ChaosRaven

I guess it's time to post some mini reviews of the VN's I've played in the last half year or so, before I forget about them. I list them in the order how much I liked them.

The last VN I read is the first episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line and it's also the one I liked the most. I haven't read a VN so far that managed to capture the feeling of a Hogwarts magical school so well like this one. The art style is really great, even if the sprite dynamics felt a bit too static if you're used to Yuzusoft stuff. The music is also decent most of the time, even though some tracks felt a bit repetitive after a while.
The protagonist was a pretty cool dude and the heroines were also very likable. The VN does focus mostly on the story, with the heroine stories being rather short. But the VN did actually commit to the story, so almost everything was drawn that was actually happening, which is in no way a small feat. According to Steam it took me about 25 hours to read, which is pretty fine for the prelude to a trilogy.
Heroine ranking: Tsubaki > Fuhito > Ushio > Rito > Neko
Overall rating: 7.5/10 (Could get even better depending on how the trilogy continues)

Tokyo Nekro was a VN I had a particular technical interest in, because it's using an actual game engine. Meaning it has a lot of animated characters and stuff. And in general I'd say the VN did succeed in what it tried to achieve. While the background textures did feel rather PS2 area outdated, the characters itself turned out surprisingly well. The combat scenes in particular deserve praise. At least the third person scenes, because they were pretty well done, while the ego scenes felt a bit too much like cheap Doom imitations. Nevertheless, the VN had a visual fidelity that bordered on an anime.
Story wise it was a bit hit or miss. I was actually lucky to accidentally end up in Con Su's route, which actually felt like the true route. It wasn't really a romance route and more of a platonic friendship route focused on Con Su and Ilia and their origins. I was also lucky that an update had overwritten the adult patch. I restored it for the other routes and I did regret it. The H-scenes felt completely random and all over the place ranging from vanilla to disturbing. I heard that Ilia's route would be the main route, but I'd definitely disagree. It was just running after Milgram forever. It shared a lot with Mitsumi's route, but Mitsumi's was better since it was shorter.
Something that was irritating about the VN were the two protagonists. I'm not a big fan of that in general, but this was really exhausting. The protagonists did switch so frequently that they were almost rotating. Sometimes even other characters got protagonist which made it even more confusing. Another annoying thing was the helmet view, that blocked almost half of the screen.
It did took me almost 50 hours to finish the VN with only the Kiri route left, which felt a bit too long for my taste. I'd also give a small warning that this VN has some VERY gory scenes, that can easily compete with Kara no Shoujo. And I'm not talking about simple zombie splatter, but stuff like opening the skull of an arguably living person to manipulate its brain.
Overall rating: 7/10 (Could have been better with single protagonist and less edgy content)

Next is Hello Lady. The highlight of this VN is probably the protagonist and the male voice actors in general. The story is a bit of a spin off of the Count of Monte Cristo. While the protagonist was kinda cool, his frequent Casanova phases of excessive sexual harassment got old and tedious pretty fast. Another problem of the VN was the lack of commitment towards the story. It felt like they took the CG set of a pure moege and tried to twist it with a half assed story where barely anything plot relevant was drawn.
Another problem was the lacking chemistry between the protagist and the heroines. I never got the feeling that they are more than just playthings for a few days to have some fun with until they are thrown away. His maid Hishia Mori felt like the only one he seemed to have some feelings for. The routes therefore felt very lackluster since neither the romance nor the plot was convincing. Especially since the routes felt extremely repetitive and the true route wasn't much better either. In total it did cost me almost 60 hours to finish the VN and it was in no way worth that time. Maybe 30 hours, but not 60.
Heroine ranking: Somehow none of them really clicked with me, even if I didn't dislike them...
Overall rating: 6/10

Next was Cyanotype Daydream. This was a rather odd VN, since it's pretty much split in 3 side stories and a final true story. I've seen comments comparing this to The House in Fata Morgana due to its plot structure. However, I beg to disagree. While the introduction stories of Fata Morgana have a lot to do with the actual plot, introducing most of the main characters, the same can't be said about the ones in this VN. They share a bit of a 'broken romance' theme, but besides that they are so unrelated to the actual main story that you could just pick a few random VN's from VNDB and read those instead. Even worse, none of them was particular convincing and I skipped most of them after a while since I found the characters not particular likable and the storys somewhat boring.
That said, the actual main story is actual quite decent with likable characters and an interesting world. However, it suffered from the fact that a lot of resources were wasted in some rather mediocre side stories. The VN would have been a lot better if they would have fully commited to the main story and flesh out the world with more characters.
Heroine ranking: Yonagi > Izumo > don't care
Overall rating: 6/10 (I'd rate the main story higher, but forcing those mediocre side stories on me demands punishment)

Okay, I wish they would have stopped the Flowers series with the last part -Le volume sur automne- on a high. Instead we got this. So, there are two main problems with this VN. First, there's no romance arc this time, so the VN has to rely on its final revelation plot to justify its existence. Which leads us to the next problem, that the revelation plot was a complete joke and it came extremly late. Even some of the micro mysteries of the predecssors were better than that. Furthermore, it tried to antagonize some of its best characters which just made no sense. There were also almost no new characters, and the whole slice of life that was left felt like copy & paste from the previous VN's.
Overall, this was a fan disc at best and even for that it did a poor job. My personal recommendation would be to just skip this VN, since it adds nothing of worth to the series.
Overall rating: 5/10
So, that was it for now. Currently reading the recently translated TypeMoon VN Mahoutsukai no Yoru, with the second episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line next in line. 

