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When I'm seriously playing a VN and I have nothing else that is demanding my attention (such as work) I will play it until it is complete or it is time to sleep... meaning up to fourteen hours in a day.

It really depends on my mood and schedule, but I'd say the norm is one-two hours a day + 3-5 hours when I'm totally free. I'm not the fastest reader, so having less than an hour means I won't bother touching a VN at all. Starting reading and getting nowhere is just plain depressing, even with short VNs, and more so with the Japanese giants. If I really want to finish a VN, like with Maggot Baits lately or I'm really immersed, it can grow to 7-8 hours, but most of the time, I simply have too much stuff going on to afford that...

And... I'm done with the true ending. Dear God... I'll share my complete thoughts on a different occasion, but my general impressions are that as a piece of storytelling, I've enjoyed it slightly less than euphoria. It's generally better-written and more cohesive (no incomprehensible weirdness or obvious plotholes), but also so utterly relentless in its fanservice that it absolutely killed the pacing even in the most dramatic and interesting moments. Also, many of the scenes are just such hollow fanservice... There's a whole witch character that serves no other function beyond being abused in arbitrally-placed scenes. There's also a whole side-arc branching from the first chapter that is nothing but literal hours of unrelated futanari porn. Why isn't it just a bonus scenario? It absolutely murders the flow of the story. You can say that's the point of the whole experience, but after a while it just stops being a good excuse when the game also tries to tell a story. It's one thing to have tons of h-scenes, it's another inserting one literally every 5-8 minutes, no matter what's going on in the plot. It's mind-numbing through its sheer intensity, and I imagine it could be so even for some people that get off from guro. And with just how much time is spend on plain porn, the core story... Is actually quite short and simple. On the other hand, I have to once more applaud the quality of the writing, including h-scenes. If I ever felt sick from something, it was the descriptions rather than visuals. The latter, for the most part, really did little for me... I think after euphoria I just stopped reacting to this kind of extreme porn whatsoever. Plus there were like three scenes that could be vaguely described as romantic, and I think I was just too numb from the guro imagery by that point to enjoy those in any real way. In summary, if I had some hesitation in calling euphoria a nukige, I have no doubt in this case. It you're looking for an ultra-violent porn game, it's definitely extremely high-quality and full of content. If you're looking for a dark story, maybe just go for a chuunige... 6/10 PS The first ending is my headcanon, a lot more fun than the true one.

