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I've now finished Heart of the Woods, my first OELVN in ages, and it was actually surprisingly good. If that's the new OELVN standard, then I'm all for more of it. Heart of the Woods could be described as a modern fairy tale about a conflict of good vs. evil. While the cast isn't particular sizable, the creators certainly tried to make the most of it. Although it's tagged as a yuri VN, it's still first and foremost a story VN about defeating an evil being. The VN relies on several corner stones for that: The friendship between Maddie and Tara, the mysteries of the woods and its inhabitants, Morgan and her weird cat, the relationship between Maddie and Abigail and the evil being itself. The friendship between Maddie and Tara is rather realistically showcased. When they arrive in the remote village they were invited to by Morgan, they are in a bit of a crisis, but over the course of the story they overcome it and stick together when it matters. I also liked how the VN just slowly reveals its supernatural elements. In the beginning, everythings looks normal and Morgan appears more like a weirdo who made up some stories to attract attention. But then, slowly more and more strange things are happening and the true nature of some people is revealed. It was also nice that the VN went deeper into the mysterious world of the woods and its inhabitants. There are other VN's which are just teasing things and riding on the sugar coat *cough* Hapymaher *cough*. The VN also does a very good job in presenting its story in a very engaging way. Many key events and situations are emphasized with well placed event CG's and some pretty good atmospheric soundtracks. Story progress is decently paced, opposing the trend of slowing down everything with tons of slice of life. Although the VN shows that the OELVN scene made a lot of progress in comparison to its Japanese counter parts, it's still a bit rough around the edges. There's no voice acting, and while the VN has some good soundtracks and effects, it's handling of it is often a bit wonky. There were many occasions when music wasn't faded out but apruptly stopped or changed instead. In other situations there was no sound at all and I wasn't sure if I accidentally muted my speakers. Sprites were okay, but they could have had more variety in positions. Why was Morgan the only character constantly staring into the screen while all the others were watching to the sides? Furthermore, while story and characters were well presented, both were still kept kind of simple in a rather straight black and white scenario. Good and evil characters were mostly clear and there was no sudden twist or surprinsing revelation in that regard. It did fit to the overall fairy tale theme though. While the relationship between Maddie and Abigail was rather sweet and well developed, I can't exactly say the same thing about the one between Morgan and Tara. They were suddently sleeping together and that was pretty much their 'relationship development'. Not to mention that there was little chemisty between them. Though I could never really see Tara as much more as a side kick of Maddie. I think I would have preferred to have a choice of Maddie getting together with Abigail or Morgan. And why does the most pretty girl of the VN, only appear in the true ending with no chance of romance?! I didn't play with the adult patch. Just found out about it after I was finished, but I didn't really care about it anyway in that kind of VN. Anyway, overall a very nice VN that values your time for a change. Heroine ranking: Maddie > Abigail > Morgan > Tara Overall rating: 7.5/10

Hi! I'm Artic (Marco) from Italy. I'm new in the world of Visual Novel, in the last months I discovered (completely random) this type of game and I've fallen in love! I played with Everlasting Summer and Katawa Shoujo (thanks for the guide, very useful!). I hope to have fun here and discover some new interesting novel with your help! P.s. Sorry if I make some writing error but I'm not too smart with english

Well m8s I'm translating majikoi A-4 (no other majikoi will be trasnlated before this one is done) Who would you want first? Ootomo Homura or Rinchuu I'll start the first route based on the times the character has been requested 'till May 15.

close to the length of the main heroines routes though im sure agave is a bit longer than any of theirs.

Thanks for the advice! I will follow your blog and NookGaming.

Many blogs should have email subscription of some kind? I know mine does (you should find it easily on the sidebar), even though it's probably not the kind of content you're looking for. English Visual Novels was the best site for plain news and release updates, but I think it's still on hiatus due to author's RL issues. With bigger sites, Noisy Pixel and NookGaming lately gained some traction within the VN niche. Also, setting up e-mail subscription/a newsletter is rather easy with most blogging/site creation services, so if a site which content you find interesting don't have one, you can just contact them and ask them to add this feature. On Blogger, which I use, it literally takes a few minutes to make it happen.