Looking for a new hard hitting nakige visual novel with some supernatural mystery? Allow me to recommend Irotoridori no Sekai. Hoshimemo is almost nothing like it: Different writer, almost no High School SoL, and kinda depressing. More in this video:
 
 

It's time for Getchu 2023 award, and the winner is unsurprisingly Sakura no Toki in which it's the sequel of very well received Sakura no Uta. Anyway, let's see top 10 below, and yes I did really mean 10 instead of 20 because somehow Getchu decided to just list 10 top rank instead of usual 20, which to say is quite understandable. By the way, you can view the result in this link.
1. Sakura no Toki -Sakura no Mori no Shita o Ayumu- - Makura

-
2. Amakano 2+ - Azarashi Soft
3. Tenshi Souzou RE-BOOT! - Yuzusoft

4. Mashiro-iro Symphony: Sana Edition - Palette

5. Mashiro Iro Symphony -Love is pure white- Remake for FHD - Palette

-
6. Koibana Ren'ai - ASa Project

7. Hapymaher - REGRET END - Purple Software

-
8. Happy Live, Show Up: Encore!! - FAVORITE

-
9. D.C.5 ~Da Capo 5~ - CIRCUS

10. Yuunagi-sou no S-kyuu no Kanojo-tachi 2 - MOONSTONE Cherry
Despite fewer number on the list, we still have the winner for each categories, so I'll list it below.
Best Scenario: Sakura no Toki -Sakura no Mori no Shita o Ayumu- Best Game System: Amakano 2+ Best Graphic: Tenshi Souzou RE-BOOT! Best Soundtrack: Sakura no Toki -Sakura no Mori no Shita o Ayumu- Best Movie: Tenshi Souzou RE-BOOT! Best Character: Tanikaze Amane from Tenshi Souzou RE-BOOT! Best Erotic Contents: Bunny's Mama Daikou Service That's all for the list, and admittedly speaking the list show the worrying state of VNs in Japan.

I guess it's time to post some mini reviews of the VN's I've played in the last half year or so, before I forget about them. I list them in the order how much I liked them.

The last VN I read is the first episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line and it's also the one I liked the most. I haven't read a VN so far that managed to capture the feeling of a Hogwarts magical school so well like this one. The art style is really great, even if the sprite dynamics felt a bit too static if you're used to Yuzusoft stuff. The music is also decent most of the time, even though some tracks felt a bit repetitive after a while.
The protagonist was a pretty cool dude and the heroines were also very likable. The VN does focus mostly on the story, with the heroine stories being rather short. But the VN did actually commit to the story, so almost everything was drawn that was actually happening, which is in no way a small feat. According to Steam it took me about 25 hours to read, which is pretty fine for the prelude to a trilogy.
Heroine ranking: Tsubaki > Fuhito > Ushio > Rito > Neko
Overall rating: 7.5/10 (Could get even better depending on how the trilogy continues)

Tokyo Nekro was a VN I had a particular technical interest in, because it's using an actual game engine. Meaning it has a lot of animated characters and stuff. And in general I'd say the VN did succeed in what it tried to achieve. While the background textures did feel rather PS2 area outdated, the characters itself turned out surprisingly well. The combat scenes in particular deserve praise. At least the third person scenes, because they were pretty well done, while the ego scenes felt a bit too much like cheap Doom imitations. Nevertheless, the VN had a visual fidelity that bordered on an anime.
Story wise it was a bit hit or miss. I was actually lucky to accidentally end up in Con Su's route, which actually felt like the true route. It wasn't really a romance route and more of a platonic friendship route focused on Con Su and Ilia and their origins. I was also lucky that an update had overwritten the adult patch. I restored it for the other routes and I did regret it. The H-scenes felt completely random and all over the place ranging from vanilla to disturbing. I heard that Ilia's route would be the main route, but I'd definitely disagree. It was just running after Milgram forever. It shared a lot with Mitsumi's route, but Mitsumi's was better since it was shorter.
Something that was irritating about the VN were the two protagonists. I'm not a big fan of that in general, but this was really exhausting. The protagonists did switch so frequently that they were almost rotating. Sometimes even other characters got protagonist which made it even more confusing. Another annoying thing was the helmet view, that blocked almost half of the screen.
It did took me almost 50 hours to finish the VN with only the Kiri route left, which felt a bit too long for my taste. I'd also give a small warning that this VN has some VERY gory scenes, that can easily compete with Kara no Shoujo. And I'm not talking about simple zombie splatter, but stuff like opening the skull of an arguably living person to manipulate its brain.
Overall rating: 7/10 (Could have been better with single protagonist and less edgy content)

