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Happy Christmas. It just occurred to me I barely have any images on my computer, so why the hell would I have Christmas themed ones? Oh, I have an idea:

Merry Kurisu-masu~

2017 has been a pretty cool year in terms of VN releases. I'm not even close to Clephas' level of reading, so I have only scratched the surface of what was released this year, but I did still read what I think is a pretty decent chunk of VNs, and now that the year is coming to a close, I'd like to go through some those games and talk about which ones I liked the most etc. This blog post will only cover NEW releases in 2017. I might make a separate blog post about VNs that weren't released in 2017, but that I still read this year later on. I started the year with Ryuu Kishi Bloody Saga, a cool fantasty game by Akabeisoft 3. The prequel to this game was a dark nukige-ish story, which didn't really impress me. But, Ryuu Kishi went into a completely different direction, and ended up being a really entertaining read. I wrote a blog post about Ryuu Kishi around the time I finished it, so I'll link that here if anyone wants to read it. Summing up though, Ryuu Kishi is a good fantasty VN, with great action scenes, an interesting plot, and good romance. (With a functional harem aspect, which was interesting.) It's by no means a kamige, but it was definitely among the better games released this year in my opinion. After this I played a few games, but none of them were anything special. Amanatsu Adolescence had some aspects I liked, but fell flat on its face with the heroine routes, which was disappointing. The next game worth mentioning is Majo to Tsurugi to Sen no Tsuki. This was my first time playing one of Kai's Mahou Shoujo games, and the only reason I picked this one up was because Ban'ya had helped write it. (I love Ban'ya's stuff.) The game honestly blew me away. I'm not saying it's a kamige or anything, (not by a long shot,) but considering that this is meant to be a nukige, it really went beyond my expectations. The story was legitimately interesting, the characters were great and the writing was satisfying. Reading this game made me interested in checking out the rest of the works in the series, which I'll get around to reading at some point. Hopefully they are similar in structure, as I took quite the liking to the way this game's structure. You basically have a nukige with a story, where making the right choices lets you skip most of the H-scenes, and move through the true route. But, if you make the wrong choice, you are thrown down "bad routes", filled with bad endings and H-scenes. So, depending on what mood you're in, you can choose what type of game you're playing, essentially. (There are of course still a decent number of H-scenes in the true route, but the bulk of them are in the bad routes.) My review of this game can be found here, on Clephas' blog. Now, next on the list is Chrono Box, and well, I'm just going to come out and say it right away: This game is amazing. It's without a doubt one of my favorite VNs of all time. Actually, it's tied for 1st place with the ChuSinGura series. I went into the game without knowing much about the story, and I got sucked into the game right away, finishing the whole thing in about 4-5 days. (Considering it's a rather hard game to read in Japanese, that's pretty crazy fast for me.) The ratings on VNDB aren't the best, which is to be expected tbh. It's a hard game to read, and it's a denpa game where every single small detail matters. I'd imagine a chunk of VNDB votes comes from people who try reading JP games with machine translations, and well, that is not recommended for this game. In fact, there are many parts of the game that cannot be hooked, as they are either in image files in the game itself, or in voiced lines without any text. In addition, it's a game with some pretty dark content here and there, and I know some people just rate games badly because of that. (This is a story driven mystery/denpa game, and similar to SubaHibi, all the dark elements are there for a reason, driving the story forward.) I don't mean to come off as an elitist saying "EOP's opinions doesn't matter!" here, by the way. I do think the difficulty of the game, and the content in it might have caused a bit of a change in the votes from English readers, though. In comparison, the game is rated very highly on EGS, being #23 of the whole year so far, (and it also has a rather high amount of votes, in comparison to some games above it on the list, which just has a handful. Like, seriously, 2 of the games on the list only have 5-6 votes, kek.) Overall, this is just a fantastic read. I strongly recommend it to anyone who can read it. It truly just blew my mind. If you ARE going to read it, do yourself a favor: Do NOT look up anything about it. No CGs, no story summaries, no nothing. Just go in blind, and enjoy the ride. Seriously, you have no idea what's in store for you. Moving on from Chrono Box, we have Pure Song Garden, the first "normal" charage I played this year that I feel deserves a spot among the "better" releases I've read in 2017. This is Pulltop's newest "club-themed game", similar to Konosora and Miagete Goran, focusing on a future world where AI and VR has become an important part of our lives. It has fantastic romance, (in the true route at least; I have to admit, I skipped the other routes for the true route. It was all I wanted,) the story is surprisingly good, and the characters aren't just stereotypes, like they tend to be in similar games. Suzu and Iroha, the characters with the main focus in the true route, definitely makes the game worth it by themselves. The MC also isn't bad, though I do wish they added a bit more to his backstory. They introduced an interesting conflict with him, which just kind of resolved itself rather quickly, something that irked me a bit. But, definitely a solid game overall. You can read more of my opinions on the game here, on Clephas' blog. Finally we have Biman 4. This was my first Biman title, and I didn't really know what to expect of the game. And honestly, I was blown away by it. The writing was fantastic, and felt nearly poetic at times, even. The drama was well handled, and some of the scenes made me take a break from the game for a bit, as they made me feel so many different emotions. These scenes were so well done. At the end of the day, the game is still a nukige, and I won't call it a kamige or anything, but man, this game is so much more than first meets the eye. Almost makes me sad that it's a nukige, as there could have been even more potential there had it been a little longer, and a little more story focused. Either way, this is another truly good VN that I strongly recommend people read. Also, it's completely possible to read it without having read the other Biman games, just like I did. You can read some more details about my opinion on the game here, on Clephas' blog. Overall, this has been a great year with many solid releases. My backlog still has a good chunk of the games that came out this year, many of which might have made it on this list, if I had the time to read them. But, oh well. I'm still happy with the amount of VNs I got done this year, and look forward to seeing what 2018 has in store for us.