Pretty much the only one that might make it is Rewrite Harvest Festa but only because it gave Kotori the route ending she deserved as well as some feel good diabetes

Meetup works best in big cities like Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya. There are many Meetup events, but in my experience it is the more low key ones that tend to be most fun and interesting (for unrelated reasons I was personal friends with a host for a smaller Meetup event and those were the most fun for me). Most of the bigger, more well known or established Meetup events are honestly just an excuse for foreigners interested in hooking up with Japanese, and Japanese interested in hooking up with foreigners to meet. In fact, I would say a good 70% of Meetup events at their very core are really just an excuse to try to meet someone for a sexual or romantic relationship. Which depending on your perspective could be great or not. Basically Meetup in Japan is like the irl version of the app HelloTalk. There is a pretense of "language exchange", but its really used for flirting. So if you want to meet a cute Japanese girl or guy, definitely try Meetup and HelloTalk. If you want to meet people who could become actual friends, then I would recommend attending Meetup events that do events that are most specific and hobby focused, and not just "language exchange". Its more that women on Tinder will say that as a precaution in case if they aren't actually attracted to the guy they meet up with on the first date. This way she can reject him more gently/indirectly by saying "No, I'm just looking for friends". Which if you think about Japanese culture, it makes a lot of sense why they would prefer to do that. But if she is attracted, well lets just say she won't have any problem accepting advances for something more sensual/romantic.

If there's been a drop in Steam sales for VNs, I think it's most likely a side effect of Valve's algorithm changes benefiting already-popular/AAA games and being detrimental to indie and niche games rather than anything to do with the VN scene itself. While the article focuses on Western indie games, I think it's applicable to "non-indie" VNs too--they're still very niche products that don't sell enough for a sales-based recommendation system to benefit them.

As it looks from the screenshots and your description, I'd say it's 50% a choose your own adventure game and 50% an RPG or simulation? Reminds of The Oregon Trail actually. I don't think there's even a proper name for these, but I'm definitely digging it. :] Do you plan to include some forms of world randomisation and RNG, similar to something like FLT or Sunless Sea, or you're rather going for a hand-crafted world player should learn and optimize their path through? Are you planning for any interactions with the NPCs beyond side quests and flavour text (like forming parties, romance)?

Captain Marvel's role is meant to be mostly off screen, as that's her role in general. She isn't an earthbound hero, but one that protects the whole universe. You really should watch her movie, it's really good! The skrulls are among my favorite characters in marvel comics, and I have a feeling we might see more of them, so it's smart watching her movie anyways, even just for that. You also see a lot more of her in the movie, and understand more about why she acts like she does. She isn't very expressive for a reason. If anything, I think her actor does a very good job of portraying the character. I also disagree with some of your comments on Thor. He wasn't reduced to a joke, he was seriously depressed. He thinks everything that happened is his fault, as, being the only being capable of killing Thanos at the time and failing, he ... pretty much was. He had no idea Doctor Strange had planned all this, and actually thought he was at fault. It's no wonder he'd drink himself half to death, and that the result would be him ending up like that. I actually very much enjoyed seeing him fight his demons when he and Rocket traveled back in time, and he meets his mother, who finally manages to get him to pull himself together. And of course, there's no magic pill to restore his apperance in such a short time, so he had to remain like that for the movie. I'm confused about what exactly it is you didn't get with Hulk. He explained exactly what happened, he embraced the Hulk as a part of himself, not as another self he has to fight. That's how he became Professor Hulk, (which is an actual thing from the comics, and not something the creators of the movie made up, by the way.) I too wish they would have done a bit more with his relationship with Nat, though, as it would have made her demise even more emotional. Though, it did still make me cry like a little girl, so, maybe it was for the better. (/ω＼) As for what's next, I'd imagine they will bring in some new giant, cosmic threat like Galactus, which would also make sense since the MCU are seemingly getting the rights to The Fantastic Four, which brings both Dr. Doom, Galactus and the Silver Surfer with it. With the introduction of the multiverse in Doctor Strange, and with the destruction of the infinity stones causing so much chaos like The Ancient One said it would, it would make sense for some new, massive threat like Galactus to show up. And seeing as he is more powerful than Thanos (without the glove), he will be quite a threat to the current avengers. Heck, just his herald, The Silver Surfer, will be a big threat. (And could be a villain for a whole avengers movie on his own.) I'm really looking forward to what they have planned for the multiverse moving forward. It's clearly a core theme in Far From Home, so I'd imagine we'll know more of what's to come after watching it. The new, post endgame trailer, if you haven't seen it:

Been reading Sakura Sakura . A good comparison would be if Fureraba crossed with Princess Evangile. Nothing serious, but quite light hearted comedy ..... with Love Triangles. Yep