Next is Hello Lady. The highlight of this VN is probably the protagonist and the male voice actors in general. The story is a bit of a spin off of the Count of Monte Cristo. While the protagonist was kinda cool, his frequent Casanova phases of excessive sexual harassment got old and tedious pretty fast. Another problem of the VN was the lack of commitment towards the story. It felt like they took the CG set of a pure moege and tried to twist it with a half assed story where barely anything plot relevant was drawn.
Another problem was the lacking chemistry between the protagist and the heroines. I never got the feeling that they are more than just playthings for a few days to have some fun with until they are thrown away. His maid Hishia Mori felt like the only one he seemed to have some feelings for. The routes therefore felt very lackluster since neither the romance nor the plot was convincing. Especially since the routes felt extremely repetitive and the true route wasn't much better either. In total it did cost me almost 60 hours to finish the VN and it was in no way worth that time. Maybe 30 hours, but not 60.
Heroine ranking: Somehow none of them really clicked with me, even if I didn't dislike them...
Overall rating: 6/10

Next was Cyanotype Daydream. This was a rather odd VN, since it's pretty much split in 3 side stories and a final true story. I've seen comments comparing this to The House in Fata Morgana due to its plot structure. However, I beg to disagree. While the introduction stories of Fata Morgana have a lot to do with the actual plot, introducing most of the main characters, the same can't be said about the ones in this VN. They share a bit of a 'broken romance' theme, but besides that they are so unrelated to the actual main story that you could just pick a few random VN's from VNDB and read those instead. Even worse, none of them was particular convincing and I skipped most of them after a while since I found the characters not particular likable and the storys somewhat boring.
That said, the actual main story is actual quite decent with likable characters and an interesting world. However, it suffered from the fact that a lot of resources were wasted in some rather mediocre side stories. The VN would have been a lot better if they would have fully commited to the main story and flesh out the world with more characters.
Heroine ranking: Yonagi > Izumo > don't care
Overall rating: 6/10 (I'd rate the main story higher, but forcing those mediocre side stories on me demands punishment)

Okay, I wish they would have stopped the Flowers series with the last part -Le volume sur automne- on a high. Instead we got this. So, there are two main problems with this VN. First, there's no romance arc this time, so the VN has to rely on its final revelation plot to justify its existence. Which leads us to the next problem, that the revelation plot was a complete joke and it came extremly late. Even some of the micro mysteries of the predecssors were better than that. Furthermore, it tried to antagonize some of its best characters which just made no sense. There were also almost no new characters, and the whole slice of life that was left felt like copy & paste from the previous VN's.
Overall, this was a fan disc at best and even for that it did a poor job. My personal recommendation would be to just skip this VN, since it adds nothing of worth to the series.
Overall rating: 5/10
So, that was it for now. Currently reading the recently translated TypeMoon VN Mahoutsukai no Yoru, with the second episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line next in line. 

It's that time to talk about favorite media in 2023 is so may as well go in video form: Explaining what MY personal favorite visual novel content read in 2023 was, in the style of Video Game Awards Categories using a meme template.
 
 
If you want to make your own template, here is a empty version where you can fill out your own with the edited category names.

 

I guess it's time to post some mini reviews of the VN's I've played in the last half year or so, before I forget about them. I list them in the order how much I liked them.

The last VN I read is the first episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line and it's also the one I liked the most. I haven't read a VN so far that managed to capture the feeling of a Hogwarts magical school so well like this one. The art style is really great, even if the sprite dynamics felt a bit too static if you're used to Yuzusoft stuff. The music is also decent most of the time, even though some tracks felt a bit repetitive after a while.
The protagonist was a pretty cool dude and the heroines were also very likable. The VN does focus mostly on the story, with the heroine stories being rather short. But the VN did actually commit to the story, so almost everything was drawn that was actually happening, which is in no way a small feat. According to Steam it took me about 25 hours to read, which is pretty fine for the prelude to a trilogy.
Heroine ranking: Tsubaki > Fuhito > Ushio > Rito > Neko
Overall rating: 7.5/10 (Could get even better depending on how the trilogy continues)

