granit

Let's be clear... I have no reason to try to be fair to charage anymore.  This might sound like a terrible statement to make, but the fact is, I've been a lot nicer than I wanted to be for years when it came to charage.  I went out of my way to look for positive aspects, and when I found one, I deliberately put it in as positive a light I could without overdoing it.  This was because the sensation I got coming out of most charage was fatigue.  SOL, in small doses, is enjoyable and even relaxing... in the kind of doses I experienced over the last five years, it is downright toxic.
Now, down to the game... CharaBration is what is termed a 'thematic charage'.  This is a type of VN with a preset theme that all the heroines and possibly the protagonist all adhere to to one degree or another.  In this case, it is the duality of the heroines/protagonist's character types.  Each of the characters presents one face to the world and another in private... and in the case of this game, the gap between them is massive.  
The heroine who starts as the initial focus is Hai, the protagonist's cousin whom he thought was a sickly ojousama that he had to take care of... and is really the kind of tomboy who dominates all the males around her, with a coarse manner and foul language.  Yukia, who is pretending to be her sister Mirei, presents herself normally as an arrogant leader who always dominates the room, but in private, she is shy and has trouble talking at all.  Himeme is normally acts in a false male role, but she really prefers to act like the girl she really is.  All the heroines are like this to one degree or another, and Rikka (the protagonist) ends up splitting his life between pretending to be a maid and attending school in his male form.
Now... this is a game with a lot of potentially fun elements, and it would have been great if the 'hidden' character traits for Hai, who was presented as the main heroine at first, weren't so grating.  Starting out with a positive hatred for Hai that never really faded even after I got into the heroine routes (her ojousama act just made me more irritated, due to that fake cough) was a huge drag on the experience for me, and it is the reason why I took so long to finish even the paths I did.  Hai is annoying, to be straight about it.  While her presence is necessary to create the situation going in, her persona (both of them) drove me up the wall. 
The fact that I actually liked the other heroines only made it worse, because whenever she came onto the scene, I just wanted to delete her character.  I'm sure some will love her (there is someone for everyone, supposedly), but she isn't for me.
Common Route
Tbh, the common route spent so much time on Hai and stuff related to her that I'm tempted to erase it from my brain.  However, it needs to be said that it does a good job of introducing the heroines and creating their relationships with Yuki/Rikka.  Rikka is a standard 'I protest dressing up like a girl but I subconsciously am coming to love it' trap protagonist, and that creates a few moderately amusing scenes... However, I can't really said this did a good job of anything but introducing the heroines and creating those basic relationships.  It is a pretty short common route, and the heroine routes afterward aren't long either, so it feels like more time and effort could have been spent deepening the relationships before they headed off into the romantic wilds. 
Yukia
Yukia is easy to like, at least for me.  Her helpful, kind nature is prevalent throughout much of the VN, and her other persona is mostly amusing (some of the ways she strings together lines to hold a conversation together make me laugh).  Her relationship with her sister, Mirei, which comes out in her path, is amusing on several levels, and I like the way she grows as a character during the course of her path.  That said, her ending is somewhat disappointing, as I would have liked to see what she and Rikka were like after graduation.
Corona
I chose Corona as the second heroine mostly because she is Yukia's opposite in so many ways...  and because I rolled a pair of dice to decide which would be the second and final heroine I would play (I can't bring myself to play all the heroines in this type of game anymore).   Umm... I really like her character, if only because it makes me laugh (an easily-embarrassed prime personality and a secondary personality that strips without a hint of hesitation and is obsessed with other women's breasts... definitely worth a laugh).   In fact, this path is nicely weird, especially because of how those twin personalities interact with the romance.  If Yukia's path was par for the course (predictable and staid as trap protagonist and ojousama heroines go), Corona's went pretty far out there.  The epilogue and after story was also too close to the ending in chronology though, *sighs*.
 
Conclusions
Despite some high points, this game is pretty average as charage go.  Like a lot of thematic charage, it makes the mistake of assuming that the theme is all-powerful, and, as a result, it falls short on a lot of minor points.  I was particularly irritated at the way they handled the endings/epilogues, and I felt that the writer didn't really do Corona or Yukia justice, when it came down to it.  Given more detail and time spent deepening character relationships in a believable fashion, it would have been much easier to engross myself in the setting.  Unfortunately, that never happened here (the good parts of Yukia's and Corona's paths stand out so much precisely because they are the best parts of the VN by far).  It felt like the writer wrote his favorite scenes first then sort of created a bare-bones framework to support it using the theme.

Before I go visit my remaining grandparents this weekend (my grandmother on my father's side and grandfather on my mother's side are both in extremely frail condition right now, so we are taking time to show my sister's kid to them), I thought I would give my thoughts on modern VN trends.
Charage aren't going anywhere
Though I frequently bash the industry for over-saturating the market with moege/charage/SOL, the fact is that the demand for this type of VN is never going to go away as long as the Japanese eroge VN market exists.  Why?  Because it is the single easiest way to present the formation of relationships of young people into a sexual one.  While the genre isn't that attractive for people in their late teens or early to mid-twenties (incidentally the reason this market is declining), the majority of any older generation is always going to prefer this.  The lesser numbers of young people in Japan compared to my generation and the lower relative amounts of income are the main reasons for the current contraction of the genre.
Good Writers don't go into VNs anymore
This is a truth that few of the plotge addicts like me want to admit.  Most of the best writers in the VN industry are getting into middle age or later now (or have already left it), and the new and upcoming writers are mostly up and coming LN writers who have a far looser grasp on how to write/narrate and (more importantly) complete a story.  This doesn't mean they won't evolve their styles to match the new medium eventually, but whenever I've read a VN written by one of these newbies, the plot holes and poor handling of the endings of their games stand out painfully.
Chuunige are in decline
I absolutely hate to say this.  However, it needs to be said.  Trends in the last nine years in chuunige have tended to result in far too much side-story exploitation and sequelitis.  There is also a distinct lack of innovation, and when innovation does come, it tends to come with a huge drop in quality in the final product (Sora no Baroque).   Fans of the genre are getting older, and some companies (such as Light) have been putting their games in non-ero form on consoles to try to grasp the hearts of younger VN lovers (this has actually succeeded to an extent), but the fact is that it takes a much longer time for a chuunige company to  make back its investment after a release.  This is exacerbated by economic issues in Japan, and the fact that these companies mostly suck at advertising (like many niche genre companies, they only put it up in places where those already 'in the know' will find them).
VN Trends are always years behind the rest of Otaku-dom
VN communities in Japan are insular.  Even moreso than they are in the US.  When rom-com anime vanished for the most part at the end of the last decade, it was replaced with cheap action-fantasy (shallow, weaker stories for the most part, with more emphasis put on 'cool' elements) and moeblob.  The glut of such anime is reaching its peak right now... and that influence is starting to overflow (interpreted through the lens of the hyper-conservative VN community, of course) into our side of things.  That said, this is a trend that is unlikely to take hold, because it requires a modicum of writing skill that doesn't involve dialogue, and most VN writers just don't have that.  Instead, VN companies that have been around for a while have been 'testing the waters' by making games that step out of their usual niches, hoping to diversify to deal with the changing trends.  Light went with going down a much darker path than usual with its most recent game, and Navel actually put up a half-assed plotge last month.  These, along with many other incidences in the last two years, make me wonder just what the market will look like five years from now. 

Yes, I did this game first.  This is one of those games that is a bit hard to define.  It is part moege, part nukige and part charage... and part surrealist story.  It is about cats being reborn as humans being reborn as cats being reborn as humans (it gets ridiculously complex, to the point where there is no point in keeping track). 
There also isn't a whole lot to say about this game... it is mostly at-home SOL, h-scenes, and reminiscence of past lives.  As a VN, it is a bit hard to read because it jumps around in time so much, and I'll probably forget this VN before long.  However, I gave it an extra point for making me cry several times, lol. 

For those who are interested, here is the first real comedy VN of the year... 
The protagonist, Takuma, having returned to his hometown to live alone in his family's old house, finds that it has collapsed in on itself, and, desperate for a place to stay, ends up staying at the homes of his four childhood friends (osananajimi).  This leads to various hilarious antics and situations, with most of the heroines being 'ponkotsu' types (meaning that they are the kind of girls no sane man would want as a girlfriend if he knew their real personality). 
First is Kyou, the 'older sister' of the group... to be blunt, she is the single laziest human being I've ever seen in a VN.  She and her mother are the type that seek marriage solely so that their husband can feed them, clean up after them, and support them financially.  If she tries to cook, explosions ensue; she won't even consider doing laundry; and her room looks like mine did in middle school (I never really did see the point of putting things away back then, lol).  Incidentally, don't expect any of this to change (the heroines are fundamentally ponkotsu types from beginning to end).
Second is Hiyori, the blonde idiot daughter of the owner of a cafe that specializes in Japanese sweets and teas.  She is air-headed, clingy, and she has a tendency to do stupid things just because she feels like it.  Worse, her mother, a widow, takes aim on Takuma almost from the moment of his arrival.
The third is Ayaka... Ayaka, when compared to her family, is a quite normal girl.  However, with an OCD mother who thinks men are filthy pathogens, a little sister who is yandere over Ayaka herself, a little brother who is addicted to masturbation, and an overprotective father... that really isn't saying much.  In reality, she has a strong interest in sexual matters, wants Takuma to be her oniichan, and is very much a schemer/manipulator by nature.
The fourth girl is Rito, the childhood friend that Takuma used to think was a guy.  This leads to an immediate argument, of course, but she quickly turns into a clingy, emotionally dependent girl who alternates between aggressively seeking Takuma's affections and snarling viciously at anyone who gets in the way.
With that particular cast of characters and a protagonist who tends to want to turn everything into a joke himself, you have a recipe for a first-class comedy game.
Of course, most of it is boke-tsukkomi (manzai) type humor, save for the fact that all the characters are running jokes in and of themselves.  There are no real serious points in this VN, and the only time the story actually feels romantic is during Rito's path... and that actually made it the least enjoyable of the four main paths. 
There are also three endings other than those of the four main heroines... a 3P ending with the yandere imouto, an extra ending with Nanako (the girl who steals Takuma's food all the time), and a 'normal ending' that probably would have ended up as a yaoi ending in some other games, lol.
Overall, I left this VN feeling laughed out.  I probably won't replay it, because I don't imagine it would be funny twice, but I honestly enjoyed it for what it was... an excuse to break out into real-life laughter to the point where my throat and head started to hurt worse than they already are (I have the flu right now, yaaay!). 