First, as I state in the title, I'm coming off my fifth playthrough (all paths and endings) of Tokyo Babel. As such, I am - very obviously - deeply fond of the game. I'm also a fan of the writer Higashide Yuuichirou (for reference, he also wrote Ayakashibito and the scenario for Fate/Apocrypha). However, in this post I wanted to address some of the complaints I get from those who play the game. First, I will address the major complaints I've taken personally from those who read or have read it untranslated, then those who read it translated. Untranslated 1. 'This doesn't feel like a Higashide game/isn't as good as his other games!' For better or worse, Higashide went in a different direction, style, and approach in Tokyo Babel in comparison to his previous works. Ayakashibito is the basis for most untranslated Higashide fanboys' love, but it needs to be said that anyone who has played the two games will barely see any resemblance beyond the writing style. Ayakashibito was about a young man struggling against the world as he tried to carve out a life for himself with his adoptive sister. His emotional struggles with unreasonable and unreasoning prejudice, as well as the active malice of powers both great and small, struck a chord in a lot of the people who read it. Moreover, it is by far the most slice-of-life focused of all Higashide's titles, whereas a huge portion of Tokyo Babel is fighting, preparation for fighting, and dealing with conspiracies. 2. 'I loved Dies Irae and this was recommended to me based on that, but it doesn't match up.' This one makes me laugh. Sorry, I'm not trying to be contemptuous, but, despite some surface resemblances, Tokyo Babel is wildly different from Dies Irae. Higashide is not a poet. Masada is. Higashide is calculating where Masada is impulsive. As such, I can honestly say the only resemblance between the two is that they both have a preference for fantasy and melodrama. Dies Irae is an opera, whereas Tokyo Babel is more straightforward and to the point, in comparison. 3. 'Why is there no ero? All his other games had ero, so why not this one?' I have to wonder if anyone but me was surprised at this one being the third most common complaint I got from those I recommended this game to. Yes, his other games have a mix of good and horrid ero (Ayakashibito is particularly infamous for its side-character scenes), but Tokyo Babel was written from beginning to end as an all-ages novel. Surprisingly, I agree with those who think the lack of ero in Tokyo Babel had a negative effect. To be blunt, I can't see Lilith not finding a way to shove Setsuna into Raziel's futon or failing to trap him in a room alone with Sorami... and that's setting aside several moments in her path that would have made for some great 'desperate and somber H' scenes. Higashide, for all that his ero scenes were sometimes awful (again, Ayakashibito), always made them relevant to the story and used them to enhance its flow... something many chuuni writers who utilize ero content fail to do. 4. 'What the heck is it with this game's weird mix of styles?!' I'm not an art bigot, so I'm not the best person to answer this question. This game's art style differs from previous Propeller games to a significant degree at times. Is that a good or bad thing? Hard to answer... though I do think the decision to make the main characters look younger than in previous games (with some exceptions) was questionable, lol. Translated 1. 'What is with the translation?!!!!'. Aah... this is the idiot argument. Sorry, but I've said this a thousand times before 'Japanese to English translation is an oxymoron'. Conjueror was pretty much the only translator brave enough to jump into translating something like Dies Irae or Tokyo Babel precisely because fans of this type of game are such a-holes when it comes to translations. Yes, it isn't perfect. Yes, it doesn't somehow magically mirror Higashide's brilliance perfectly. However, I would like to make a few major points for those who insist they could do better... Japanese has numerous concepts, sayings, and even casual phrasing that simply don't translate into English without a much larger number of words to fill in the gaps in the language. One reason I always recommend anyone who can read a game in Japanese (even if they have to use a parser and text hooker) do so is because it is impossible to perfectly replicate everything in a localization to English. It is possible to get across many concepts with creative language and a wide vocabulary in English, but that sometimes means spending minutes or even an hour on a single line, trying to create something that can somehow retain the best parts of the original. Chuuni translations tend to be awkward (both anime and games) because the language used requires more of this, and it becomes too easy to fall into the habit of robotically spewing out the translation instead of actually writing it into prose (look at the FGO cell phone game and you'll see what I mean). 2. 'This wasn't as dramatic as I thought it would be!' This one puzzles me... but then, I never played the game all the way through in English (I went up through the Miyako fight in Raziel's route to get an idea of what it was like), so maybe more was lost in the localization toward the middle and end than I thought. 3. 'The subject matter made me uncomfortable'... Ah yes, this one. To be honest, even I felt the remnants of my upbringing pounding on the doors of my psyche at times when I played this game. To be blunt, to anyone brought up in a devout Christian (or even Muslim) household, playing any of the routes can be enormously uncomfortable at times. By the nature of the process of 'suspending disbelief' that occurs when you read something fantasy, your prejudices and upbringing inevitably play into how you see the game. To be blunt, by Christian standards, this game is blasphemous, lol. In Japan, due to the way the divine is seen (impossible to explain if you haven't studied it, so I won't go into this here), this game doesn't feel that way. However, this game can cause some odd reactions in some Westerners. 4. 'I don't get the humor.' Sad to say, but a good portion of humor in Japanese VNs simply doesn't translate very well. The funniest scene in the game (in my opinion) is the drunken party in Sorami's path... but there are several points in this scene that don't translate (think plays on Japanese wording, puns, and phone number styles) that had me cracking up every time. Sad to say, but, for those playing translated JVNs, this is something you'll just have to live with. Conclusion I didn't really refute any of the complaints here... but I did try to address them. Tokyo Babel is one of the few of my favorite games that have been translated (though more of them have been in recent years, including Hapymaher and Dies Irae), but it is also the one of my translated favorites that is most likely not to be mentioned when someone is asking about this type of game.