Tokyo Nekro was a VN I had a particular technical interest in, because it's using an actual game engine. Meaning it has a lot of animated characters and stuff. And in general I'd say the VN did succeed in what it tried to achieve. While the background textures did feel rather PS2 area outdated, the characters itself turned out surprisingly well. The combat scenes in particular deserve praise. At least the third person scenes, because they were pretty well done, while the ego scenes felt a bit too much like cheap Doom imitations. Nevertheless, the VN had a visual fidelity that bordered on an anime.
Story wise it was a bit hit or miss. I was actually lucky to accidentally end up in Con Su's route, which actually felt like the true route. It wasn't really a romance route and more of a platonic friendship route focused on Con Su and Ilia and their origins. I was also lucky that an update had overwritten the adult patch. I restored it for the other routes and I did regret it. The H-scenes felt completely random and all over the place ranging from vanilla to disturbing. I heard that Ilia's route would be the main route, but I'd definitely disagree. It was just running after Milgram forever. It shared a lot with Mitsumi's route, but Mitsumi's was better since it was shorter.
Something that was irritating about the VN were the two protagonists. I'm not a big fan of that in general, but this was really exhausting. The protagonists did switch so frequently that they were almost rotating. Sometimes even other characters got protagonist which made it even more confusing. Another annoying thing was the helmet view, that blocked almost half of the screen.
It did took me almost 50 hours to finish the VN with only the Kiri route left, which felt a bit too long for my taste. I'd also give a small warning that this VN has some VERY gory scenes, that can easily compete with Kara no Shoujo. And I'm not talking about simple zombie splatter, but stuff like opening the skull of an arguably living person to manipulate its brain.
Overall rating: 7/10 (Could have been better with single protagonist and less edgy content)

Next is Hello Lady. The highlight of this VN is probably the protagonist and the male voice actors in general. The story is a bit of a spin off of the Count of Monte Cristo. While the protagonist was kinda cool, his frequent Casanova phases of excessive sexual harassment got old and tedious pretty fast. Another problem of the VN was the lack of commitment towards the story. It felt like they took the CG set of a pure moege and tried to twist it with a half assed story where barely anything plot relevant was drawn.
Another problem was the lacking chemistry between the protagist and the heroines. I never got the feeling that they are more than just playthings for a few days to have some fun with until they are thrown away. His maid Hishia Mori felt like the only one he seemed to have some feelings for. The routes therefore felt very lackluster since neither the romance nor the plot was convincing. Especially since the routes felt extremely repetitive and the true route wasn't much better either. In total it did cost me almost 60 hours to finish the VN and it was in no way worth that time. Maybe 30 hours, but not 60.
Heroine ranking: Somehow none of them really clicked with me, even if I didn't dislike them...
Overall rating: 6/10

Next was Cyanotype Daydream. This was a rather odd VN, since it's pretty much split in 3 side stories and a final true story. I've seen comments comparing this to The House in Fata Morgana due to its plot structure. However, I beg to disagree. While the introduction stories of Fata Morgana have a lot to do with the actual plot, introducing most of the main characters, the same can't be said about the ones in this VN. They share a bit of a 'broken romance' theme, but besides that they are so unrelated to the actual main story that you could just pick a few random VN's from VNDB and read those instead. Even worse, none of them was particular convincing and I skipped most of them after a while since I found the characters not particular likable and the storys somewhat boring.
That said, the actual main story is actual quite decent with likable characters and an interesting world. However, it suffered from the fact that a lot of resources were wasted in some rather mediocre side stories. The VN would have been a lot better if they would have fully commited to the main story and flesh out the world with more characters.
Heroine ranking: Yonagi > Izumo > don't care
Overall rating: 6/10 (I'd rate the main story higher, but forcing those mediocre side stories on me demands punishment)

Okay, I wish they would have stopped the Flowers series with the last part -Le volume sur automne- on a high. Instead we got this. So, there are two main problems with this VN. First, there's no romance arc this time, so the VN has to rely on its final revelation plot to justify its existence. Which leads us to the next problem, that the revelation plot was a complete joke and it came extremly late. Even some of the micro mysteries of the predecssors were better than that. Furthermore, it tried to antagonize some of its best characters which just made no sense. There were also almost no new characters, and the whole slice of life that was left felt like copy & paste from the previous VN's.
Overall, this was a fan disc at best and even for that it did a poor job. My personal recommendation would be to just skip this VN, since it adds nothing of worth to the series.
Overall rating: 5/10
So, that was it for now. Currently reading the recently translated TypeMoon VN Mahoutsukai no Yoru, with the second episode of Tokeijikake no Ley Line next in line. 

Yaho, time for another one of my sporadic shilling of the few VNs that I've read over the past few months.
SHINRAI -broken beyond despair- it was an alright Halloween Party murder mystery between 10 middle school friends. What's great about it is that you can have totally logically sound but incorrect deductions at the very end as to who the master mind is and you'll feel like a total dumbass afterwards when the protagonist realizes her mistake. 7/10

"Remember, these are a buncha middle schoolers lol."
 
Fragment's Note+ & Fragment's Note 2+ This was apparently a mobile-VN made 10 years ago, remade for the Switch recently as + versions. Gee, wonder how their sales went lol. Anyways Fragments Note is a standard charamoege high school slice of life, with the twist being that in the first game the protagonist's future daughter travels to his time in order to prevent a tragic fate that would befall him if she were to not intervene. That's pretty much the only thing that kept me interested in this VN, cuz I just can't with HS SoL nowadays lol. 7/10

"Guys I'm not a Lolicon I swear lol, but Miu is just too cute."
 