Some veterans of reading untranslated VNs refer to the period between 2004 and 2010 as 'The Golden Age of Visual Novels'.  However, you shouldn't really take that statement at face value, as the meaning is a bit more complex than you'd think.
There are some significant differences between VNs today and VNs during that period that both made it the peak of the medium's sales in Japan and produced the greatest ratio of quality VNs to crap VNs. 
One of the primary differences was that, other than moege, there were no strict genre boundaries and genre conventions had yet to slide into place in the minds of fans and writers both.  Companies were mostly experimenters during that time, sometimes basing their projects on previous works (Tsukihime and the Key games got a lot of knock-offs during this time, of varying levels of quality) and sometimes forging out on their own.  
Since there were few genre boundaries, companies were more likely to give the creative staff free reign as to what kind of story they could write, and  - ironically - this actually helped define the various genres in the years to come, as people explored the boundaries of how they could stretch a concept or theme in a story.  Some of these attempts were abortive (ie- thematic moege where all the heroines are of the same type, such as tsundere or yandere, generally didn't catch on) but others were immensely successful (ie- the definition of the chuunige genre and its gradual escape from gakuen battle mania).  However, the point is that the writers, directors, and producers of the time were allowed to fiddle with the formula a lot  more than they are now.  Most major companies nowadays have a 'signature style', that was formed during that period, even if their greatest successes weren't during that period. 
This period also killed the 'pure moege' as a genre, ending the majority genre of the previous half-decade (moege having dominated during that period due to the Da Capo series and Key's games).  The rise of the charage, a demi-moege genre that was much wider in scope and more adaptable, occurred during this period, mostly unrecognized until after the fact.  At the same time, nakige, which had previously been enslaved to the moege genre through Key and others like them, came to define itself as a new, standalone genre that wasn't necessarily dependent on moe stylization.  Even Key itself moved beyond pure moe, though it didn't entirely abandon some elements of it (as the existence of Kud testifies).
However, this age was already ending in 2009, as clearly-delineated genre norms began to form, and charage became the driver for the industry, taking us back, in spirit, to the age before that.  By 2011, the ratio of truly creative works to derivative works was overwhelmingly in favor of the latter, in comparison to the previous decade. 
That isn't to say that the years since haven't produced some great works.  That is patently untrue in my experience... but the fact remains that fewer and fewer writers are able or willing to look outside the 'genre boxes' for answers as to what to write.  I sometimes refer to our current age as the Age of Stagnation, where there is an overwhelming industry pressure to stick to genre norms and those that break the mold are so exceptional they stand out more than they should.
It is possible to create a charage kamige... but it is much easier to make a kamige out of a game that breaks genre boundaries, lol.

This is a VN frequently recommended to those who have just gotten used to playing untranslated VNs, a story-focused mystery VN focused on the village of Minagami, a small farming town in the mountains somewhere on the main island of Japan.  I remember playing this back when it came out and enjoying it immensely... but since it was like the twentieth untranslated VN I'd played, I was still not quite to the point where I was able to grasp every single detail of the story.  In addition, I was still devouring primarily chuunige at the time, so 'in-between' games like this one and Kurenai no Tsuki tended not to be very satisfying for me, lol.  As such, while I remembered a lot of the big points of the story, I found a lot of details on my return to it that I didn't recall.
The protagonist, Kousuke, returns there after ten years away, visiting his cousin and aunt on a long summer vacation from college.  At first, he primarily focuses on re-connecting with old friends and getting along with his shy younger cousin, Shouko.  However, after he encounters a monster made of a rotting bear in the mountains, he begins to pursue the mysteries of the village he was born in.
This game has seven heroines in total, with four of them main heroines and three sub-heroines.  The main heroines are Ginko (the mysterious silver-haired beauty), Shouko (the protagonist's shy younger cousin), Iroha (the successor to the local Shinto Shrine and the protagonist's osananajimi), and the protagonist's younger sister Sakuya.  The three sub-heroines are Sachiko (Shouko's former best friend and a 'traditional' violent tsundere), Akane (a hired miko at the shrine who is slightly older than the protagonist), and Misato (a girl from the neighborhood who is a bit older than Kousuke and serves as the homeroom teacher for Shouko's and Sachiko's classes).
There are two paths for the heroine routes.  One is the Left Route, containing Shouko's, Sakuya's, and Sachiko's routes.  The Right route contains Ginko's, Iroha's, Akane's, and Misato's routes.  The Right route is based off of you choosing to follow, then trust Ginko early on and changes the protagonist's relationship with her (and thus how he treats the mystery).  The recommended path order is Ginko>Iroha>Akane>Misato>Shouko>Sachiko>Sakuya>True.  If you just want to get the true ending, you should take this route: Ginko>Iroha ending 2>Shouko ending 2>Sakuya ending 2>True. 
Ginko
Ginko really is mysterious, with her spending most of the VN only revealing stuff about herself in scraps.  Part of this is because in paths other than her own, there is no need for her to reveal herself, and part of it is pretty much habit and reflex, lol.  She is lonely, kind-hearted, and somewhat impulsive.  However, if needed she is quite capable of being ruthless. 
Her path focuses on her secrets primarily, while also touching on what happened ten years before in general without going into details.  To be clear, the rest of the VN is just too frustrating if you think of it without the information from this path (you'd probably hate Ginko in some of the other paths if you didn't see hers first).  This doesn't reveal the whole of the secrets of what is going on, pretty much because Ginko herself only has bits and pieces of knowledge and a few theories.  However, I found this to be a touching path in and of itself.
Shouko
Shouko is a shy little girl (seriously, if this VN were ever localized, they'd probably have to completely erase her path or up her age by five years) who is deeply troubled by nightmares and gets chased by the monster in the prologue.  Curious, impulsive, and as childish as she appears to be, she is also stubborn and focused when she needs to be.  Both in her path and in the rest of the VN, she is someone to be protected by almost everyone, precisely because she acts on impulse at all the wrong times.  Nonetheless, her path provides a valuable puzzle piece to the mystery that envelopes Minagami Village.
I'll be blunt, in that while the romance was sort of cute at first, I have no taste for loli... so this path was only of interest to me for the ending, which I remembered from way back at the beginning.  I honestly don't like her as a heroine, but this game shares one of the primary qualities of the best VNs of the past... the heroine paths are greater than their heroines.
Sachiko
Sachiko's path focuses on more mundane family issues that sprout out from Shouko's path, ignoring the fantasy aspect of the story.  As a result, it is fairly humorous and cute overall, without becoming dull or feeling like it was a waste of time.  It does add something to the reader's viewpoint, because it is the only path in the VN that actually makes the protagonist's mother into a person rather than an archetypical 'deceased mother' figure.
Iroha
Iroha is an active, ever-smiling miko who is also the protagonist's childhood friend.  She is generally warm-hearted and forgiving of others' faults, willing to get along with just about anyone and devoted to the shrine at which she serves, if not the deity it enshrines.  Her path focuses on the yamawaro (the monsters) and their nature, going into more detail than Ginko's path as to what they are and their behavior.  Unlike Ginko's and Shouko's paths, this one doesn't have as much of a bittersweet edge, though some parts at the end of Ending 2 are worth crying over.
Sakuya
Sakuya is the protagonist's little sister (by around three years).  She is cool-mannered, calm, and pretty much the only character other than Ginko that can keep up with Kousuke's teasing.  She and the protagonist have an easy relationship that seems unnaturally close to those who know them.  Her path is a preliminary to the true path (her second ending leads directly into the events of the true path, with the epilogue scene being the starting scene of the true path).  However, it is primarily focused on the formation of their romantic relationship, which has the usual barriers you see in cases where the people around an incest couple have at least some common sense. 
The Fragments
The Fragments are a set of four scenes that are accessible on the flowchart after the four main heroines' second endings that tell the story of the Tennyo from the point where she arrives in the village to the point where the curse of the yamawaro comes into being.  While the beginning is sweet, the ending parts are pretty horrible (guro), and it puts a lot of what happens in Shouko's and Ginko's paths into perspective, helping you put together the pieces of the puzzle from the main heroine paths into a more complete picture.
The True Path (Sinsemilla)
This path finally confronts the core of the curse inflicted on Minagami Village, and there is some serious action in here.  The actual length of this path is about half that of the heroine paths, but since it is basically an extension of Sakuya's path, that makes sense. 
 
Honestly, even after all these years, I can't name more than three non-chuunige VNs that did as good a job at presenting a story as this game has done overall... though that doesn't necessarily mean this is one of the best ten VNs I've played.  For one thing, It doesn't, despite the fantasy aspects, match my personal tastes.  I don't really enjoy mysteries and this definitely is a mystery (a multi-path mystery that is only solved in the true path).  In addition, presentation isn't the only factor I look at when judging the overall quality of a game.  This is definitely a kamige... but that doesn't mean it is one I'm going to want to replay again anytime soon. 
I can definitely recommend this to anyone who liked Kurenai no Tsuki, Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, and any number of other VNs that combine this type of setting with a multi-part mystery/thriller setup.  However, this isn't something I'd recommend for someone who just wants to sit back and enjoy the slice-of-life.  For better or worse, the story is very tightly-focused, despite its immense length.  For those who want extra slice-of-life, they should read the fragments that pop up occasionally on the flow chart as you read (alternate perspectives, optional scenes, etc).
I do have one huge complaint, though... (Don't read this unless you want to be spoiled about the ending)
 
 
I WARNED YOU!!!
 

