber of the writing and I love it. Music is the setting, plot and tone, everything else is along for the ride. Not having an enforced play order actually; Not reading Riho last will feel very underwhelming. And while Kanade's and even Yayoi's stories gave more things about universe and plot away, Rimu's route is pretty pointless? I didn't even like it as a fun "side-dish", like the Majikoi side routes for the boys. If I was put on the spot on what to improve immediately about this VN? Rimu's route. I adore jaded, cynical adult figures, especially when they come in the body of a 9 year old girl. I would say it's immersive for first time readers, because it forces you to follow along with the music (even more so for japanese readers, since they can actually understand the lyrics). People who are rereading Deardrops however, are most likely annoyed. ... Oh wait, I'm not a member. Who cares, I love rattling on about Deardrops. Just in case anyone reading this thinks about going for the fandisk afterwards: Don't bother unless you've read Kira*Kira. You'll be utterly lost.

The industrial country Citelle has been locked in a fierce battle with the military country Martasco for centuries. In order to combat the fighting advantage that Martasco had, Citelle invented the HASBER project, an experiment that genetically alters physical abilities. Follow the story of individuals who struggle to get back on their feet after being hurt by society, in a world where prejudice reigns strong, failure is unacceptable, and the HASBER project governs all. There will be a Kickstarter going live on 5/4/2017 at 12PM EST. Follow us on twitter or tumblr! FEATURES - Free to play - Customizable name - 5 visual novel routes, each with a corresponding kinetic novel route - Estimate word count: 200,000 - 300,000 - 10+ endings - 30+ CGs - Original soundtrack - Opening video CHARACTERS

^ It appears you have been downgraded to an "it". My condolences.

I finished Kanade's route a few days ago and thought it was definitely much better than the Rimu and Yayoi routes since it didn't feel tacked on in comparison to those. I really like how the narration changed frequently between Kanade and Shoichi because I thought it was really interesting to see things from both character's perspectives. I hope to see perspective changes in Riho's route as well; I think it would be cool to see things through Riho's eyes. Some of the drama in this route felt really awkward and strange like Kanade's various reasons for not being able to sing and the Johann stuff, but there were other parts of the route that were really good that made up for some of the awkwardness. My favourite parts of her route was the concert near the end as well as Shoichi playing in the street. I'm hoping to reading/finish Riho's route soon since she is still my favourite heroine so far I'll get to the questions in a bit since I want to think about them for a little while before responding.

Yeah, some of choices are rather stupid and counterintuitive. I would say its standard for KEY games unfortunately. Nowadays when I start reading something the first thing I do is look for walkthrough so I won't have that kind of poblems (and I don't miss any scene). It's not something everyone do, but I think it just saves me from that kind of frustration you currently have ;p

I've been looming in and around fuwa for some time now (like a year), finally got around to this. I like Majikoi and short walks on the beach. It's nice to meet you all!

Welcome to the forum, nice to meet you.

Welcome to Fuwanovel, and nice Wanko avatar there by the way. Nice to meet you too, and hope you have fun here.

hello and welcome to the forums! nice avatar. hope you like it here and have a great time! have another wanko pic!

Hello, welcome to Fuwa :3

Confession: I recently got a friend addicted to Monster Girl Quest. It was supposed to be payback for making me sit through Boyfriend to Death with her but she just ended up really enjoying it.

Ahaha, most of my answers will probably be the same as TexasDice's... Oh well, here goes. My favorite aspect of the game is the music. Much like TexasDice stated above, music is what the VN is about so it's very important that it's done right here. But apart from that, the VN carried a very distinct aesthetic, and the music is a big part of it. It's an incredibly stylish VN as a whole. The art has a sort of "pop" to it and looks very bright and colorful without being overbearing. The music's instrumentation and general tone is similarly striking and suitable. On a side note, the H scene track is genuinely one of my favorite tracks and I wish it was used more outside of H scenes. I didn't love how several routes felt sort of tacked on. It's not awful, but there's a distinct gap in quality between the Riho route and the rest that almost makes me feel as though the VN would be better linear (though, I think I'm the minority in preferring mostly linear VNs, so make of that what you will). I also didn't love the character of Kanade. I generally dislike the childhood friend archetype; they're an incredibly lazy way to make a heroine come with a prepackaged affection for the MC. For the most part she was fine, but I really wish her being in love with Shouichi wasn't so obvious from the outset. I think that these things are much better if developed during the VN itself... My favorite side character was probably Megumi, the stripper who served as a friend to Kanade. She only showed up in Kanade's route, but she was really funny and charming in her own right. She wasn't complex at all, but she did everything she needed to do and was fun to listen to. Honorable mention goes to the cat. <3 As for the forced auto-text during the concert scenes, I wouldn't change it if I could (even though 9 times out of 10 forced auto-mode drives me insane). There's a certain magic to the concert scenes that makes them incredibly powerful and evocative, and I think that's part of it. It's almost as though you're experiencing things in real-time with the characters.