Happy whatever holidays you celebrate these days!

Since Poltroon already broke the S;G combo, I'm putting a 2B pic here! Merry Christmaaaaaaaaaaas~~~~~

Merry Christmas/Happy Holiday to you all! I would add an appropriate image but unfortunately, I'm a lazy fuck and can't be bothered to look for one. :3 EDIT: Oh, well, I'm in a sharing mood after all, have some Christmas yuri:

merry holidays you beautiful dipshits

Merry but it's the 24th youse guys

Learning Polish right now as I have a study abroad trip to Krakow this summer. It does also help that I have a family member who is full polish to help along the way as well.

Well, I went ahead and got the bundle like you said. Can't argue with the price when it's 71% off. Seems that I have a lot to look forward towards with this VN.

Welcome to Fuwanovel! I hope you enjoy your time here probably, maybe. Yeah Clannad was made by Key and yes they excel in mercilessly extracting tears from tender hearts. It's a pretty seminal work and worth reading for Kyou's and Tomoyo's routes alone

I do have to ask, though, are all original japanese games even written well enough? This could be a larger discussion, even; when people complain about the english translations, do they consider that the original may be as bad as it and probably people don't care because it is the "true" version? I mean, it is not possible that ALL translations are bad, right? Sometimes this question comes to my mind but I've never seen anybody talking about this. Sorry for being off topic :<

Yes actually I do. I'm currently reading Little Busters! and have read Steins;Gate and Higurashi no Naku Koro ni which I both liked immensely.

Been a long time since i posted this beauty.

Rem with a santa hat? Yes please! 10/10

Hope mainstream media doesn't go on an attack because of this. Really anoying how people with no clue about what they are talking about are the ones who could have the most effect on something.

I dont intend to use fakku's services and never really used fakku before either (they were shit before they went commercial as well) but let me summarize for those unfamiliar with fakku: the hate for fakku stems from how they once hosted stuff for free (illegally) like sadpanda etc but then they went commerical bought licenses and then they demanded other sites to take down everything they now own people hate fakku for pretty much the same reasons they hate crunchyroll at first they were free and didnt give one shit about copyright but once they went commercial copyright suddenly started to matter way too much drama in the western scene for me pro-tip: learn Japanese

I too hate when people get payed for their work

MoeNovel is a best company! It's an only decent company that cares about actual fans who actually likes VNs and not about perverts who only see VNs as fap material. They have my full support and respect for not going for easy money by giving perverts their fix and ruining a VN with H-scenes crap but instead sticking only to a fixed (all-ages) versions. We need more companies like them!

Finally managed to get around to finishing off Kindred Spirits On The Roof and man I'm glad I did! Those were some real fine emotions though! I even teared up a bit at the end and that almost never happens. There was a lot of tenderness and warmth on display along with lots of humor. I enjoyed pretty much all the couples and I thought they matched each other pretty well. Overall it was definitely worth playing (Still haven't gotten through the bonus content though) Plus it was worth playing just for this one moment alone

Oh god new event is team effort Everyone will know how bad am i at this game

The combo was doomed to break as soon as I posted something in it. This always happens to me. I never break the combo directly, but I'm always at the end of it.