... Laplacian isn't a company I had any hopes for, after how much of a kusoge their first game, Kimi to Yumemishi was.  However, Newton to Ringo no Ki is a pleasant surprise, with a lot of nostalgia for people, like me, who were born in the mid to early eighties.
Why?  Because this is, in some ways, a tribute to the Back to the Future movies I watched as a kid.  While the time travel style is switched from a car to a telescope and there are a few minor differences (no vanishing protagonists), the idea is the same.  Time paradoxes exist, you can change the past, and you can never tell what will screw up the future.
This game has a true ending.  That probably won't surprise anyone, seeing how the game is all about Sir Isaac Newton, who is actually a pen-name for a twin-tailed loli named Alice.  Basically, the protagonist and his childhood friend, Yotsuko, accidentally go back to the past and screw up the moment when Newton normally would have gained inspiration for the final part of his theory of gravity.  The rest of the game is about fixing the damage they did to humanity's future by trying to arrange for Newton's work to be published regardless.
To be straight about it, all the other endings besides Newton's lead to failures for science, though the protagonist himself is happy in them.   I honestly enjoyed most of the game... but, similar to the previous game, it is poorly paced at times.  Also, Yuuji is not exactly an interesting perspective... he is the dumbest guy in the room throughout the game (which isn't hard, since everyone there is a scientist), which is depressing in and of itself at times.  These two elements definitely dragged the game down from where it might have been... and the true ending sort of put the final nail in the coffin, taking the game below the acceptable levels for a VN of the Month candidate. 
I did think Lavi's side-stories were hilarious though.

Tsuisou no Augment, when I first played it, blew me away.  Part of it was because it was so surprising, part of it because it was just that good.  Thankfully, it turned out to be just as good on a second playthrough.
First, this VN doesn't fall into any of the standard genres.  Most of the game is hilarious, some of it is romantic, some of it is hot and sexual (seriously so), there is serious drama, and there is even some guro, though of limited scale.  The game begins with Hideya, the protagonist, lying in an old folks home at the age of 80, unmarried and looking back on his life, seeing it as empty and meaningless.  So, quite naturally, he takes up a nearby fruit knife and stabs himself in the throat, twisting so that the wound opens nicely, spraying his blood over his room.  To his surprise, this isn't the end... he wakes up in a park, sixty-something years before, in his young body, with a hideous creature calling itself a shinigami floating in front of him.  The shinigami explains to him that it, Augment, wants to take his soul at the peak of happiness, so having him die of suicide after an empty lifetime was inconvenient.  As a result, Augment took him back in time at the moment of death so that he could find his happiness - mainly a romantic life partner - so that Augment can use his soul after death to purify his own.
So begins Hideya's dramatic journey to gain happiness... or not.  Hideya's personality isn't exactly Japanese-standard, so things don't really go the way you would expect with the standard VN protagonist.  Hideya is a fast-talking young man who takes an unholy pleasure in derailing conversations onto random topics (which are disproportionately related to sexual fetishes), which makes most of this game hilarious to read, since Hideya absolutely cannot stop himself from derailing even the most serious of conversations.  A lot of the choices in the game are worth exploring alternatives to, if only for the few hilarious extra lines they grant you, lol.  
The three heroines of the original game are Shiho, Satsuki, and Nami.  Shiho is the protagonist's osananajimi, who began to distance herself from him sometime in middle school.  She is a kind-hearted and generous young woman who studies obsessively.  Satsuki is a girl from the next class over that Hideya meets on the street one day while she is stomping on her older brother's head.  She is the game's tsundere, often saying the opposite of what she means, and she is a brocon that happens to beat up on her brother regularly because he is rather... annoying.  Nami is the younger sister of the protagonist's class teacher.  She seems quiet and mysterious on the surface, but she is actually rather expressive... though that expressiveness tends to come out in reaction to jokes, opportunities to put down her sister, and opportunities to blackmail her sister (the teacher is a total siscon). 
In Shiho's path, you confront the reason why she put a distance between herself and Hideya, and the reason is fairly... traumatic.  It is a reason that is all-too-common but no less tragic for all that.  In this path, there are too endings.  One, the one that is available from the beginning and is the 'true' ending for Shiho, has Hideya borrow Augment's power in order to right the past wrong that so twisted Shiho's life.  The other has the protagonist accept the current Shiho for who she is, loving her including her scars.  Depending on the individual, it is questionable which one is more touching, though.
In Satsuki's path, you find yourself confronting yet another issue common to pretty and friendly girls everywhere... in this case, the endings are slightly less distinctive, because the end result differs so little, though there is a third, bad ending you can get if you pick the path to the true ending and make the wrong choice at the last. 
Nami's path is a little different, and her true path is pretty guro (if you look too close at the CGs, the average person will probably need a barf bag).  Nami is the cutest of the girls when in love with the protagonist, but that just makes the guro parts worse, lol.  Her non-true path involves evading the guro events to reach a normal happy ending, and in that sense, hers has the most disparity between the endings.
The Tsuisou no Aumgent FD (also pronounced Tsuisou no Augment) covers after stories (between the epilogue and the ending of the stories in the first one) for each of the three original heroines, as well as adding on paths for Augment, the protagonist's older sister Youko, and Nami's older sister.  The after-stories are basically a treat for readers who wanted a little extra ichaicha material from the heroine paths and more Hideya doing his level best to prevent conversations from going anywhere.  The Youko and Minami paths are both about two-thirds the length of the original heroine paths from the original game, and while they are good, I honestly preferred the original heroine paths.  Augment's path is basically a joke h-scene.
Overall, Tsuisou no Augment is one of the more memorable games I've played over the years... and one of the few games where I spent most of the game laughing my ass off but could still cry at the important parts.  This is no charage - the paths are a bit too harsh on the characters for that - so this won't attract those interested in that sort of game.  However, it does have nice romance with serious drama attached. 

Content Created by Kiriririri and edited by fun2novel and myself (Clephas: I kept myself to grammatical fixes, so the content is pretty much as-is, with me only eliminating some excessive spoilers here and there.
Kamidanomi Shisugite Ore no Mirai ga Yabai.
Hulotte’s previous game Yomeyaba was an unexpected surprise. It wasn’t anything special but it appealed to readers with a fondness for charage with lots of ichaicha and some drama. Hulotte’s newest entry, Kamiyaba, treads similar grounds with identical structure and writing. But Kamiyaba is either too similar or in some case not as good as Yomeyaba and those expecting more of the same might want lower their expectations. Not like the expectations were very high for Yomeyaba anyway.
Our story begins with Hajime and his quest to find a girlfriend. The poor guy even goes to every marriage related shrine he can find, visiting and buying good luck talismans... All in the hopes to finally find a girlfriend for himself and maybe even get ‘lucky’ in the end. As it happens his life is turned upside down when a cute kami Urara takes pity and decides to help him with his fateful encounter. Urara picked 3 partners for Hajime and tells him he needs to get his “fate-counter” with each of the girls to hit zero. It’s an interesting premise actually and can lead to lots of interesting and even hilarious situations.
The thing that makes this game interesting and keeps it a few levels above other similar titles is that the female cast is interesting and have great personalities, it’s a must for people who are into this genre.
Nanami is Hajime’s classmate and she is also the daughter of the prime minister of Japan. It’s a premise we’ve seen many times before. The girl is a snobbish high nose tsundere who thinks she’s better than anyone but the protag wins her love…. Oh wait. What?? She’s NOT??? Well, that was quite a surprise. You see, she is actually a nice girl and pretty awkward at times. Her father is concerned about her as well and wishes for her to live the life she really wants and for her to be happy and has no problems with her dating and socializing. Hajime starts to care for her and tries to ease her loneliness, which is bad enough that she eats her lunch alone on the schools building’s roof (with the other two girls, the roof is their sanctuary). She gets a good development in her route. Unfortunately, the potential drama in her path, the usual 'introduction to the father', never happens, resulting in it sort of falling flat in the end.
Suzumiya is a clumsy senpai of the group. Hajime’s first encounter with her was when she fell down the stairs on top of him.  Little did these two know that fate had bigger plans for them. She is also a very popular idol in Japan. She is good at cooking and spends time making benrous for everyone once a week. On other routes she even teaches the girls how to cook. So she’s a pretty nice and interesting character. Hajime’s fate counter with her is the closest one to  zero, as it is down to 15 (Nanami had 900 million). Her route is about her dealing with being an idol and dating someone at the same time, a common theme in idol heroine routes, and by the end everything is resolved. However, out of all the girls she is the only one who changes little throughout her route. Nonetheless, the ending was very beautiful and shows them together in the future.
Yukari is the mischievous kouhai of the group. She is also a detective but they never say why she wants to be one. She just does. Perhaps they tried to give her some special quirk, but it is never explored much, with means it ends up just being 'flavor' for her character. Her fragile body doesn’t mesh with her detective occupation. Most of her route is her and Hajime spending their time in the school infirmary and many scenes have Hajime carrying her there. There aren’t any real conflicts like Nanami and Suzumiya routes. The ending was nice too, but I couldn’t help but think that something was missing.
Urara is the kami that took a liking to Hajime and wanted to help him find a girlfriend. They were not supposed to be partners in fate. But Fate seems to be perfectly happy breaking its own rules sometimes. She doesn’t change much in her route, but that might not matter much, since she’s best girl in Kamiyaba. She is a hyper energetic girl and says ‘maji’ too much (Clephas: gyaru kami heroine?  lol). She also demands a reward for every good thing she does (usually ice cream), and she is very cute when she’s embarrassed. She really is best girlfriend material our of all the heroines in Kamiyaba. She is disguises herself as Hajime’s imouto,7 and this causes problems when it leads to them dating. However, things are resolved with the usual ease seen in the average charage. I don’t want to spoil her route because it’s the best one.
All the routes are full of ichaicha and any focus on something dramatic is resolved very quickly before anything really major can happen.  There are two shorter side routes as well, but they are also just ichaicha with one h-scene each. Overall the characters were great and enjoyable but they don’t do too much with them, which is a little disappointing. Yomebaba wasn’t highly rated and Kamiyaba is scored a few notches lower so don’t expect the same quality from this game. But if all you want is ichaicha this game is good for consumption. Did I say icha icha already?