Who the hell are you?

No, you really don't need to know how baseball works to play Little Busters!. If anything, it'll just make things more confusing...

Thank you for your kind words, Zalor! I promise we won't let you down. PS: I haven't played Saya no Uta (I wanted to - after having read review on Kotaku which said something like "Lovecraft would be proud", and I'm a big fan), but I read your analysis with great pleasure today. It was useful, too - the way perception affects empathy/sympahy is one of Minotaur's main themes. Although we're going with more of a Frankensteinian angle... morals of society and whatnot By the way, the second link (to Narcissu) doesn't seem to be working for me. Maybe it's broken?

I'll catch you dead after keeping you on the run for long enough Jokes aside no, I never turn off BGM. I usually set it to significantly lower than the original volume setting though while mostly leaving the voices and sfx high.

If you do that for Hapymaher, I'll crucify you. I usually just use the music in the game. The exception is when the music really does just suck, like Tsukihime...

Sauce*

Just finished Kanade's route and got started on Riho's route (not looking like I'm going to finish the whole game by April, but I'm going to try!). I'll echo Turnip's comments that Kanade narrating so much of it really helps the route feel more complete. In general, I'm a fan of VNs that let the heroines narrate for a while (the longer the better, almost), especially when that means you see the protagonist from their perspective, so I'm hoping that Riho's route will deliver more of that. I also liked a couple of the new characters who appeared in her route, especially Megumi and Johann, both of whom ended up being much more interesting than they looked at first blush. The story arc was solid and well-resolved, and felt both thematically appropriate for the game (in contrast to Rimu's or Yayoi's route) and quite different from anything I'd seen so far in the common route. Kanade hadn't really been properly shown off elsewhere, and it was pleasant getting to see her really shine. Also, I feel like the CG artist really loved Kanade; every last CG of her looks stunning. The sprite artist, well, not so much (though her secondary sprite is kind of cute, I suppose). On to Riho's route!

Finally got around reading more. I've been spoiled by books so much lately that I managed to read 5 books in the time I spent thinking when to continue with Deardrops. Anyways. Yayoi's route was pretty weird that it's made just like a cop-out side-route (short, skims around the main story/themes), but despite these it wasn't that bad. The drama was interesting enough that I almost forgot they should still have a band and the ending was really cool. Kanade's route seems pretty good. I really like how Kanade itself narrates about half of her route (so far), makes it feels like it's actually her story too. But it also makes me wish even more that Shoichi would have more personality. He already drowns under others during group scenes, partly due to not being voiced and not having enough presence because of that. Contrasting that with Kanade makes it even more obvious.

Curently reading Tokyo Babel. I finished Raziel's route and while it's good, I personally couldn't feel the 'romance'. It feels forced to be honest, like they shoehorned it at the last minute. I couldn't see any reason they would fall in love- it just happened. I do like the story even though I find myself rolling my eyes at parts. I'm personally impressed by the amount of research that went in the lore and worldbuilding. I like the references made to Judeo-Christian mythology and even apocryphal books. I have an interest in apocrypha so I really liked those elements in this VN. I loved how they incorporated all those elements in this VN and it ended up that I'm more excited about exposition than the action scenes. I'm a practicing Catholic so some parts did make me uncomfortable. I just reminded myself that it's all fictional but it's definitely not something I'd recommend to my more conservative religious friends haha. I have high hopes for this VN. I hope Sorami's and Lilith's routes are better because as good as Raziel's route is, it's lacking. Sorami and Setsuna so far seems to have more chemistry than Raziel and Setsuna so I'm definitely getting my hopes up. Edit: Just to add, Adam and Setsuna's interactions feel more romantic than his and Raziel's. I was halfway inclined to ship them instead.

Yosuga no Sora. There's barely anything wrong with it in my eyes. The drama was never complicated enough for me to feel like it was overdone, the incest was handled very well, they actually incorporate the sex into the plot, and I like how they use the omnibus format to shed light on other arcs, rather than have them not be connected at all. It easily gets an 8/10 from me.

It takes dedication but I believe you can get there. Other confessions: I'd want to be born as a being that can switch genders so I don't have to constantly complain about my gender. I'd settle for being a trap if I was cute enough though.

Right after the first episodes of Naruto first came out, I spent hours making hand symbols.