LAsuka

I'm surprised that many of this year's best and biggest releases didn't make this list. I understand personal bias is at play, but when you have a nukige as the best VN of the year, I have to cry foul. For example: Best moe-ge/chara-ge: Clover's Day Plus Best Chuuni-ge: Tokyo Necro Other possible contenders that were not mentioned: Future Radio and Artificial Pigeons/Chaos;Head NOAH/Tamayura Mirai I do agree with Kinkoi Golden Time and Kunado Chronicles, but I would be remiss not to mention the sheer number of VNs that arguably were better on every level and did not receive a mention.

Many thanks to the people that have been working tirelessly on this. Cheers to the August curse finally being broken!

This seems like Murphy's Law in action; all the supernatural forces conspiring to make buying a game and enjoying it as hard as possible when any self-respecting company wants to make the process of buying and receiving the product as painless as possible. Speaks volumes about the company and the dedication (or lack thereof) it has to fans.

Games are excessively long and padded out because writers are paid based on the number of lines they write. Even if you feel "every scene is necessary" or if you feel the VN is too short, that's because the writer did a very good job masking the fluff, and making the fluff seem "integral" to the story, when in actual fact, it adds absolutely no value, and is the writer just pulling ideas from (for lack of a better term) his ass. But hey, if you thought the fluff was good, more power to you. The work exists for the reader, after all.

Isn't that because some people are not allowed to attend 18+ panels if they're underage? Or maybe some people get offended/don't want to see 18+ panels. Even if they don't show any sexually explicit content, the content they talk about in this panels may be NSFW,

You really question the validity of such a list and the tastes of Japanese people when 5 nukiges are on the list, and Tsui no Stella is not. Also, is Hamadachi Creative Totsu such a kamige that it made it so high on the list, despite it being a fandisc - which is usually an excuse for H-scenes.

I never did understand what Narita's power was. Apparently, he has the power to implant thoughts into other people's mind, but that was an application of his true power, which is to slow down people's perception of time? I have no idea how the former ability is an application of the latter, since they are completely different from each other. Then his abilities got upgraded into KIng Lear V, which I assume is because he came into contact with the Owl? There has been no mention of HMIs ever changing or evolving in the entire visual novel, so I'm not sure if that works. Also, it doesn't mention anywhere what King Lear V does, despite King Lear HMIs supposedly being the strongest type of HMI. And then he uses his ability even though he has never used it before - and it has been established that even people like Saku, who has used her ability since birth, didn't know it true power - and it somehow Dues Ex Machina defeats the main antagonists? I would appreciate if someone could make some sense of this, because Superior Entelecheia was my favourite part of the visual novel, but the way it ret-cons a lot of the power system established in the original game really left a sour taste in my mouth. P.S. Also, he managed to return to the surface despite it being mentioned that he was too low to ever manage to return. Could that be a power of King Lear V?

I would like to point out a few others that were pretty good but were missing from the list 1. The final title in the Clockwork Ley Line series, Flowers in the Morning Mist - Concluded the story very well, engaging from start to finish and didn't overstay its welcome 2. Alpha Nighthawk - Excellent worldbuilding, solid characters and a well written short story by liarsoft, although the ending seems a bit unfinished 3. Summer Pockets REFLECTION BLUE - Maybe a bit of a cop-out since the original was already released, but I think reflection blue adds a lot to the lore and backstory surrounding the central mystery.

Minakami Yuki isn't exactly smart, but she's infinitely resourceful and has relatively good deductive skills. Haru is one of my favourite characters, and one of my favourite genres are wit battles, but there are fairly few visual novels with smart heroines (at least in English). Off the top of my head, there's Yoru (and Amane, but she's kinda airheaded too) from If My Heart had Wings. Honestly I can't think of any more, but I'll update this post when I do.

He pretty much makes puns of various VNs and anime contents to create interesting titles, and it happens once a week with a weird title, so you can generally guess it when it comes out. It helps that LittleShogun doesn't do too much other blog posts other than this.