As usual, I spent a lot of time thinking over this before I even considered making a decision.  The original list of candidates at the end of the year (after the initial series of in-brain eliminations) is as follows:
Tokyo Necro
Akeiro Kaikitan
Amatsutsumi
Karenai Sekai to Owaru Hana (knocked Inochi no Spare out of the running)
Tokyo Necro
Tokyo Necro is Nitroplus's first masterpiece outside of the Science series (Steins;Gate, for those who don't know what I'm talking about) since Muramasa, all those years ago.  As such, it is an obvious favorite, being the sole chuunige kamige of the year, as well as a solid story from beginning to end even without considering my personal tastes (if anything, the presence of zombies is a negative for me, normally).  It is brilliantly written from start to finish, with a masterful twisting of the elements of the setting to create a fascinating variance between the paths that made for some really interesting endgame story paths.  In addition, the characters themselves were awesome, acting out their roles within the story in a down and dirty way that you generally don't get in most non-rapegames.  In other words, this is Nitroplus at its dark and dirty best for the first time in over half a decade.
Akeiro Kaikitan
Like its predecessor, Nanairo Reincarnation, Akeiro is a brilliant blend of supernatural darkness with everyday life... and with real consequences rather than the moe goofiness that defines most such mixtures in VNs.  It has mystery, it has horror, it has catharsis, and it has great characters.  Depending on what path you choose, the protagonist's path through life is dramatically altered, as is the fate of the heroines.  This reminds me of why Nanairo won the incredibly competitive 2014 competition so easily, despite the presence of Bradyon Veda and a number of other awesome games.
Amatsutsumi
Amatsutsumit is a game for those who want a good cry, and it shows.  It lost out to Floral Flowlove in its VN of the Month competition, but the truth is that it should have been a dual winner, when it came down to it, since they were equal in quality from beginning to end, with only the ladder-style story structure causing me to rate it somewhat lower.  Seen apart from that, however, it is an ideal example of Purple Soft's evolution from a third-rate charage maker to a brilliant maker of fantasy nakige since the release of Mirai Nostalgia.
Karenai Sekai to Owaru Hana
This is 2016's biggest surprise, an overwhelmingly powerful nakige that doesn't bother doing much more than stabbing your heart with the plight of the characters and their travels from the depths of despair up the staircase of hope.  In terms of emotional impact, I can honestly say no other VN in this year even got close, which is why Inochi no Spare got knocked off the list by this one.  I'll be straight... I'm a sucker for the heroes drunk on their own heroism, and the protagonist in this one fills that bill perfectly.  As such, I literally spent hours in tears playing this game. 
VN of the Year Announcement
Those four were the final candidates when I moved to my inner-brain semi-finals, and they fought one another viciously for a place in the finals, then the golden Pocky of VN of the Year.  Karenai Sekai shattered Amatsutsumi in a battle that lasted only a few moments, and Tokyo Necro and Akeiro Kaikitan fought a brutal fistfight that ended with broken bones and Tokyo Necro's heel on Akeiro's head.
In the end, there came a brutal month-long battle in my back-brain between Tokyo Necro and Karenai Sekai, the two kamige blasting entire imaginary cities away in their attempts to claw out one another's guts.  Again and again, they shattered swords on one another's bones and regenerated from seemingly fatal wounds in an instant.  A continent sank beneath their feet, yet they continued to war with one another, even as their armies of followers drowned in the onrushing waters of the world's oceans.
In the end it was a matter of overall brilliance of design as a victory over pure emotionalism that resulted in Tokyo Necro being victor over Karenai Sekai, thus becoming VN of the Year 2016.  Unlike 2015, where there were few to choose from, 2016 was excellent, with numerous candidates from various genres to pick from.  While I won't go so far as to say the year was awe-inspiring, it was indeed a pleasure to read the VNs listed above, as well as those below.
Honorable Knockouts/Worthy of Memory
Floral Flowlove
Inochi no Spare
Senren Banka
Gin'iro, Haruka
Akiyume Kukuru
Ryuukishi Bloody Saga
Signalist Stars
Yomegami
Sora no Tsukurikata
Lamunation (this and Signalist were the best comedy VNs of the year)
Sakura no Mori Dreamers (knocked out of the running by Akeiro Kaikitan)
Soshite Hatsukoi ga Imouto ni Naru  (knocked out by Floral Flowlove and Amatsutsumi for nakige candidacy)
World Election
Koi Suru Otome to Shugo no Tate - Bara no Seibo - (sequel, so not a candidate)
Ou no Mimi ni wa Todokanai (two great games by AXL in one year...)
 
 

... I'm going to be blunt about this... I can't  believe this was written by the same guy who wrote Nekopara, Sakura Bitmap, and Strawberry Nauts.  This VN has an overwhelming degree of impact compared to his other works, to the point where I'm even willing to consider it a kamige.  Music, music-usage, story, presentation, art, and art usage are all at their highest levels, combining to create a nakige whose impact is far out of proportion to its length (which is only about seven hours, for me). 
I honestly wasn't expecting the emotional impact of this VN.  In terms of this quality, it approaches Houkago no Futekikakusha, without being an utsuge... I literally cried throughout the entire game, to the point where my sinuses are swollen and my eyes bloodshot.  From the very beginning, this game makes no pretense at being anything other than what it is... a cathartic trip full of love, despair, sorrow, and loss with a drop of hope. 
I won't spoil you as to the central concept, even though it is tempting.  Based on the fact that no details of the setting other than the characters are revealed in any detail on either the official website or the Getchu page, in addition to my own experience, I can say straight out that this is a VN best enjoyed without someone giving you details to the setting or situation.  I will say that it is a fantasy setting, based in a world that has early nineteenth-century tech (no guns that I saw though), based on the presence of an ice box and ice sellers in the game.  This is also based on the fact that matches exist but electric lights apparently don't, since the characters are using candles and oil lamps. 
This game is pretty short, mostly due to its structure, where heroine 'paths' only come into existence after the main story is over, as epilogues for each of the four individual heroines (Haru, Yuki, Kotose, and Ren).  There is no 'true' heroine in this game, for those are wondering.  All the heroines are quite literally equal, though the protagonist is a bit more intimate with Ren and Haru, which is probably more of a reflection of the writer's preferences than anything else.
This game is 100% 'business', including the slice-of-life scenes.  Not one scene in this VN is wasted on something other than portraying the characters' suffering and joy or progressing the story.  To be blunt, if this game weren't so perfectly designed, I'd probably be calling it 'bare-bones' in that aspect.  That lack of wasted time is actually of immense help, as it prevents the phenomenon of 'contempt due to familiarity' that tends to occur when a VN has an excess of 'meaningless' slice-of-life scenes. 
This VN isn't humor-centric, so don't expect a lot of laughs out of it.  The heroines have serious issues, and even in everyday life, those issues peek out from beneath the surface on a regular basis.  As a result, humorous situations are relatively limited after the setting's central issue gets introduced to you and you come to understand the protagonist's objective.
Unfortunately, there is little more I can say about this VN without ruining it for you.  I can say it is a first-class nakige, and I can say it is a cry-fest designed to suck the tears out of you with a virtual vacuum cleaner.  However, that is just a repeat of what I said above.  I do advise that anyone who goes into this VN should do so without excessive prior knowledge, as it is a VN that is best enjoyed with a 'clean slate' the first time around.
VN of the month November 2016
Karenai Sekai to Owaru Hana

Minamijuujisei Renka is by far my favorite Studio Ryokucha game.  The setting, the characters, and the presentation of this VN are first class.  The only real downside this VN has is that the true (Kanori's) ending stops short of tying up all the loose ends.
The setting of this VN is in a southern island, purchased from old Britain by a now-defunct kingdom and colonized by the nobles from that kingdom.  It is called the 'Dukedom of Gwinburg', despite being ruled by a king because of the fact that the individual who originally developed the islands (two centuries before) was a Duke who merely bowed and lent his lands to his king-in-exile when that king arrived, fleeing from their original homeland. 
This VN is surprisingly deep in concept, touching on concepts that will be familiar to anyone who is aware of the way South Africa was alike during Nelson Mandela's youth.  The white nobility basically lord it over the aboriginal and immigrant communities, despite most of them being laden with debt, and, until Kanori became princess, the majority of the country was either mined-out wasteland or slums (outside of the districts held by the nobility).  Kanori spearheaded an initiative that brought foreign investment - primarily from Japan - as well as building low-cost housing out of abandoned containers from cargo ships, and as a result, the slums disappeared and the wasteland was filled in and rebuilt as an economic district where companies carried out various research that is borderline illegal in their homelands.
The protagonist of the story, Tobe Ryousuke, is brought to the Dukedom by his twin little sisters who agreed to work at a research lab in return for letting him go to school.  The reason for this is that he was working his ass off to support them, then collapsed from exhaustion, making the twin geniuses resolve to act to save him from himself. 
Ryousuke is a kind-hearted young man with a maturity far beyond his years and a streak of altruism a mile wide.  He is also athletic and sincere (though he is only of average intelligence), with an extensive knowledge of survival techniques and outdoor pursuits such as hunting and spelunking.  His good nature easily worms him into the hearts of the heroines, especially Kanori, and he is one of the more believable protagonists I've seen in one of Studio Ryokucha's games.
There are five heroines in this game... Miyako (Ryousuke's cousin on his mother's side), Mitsuki (a genius engineer who is utterly incapable of taking care of herself), Elize (a loli knight who is Kanori's best friend and a member of the white nobility), Sakuya (a mischievous master hacker who spends most of her time exploring the old tunnels beneath the school), and Kanori (the immensely popular half-Japanese princess of Gwinburg). 
Miyako's personality is more than a little acidic, and she is the type of tsundere who insults everyone in public and is extremely dependent on her beloved oniichan in private (her oniichan being Ryousuke).  As a heroine, she is fairly adorable, and the drama in her path primarily focuses on Ryousuke's and the twins' origins rather than her own issues, since her issues are mostly resolved in the common route.
Mitsuki is also more than a little dependent on her small circle of friends and loved ones, both in the physical and emotion sense.  The reason is that she is incapable of noticing hunger, thirst, or even outright exhaustion once she begins thinking on a subject, sometimes leading to her spending several days at a time in thought, not taking care of herself.  At first she is merely dependent on Ryousuke's kindness (he brings her food and looks in on her to make sure she isn't dying), but that turns to rather open romantic affection relatively early in the common route.  Her path is the weakest of the five, focusing on side issues that don't reflect that much on the main story.
Elize is a 'tsundere with reason'.  Setting aside the fact that she is an adorable loli that is easily lured using candy in particular and food in general, her tendency toward violence against the protagonist primarily comes because of her worries about Kanori.  She has an incredibly strong sense of duty and is more than a little uptight.  However, that translates into a rather intense 'dere' when she falls completely for Ryousuke.  Her path is primarily focused on the political element of the main story.
Sakuya is a living loli-shaped ball of curiosity, driven to seek out others' secrets by her impulsive nature.  The way she falls for the protagonist naturally extends from her curiosity, and hers is perhaps the most straightforward of the romantic paths.  Her path is primarily focused on the espionage elements of the main story.
Now we come to Kanori.  Kanori is a multi-faceted character, being both an anti-establishment princess driven by the political and social realities of her current country, as well as a girl in love with a guy she only met recently.  She is also a 'fujoshi' (spelled 'rotten girl' in kanji).  Her love for Ryousuke is sincere and straightforward, but she has some serious issues hiding behind that smiling exterior.  Her path covers all the aspects of the crisis that is ongoing in the story, but it ends on a somewhat unsatisfying note due to a failure to tie up the major loose ends of the main story (everything is revealed, but the revealed secrets are not brought to a resolution). 
Overall, this is a game that combines the best of the moe-charage and story-focused VN.  It has a wonderful cast of characters, a well-thought-out setting, and it presents it all in a wonderfully beautiful package.  If it weren't for Studio Ryokucha's utter inability to handle making a satisfying ending, this VN would have reached kamige level.