Why is 18+ visual novel romance so wholesome, but romance genre which is more all ages and in anime etc, almost never follow through? Not even a kiss, confession or anything, even if they're tagged as romance. Only 18+ romance visual novels usually always end up in an expected way where they become a couple, yet in anime etc it really, really rarely happens. THere must be some reason for this. Shoujo etc include even sex a lot, yet shounen or seinen seems to shy away from these themes. Is it some gender thing where girls are allowed to read more "lewd" things then boys? It's always been a funny thing where the reader looks at "lewd" stuff while the protagonist doesn't. I don't get it. It's like they're trying to teach young boys to be prim and proper while looking at lewd stuff anyway. Like i said, i don't get it. Ok, was a bit of a mess of a post but it's Saturday and i'm bored, whatever.

On the topic of harem titles: Harem, by their very definition, involve multiple people. Due to the traditional standards of romance, polygamy is not often in the cards outside of outright sex stuff (much to my dismay). This would mean that any title that pursues the avenue of multiple romantic interests will have to either choose one, changing genres and killing some of the audience, or never come to a resolution. These are the kind of titles that can only live off the premise, and they will end should it be resolved.* That is why I believe that titles that can somehow find a way to continue after breaking through this limitation (without introducing a new such hook and limitation) are best. That, or titles that are never inconvenienced by such limitations, like the slice-of-life genre. However, despite these obvious limitations, harem titles and their ilk are by far the most popular. Teasing with only minor pay-off (a kiss after three seasons that gets misunderstood and reverts back into the status quo) does wonders at keeping people addicted. It also often happens that harem titles are somewhat sexual in nature, skipping over the romance in the process. This is, of course, to offer some stimulation and pay-off even without needing to commit to any one person, and maintaining the hook and status quo for as long as there's money in the business. There is also something to be said about multiple girls being interested in the same person providing a great scenario for all sorts of drama and 'best girl' moments and competitions. Anime such as Nisekoi made they living by giving everyone a chance to be best girl and Re:Zero has the famous debate over Rem and Emilia. A lot of wonderful scenarios can be concocted by having multiple romantic interests, but it is usually not in the makers' best interests to let the hook end and reach a conclusion. Visual Novel's inherent advantage is that they CAN choose everyone, and they don't even need to make it a polygamous relationship. Multiple paths enable these possibilities that are mostly shut-off to the other mediums. The thing with VNs is, as a PC game in Japan, they usually need porn in order to sell, as it's the one thing they have over mobile and consoles, which are far more popular in Japan. So the reason VNs do well on the romantic front is two-fold: They can establish hooks like anime and manga, but since VNs are necessarily finite in length, they cannot let the hook carry them indefinitely and will need to commit. Thankfully, it is easy to pull that off with VNs, as they can offer multiple paths, dedicating to everyone a full path of sole romance. As a PC game, they tend to press their one advantage: sex. This usually brings along with it a plethora of other romantic shenanigans in order to provide context. *For example, the other day I saw a manga where the entire premise was that the romantic interest is a huge tsundere that is only true to herself... when she becomes a ghost, as she has the power to do so at any point. What she doesn't know is that the protagonist can see her. The whole story is around the protagonist pretending he can't see her whilst she goes super dere-dere all over him in ghost form. A reader will spend the entire time hoping that the two get together, but it is plain to see that there's nothing to the manga outside of this tease and premise. On the topic of manga: Shoujo can include sex as something that happens off-screen, assuming it happens at all. Where sex happens more often is in smut titles, and those would generally be considered josei more than shoujo. The reason why shoujo include sex more often is because when seinen and/or shounen do it, the titles are usually just hentai by that point. That is to say, seinen and shounen tend to be more extreme, leading to borderline-h titles that you're likely not interested in, whereas shoujo scarcely ever goes this far, instead becoming a form of smut and josei you're also not interested in by that point. So the question becomes: "Why is there a clearer separation between all-ages and 18+ for male stuff than there is for female stuff?" I would theorise that that would be because porn is more widely spread as a thing among the teenage male population than among the teenage female one, and that would mean that including light stuff in shounen and the like is not as much of a selling point as it would be to the teenage female audience. So, when you say that shoujo manga has more romance stuff, I reply with Girls are believed to have more interest in romantic matters where as boys are believed to prefer more raunchy stuff. It follows that stories aimed at girls more often include romantic things that boys'. This includes very romantic and non-explicit sex scenes, the exact opposite of what you find in seinen and some shounen stuff. More popular shounen usually have a harem than shoujo stuff, which impedes romance severely (shoujo have love triangles, which are their own kind of hell, but don't sabotage romantic interactions as much as a harem intentionally does). Shoujo plotlines traditionally follow a girl falling for a guy who's nice (or mean) to them once, and tend to involve more one-on-one and romantic interactions, whereas shounen doesn't usually even focus on romance to begin with, unless it's a harem. The reason why this is is because plotlines where a guy falls head-over-heels with a girl and is led around by the nose aren't as popular as the shoujo versions. In the end, then, why is it that the titles are usually at one extreme or the other: Full-on hentai VS endless harem/romance with scarcely a bit of progress in sight. The reasons are all spread out throughout what I've mentioned previously. Romantic titles tend to garner more interest by placing a hook or dramatic situation that, if resolved, would either end the story or cause a sharp decrease in interest. This is the reason why romance anime and some romance manga tend to be long and inconclusive. If progress is made, it'll usually be towards the end. They use these methods because they air/publish continuously, whereas VNs are single titles with a set beginning and end. It is not that there are no titles with proper romantic progression over the course of the story: consider these two lists I made (that are now rather outdated, as I've come across many more). It's just that the popular ones aren't usually these. They're the others. Because of their hooks and more continuous nature. The more romantic titles will always, due to the absence of strong hooks and drama, be less popular, despite offering more romantic progression. The reason why all-ages stuff doesn't tend to include sex or intimate nudity is that it is a very large jump to make. You'd be jumping from something that can be sold everywhere to something that's have more limited sections to be sold in, and that is simply not a worthwhile sacrifice to make unless you're going for full-on porn.