Fragment's Note 2 is an indirect sequel taking place 1 year later at the same high school, but with a different protagonist. What I found particularly interesting is that this protagonist was only briefly mentioned in the first game, and now he has his own story! Talk about Ascended Extra. I'm a sucker for these types of continuity in stories. Even better, one of the unromanceable heroines from the first game (because plot) is actually romanceable this time around hehehe. Unfortunately, most of the plot is wasted on the protagonist's trauma, because a core theme of this VN is to conquer your inner demons and move on type of deal. 7.5/10

"^This here's Ayame. And hori shi she might just be my most guilty pleasure character ever lol. She's the doting gentle older sister type. Totally gives my pink-haired heroine bias a run for its money"
 
Paranormasight: Hoh boy, if you are ever looking for a supernatural battle of wits murder mystery, look no further. Paranormasight's gotchu covered. Simple premise. 7* Mysteries of Honjo, 7* Curse Bearers with relics/kill methods based on those mysteries, and you're in for a good time. Only gripe is the whole deathnote-style kill or be killed thriller gameplay is literally reserved only for the PROLOGUE, yes only the PROLOGUE, and the rest of the game after that is piecing together the mystery/lore/character motivations and does away with the climactic character confrontations. Also kind of short, clocking in only 10-15 hours. 8/10

"Give me a 30hr VN that's purely more about these type of character confrontations sizing each other up before going for the killing blow and you'd have a masterpiece lol"
 
Yurukill: Four pairs of "Prisoners" and "Executioners" are taken to a 'theme park' Yurukill Land and the winning pair that makes it through all the 'attractions' will get the Prisoner exonerated from their crime, with the Executioner having any wish of theirs granted. This VN seriously doesn't know what it wants to be, murder mystery, escape game, Danganronpa logic puzzles, bullet hell shoot 'em up... it implements all of these mechanics, so like a jack of all trades but master of none. Fun enough though. 7/10

"Totally unrelated comment, but Rina totally looks like someone who would appear in like Fata Morgana or something LOL"
 
Suhoshin: Another short (~5-7hrs) murder mystery VN (see a trend here?) this time taking place in a more medieval setting. Interesting, up until you get to a certain midway point and get one of those infodumps that totally ruins the intrigue because the characters just know too much about what they are dealing with at that point. 7/10

"Oh yes, you'll totally always frustratingly be one step behind the killer lol -_____-"
 
Currently reading: Kunado Kokuki Gee, Purple Software really liked the Kotodama gimmick that they made in Amatsutsumi didn't they >.>. I didn't get very far in Amatsu before I got bored of the high school SoL as usual, but Kunado Kokuki is set in post apocalyptic man vs machine setting and the Kotodama gimmick is quite intriguing there.

"And let's be real, Haruhime (center) is a God-tier heroine lol. Ruler of the nation, gorgeous as fuh, and has the same exclusive Kotodama powers as the protagonist. It's a match made in heaven."

Well, there are certainly still a lot of problems. Unlike computer games, VN's get barely any media coverage. And there are usually no standout lighthouse titles that could expand the scene. We still rely on the occasional oddball like Nekopara or Doki Doki that for some reason manage to get more attention. And due to their explicit content, they are usually more difficult to talk about wih other people.
And selling those titles is still a problem. While it's easier on Steam than in the past, many titles have to split the adult content into a separate patch or don't make it at all on Steam. And not everyone likes buying incomplete versions that require additional patches. And in addition to that, there are 'regional restrictions' *sigh*. German Steam blocks every adult VN by default for years now that can be bought in the US and other countries without problems. Sometimes even if the adult content is split into a separate patch for whatever reason. Like Hatsuru Koto Naki Mirai Yori for example. I'd really like to buy it, but since it's only available on Steam and Steam blocks it in Germany, the only way I could get it, would have to be to pirate it.
Another problem is that VN's usually are a significant time investment. So, many people probably won't buy more than they can read. Other than me who still buys almost everything I just want to read at some time, leading to an ever growing backlog. 
On the other hand I'm kinda positvely suprised how many VN's we are actually getting in the west. Thanks to strong newcomers Nekonyan and Shiravune (relative to MangaGamer, Jast and Sekai at least) in particular, we do get a decent number of titles translated. And we actually do get a lot of the good ones.
What the publishers could definitely do to improve the situation, is to improve the shopping front. An English Getchu variant where I could get ALL titles would be great. Nekonyan at least sells their titles also on MangaGamer, but Frontwing sticks to Steam and if Steams blocks the title in my country, I just can't get it. I'm also unhappy with Shiravune's Johren which feels unnecessary complicated in almost every way. I couldn't even find a way to filter out untranslated VN's when browsing titles. And the one title I once bought made my Windows Defender go crazy.
I also see AI translations as a great opportunity and unlike others, I see it as a great way to make work easier for translators and not as a threat to them.

I think some visual novels which SHOULD be masterpieces end up at least partially brought down by being too long and in turn bad pacing. In this video I want to show what I consider good and bad pacing in visual novels.
 
