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Yeah I think in even regular eroges it would be good to see the guys visibly instead of a disembodied husk or some faceless horror.

In my experience talking to otome fans, absolutely there is a market. Everyone likes some good smut to an extent

So, just kind of piggy-backing (is that the right term?) off my previous thread, re: finding good +18 otome with good artwork... Is there a genuine interest for +18 otome games, with good art style and heavy, plotwise? I'm just going to come out and admit that yes, I AM working on an +18 otome game, but I'm only familiar with the Asian market and while otome games are a niche market, the +18 otome games are a niche within a niche, making me worry that I might be producing a product that ultimately will not have an audience in a English speaking market. So TLDR; would you play/buy an otome game with +18 elements?

Creature Romances because misery is a thing best shared Other than that Campus Notes: Forget Me Not turned out to be quite funny.

Sr blitz

The romantic subplot has finally culminated in the kiss: Credit: Red from Overly Sarcastic Productions

The Best Eroge Ever is the only thing that comes to mind. It may be a bit too silly though.

Yyyyy... Anything more specific (about the friend and what you're looking for)? DDLC comes to mind as a pretty obvious choice. I also know a ton of good, free OELVNs but it depends whether you look for something serious-looking or cute fluff can work too. This is also a good option. Or something like Love at First Sight? Short, cute and weird.

I would focus more on telling the story you want to tell. If that story involves 18+ and it thematically makes sense, go for it. You don't want to shoehorn in 18+ just to have it.

Fixed that for you.

I'm rather shy, the only person who knows about my visual novel addiction is my boyfriend and some very long-term friends who I'm hanging out with for years.

Hi! I'm looking to play an 18+ otome game, preferably from Japan, with some sexual content, and good storyline/art, ala Otomate games or Mystic Messenger. Thanks in advance for the recs!

So tomorrow I'm meeting with a close friend of mine and y'know, instead of the good ol' plan of watching a movie, we agreed to have some fun reading a VN and roleplaying some. Do you have any ideas of a short and hilarious VN? Thank you!

They did not, which leads to speculation this year being more difficult in a way.

I'm hoping for another AliceSoft announcement at the very least. Something like BBH maybe?

There are many characters I would gladly go lesbian for (Rikka, don't be sad about Suou, I'll make you feel better ), but I would have to find a proper gender-bending wizard first.

As long as the story is moving along, then I don't see it being too much reading. I often find some VNs too short though cutting out development and going straight to the result.

Some BxG H scenes from Girl perspectives * Grisaia no Meikyuu (1 Masturbation Station scenes only) * Swan Song (only one of the few vanilla ones) * Fashioning Little Miss Lonesome (all of them) * Cute Demon Crashers (all of them) * If My Heart Had Wings/KonoSora (like half of one)

Dustmania Grotesque would be great. @Dergonu approves of it, so you know it's good. w

Hey, reading VN along with a friend is the only way to go for me, any VN becomes fun with two morons reading it at the same time! As for suggestions: - Dot Kareshi series is an otome that focus more in comedy (poking fun at RPG tropes) than romance; - Any short game with the "High Amount of Bad Endings" tag. Playing those without a guide is very fun, just try to reach the ending! (I tried an otome called "Monochrome Heaven", it's story is pretty shoujo cliché, but there's like five or six ways to die in the common route alone) - So bad it's good games like "John Cena's Sexy High School Adventure" or "Señor Volky McLupinstein and the League of Extraordinary Dentists" (I played this last one and my god that voice acting is gold)

This actually interest me greatly. And it's just as solidbatman said above, if you write the 18+ parts with care and to serve the plot, not simply shoehorning it in, by all means, do it! But if you want to do a story also fully revolving around the 18+ parts, that's okay for me too! Sometimes I have that feeling too. It would be cool to have more "by girls, for girls" VNs, without "trying to appeal to male readers too to sell more". There's some OELVNs that do a good job with this, and I'm thankful for that. Of course, I like those JP Otomes too, but something different once a while is surely refreshing. And, as the good and pure horny girl I am, I only ask to make the nude guys fully visible, it's only half the fun only showing the girl. K, thanks, bye!

Also, isn't the fact that there aren't many 18+ otomie games out there all the more reason to make one? (At least in English) Don't the best market leaders provide a product or a service that is currently underused or not in existence? What better way of standing out against the tide of visual novels that are out there. Especially if it's a VN of great quality.