This is partly an issue of genre and partly an issue of medium. The "harem" genre features a protagonist surrounded by girls competing for his attention/affection; this competition and the antics that result are often a thematic focus. Resolving that competition essentially entails a genre shift, which risks losing your audience. Visual novels resolve this issue by splitting games into a common route and several heroine routes (and sometimes a "harem" route). Visual novels are relatively cheap to produce compared to the time spent consuming them and are sold up-front as a complete product, so forking the narrative into multiple parts, some of which may not be consumed by each user, is commercially viable. Anime are more expensive to produce and typically represent linear, serialized experiences that have to fill broadcast time slots and sustain viewership over time. If you air something that doesn't interest a viewer, you risk losing him permanently; the viewer can't just skip to the alternate "route" for the day. As a result, harem anime are often compelled to appeal to the lowest common denominator.

One thing I find even more annoying than open endings is when you reach the end of a long story and they wrap everything up with marriage, time leap and whatnot in like a single chapter. This problem is especially apparent in manga, where it can take years to reach the conclusion. If they spend so much time building up towards that ending, why can't they put some more effort into it and make it more memorable by showing more of what happens later? I've lost count of the amount of manga that I liked at first but was ultimately disappointed by because the ending felt rushed.

No harem endings in Kajitsu (though harem ending becomes canon in later entries of the trilogy). Grisaia has two spinoff series (Phantom Trigger series, and a magical idol spinoff). Neither has H scenes though. What kind of moeges are you looking for exactly? There's light hearted comedic ones ( Fureraba , Wagamama High Spec , Chrono Clock , Kono Oozora ). And on the other end of the scale, there's moeges that have a lot of plot, or Nakige elements ( Sorcery Jokers , Kira*Kira , ef - a fairy tale of the two , Muv-Luv Trilogy ) If you're into harems, there's always the Nekopara series, or Imouto Paradise series. As well as Onii-chan, where's my kiss? (when it's released). I've heard Sharin no Kuni is supposed to be like Grisaia, but it isn't released yet (might be within months).

How do you define "older"? Older than the protagonist? in her 30s? 40s? Well, from the ones I've read: - Masumi in Kazoku Keikaku (Family Project) - Margit in Majikoi S - Misato in Yukizakura - Ayame and Kaori in Crescendo - Ayumi, Kaori, Mitsuki and Eriko in YU-NO - Nanako in Sakura Sakura - most of the heroines in Mugen Yasoukyoku (Nocturnal Illusion) - Mistress, Miwako, Maya, Sari and Yukina - Ayame from Konosora could perhaps qualify too (she's few years older than the protagonist)