Mein waifu is the Fuhrer is literally a thing

Thanks for the updates Mangagamer's acquisitions and catalogue continues to disappoint. At this point, their company seems to be on a slow decline. Fan Translations are still trucking along fine. They work on their passion, so the fact that they give us anything is nothing short of a miracle. Nekonyan continues to get pretty good acquisitions from a variety of producers. At this point, it is probably the most beloved VN localisation company at this moment. Oh yeah, JAST still exists... I guess. I guess its fine. It gives us some great VNs, occasionally.

Can't blame you. Its very hard to find people willing to volunteer nowadays. All the OG translators and editors have moved on or are working for actual localisation companies, and all the potential new ones are kinda spoiled by the volume of English releases that they don't see the point of learning Japanese. In the past, out of necessity, there would be people who would try to improve their Japanese by translating in the own time. I'm really grateful and thankful for all the work you and the team put in

Good luck! Ruitomo is one of those VNs which is very surprising hasn't had a fan translation for a long time, considering its acclaim and the story it tells. I would help, but sadly my Japanese isn't at the level where I can read VNs without a parser.

OOH, ENDLESS 13.... SCARY

Really? Because I actually really like Chunni-ge from the likes of Akatsuki Works and Akabei-Soft 2. Works like Fate, Comyu and Ayakashibito rank pretty high on my list, and lack any sort of cumbersome philosophizing on the mundanity of life and the transcendence of killing and death or some sort of nonsense. Of course our tastes are different and there are many people who like Dies Irae and think that the philosophy is profound and awe-inspiring. But as someone who is trained, by virtue of my profession, to critically analyse text, the philosphizing just fell flat, was bloated, and went on for WAAAY TOO LONG.

No hot takes here. I actually agree with most, if not all of your points. 1. I particularly prefer if localizations are kept as faithful to the original as possible. Most VN fans are able to generally distinguish anime/japanese culture to a certain extent, so jokes that play with Japanese culture isn't too much of a problem. Localizing things that involve honorifics often seems extremely out of place, and should be avoided. On the other hand, when the jokes employ Japanese wordplay or obscure Japanese folklore references that general audience would not understand, localizing them is a plus in this regard. Also enjoy how some localizations are super creative i.e. One of the ones that I can think off the top of my head is in HoshiOri Sora's route, where the Umeboshi --> Hoshi reference was replaced with MuSTARd, which was really creative, if completely missing the point. 2. Love H-scenes, but must be placed in proper sections, not disrupting the plot. Also, don't like it when MC/heroines personality change in H-scenes, especially when the MC becomes S all of the sudden, or when the heroines suddenly become nymphomaniacs. Also agree that H-scenes should be vanilla, apart from the lightest kinks. I absolutely hated the H-scenes in Muramasa. I usually don't mind H-scenes even if its unnecessary. I do mind when it comes to Muramasa, with its completely distasteful and awful H-scenes, which are ALL disturbing to some extent, even the "pure love" ones. 3. To be fair, most VN adaptations are terrible, because of the nature of VNs. Any VN adaptation not given a sufficient enough timeframe is doomed to failure. Like Muv-Luv Alternative. The best VN of all time in English was heavily butchered and barely completed its first, and shortest arc in 12 episodes. How are they going to cram in 2 extremely long arcs in the next 12 episodes? Its already doomed for failure. And it had 24 episodes. Most VNs get 12, and can barely hit the plot beats. Grisaia completely rewrote its story and CHOSE to neglect all the girls except the two girls that had the best plotlines to try and circumvent this, and still didn't do well. Also, unless your favourite girl is the main girl, she will never 'win'. When there is no main girl, its worse because they will just not go with any girl instead. 4. Gameplay VNs are another breed of games to me. However the lines blur when gameplay is part of the story, but not a core element of the game, like in Princess Waltz and Shikkoku no Sharnoth. 5. Really hated Dies Irae. For something considered the Holy Grail of Chunni-ge, I got so put-off by the pretentious philosophizing and pesudo-literary bullshit they pull, and I have a high tolerance for that, since I majored in literature. Dropped it after Marie's route and will probably never complete it unless I have a change of heart.