 

I've red a handful of VNs over the past few months but never got around to really doing one of my usual misc. thoughts/comments 😅
A Clockwork Ley-Line: good if you're still into SoL high school setting, except make it in a magic school setting. There's not really heavy emphasis on the magic itself ie. no classroom infodumps about magic and/or students learning about magic and battling each other sorcerer vs witches style, just mainly protagonist Koga Michiru and friends from the Bureau of Investigation club running around trying to capture rogue magical artifacts that cause supernatural shenanigans to occur in the school, with an overarching mystery regarding the school itself. Trilogy, so you have plenty of time to get attached to the cast and watch the blossoming romance between Michiru and main heroine Shishigatani Ushio. Now that I think about it, I actually didn't finish this lol, stopped early on in the last episode because life so I'll pick it up #soon. 7/10

"Ya, the Bureau totally works for the sake of the school and aren't a part of any sketchy conspiracies "
 
Corpse Factory: randomly tried this OELVN, yes you read that right OEL, ENGLISH VN, and surprisingly had a pretty good time with it. The English voice cast was decent enough that I actually listened to most of the lines fully instead of my usual half-listen-but-then-move-onto-next-line-before-audio-finishes for regular JVNs. Plot was alright, was mostly intrigued by the characters themselves and how messed up in the head they can be. 8/10.

"Yeah... I've never actually watched DEATH NOTE (i know, blasphemy, sue me), but I'd imagine there's some inspiration taken from it..?"
 
Process of Elimination: The Detective Alliance consists of 100 super detectives that have a particular special ability and they are trying to capture "The Quartering Duke" a criminal mastermind who's been on a killing spree. 14 of the detectives get isolated trapped at their very own Detective Alliance Headquarters, murders start happening, and chances are the mastermind is among the 14...Yup it's a Danganronpa offbrand isolated murder mystery setting type with a quirky cast each with specializations, but hey you have technically 14 Ultimate Detectives this time around so how hard could it be to find out who's the mastermind ?
The "investigation" and eureka! segments are played out as strategy RPG gameplay where you turn based move characters to points of interest and analyze evidence. Not as flashy as Danganronpa's classroom trials, and overall most of the murders and cases are pretty meh and ultimately the confrontation with the big bad totally falls flat and totally cannot hold a candle to Danganronpa's Hope vs Despair shenanigans, but it was fun enough. 7/10

"^This here's 'Ideal Detective', and yeah, they totally made her such an ideal type lol. Btw the protagonist is known as 'Incompetent Detective'"
 
Umineko: When the Seagulls Cry: Sigh, yes, I finally got around to reading the masterpiece that is Umineko. I red someone say that Umineko's mass 10/10 ratings is from survivor bias- this thing is LONG, like probably the longest VN I've ever read, and took me like 1-1.5months on and off casual reading to take down lol. The 75hr length estimate on VNDB is no joke. And that's just for Ep 1-4, with 5-8 also being another 70+hr estimate!!! And so the people that did manage to finish were the ones that thoroughly enjoyed and thus were able to make it to the end.
Umineko's very good. Especially for its time. It's basically a murder mystery with an emphasis on battle of wits on whether it was done via a witch/supernatural or whether everything could be logic'd out and the culprit was human with realistic methods. It unfortunately kinda... devolves and drags later on, but I enjoyed my time with it. 8/10
"^If you don't get absolutely hooked on this VN by the time you reach the end of Episode One and hear this BGM, just drop the VN."
 
Master Detective Archives: Rain Code. Spike Chunsoft's latest Danganronpa x Al: Somnium Files had a baby. Technically not a pure VN since they have enough adventure game aspects so this game got the Zero Time Dilemma treatment on VNDB but yeah. 

"If you enjoyed Danganronpa's Classroom Trials this game implements some of that, and if you enjoyed Al Somnium Files' quirky female companion or the Somniums this game also implements some of that via Shinigami and the Mystery Labyrinths. Play it."
 

Well, there are certainly still a lot of problems. Unlike computer games, VN's get barely any media coverage. And there are usually no standout lighthouse titles that could expand the scene. We still rely on the occasional oddball like Nekopara or Doki Doki that for some reason manage to get more attention. And due to their explicit content, they are usually more difficult to talk about wih other people.
And selling those titles is still a problem. While it's easier on Steam than in the past, many titles have to split the adult content into a separate patch or don't make it at all on Steam. And not everyone likes buying incomplete versions that require additional patches. And in addition to that, there are 'regional restrictions' *sigh*. German Steam blocks every adult VN by default for years now that can be bought in the US and other countries without problems. Sometimes even if the adult content is split into a separate patch for whatever reason. Like Hatsuru Koto Naki Mirai Yori for example. I'd really like to buy it, but since it's only available on Steam and Steam blocks it in Germany, the only way I could get it, would have to be to pirate it.
Another problem is that VN's usually are a significant time investment. So, many people probably won't buy more than they can read. Other than me who still buys almost everything I just want to read at some time, leading to an ever growing backlog. 
On the other hand I'm kinda positvely suprised how many VN's we are actually getting in the west. Thanks to strong newcomers Nekonyan and Shiravune (relative to MangaGamer, Jast and Sekai at least) in particular, we do get a decent number of titles translated. And we actually do get a lot of the good ones.
What the publishers could definitely do to improve the situation, is to improve the shopping front. An English Getchu variant where I could get ALL titles would be great. Nekonyan at least sells their titles also on MangaGamer, but Frontwing sticks to Steam and if Steams blocks the title in my country, I just can't get it. I'm also unhappy with Shiravune's Johren which feels unnecessary complicated in almost every way. I couldn't even find a way to filter out untranslated VN's when browsing titles. And the one title I once bought made my Windows Defender go crazy.
I also see AI translations as a great opportunity and unlike others, I see it as a great way to make work easier for translators and not as a threat to them.