I'm going to say this straight out... Awesome job, Alcot!!! 
There is a peculiar balance needed to make the perfect fantasy story-focused charage... and it has literally been years since the last time a VN has managed it.  I should know, since I play everything fantasy that isn't a nukige and some that are. 
Alcot's formula of comedy (in particular sexual comedy and situational comedy) is pretty straightforward and easy to enjoy, going across cultural lines fairly easily.  As such, it doesn't require much effort to enjoy.  That provides one element of this VN that 'completes' it. 
Another element is the setting.  Is there a solid setting?  Is that setting vital to the story and utilized well to enhance it and give it life?  That is definitely the case with this VN.  The fantasy elements are vital to every aspect of this VN and touch upon every element of the story.  I am happy to say that this VN is one of those rare fantasy VNs (non-chuuni, non-rpg) where the setting is so integral to the story as to make it inseparable.
Third is the heroine paths.  Are the heroine paths consistent with the setting and the story of the common route?  Are none of the heroines overly favored?  Is there a good balance between ichaicha, drama, and plot?  I can say yes to all these questions with this VN.  The heroine paths are universally solid, with none of them exceptionally favored over the others.  I was seriously impressed at the creativity of the writer when dealing with the endings, since they pretty much universally deviated from the 'golden road' of charage in peculiar ways while keeping to the spirit of the genre (happy endings for beloved characters).
Fourth is the characters in general.  Do they fit into the story?  Do the relationships between the characters feel 'alive', even if they aren't necessarily always believable from an excessively realistic point of view?  For that matter, does the protagonist 'fit' into his role as the center of the story (and the heroines' affections)?  Again, the answer is yes to all.  While the protagonist isn't necessarily exceptional in most ways, he has many qualities that both make him attractive enough to make the romance portions feel real, as well as the roundness to justify such a protagonist-centric story.
What this all comes down to is that this VN is fairly close to a perfect example of the best of the sub-genre, as well as being an example of why I still play charage, even though most of them are crap hiding the gems.  For people who like a strong element of fantasy in their charage, as well as a strong plot for both the characters and the game in general, this is an excellent choice.  For those who prefer to avoid seriousness and stress at all costs, it might be a too much though.  Also... SPOILERS BELOW

For the last two years or so, I've gotten repeated requests to unequivocally name my top VNs made up until the present, ignoring objectivity, my vndb votes, etc.  I've more or less just ignored most of those requests, because it is a pain in the ass to name a 'favorite' VN in the first place.  I've made lists of VNs I loved from various genres, and I've also made lists of VNs for a specific purpose.  However, I've avoided making a list like this one up until now, mostly because my 'favorites' switch out so often. 
Let's get this straight for those who are going to criticize my choices... these are the VNs I like the most, not the fifty best VNs of all time.  I make no pretense to preeminence of opinion in this case, because I'm also discarding all attempts at objectivity.  What a person likes is ultimately a matter of personal tastes, not a matter of logic.
Why did I make it fifty?  Because my number of VNs played, setting aside replays and nukige, is over six hundred already (with replays and nukige, it is closer to eight hundred...)... I'd be surprised if I didn't have this many VNs I considered wonderful. 
Keep in mind that these aren't in a particular order.
 
1.   Evolimit
2.   Dies Irae (the one by Light)
3.   Ikusa Megami Zero
4.   Nanairo Reincarnation
5.   Semiramis no Tenbin
6.   Bradyon Veda
7.   Vermilion Bind of Blood
8.   Hapymaher
9.   Tiny Dungeon (as a series)
10.  Bullet Butlers
11.  Chrono Belt
12.  Ayakashibito
13.  Otome ga Boku ni Koishiteiru 2
14.  Chusingura
15.  Draculius
16.  Otome ga Tsumugu, Koi no Canvas
17.  Silverio Vendetta
18.  Konata yori Kanata Made
19.  Grisaia series
20.  Akatsuki no Goei series
21.  Reminiscence series
22.  Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no
23.  Harumade, Kururu
24.  Soukou Akki Muramasa
25.  Tokyo Babel
26.  Tasogare no Sinsemilla
27.  Komorebi no Nostalgica
28.  Yurikago yori Tenshi Made
29.  Izuna Zanshinken
30.  Moshimo Ashita ga Harenaraba
31.  Kamikaze Explorers
32.  Devils Devel Concept
33.  Suzunone Seven
34.  Baldr Skydive series
35.  Baldr Sky Zero series
36.  Toppara Zashikiwarashi no Hanashi
37.  Tsuisou no Augment (series)
38.  Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier
39.  Shin Koihime Musou (series not including the original Koihime Musou)
40.  Soshite Hatsukoi wa Imouto ni Naru
41.  Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide
42.  Irotoridori no Sekai
43.  Noble Works
44.  Koisuru Otome to Shugo no Tate (series)
45.  Kitto, Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo
46.  Jingai Makyou
47.  Sakura, Sakimashita
48.  Abyss Homicide Club
49.  Re:Birth Colony Lost Azurite
50.  Owaru Sekai to Birthday
 
 

First, a little background for those who didn't read my previous posts on the subject.  I'm one of those rare souls who read Aiyoku no Eustia, by this same company, and came to hate it in the end.  I have reasons... even good ones.  The biggest one is that the side-heroines' endings make no sense in the context of the story as a whole.  This isn't a joke and it isn't something that can actually be denied by anyone who finished the main path (Eustia's).  This is actually the thing I despise most about the 'ladder-type' story progression seen in this and G-senjou.  The inconsistencies in the setting and plot as a whole bother me, precisely because those side-heroines almost always seem to be more interesting than the main ones (this seems to apply to almost all VNs that utilize this story structure, for whatever reason).  This is not so much an excuse for how I feel about this VN as an excuse of why I temporarily abandoned playing it.  I got so stressed out when I found out it used this story structure that it took me seventeen days to get back to it. 
Sen no Hatou is August's second chuunige.  In some ways, it echoes Eustia's flaws while escaping others.  The thing that both VNs share is a massive hole in the setting (again, anyone who plays the main path of either game is going to run across that hole).  However, on the bright side, Akari makes for a far better true heroine than Eustia.  Eustia was a weak-willed, weak-spirited, and overall weak heroine in every possible way.  Akari, despite being politically naive (sorry, but no matter how you look at it, she is that), is a far stronger spirit and she grows a lot more during the story than Eustia does, which shows that August at least learned something from us hecklers' complaints, lol.
I did play the secondary heroines' paths, and they generally had interesting endings... that just aren't possible when you consider the elephant in the room waiting beyond the door to the true path.  Considering the nature of said elephant, there is no way any of those endings could have turned out that way, logically speaking.
The common route has its ups and downs, with plenty of blood shed for the 'hungry' ones such as myself.  If I have a complaint about this aspect, it is the relatively low number of combat CGs (considering August's investment in artwork, you'd think they would have included more than there were...), but the clever usage of the sprites made up for a lot of that.  The protagonist, being your classic stone-faced samurai by nature, tends to bear a distinct resemblance to numerous other 'donkan' protagonists, but, considering his origins, this isn't surprising.  For those looking for slice-of-life or comedy, this VN won't be a winner in your eyes.  August went completely for the 'serious storytelling' bug, so no scene is wasted and everything is focused on progressing the story.  From my point of view, this is a plus, but for people who have fond memories of more 'peaceful' works by this company, such as Fortune Arterial or Hitsujikai, this would probably be a disappointing aspect.
There are some really great moments in this VN... but as an addict of chuunige and fantasy-action VNs in general, it was a bit too obvious when it started stealing from Chuusingura and Hachimyoujin (yes, by Masada).  While stealing stylistic approaches and setting concepts is common in chuunige, those moments were definitely 'ah, I've seen that before' moments for me, and since August's team just doesn't have the flair for this that Light and the makers of Chuusingura do...
Some of my complaints about the setting from my previous - raving - post  and certain pms were eased by things revealed during the progress of the story (the elephant mentioned above helped with that).  As such, you can disregard most of that rave, save where it concerns the annoyances of this story structure.
As story-focused VNs go, this VN does manage to move the emotions and there are moments where it is exciting, but when I compare it with other VNs with similar themes and concepts, it tends to lose out on the details and in terms of impact.  It is definitely above 'common' chuunige like ExE by Yuzu Soft, but I can't really classify it as being in the same league as works by Nitroplus, Type-moon, or Light.  I did think the way they ended it was a bit cheap (I sighed in resignation there, since I was hoping to be allowed to cry for an hour after the end based on what was happening up to that moment), though.  The addition of extensive after-stories in the extras section is a huge plus and a familiar one for those who read Eustia.  In the end, I enjoyed this VN, and it was an interesting one to play.  However, if you were to ask me whether it would remain in my heart forever, I'd have to say no. 
PS: For those who love Eustia, understand that I consider this VN an improvement in some ways, but in terms of the raw setting, Eustia was about equally as interesting.  The biggest improvement, to me, was the decision to use a true heroine who doesn't grate on my nerves by the end (in opposition, Tia drove me insane every time she came on the scene, and I hated the way Kaim acted in her path). 