It is probably the best looking VN without e-mote or Live2D, with animated eyes, non-reusable backgrounds, and a crazy ton of CGs, done in minori's incredible art style. The story suffers for it, but in sheer art quality alone, trinoline ranks among the best-looking VNs of all time.

If you're fine with semi-nukige and female protagonists, Salete is a good pick.

You should treat 9-nine- as a tetralogy instead of a standalone VN. True, it can be played as a standalone game, but it would seem to be very lacking, as its story and plot builds up on future releases. Treating it as a necessary piece of a larger whole makes the game far more valuable. So your question can't really be answered. However, if you were to ask me if the 9-nine- series is worth playing and worth the money, then it is would be a resounding 'YES' and worth every cent. My favourite character is a toss-up between Miyako and Sora.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion ...Even if their opinion is kinda wack and completely unfathomable.

Muv-Luv series - Generally considered one of the best VN series around, mainly for Alternative, but Extra and Unlimited are pre-requisites. Revolves around a post-apoclayptic world where humans have been pushed to the brink of extinction due to a alien species known as BETA (Beings of Extra-Terrestrial origin and Adversary of the human race). Humans have developed Tactical Surface Fighters (TSF) which are basically giant robots which are the only weapon effective against the BETA. The series revolves around a guy named Takeru who is somehow able to cross worlds and his attempt to save the human race. This is the most understated explanation of the game, but if you read any reviews, this VN series is almost universally praised. Aokana - Four Rhythms Across The Blue - A world where humans discovered an anti-gravity particle that allows them to fly. They develop a game/sport called Flying Circus (FC) where they fly around to touch buoys to score points. The story revolves around a guy who was once an up-and-coming star in FC, but gave up his dreams for some reason. Considered one of the best character-driven game of all time and one of Sprite's best works. There's an all-age version available. Planetarian - Short (About 5-10 hours) story about a human and an female android in a post-apocalyptic world. It is considered one of Key's better works and is all-ages. *eden - Short (5-10 hours) story about humanity's decision to leave Earth due to a comet which would hit Earth in a couple of years. Resolves around a hyper-intelligent bio-engineered girl who decides to remain on this planet and the guy who decides to stay with her until the end. Base version is all-ages. Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo, and its sequel, Yuukyuu no Shounenshoujo - Revolves around a group of elites called Special High-Class Individual who are tasked with re-educating and reforming criminals. The main character is on his final exam to be a Special High-Class Individual and his final test is to reform 4 girls. One of the best character-driven VNs ever. G-senjou no Maou - Revolves around the brain of a yakuza enterprise, an extremely intelligent girl and a mysterious hyper-intelligent criminal called Maou. A cat and mouse game between the girl and Maou ensues. If you like wit battles, this game will be a god-send.

Same. I was a quite hyped for a VN which everyone either hates it or puts it on the pedestal of a legendary VN with god-tier writing on the level of the greats of the literary canon. It turned out... well not as great as expected. Is it a kamige? Not to me. Is it worth playing? Definitely yes. I'll give it an 8/10. Just don't expect any catharsis in any of the routes, except maybe the Demon route. Disclaimer: The English version is obviously very different from the Japanese version which is almost universally praised. However... it probably doesn't matter too much. Also the H is terrible. They are short and all very disturbing - even discounting the rape scenes, the pure love "vanilla" ones are equally disturbing.

Very salient insights. I enjoyed watching the video. Couple of thoughts maybe to add: --> What about the relationship of VNs to anime, considering most people came from the latter. --> What is the future of VNs, given the continued decline in reading literature? --> The relationship of adult content to the literary value of VNs

Don't know what you've read, but the folllowing are some of my favourites Muv-Luv Series (mainly Alternative, but Extra and Unlimited are required reading) G-senjou no Maou (more like ~30 hours, but still extremely good) Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo 9-nine- series (technically 4 short episodic VNs, buts its about ~50 hours total) Grisaia Trilogy (The original Fruit, Labyrinth and Eden, Phantom Trigger is optional) If you're fine with gameplay, Kamidori Alchemy Meister (sunk around ~200 hours on that game)