Well, there are certainly still a lot of problems. Unlike computer games, VN's get barely any media coverage. And there are usually no standout lighthouse titles that could expand the scene. We still rely on the occasional oddball like Nekopara or Doki Doki that for some reason manage to get more attention. And due to their explicit content, they are usually more difficult to talk about wih other people.
And selling those titles is still a problem. While it's easier on Steam than in the past, many titles have to split the adult content into a separate patch or don't make it at all on Steam. And not everyone likes buying incomplete versions that require additional patches. And in addition to that, there are 'regional restrictions' *sigh*. German Steam blocks every adult VN by default for years now that can be bought in the US and other countries without problems. Sometimes even if the adult content is split into a separate patch for whatever reason. Like Hatsuru Koto Naki Mirai Yori for example. I'd really like to buy it, but since it's only available on Steam and Steam blocks it in Germany, the only way I could get it, would have to be to pirate it.
Another problem is that VN's usually are a significant time investment. So, many people probably won't buy more than they can read. Other than me who still buys almost everything I just want to read at some time, leading to an ever growing backlog. 
On the other hand I'm kinda positvely suprised how many VN's we are actually getting in the west. Thanks to strong newcomers Nekonyan and Shiravune (relative to MangaGamer, Jast and Sekai at least) in particular, we do get a decent number of titles translated. And we actually do get a lot of the good ones.
What the publishers could definitely do to improve the situation, is to improve the shopping front. An English Getchu variant where I could get ALL titles would be great. Nekonyan at least sells their titles also on MangaGamer, but Frontwing sticks to Steam and if Steams blocks the title in my country, I just can't get it. I'm also unhappy with Shiravune's Johren which feels unnecessary complicated in almost every way. I couldn't even find a way to filter out untranslated VN's when browsing titles. And the one title I once bought made my Windows Defender go crazy.
I also see AI translations as a great opportunity and unlike others, I see it as a great way to make work easier for translators and not as a threat to them.

You ever wondered why we still have a lot of visual novels without translations? Based on talks with people in the industry, watching the community, and analysis, here are 7 reasons why we don't have MORE VN translations:
 
 
 

So once again the time has come for AX, which mean that we may get several interesting announcements. Still no idea on what Mangagamer will announce, but at least we know we'll have 4 announcements from them.
Anyway, the schedule below and for the info the time is UTC -7. I'll list the announcements in this post later.
PS - I'll list the announcements in here.
Mangagamer
JAST USA
Type Moon
JAST Blue
Sekai Project
That's all for the announcements.

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,

JAST and Mangagamer recently had their announcements, and let's just say that it's quite stacked in number. I'll try to comment when all of the announcements gathered, so for now I'll just update the OP post.
PS - I'll compile the announcement in this post below.
Mangagamer
Hana Awase Choukou Shinki Ixseal Sex Open World e Youkoso! Dead Days JAST
Shingun Goblin Gundan ~Jinrui-sou Naedoko-ka Sakusen~ Yomegami: My Sweet Goddess! Yamizome Liberator -Yamiochi Yuusha to Ochiru Senki- Minikui Mojika no Ko Mankai Tenshi Djibril sisters ~Natsu no Saigo no Hi~ Type Moon
Tsukihime -A piece of blue glass moon- JAST Blue
Masquerade ~Jigoku Gakuen SO/DO/MU~ Paradise Sekai Project
Neko-nin eXHeart SPIN!

Just want to get two VN's off my list I didn't like too much and therefore dropped.

The first is Kin'iro Loveriche - a story about a boy accidentally ending up in a noble private academy for rich kids. Felt a bit like a poor man's Yuzusoft VN. Not the worst thing to be compared with, but the VN has a few peculiarities which I found rather off-putting. First, the protagonist is lazy, dumb and perverse, which made the whole heroine cast fawning over him rather unbelievable. Carrying tons of porn magazines around, drawing nude girls in lessons instead of studying and 'enlighten' his comrades about new fetishes on a daily base like a pimp. And not to mention the running gag going on about his countless hardcore sex fetishes - you get the picture!
That said, I wouldn't go so far to say that he's a bad guy, and his interactions with Ria in particular were almost mature and well above the rest. Unfortunately, besides Ria the rest of the cast was pretty generic. I played Elle's route, which was trash, with no chemistry whatsoever between the two and little to no plot. I also tried Sylvia's route, but almost died of boredom and Sylvia's absolutely bland personality didn't help either. And I found Reina's 'I'm more lude than you' attitude pretty annoying, so I just skipped it. Maybe Ria's would have been better, but it just wasn't worth having to go through all the other routes, just to 'maybe' get a decent route. Besides Ria, I had an odd liking for Akane, but she didn't seem ready for a relationship yet and especially not with the protagonist.
Though to be fair, it's not the worst moege you can play and I've certainly played worse. However, this VN had a strong 'lude & cute' vibe going on, which I simply found unfitting and tasteless. Just not my cup of tea.
Heroine ranking: Ria > Akane > Don't care
Overall rating 5/10