Akatsuki Works and Applique, two subsidiaries of Akabeisoft2 (of Sharin no Kuni and G-Senjou no Maou fame) have each released a mini-VN for free on their websites (which are a pain to access from outside of Japan, but anyone used to bypassing DMM's controls on their MMO releases should be able to manage it).  Akatsuki Works released Hi no Nai Tokoro ni Kemuri wa Tatanai  ( https://vndb.org/v19369  ), which seems to be a chuunige-type by Hino Wataru, as is typical of the Akatsuki Works brand.  Applique released  Tsukikage no Simulacre ( https://vndb.org/v19964  ), which seems to be an occult story based in a mansion with a living doll.  Both VNs are kinetic novels with no h-content (one of the comments I saw on the Akatsuki Works company blog mentioned that they wanted h-content next time, laughingly). 
For reference, Akatsuki Works releases chuunige and games with a heavy emphasis on narration over dialogue (story-focused VNS).  Applique tends to prefer fantasy and sci-fi transhumanistic stories, nakige, and hard sci-fi.  Both are excellent companies that have produced multiple kamige in the past, lol.
PS: This is Entry 300 in my blog... surprise surprise.
Edit: Oh, IOS and Android versions are being released as well, for those interested.
 

Now, as I stated in the previous post, Saga Planets' has two types of VNs it primarily produces... a story-focused type that doesn't avoid the kind of bitter drama that charage/moege tend to despite the moege-type visuals... and a 'strong charage' type that essentially is a more character-focused VN with many of the same strengths as the former type.  Floral Flowlove is the former type, being much closer to Hatsuyuki Sakura and the other 'Four Seasons Series' VNs. 
As such, as in all VNs by this company, there is a definite 'proper' play order, if you want to fully enjoy this game.  First, unless you are inexperienced at playing VNs, you probably would have figured out that Kano's path is the one that touches on the core elements of the story most intensively... and that is the case, so I seriously suggest you do her path last.  This is my suggested path order Adelheit>Aoi Suu>Kohane>Nanao>Kano.  My reasons are that Adelheit's ending is the one that goes the most out of its way to avoid touching on the protagonist's most intensely personal issues and is the most 'charage-like' path, and Suu is a sub-heroine whose path branches off of Kohane's path.  Nanao and Kano share a basic flow of events up to a point that basically requires you to choose one of them and it dramatically splits off, so it is best to play Kano's path right after Nanao's.
Now that I got that out of the way, I'll make a few comments on the setting and subject matter.  For those who dislike Christian mythology, this VN might make you feel uncomfortable, though - given that it is a Japanese story - it isn't full of the moralist excess that a Western Christian writer would have put into it.  The focus on angels does have meaning, but for most of the VN, you won't know what meaning it has.  Another issue is the protagonist.  He isn't a cipher in any way, shape, or form.  He is an extremely emotionally-scarred, somewhat self-derisive character who also happens to be eminently capable at whatever he chooses to do (my favorite type, lol).  However, his tendency to distrust everyone, despite his ability to see the nature of people's intentions, will probably drive some people up the wall.  The guy is fundamentally a rationalist (which is fairly rare in Japanese VNs), save on a few issues regarding his emotional scars and the need to protect Kano from her own bad luck.
The common route of this VN is fairly dramatic and interesting, and Adelheit's path branches off from the rest almost immediately after the first dramatic point.  A second turning point occurs after the turn-off for Adelheit's path that sends you digging through the protagonist's half-healed emotional wounds and his past, and it is actually pretty interesting.  Save for Suu's, the paths and endings are universally first-rate (Suu's path is this game's abortion, though it is fun to watch the protagonist seduce a nun, lol).  I will say that I - as always - have to complain a bit about the fact that the endings only go a few months to a few years past the climax of the story (I really, really wanted to see Adelheit five or six years later, because I thought it would be rofl-worthy).  However, for most people this won't be a problem.
Each of the paths gives you a final snippet of the past after the credits, and it is, in part, this that made me give you that order of completion.  To be blunt, Kano's revelation is a bit too big in comparison, and as a result, it would be problematic if you saw it too early on (it is meant to be viewed right before going to the final path). 
About nine out of ten people are going to spend this VN wondering 'who the hell is Riku?' because the protagonist never really explains her in any of the game's main paths.  So... I'm not going to spoil it for you (though a lot of you will probably figure it out anyway).
Emotionally, this VN definitely has impact... but a lot of it is pitying, sympathizing, or empathizing with the protagonist.  I will say that Kano has seriously awesome hidden depths that come out in all the paths (think a ditz with an intelligence of ten but a wisdom of five hundred in a D&D game), as she is perhaps the single wisest, most selfless and compassionate heroines I've seen.  She isn't terribly intelligent though.  On the other side, Adelheit is pretty hilarious... she is easily the laziest heroine I've ever seen (though she is also one of the more intelligent ones).  Kohane is the kind of girl who would make the perfect mother for a family of twenty adopted kids, and Nanao is basically your standard tsundere (on her own merits, she is probably the second-weakest heroine). 
The true route... you will cry, so I predict (lol).  Anyway, the true route had me crying for a while, and it was definitely worth playing.  Unfortunately, it is also impossible to talk much about this route without spoiling the entire mess, so I'll just stop here.  I will say that they did manage to avoid the 'true route renders all the other routes meaningless/relevant only relative to the true route' screwup, which is what happens in most VNs with a true route.
Overall, this VN is Saga Planets at its best, having learned from a lot of the little mistakes in their previous games.  For those who liked Saga Planets already, it is crack, and for those who like a good story-focused VN that isn't a chuunige, this is an excellent choice. 

... it's been a while since my feelings on a VN have been as complex as my feelings for this one are.  I say 'feelings' because this VN has massive emotional impact... not as much as Hapymaher, but nonetheless a lot of emotional impact. 
To be blunt, Makoto is nothing like Hapymaher's protagonist, so if you were hoping for more of his 'consumed by sorrow and despair but still living my life' personality, sorry, no luck here.  Makoto is... a blank slate.  I don't say this in a bad way.  For better or worse, Makoto has lived his life in an isolated village where people literally don't talk any more than is absolutely necessary, lest they accidentally compel one another with their power, 'kotodama'.  Makoto has a fiance named Mana (and no, not that kind of lukewarm, 'distant fiance' sort of thing you see in some VNs, since they actually get down to business), and a rather nice, slow life in that village... However, he yearns for the outside world, where people can talk to people without restrictions.
He escapes from the village and collapses from hunger in a small town four days later, where he is saved by the first of four heroines, Kokoro.  From there the story begins, as he makes the journey from an innocent 'kami' to a real human being with all the baggage that comes along with it. 
A lot of the most interesting parts of this game come from the fact that he naturally doesn't understand much about the outside world.  Makoto's innocent, unstained viewpoint, combined with his natural kindness and willingness to embrace new experiences, feel surprisingly refreshing.  Things other 'normal' protagonists would worry over don't even occur to him, and he is so laid back he makes the drugged hippies of US in the sixties seem tense.  While he does change as part of the story, his personal 'lens', through which he sees the world, remains remarkably clean throughout... not to mention the guy has absolutely no sense of sexual morality (in other words, his idea of sexual morality is 'don't use his power to compel people to have sex with him').

The first of the heroines, Kokoro, is a shojo manga addict who has fantasies about immoral relations with older brothers.  She is a natural at unconsciously grasping the hearts of others around her without trying, and she is pretty much the picture of a heroine who 'exists to be loved by everyone'.

The second heroine, Kyouko, is a miko that can see dead people (yes, I went there).  She has huge self-esteem problems and is more than a little weird... for one thing, her reaction to Makoto is one of the more unique heroine reactions to a protagonist I've encountered over the years... for another, she is abnormally self-derogatory in both action and word.

Mana... is the protagonist's fiance from the village.  She is pretty much apathetic about other people, unless they have the decency to provide her with food (from her point of view, people who give her food move up from 'stone in the road' to 'slightly adorable insect' in most cases).  She is a bit of an S, when it comes to Makoto, and Makoto is pretty much her reason for living.  Because of a careless use of kotodama by another member of the village, she is always cold and in her eyes, it is always snowing.

Hotaru... is the true heroine of this story.  Cheerful and active, not to mention highly intelligent and perceptive... she is actually a fairly attractive heroine from the start.  However, she has less initial impact than Mana or Kokoro, for reasons that are fairly apparent.  Since that is by design, I actually am not complaining about this, though.
Now, to get to the downside of this game... it uses the G-senjou 'ladder' story structure, wherein the story progresses arcs where you choose to either pursue the heroine associated with that arc to an ending or move on with the main story.  I can say that the path endings for the non-true heroines were actually pretty good, but having played the true path, they are comparatively low-impact.  A lot of this is the fact that the major events of their 'paths' are in the arcs they branched off from, so little is added by their endings save for more sex and some minor tying up of loose ends. 
To get back to the main game... the true path is the impact I was talking about.  The main arcs were all emotional, so I guess you can say that the other heroines' 'paths' were also emotional, but, as I mentioned above, there is a definite sense that very little was added by choosing one of the other heroines.  Hotaru's path is easily the most powerful 'arc'.  In fact, it is so emotional and powerful that there are two ends for it.  The first one (which you are required to watch first) is... sad, to say the least.  It isn't a bad ending, but it is a sad one.  I know I cried.  For the second ending... well, let's just say it is a good one and leave it at that.
Overall, my viewpoint on this game is... just as mixed as I said above.  My conclusions on the G-Senjou story structure are unchanged in the least.  I still believe that all VNs that use that story structure should be changed to kinetic novels, just so I don't have to deal with heroine endings that are neglected by the creators of the stories themselves.  While all stories with true heroines inevitably put a much larger emphasis on the true heroine, the way this story structure trivializes the other heroines is really irritating, especially when they are good heroines, like these were.  However, if you take the arcs, characters, and the true endings separate from that source of irritation, it is a great VN.  It just happens to use the single worst VN story structure in existence.  Indeed, that story structure and the inevitable realities it brings along with it are the only thing that kept me from naming this as a kamige. 
PS: I will erase any and all comments that spoil anything in the last arc.  I say this because this is the type of VN that can only be enjoyed to the fullest once, not the type that merely changes flavor with each playthrough, like Devils Devil Concept.  Anyone who spoils this VN should have their skin sliced open, drawn back, then have salt rubbed into the exposed flesh. 
... *Clephas drools and goes off to make BBQ*