I diagnose you with "not sexually attracted to anime boys".

I guess it depends on if you like the protagonist. If you do, you're going to have the time of your life. If you can't stand him (like I do) the comedy will probably fall flat (which makes up the first ~40 hours [does this count as a spoiler?]) and the rest will feel ridiculously over the top. But almost everyone in this forum seems to like him, so it would be best not to listen to me.

Agreed. I for one was totally hyped for a bishoujo anime that was the length of a battle shounen, but alas it was not to be.

That kind of stuff happens... I guess GnK didn't need a sequel, but I still think it's a huge shame it never got an amine adaptation.

Yes, Grisaia no Kajitsu is good. It's easily my second favorite vn I've read, probably even my second favorite work fiction. I'm not quite sure why you pluralized "visual novel" though, GnK is the only Grisaia VN and was the last novel Frontwing made before they shut down. What? Yeah that's definitely what happened, I'm pretty sure I'd remember a long string of disappointments following GnK.

[No Spoilers] Yes

Average Abilities (4 episodes) - The first three were excellent. It was a great comedy story with no particular stakes. As of the 4th, it took a turn for the serious. Comparatively speaking. It's at a point where they could still go either way, and I'm counting on it taking the light-hearted "handwave it away" path.* In short, I hope it continues to be a silly cute girls story with a bunch of ridiculous OP-ness. Pull off another story like Endro~!. That said, on the off-chance that they tried to take a less original and more serious approach, I decided to read the light novel. I feel this adaptation will be best if they just continue on their own way, and let the light novel's plot be experienced as intended, rather than summarising it in anime format. Light novel spoilers:

As with others, time dictates what time I can spend reading VNs, so it is by no means daily that I read them, but when I do, it's normally 2 or 3 hours per VN. I can read multiple or none in a day. If I am particularly engaged, I can spend my every moment of free time on the particular title of interest. However, this goes for any piece of entertainment, so if I'm engaged in an anime, manga, light novel, or game, then I will have no time for VNs.

To be honest, I'd recommend you to read just as much as you want. I mean, in the end they are just entertainment, and there's no real point in making yourself play them more than you want. Most likely, it will just lead to you burning out. That happened to me at some point. That said, in my case it just depend on how much I like what I'm reading. If I'm really engaged and more or less free, I can easily spend every moment of my free time on reading. Though I don't really think this happened in a really long time... Usually it's just one or two hours a day. Right now it's more or less zero.

These days my average is 0 minutes a day. But around once a year when I get the bug to play a VN again (and manage to find one that genuinely engages me) I will spend all my free time and likely procrastinate irl obligations to read it. This most recently happened to me with Dies Irae this past winter.

If I have time, then it can be even up to 4-5 hours a day. Basically, if I start reading, it's hard to stop But on the other hand there are also days when I don't play/read at all, since there are also other things I want or need to do. I like when VN has some kind of "chapters" or something, as that makes it easier to stop after reaching such breakpoint

Yeah, that’s Clock Up for you. Tbh, I feel like MG were trying a little too hard to sell this game to... with the lack of a better word, "normies," lol. I mean, it’s a fetishy porn game, at the end of the day. Yes, it has a great story, characters etc etc, but these are still all elements built around a fetishy porn game, and one with lots and lots of porn at that. While I love Maggot Baits, I think trying to market it as a serious story where extreme H comes second is a little misleading. It’s a serious story, don’t get me wrong, but it’s hard to deny that this is also pretty much a porn game aimed at people who love twisted H content. Like me! I actually feel like Euphoria’s H is a lot more plot relevant 90% of the time, while Maggot Bait’s H feels like, just like you said, fanservice for the readers to get off to. (I don’t mind this, but I can see why the... "normies" reading this would, lol.)