I also played Amatsutsumi, but didn't like it. First, from the three Purplesoft VN's I've played so far, this was certainly the most boring one by far, with absolutely nothing happening whatsover. But well, a VN can still get decent without much plot if it offers at least good romance. However, the protagonist was apparently taken straight out of a nukige. Pretty much a walking boner who barely thinks about anything else than sex and seems to think that the world is his personal brothel. He therefore bangs all the heroines already in the common route - who needs a romance anyway? Ironically, the VN would have been way better if it would have been at least honest enough to fully commit to a nukige. Instead it tried an inbetween ride with the most misplaced and unfitting H-scenes you can imagine. Kinda "Oh I'm so down and depressed - let's f*ck?!" cringe.
I also found the character designs - with the exception of Mana maybe - rather bland in comparison to previous works, with HapyMaher in particular standing out with an incredible audio-visual design. Though, to be fair, the visual effects of many backgrounds (usually involving water) in this VN are off the charts.
While all PurpleSoft VN's I have read so far had their issues, they at least got the basics of romance right. This VN fails even at that. So yeah, if that's the future of PurpleSoft VN's, it'll be a future without me.
Heroine ranking: Don't care
Overall rating: 3/10 (I added one bonus point for the visual effects)

It's been a while since I've done a visual novel publisher history retrospective video. This time I'm going to do Shiravune: a relatively newer publisher with quite the catalogue. Thanks to @TheLocalWeeb for editing!
 
 

Unlike last year when Nekonyan also participate, this time we have Mangagamer and Sekai Project announced some title, although those title are not a big one.
Mangagamer
Announcement 1 - Uchi no Koibito
Announcement 2 - Nightmare x Vampire
Sekai Project
Announcement 1 - Kemonomichi Girlish Square Love + Plus
Contains fluffy & ecchi afterstories for the heroines of the main game.
Announcement 2 - Kemonomichi Girlish Square 

-
By the way, Mangagamer actually also released Uchi no Koibito in which it made all three parts of Uchi trilogy available in English. With Shiravune take over the first part of Succubus Session trilogy, I wonder if Mangagamer will license Bishoujo Gakuen trilogy later. Sekai, well they did a good job for being predictable with Kemonomichi aka Animal Trail license instead of trying to pick up some bigger title from the same company such as Unless Terminalia.
That's all for Anime Central 2023 announcements here.

I'd recommend Sugoi Translator with the updated model installed.  It runs locally, with output as good as or better than DeepL.  You can read my more detailed write-up on the tool here.

There's always been a debate on if machine translation is worth using for visual novels. In this video, I'm going to use Sanoba Witch's official translation and compare it with DeepL attempting to machine translate the same scene.  
 
 

Have you wondered who were the most popular visual novel characters from a certain visual novel, series, company, or even from a whole year? This video will highlight some notable online popularity polls done by Japanese developers.  
 

There's a bunch of visual novels I read a while back, and have little to no video reviews, so I'm starting a video series I'm going to call "Ange's Visual Novel Quick Recommendations"
In this video I talk about Koisuru Natsu no Last Resort:
 
 
 
 
 Tsujidou-san no Jun'ai Road. A unique delinquent girl heavy setting with emphasis on comedy action and some romance melodrama. The closest we'll get to another Majikoi. 
 
 
 
Rewrite OkaKen Idols and Cradles Tale, two fun but optional spinoffs. They both can be finished in an hour or less. Idols can be good for newcomers, Cradles for post-Terra fluff.
 
 
 
 Edelweiss, Overdrive's first visual novel. It has some degenerate comedy, but I thought it was entertaining and wholesome. Has an interesting setting and melodrama. 
 
 
 My Fair Princess. Imagine a "rich school" setting but a little more emphasis on wholesomeness and theatre instead of a princess cheating you in like in Evangile or Kinkoi.
 

 
A full visual novel review for Honey * Honey * Honey! A very unique setting with gender segregation laws with some of the weirdest humor I've seen in VNs. Was pretty short with only 3 heroines but a decently fun time.
 
 
 

Finally we have Tokyo Necro released, so go get it if you've been waiting for this and have fun.

It's there, you know. Look at #6.
Honestly, I thought the same thing. I don't know, maybe some of these VNs are actually better than they seem from the descriptions, but so far the only VN from this list I find myself interested in is Tsui no Stella, and only because it's Key.