Before I go into this VN, I should probably bring up a few facts I’ve noticed about Yuzusoft VNs in general.   First, while most Yuzusoft VNs have a central story that is vital to the heroine paths as well as the common route, the degree to which that central plot effects the heroine paths varies pretty wildly.  In some cases – such as with Nicola in Dracu-riot – the effects of the main plot are almost nonexistent, and in others – such as Miu’s from the same VN – the effects are dramatic and integral to the progression of the heroine’s own story.  Another aspect is consistency… or rather, the degree to which heroine paths are consistent with one another.  Generally speaking, Yuzusoft games don’t strive for absolute consistency.  One reason is because most charage writers (and Yuzusoft writers are mostly charage writers) are not nearly as good at managing the numerous ‘threads’ of their stories as a chuunige writer has to be.  To be blunt, Yuzusoft games tend to eliminate the need for consistency as much as possible, limiting ‘contact points’ between the heroine routes wherever they can.  Unfortunately, there are always minor details that slip through the net, so you can’t really expect perfect consistency in any charage. 
Another aspect of Yuzusoft VNs is that they still utilize the concept of ‘heroine salvation’.  The idea that a heroine needs to be ‘saved’ by the protagonist on some level used to be integral to virtually all VNs that tried to charge the emotions of the reader, but it fell out of use over time as the emphasis shifted from story to characterization in most cases.  Yuzusoft is somewhat ‘old-fashioned’ this way, as they focus strongly both on the actual ‘stories’ of the heroine paths as well as the characterization aspects.  As a result, for those of us who get emotionally invested in the characters, the inability to ‘save’ the heroines you didn’t choose is always a bit… troubling, lol. 
I know that sounds weird coming from a self-proclaimed pragmatist like me, but that is one of the few areas in which VNs are still mostly games, rather than just reading material.  The act of ‘choosing’ a heroine inevitably invests you just a little bit emotionally in the heroines, barring a kusoge experience, lol.
Yet another thing to keep in mind about Yuzusoft games is that the company, even after all these years, is still experimenting with the ratio of ichaicha (lovey-dovey flirtation in the girlfriend/boyfriend part, such as dating, visiting one another’s houses, h-scenes, etc) to the actual story and character development.  Most of their games tend to have long (in terms of text) dating/lovey-dovey/sex periods, which can be unbelievably annoying in a VN with a good story, lol. 
Last of all, Yuzusoft games tend to have longer heroine routes on average than most moe-VNs.  I’d say by about one and a half to two times, depending on the other developer.
Now, having gotten that over with, enjoy my comments on this VN, as I plan to go into more detail than usual.
PS: I don’t intend to bother with the two sub-heroines, Ruka and Koharu.
Common Route
 
The beginning of the VN is somewhat fantastical, and with a little effort, they could have easily turned this into a light chuunige (I’m actually wondering why they didn’t, considering how suited many members of the cast are for that type of VN).  One of the most fortunate aspects of this game is the fact that very little time is spent dwelling on school life… in fact, it is probably the least relevant portion of the game, outside of the character setting of ‘gakusei’.  In my experience, the more reliant a VN is on school life for character development and story progression, the less likely it is to be interesting from beginning to end.
The basic story is that the protagonist, having drawn the sword from the stone (lol) by breaking it off at the hilt (viva, self-repairing holy weapons!  Haha), ends up engaged to and living with the himemiko, one Tomotake Yoshino.  He’s also together with a bodiless loli who presents herself as the guardian of the sword calling him her master, and a ninja who does all the cooking and cleaning around the shrine. Apparently, in order to cleanse the taint left by an ancient curse on Yoshino’s family and prevent disaster, he has to help them fight dog-monsters in the mountains around the town, so that their taint doesn’t build up enough to cause natural disasters and other tragedies.  The common route is consumed by the quest to free the Tomotake bloodline from the ancient curse and the characters’ travails in the process.
For better or worse, the central story of the VN is nearly completely resolved in the common route, leaving the heroine routes for those heroines’ personal issues.  This does mean that the tie-in to the central background story in the heroine routes is weaker than in some of Yuzusoft’s other games, such as Dracu-riot.  However, the common route itself is actually one of the better ones I’ve seen from this company, and I enjoyed the process immensely.  The downside is that the transition feels a bit awkward, sadly.
Murasame
 
Murasame is the overseer of the holy sword Murasamemaru, and Senren Banka’s resident loli.  In a lot of ways, she embodies the archetype of the ‘outsider/exile from life as we know it’ heroine archetype that has popped up occasionally in VNs like this one.  Favorite, in particular, is a company that loves this heroine archetype, utilizing it for the true heroine of every one of their games, and a disproportionate number of the heroines of this archetype are lolis (somewhere around two-thirds, starting with Ilyasviel from FSN).  This is probably because a childlike heroine who suffers from that kind of isolation is more likely to strike at our hearts.  She started out as a common village girl, and when a sacrifice was needed to become the guardian of the sword, she gave up her humanity to stay with the blade (this isn’t really a spoiler, since they tell you this early on and it is in the character profile, lol). 
Murasame comes across as your typical ‘loli who hates being treated like a child’ most of the time, but her speech and manner in more serious scenes shows at least some of her experience… and her path rakes her over the hot coals of her own personal darkness and insecurity.  Hers is a path that is all about salvation through love, and it is one that can’t help but resonate with romantics in general.  I should know… I cried several times in the course of this path.
I honestly felt that this path represents Yuzusoft at its best, and for this path alone I would have been willing to play the game… and I’m not even a lolicon. 
Mako
 
Mako… is the descendent of a ninja family that serves Yoshino’s family (Yoshino being the white-haired hime+miko heroine).  While she is deadly serious about her duty to protect and serve Yoshino, her personality is generally friendly, cheerful, and easygoing.  She is also more than a little… motherly in the sense that she loves to take care of people.  This tends to express itself in the common route through her devotion to never letting Yoshino or her father do anything around the house outside of their duties as a priest and miko at a Shinto shrine (and Yoshino’s duties as the sole descendent of her mother’s family line).
To be honest, her path is significantly more boring than Murasame’s, in that her personal worries are ‘classic’ worries from the archetypical ‘raised to serve’ heroine who is suddenly free to do what she wants, along with the fantasy worries unique to her path.  It is still a good path, even touching at times.  However, since they fell back on what amounts to a ‘normal’ love story with a half-humorous twist, things were significantly less interesting from my point of view.
 That isn’t to say that it doesn’t have its high points… but most of those are toward the end or involve the fantasy elements.  I’m sure the people who adore the junai (pure romance) that is the staple of most VNs will lap it up like their favorite flavor of ice cream, but for someone like me who has been fed that stuff until he feels like a foie gras goose…
Yoshino
 
The structure of Yoshino’s path is something of an exception, looking at charage with a serious element in general.  Most of the time, the serious element is focused at the end of the path, with the ichaicha part making up the early parts of the path, during and immediately after the formation of the relationship.  In this case, the dramatic part happens immediately after the formation of the relationship… and the rest is essentially endless ichaicha and sex.  The path has impact, but I honestly thought that the latter part of the path dragged on.  However, the ending is pretty touching, and I was honestly happy for them afterwards.
Overall
 
Yes, I have no plans to play Rena’s path immediately.  To be honest, just two paths in this game takes up ten hours, and with the common route, this game could easily hit thirty hours if I played all the paths… and I don’t have the energy for dealing with an airhead heroine right now.
Overall, this VN is one of the better Yuzusoft games I’ve played (considering that I’ve yet to encounter a Yuzusoft game that wasn’t at least worth consideration for a VN of the Month, this is a definite compliment).  It definitely beats out Sanoba Witch, both in terms of raw quality overall and in terms of the design of the setting in particular.  While the game itself doesn’t escape a lot of the clichés of the fantasy charage with story sub-genre, it carries them out well enough that I didn’t find that irritating.  The biggest downside of  the game is the downside to just about all of Yuzusoft’s games… the ichaicha is far too extended and there is usually a lot of runaround before they get to the point. 
PS: By far, Murasame's path is the best... which probably means I should have played it last.  For better or worse, after seeing Murasame's path, it felt like a betrayal not to choose her over the others, simply because of her situation, lol.

... wow, it has been a while since I've come across a VN where I can't use meta terms to explain everything. 
If I had to put a genre type to this, it would be 'random/comedy/ecchi'.  There are a few really unique elements to this VN that I should probably explain before I go any further.  First, narration in this VN is almost nonexistent... roughly 98% of the game's text is dialogue, though the h-scenes are narrated.  Second, this VN makes no attempt whatsoever to be serious at any point.  I'm not kidding.  There are literally no serious points in this VN (I at first disliked it, then when a stuffed penguin appeared with the same brand of beer my father drinks in hand, I completely lost control and started rofling).
... which is its attraction.  This VN feels a lot like an eroge-version of an American cartoon of the same type as the Simpsons or Family Guy, right down to the movie references and low humor (repeated jokes, sex humor situational comedy, and jokes related to defecation and other weirdness).  There are also a huge number of old American movie references (mostly 1980's to the turn of the century) and a few references to TV shows that were old when I was born, such as the Lone Ranger.  To be honest, this VN is all over the place...
This VN is immensely fun if you are fine with the kind of insensitive, low humor that is common in the American cartoons I mentioned above, as well as Japanese humor.  However, if you don't like that kind of thing, this will probably be pure torture. 
PS: All the heroines are bisexual.

NSFW?
 