Finished Risa x Miya and starting Nanami x Yuuna route. As for Risa x Miya route, in regard of this I would say that this time it's slightly better now that we knew what's our two heroines family situation like. I say this because if I recall, there's no much family talk in previous Sonohana except for Sonohana 2 (Sara and Kaede are cousins) and Sonohana 7 (Runa's sister leave her alone). As for the story, well it's usual Sonohana so it's mean that we only saw of how both of Risa and Miya approached each other, although this time it's more complicated compared to previous Sonohana because we have Risa angry at Miya who is always skip the school. Of course what follow is that at first both of them were quite distant to each other until Miya made advance to Risa, and Risa still don't know if Miya really love her until Christmas (Or perhaps Risa still try to deny her real feeling). At Christmas, finally they declared that they love each other and from there we have both couple flirt with each other. Compared to past Sonohana, I think the development for our main couple (Risa x Miya) was more complex if only was because they become the focus of the common route (And Risa being MC) for the most part, and the post Christmas scripts for them was slightly longer compared to one Sonohana VN, so I see that they put the effort for their first official release. As for the art, while I think both of Risa and Miya art is fine enough actually the couple from past 10 games was redrawn, and some people might find it awkward to see the new art style compared to the old one - Risa and Miya was not so awkward though because both of them were new characters and therefore need a new sprites. As for the setting, I think there's no enough explanation that Risa is half Japanese because I only hear her said that near the end of her route, and I only knew that she was half British from VNDB description. Other than that, I see that while I did call this Sonohana all star, at most Risa was only interact with both of Nanami and Sara although it's pretty reasonable though because only both of them were fellow 1st grade. I think that's all for what I can write in regard of Sonohana 11 for now.

It's such a simple question, but it's really hard to give an answer, because there is no single right answer. Every single answer usually includes "it depends on..." and one major factor is personal taste. The best answer I can give is to make the good parts long enough and the not so good parts as short as possible. If there is a section, which ends up being boring, it will take forever to get through and the risk of dropping the title increases significantly. It doesn't matter if the good parts are really long as long as they are good and worth reading. I don't think you should view the VN as a whole as too long or not. The issue is rather each scene. For each scene, possibly each line, you should ask yourself if what you are looking at will be interesting to read, if it has significance to the plot in the future, character buildup (as in reader gaining knowledge of personality) and so on. You should consider not using something where you have to say no to all those questions. Even if the section is interesting, you should consider if it could be done in 20 lines instead of 30 and if it would be better or worse for doing so. Your goal is to cut away as much as possible without removing anything good or needed. Perfection is not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. One thing people often complain about is way too long H scenes, but any suggestions to remove them aren't popular either. However somehow I get the feeling you aren't adding any, which is ok. It's a genre decision and some VNs are better for not including H scenes at all. Some of the really popular VNs have no H scenes at all and instead focuses on something completely different, such as a well written story with carefully fought out plot elements. One thing, which is fairly important when writing a VN instead of a book is that it doesn't go A to B. VNs usually have a number of choices, which either makes the story branch right away or answered are stored in flags to be used to branch later. In some cases both. There exist VNs without much branching and in some cases none at all. However proper branching is generally viewed as a good thing.

I see. Then it's good that I used double spoilers. I edited my previous post, just in case.

You're not at Episode 10, are you? In that case, you still have a long way to go.

No I think he was referring to Operation 21st. Operation Ouka comes much later.

I've been trained so that I no longer consider them genitals if there isn't mosaic. *Clephas eyes turn flat and dead briefly*

Not really.

If you are making a story with actions scenes, the more detail and description (and the more graphic) the better. If you are making a philosophical ramble, similar. Sci-fi and fantasy are also more tolerant of infodumps and extensive explanation of details. However, if you start going off on explanations of making coffee and cakes in an SOL story about a guy working as the owner of a cafe, then you are probably just going to irritate your readers unless you are a total genius at making it interesting. In that kind of case, you should restrict action descriptions to the 'bare bones', rather than going insane with it. You can get away with spending the equivalent of half a page on the making of a special tea or coffee in a novel, but in a VN, it is just irritating. As an example... Modesitt (the fantasy author who writes the Recluse and Imager series) is a genius at making relatively mundane tasks interesting. However, most people can't do that and shouldn't try. What is your area of mastery? Every writer has one. Mine is setting design and action (violent) scenes. However, I suck at slice-of-life, because it really isn't possible to make something interesting if you don't find it interesting. The key is figuring out how to translate your area of mastery from the novelized format to a VN format.