I'll say it straight out... in my mind, Draculius is one of the top two vampire VNs in existence... with the other one being Vermilion by Light.  Meromero Cute was a company that had a tendency toward making... eccentric works.  Mahou Shoujo no Taisetsu na koto is particularly memorable for the cross-dressing protagonist who spends a ridiculous amount of time being reverse-raped in a magical girl costume...  It used the fact that nobody expects mahou shoujo stories and settings to be consistent to go a bit crazy...
Draculius is a bit different... the protagonist, Jun, is the kind of guy who would be a hero in an otome game.  While he isn't voiced (a mistake in my mind, but one that is common) his narration and lines have so much personality that you never see him as a 'standard' protagonist.  There are precisely two paths in this VN... a 'joke' path where Jun doesn't make the full transition to a vampire during the story (focused on Rian and Zeno), and a true path, where Jun confronts the people hiding behind the curtains in the course of building his vampiric harem of a trigger-happy tsundere vampire-hunting nun, an ancient vampire who was once his father's vassal and lover, a vampire 'ojousama' whom everyone takes joy in teasing, and a loyal werewolf maid who makes  a hobby out of tricking her mistress into making a fool of herself.
The action in this VN is actually a bit above the standard for chuunige of the era, though it doesn't match works by Light.  At times there are battles of wits, and there is enough comedy to make a lot of modern charage seem boring.  To this day, I've never met a loli in a VN that matches Belche for characterization (yes, I include stuff by Favorite).  The multitude of roles she takes on and the layers to her personality and viewpoint on life make her one of the few 'ancient heroines' who doesn't seem in the least bit fake. 
One of the things that is most important in a vampire story of any type is the perspective... to be blunt, a vampire setting where the vampires don't drink blood or are fundamentally harmless is... boring, to say the least.  Vampires in Draculius are nothing of the sort... in particular 'Seconds', vampires made from humans, can only turn humans into zombie-like Roams (and can potentially do so just by biting someone), so vampirism is actually a legitimate threat.  Firsts, like the protagonist and Rian (also called Shiso, like the True Ancestors in the Tsukihime world), don't have any of the vulnerabilities of their servant vampires... and they can make vampires that are sane.  However, most Firsts perspectives are... warped, to say the least.  There is nothing worse than a justified sense of superiority to make people insanely arrogant, lol.
The actual story of this tilts back and forth between the more absurd slice-of-life and the more serious parts, but this is one of those rare VNs that manages the balance nearly perfectly.  People die, the protagonist kills, and the enemy is ruthless (as is Belche, lol).  However, the slice of life in this VN tends to serve as a bright and amusing contrast to the darker elements, keeping it from becoming a purely serious VN. 
Overall, replaying this VN has confirmed to me something that I had more or less guessed over the last few years... they don't make ones like this one anymore, lol.
Edit: The pic is Belche just after she became a vampire.
Edit2: ... for those who wonder, the h-scenes in this VN... are pretty unique.  Most of them switch between Jun's and the girls' perspectives...

Those who talk to me regularly or pay attention to my lists will notice that one of the VNs that comes up fairly often is Draculius.
This is a VN that has had a surprising amount of influence on modern VNs... or rather, the Western VN world.  Oddly enough, that influence is mostly indirect rather than direct (it isn't translated, so the VN's direct influence is rather limited). 
The most obvious point is Grisaia... to be straight about it, it had the same writer as the Grisaia series, a fact that made me nod in recognition when I discovered it.  Replaying Draculius, the points of connection are blatantly obvious... such as the fact that Misao's basic character is obviously the prototype for Makina or that Rian's characterization was the prototype for Michiru (though honestly, she is better than Michiru, lol).  Zeno is Sachi's prototype (think if you added insane protectiveness and a tendency toward violence to Sachi and removed the good girl obsession).  Last of all, Rika is Yumiko (except that the dependence comes out faster and Rika is a lot less weak-willed under the surface).  It looks like Belche got split into multiple characters, probably because her role and characterization was so complex that building on her as is just wasn't possible (Amane, JB, and Chizuru). 
Now, do I even have to mention how much influence Grisaia has had on the Western community?  I'd be preaching to the choir at this point, I think. 
A less-obvious point is Kyuuketsuki no Libra or Libra of the Vampire Princess, which is getting a localization through a Kickstarter sometime this year.  To someone who played and loved Draculius, the older VN's influence on Libra is extremely obvious... Iris, who serves as an antagonist in the VN, is to some degree based on Belche (right down to her attitude toward humans and tendency toward obsessive love hidden under a cold exterior).  The actual situation is a dead copy (play on Belche's special power, for those who have read the VN, lol) in the sense that both Jun in Draculius and the protagonist of Libra are young men who are the children of born vampires who died, leaving the child's mother behind, who then died before the story began.  There are a number of differences of course... and I won't spoil the VN by telling you where a lot of the deeper similarities are (though I will give you a hint... the truth about the vampire hunter organizations). 
Other than Dies Irae, I honestly can't think of a VN that has had more impact on the community without actually being translated, and as I re-read this VN for the third time, I find more and more common points with the VNs that came later on, lol.

This is a moege (yes, a moege) and a nakige (think Key style, with less depth and more sex) by Aries, a company that makes 'themed' games (mostly).  In this case, the theme is 'what if?'  Basically, they set it up as a deliberate 'what if you changed these events?' scenario for the protagonist.  To be frank, Aries' games tend to rank from average down to somewhere below mediocre, outside of having some of the sexiest heroines I've seen outside of nukige and Semiramis no Tenbin, lol (this is setting aside the actual art style and focusing on how it is used). 
I'm going to be blunt... this VN's pacing is downright awful at first.  At least part of it is because it uses the 'map episode choice' system, where you literally choose what episodes of the VN's story to read from a map... about eighteen times.  It is more or less established fact, in my experience, that VNs with too many choices tend to have horrible pacing... and this doesn't break from that mold.  It is fine when those choices actually make an obvious difference to the story, but this is basically choosing what heroines you pay attention to, over and over until you get to the end of the 'common route'.  To be blunt, this system is as annoying as hell and breaks immersion to an immense degree, weakening the VN as a whole.
The biggest example, other than the choice system, of how the pacing is awful... is the actual progression to romance.  Basically this is an 'every love confession happens at approximately the same point' setup.  There is no buildup to the confession save for one brief scene, and that isn't nearly enough to aid the formation of the kind of mindlessly adoring deredere bacouple that gets formed in this VN.  For one thing, who has sex within an hour of a confession of love when neither side was really even aware of their own feelings up until that point?  lol  That seriously stretches suspension of disbelief.
On the upside, the heroine paths are pretty decent... emotional, with mild catharsis.  However, they are also exactly like a dozen other similar paths from VNs made in the nakige 'golden age' between 2000 and 2004.  Tia's path is probably the most emotional - for obvious reasons - but even it has such a cliche turn of events (think uguu~ ) that I just had to sight with exasperation at the end, after it was all over.
For better or worse, this is a VN that goes back to basics... in other words, a bare-bones old-style 'classic' nakige.  If you actually like that type of VN, it will be a nice appetizer... but if you are tired of the old styles, it has an immense potential for boredom.

I got asked what I was doing for this blog this month just today, by several people (probably because this is the longest time I've gone without posting since I started this blog). So... I suppose I'll go ahead and tell you.
First, the two titles I'm reading on request (though I was planning on doing one anyway). 
Sakura no Mori Dreamers (reading now)
Ruri no Ie (yes, it is not exactly something I would normally bother with, but he was insistent... sort of like with Maggot Baits)
The rest of the releases this month I'm considering playing:
Soshite Hatsukoi ga Imouto ni naru
Seiken Tsukai no Proposition (by a new company, might suck, might  not)
Natsuiro Kokoro Log (this is by Hearts, a company infamous for producing kusoge, lol)
Tarareba (by Aries, that makes decent to horrible charage)
 
Personally, from what I've played, if they don't screw it up, I think Sakura no Mori Dreamers will probably end up being the best.  However, my past experiences with Moonstone's rare attempts to be serious tell me that that feeling isn't really trustworthy.  Clear started out good but went downhill with terrifying speed, for instance.  Their single best game is Maji Suki, and that was seven years ago...  though Natsu no Iro no Nostalgia was pretty good, for Moonstone.

Now... I've already commented on this VN elsewhere, at least to a point.  So, I'll just do a quick recap of my initial feelings on this VN.  I'll go ahead and get the negative out of the way first.
First, the common, Sara, and Karen routes... as I've said elsewhere, these routes exist solely to give you certain information that adds depth to the story of Rinne and Setsuna.  So, lolicons and fans of heroines like Karen, you are wasting your time if you go into this VN if you are expecting something truly great out of those two.  Sadly, those routes are about as weak as some of the worst charage routes I've played. 
Things change dramatically during the Rinne, Winter, and Summer routes (they extend from one another).  The degree of character development quality, story-writing, and narrative is incomparably better than that of the common and sub-heroine routes.  This is perhaps inevitable, as this VN is basically a kinetic novel using chameleon-like techniques to make itself look like a normal multi-path VN.  Do you think I'm joking?  I'm not, seriously. 
I'm going to be blunt... I wasn't moved emotionally at all until the Rinne route.  I can honestly say that if you are looking for emotional stimulation, the Rinne>Winter>Summer progression is ideal.  There is a lot of mindfucking involved (those who compared this to other VNs with similar themes are more or less correct).  The biggest complaint I might decide to bring up would be a very simple one... in the VN's 'true' ending (there is a 'good' and a 'true' one, whose actual names I won't reveal, since they are spoilers) the story as a whole isn't actually brought to a resolution.  Of course, there is a definite sense of hope that comes out of it, but the writer chose to leave the story unresolved, probably for similar reasons to the people who did so with other VNs of the type.
Intellectually, this VN isn't nearly as stimulating as you might think.  For one thing, the protagonist is too much of an idiot to grasp most of what is going on.  For another, there isn't much food for thought that hasn't already been covered if you've taken an advanced physics course or two (at least conceptually).  The humor in this VN tends toward shimoneta (sexual humor), which is kind of ironic, considering it is an all-ages VN.  I honestly enjoyed the humorous character interplay in the various paths, and they did a really good job in the latter half of the game of bringing the various characters and the settings to life.  Edit: One thought that occurs to me is that this might be intellectually stimulating if you aren't accustomed to juggling sci-fi and science fiction weirdness, such as the stuff from the Hyperion book series.  The protagonist's perspective in this VN isn't so much ignorant as limited by his own psychological immaturity (like a five year old in an adult's body, his immaturity enforced and reinforced by his amnesiac state).
Is this a kamige?  No.  Three elements make this an impossibility... the common, Karen, and Sara routes, the inconclusive final ending, and the somewhat stale attempt (in my eyes, at least) at intellectual stimulation.  However, this is definitely one of those VNs I'll name as 'one to remember from 2016'.  It won't make it onto my personal favorites list, because I intensely dislike inconclusive endings, but it is still worth mentioning, just as many flawed VNs I've played have been.
Overall... this VN will probably appeal to the sci-fi mystery crowd and inveterate romantics (love across time, lol) the most.  This isn't a moe-type story, despite the art style, but it does take a page from the playbook at times.  This is also a relatively short VN, considering how much content they tried to force into it... think about seventeen hours of playtime, total (that is what my clock is saying, anyway).  It is about the same length as an medium-length charage, so that isn't necessarily short... but for a story-focused VN that is pretty short.  If you were to ask me straight out whether I liked it as a whole, I'd say yes, but if you ask me if I'll replay it, I'll say 'only if they remake the ending'.