The limit of "too wordy" really depends of what you are writing, genres like sci-fi have much more tolerance in that aspect than SoL, the excess of words tends to be a problem to less skillful writers, but in the right hands and concepts could make a really good work. If you are uncertain, use the motto "less words, more meaning". In my opinion, a negative example of a wordy vn is Tsuki ni Yorisou Otome no Sahou 2, the phrases per se are already lengthy and there some random background info dumps that are totally fucked by how lengthy they are, resulting in a horrible flow to the history.

Pretty much this (assuming there are any good parts to get to :p). To be more specific though, I'm quite a patient reader after I get into a story, but if something bores me or bums me out it's usually long descriptions or overly-long, exaggerated internal monologues. The VN that bored me like no other Sweet Volley High, starts with 10 minutes of the protagonists thinking about how bored and average she is. The VN was consistently shit, but even a good one would have problems to salvage things after such an introduction. Everlasting Summer, generally a very good VN, have a solid 5 minute sequence of the protagonist freaking out after being inexplicably transported to the pioneer camp where the action takes place. After two minutes its really clear enough how he's feeling (and the fact he left behind a completely miserable, empty life really makes the whole thing even more annoying). Some people hate "pointless" slice-of-life interactions, I personally don't mind them, as long as they're decently written. The problem starts for me when the game stops flowing properly, like in the examples mentioned above.

Too much reading is any reading you have to do to "get to the good part/s"

Well for me I've noticed that my attention span is not what it used to be so I have a harder time staying engaged with a Visual Novel over it's slow parts. Right now I'm playing Aoishiro and while I'm liking quite a bit right now it spends far too much time focused on talking about food and obscure Japanese folklore than by advancing the plot. At this point it feels like I'm drowning in all these terms that I can barely understand and could care less about. Still I am really enjoying the visuals and characters and the story is interesting enough to hold my attention which I think is the most important thing.

Agreed- whether a VN is too long or too short depends pretty much entirely on the subject matter and how it is tackled. Saya no Uta wouldn't really work as a 30 hour VN but, say, Umineko wouldn't be the same if it were only 20 hours.

I usually read in periods of anywhere from 1 to 3 hours unless I'm completely invested in the story or vn in question in which case I can just read for hours on end. I've blazed through 50hr vns, on the flip side I've taken ages with 10hr ones simply because I wasn't into it. For me if it starts to feel "wordy" or "too long" it's because I'm not into it or don't find it interesting, otherwise I'm not likely to notice it because of how engrossed I am in the content.

If you do it in a style similar to Light, there is literally no reason not to use the NVL style and fill the entire screen with text, with the characters and CGs in the background. The one thing you need to do that you probably aren't used to is to firmly separate dialogue and narration lines. In addition 'he said/she said' is unnecessary. Dialogue boxes make that irrelevant. Rather, when narrating, you simply describe their body language or tone of voice to provide emphasis. Honestly, if your game is slice-of-life, you should avoid heavy narration like the plague. Slice-of-life stories just become interminable if you narrate it heavily. Also, adjust your dialogue to narration rate so that dialogue is at least somewhat more heavily favored than it would be if you were writing a novel. Some of your narration will inevitably be made less relevant by the use of sprite poses and expressions, necessitating somewhat less in the way of detail.

I read on average 4-5 hours per day when I read VNs. I still don't think that's too much compared to the 10 hours I used to spend on them.

Yeah visual novels have always known to be very long in in terms of length. For example, Fate Stay Night is more than 1 million words in length, which is more than twice the length of the Lord Of The Rings trilogy. This is why it can take much longer for people to finish a visual novel as compared to a standard novel. I used to frequently read standard novels a few years ago (when I was 13-15) and I could finish a trilogy within a day. Meanwhile, a very long visual novel which is over 50 hours in length will usually take me at least a week to complete, provided that I dedicate all my time to it (which is about 10-12 hours). If you are looking for a wordy vn, I think it would be Higurashi as it took me months to complete it (though to be fair, I didn't dedicate much time at one go in the earlier half of the game).

Wireless Bluetooth Headset + Visual Novel Music (half of it Grisaia music) = Much Cleaner Kitchen. That makes me power through chores so much easier (a rainy day that isn't hot or humid helps too).

when you read VN more than doing other things per day???

This covers not one but a couple of dates, has some actual uncensored porn, to spice the date up, it's horror, and it's cheap: http://store.steampowered.com/app/585890/

Well, actually my average vote is just below 7, mostly because, just like @bakauchuujin said, I just don't finish most of the VNs that fall into 1-5 category according to my system, unless they are very short. 5 in my case is more or less a vote for a VN of absolutely average quality, which is something I wouldn't normally enjoy if there are better VNs out there.

That previous example was fairly subtle compared to how bad it can be. I can do much better than that. Nuff said: