LemiusK

Well, when Maggie put it that way, it becomes clearer from a business standpoint why it's just more convenient to ban those games. Saves them the trouble of getting into a lawsuit and losing money. It's bad for their business.

I would also like to throw in the fact that Asians happen to age much slower in appearance than westerners, so it's not surprising at all for artists to reflect teenage Asians as younger than they actually are. A girl who's 18 might very well look like she's 13 or 15 sometimes, especially if she has a late growth spurt.

Well, you do still like anime, and VNs often use the artstyle of anime, so I'm not surprised if you had felt like Valve is acting not just anti-VN, but also anti-anime. That might explain why you're so pissed off.

Well, to begin with, a lot of VNs begin their game with the message, "All girls depicted are at least 18 years old of age" or something like that if I'm correct. And even if I'm wrong, I don't really recall that many VNs with lolis as a love interest. Those that look child-like, yes, but they are still fully grown women of age who happen to have a younger-looking face.

Initially, I wanted to say something along the lines of, "Where will such anti-anime sentiment stop? Would Netflix cancel all their anime releases too?" But now that I think about it, anime being brought to the west is a very profitable business. Valve being anti-anime would only be shooting themselves in the foot, losing out on a potential golden goose. It just doesn't make sense. To be fair, that kind of resentment has been present throughout many non-anime western communities for a long time, not just Steam. The fact that Steam was selling anime-themed video games just gave those detractors a more mainstream forum to openly preach their hatred to more people who would listen, continuing the cycle of blind hate. Plus, it's just that easy to generalize all anime with weeabooism, or generalize anime with VNs at all for that matter. On a sidenote, I doubt Gabe Newell would bother making any improvements at all for Valve or Steam. For starters... WHERE IS HALF-LIFE 3, DAMMIT?!

Can't say I'm too surprised. This type of heavy censorship feels like it's inevitable, like something that would happen in a matter of time in this day and age, where everything needs to be squeaky clean and "safe for work" for everyone to extreme levels. Putting that aside, since they also banned censored/all-ages versions of VNs, I think it's more likely due to the second factor regarding Steam users and a number of gamers over the years: a prejudice against VNs. "They are not real video games." I'm not surprised at all someone over at Steam has an axe to grind towards the medium. Well, the good news is, Steam is just a platform. It's just one of the ways you could easily access games and softwares. It's not as if the entire Internet is banning VNs from western media for good, so that's something. I understand that Steam is a significant means of convenience for gamers, but Steam is not the be all and end all of video gaming. There are disadvantages in owning digital copies of games, after all, more so if those digital copies were bought from a single corporation like Steam. When I was a kid, I was playing games and buying physical copies just fine before something like Steam even existed. And even if you consider the convenience of digital copies, you still have other companies that offer digital copies too, like GOG.

Made a rather risky move of buying two PS Vita otome games at Carousell.com.sg today (Code: Realize and Collar x Malice), a site that's been involved with multiple online scams. I only found out about this after I've transferred funds to the sellers, figured it looked harmless enough. Sigh. Well, there's no confirmation of a scam... yet, and the hundreds of feedback given to the two sellers look legit enough (though they could be easily faked). And scamming people with Vita games do seem to be a rather dubious scheme, considering there are easier products they could scam people with. So... fingers crossed and hope my products get delivered. Will probably choose a safer means of acquiring my VNs in the future. Amazon is safe enough, but its shipping fee is ridiculous. Local merchants selling Vita games are a rarity, but it's probably the only means of acquiring Vita visual novels in English, since the Vita games in my local PS store are mostly in Japanese or Chinese. Normally, I wouldn't even rely on such dubious websites and just go directly to the homepage of the developer selling the VN, Steam, or even Denpasoft or whatever. But PS Vita games aren't available on Steam, and probably not on Denpasoft either. They really are a problematic type of VN to purchase. Honestly, I wouldn't even bother with Vita games if I don't already own this chunk of paperweight; I would just stick with the good ol' PC games. You go to a local gaming store in my country, and you'll most likely NOT find any visual novel games, period, let alone visual novel Vita games. They are really annoying. Sigh. My heart doesn't need this kind of stress. I think I might just stop buying Vita games for a while after this purchase, or online products for that matter. Wait for the heat of online scammers to die off for a bit before taking the risk again. Steam and Denpasoft are still trustworthy sources, of course, but games that need third-party merchants... Sigh. I'll take a break from them. Edit: Saw this "advertisement" on another Carousell page - While his words are rather... crude, to say the least, they've put me at some ease. It's true that a lot of things can be traced back to the owner in my country, including your bank account and IP address. It's not exactly a huge country like America, so if you try and scam someone, you're only screwing yourself. Good fucking luck. lol Edit 2: Okay, so it's my mistake. Apparently, you could actually buy the two aforementioned titles from Aksys Games (the developer) and their website. But it doesn't matter, because those two titles are sold out in their store anyway. The good news is, I could at least still buy "Psychedelica of The Black Butterfly" from their store rather than from a third-party merchant. I could also buy the Steam version too, but I heard that the Steam version has a shitty translation.

Gotta admit, the second trailer is an improvement and makes me more interested. I still feel like it's going to be one of those "Iron Man" quality level origin stories though.

Sounds like one of those shitty Christian games The Angry Video Game Nerd made fun of.

Fap'em while you can! I'm sure the more risque pornographic Tumblr sites would have tons of hit over the next month. Not bad for a final hurrah for them.

lol Shame. I could use some bad blood drama this morning.

Wasn't really interested in this movie, Miles Morales, or any of the multiverse versions of Spider-Man at first (aside from Spider-Man Noir maybe, but he looks very cartoonish instead of his usual dark and gritty self here), and this was in spite of me being a huge Spider-Man fan (and even that's an understatement). But this video's got me thinking back on what got me into loving the character so much in the first place, and it seems that the film might just pay tribute to the spirit of Spider-Man's character within rather than just all the superficial powers and aesthetics on the surface. If so, then not only is it a great send-off for Stan Lee, having created such an amazing character (pun intended), but would also bring back my love of Spider-movies (Homecoming was meh and didn't do much for me). The film is released on the 13th this month in my country. Can't wait. On a sidenote, I haven't bothered watching movies at the theater for a long time, outside of MCU films (except Ant-Man). The next film I might be watching at all would be Captain Marvel, then Avengers 4. Edit: This movie has a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score. I know RT ratings hardly amount to much, but a perfect score is still something uncommon. Edit 2: See this guy's other video about the death of the creative spirit that once drove Pixar studios if you want more context on the above video. Personally, despite being a huge Pixar fan, I absolutely agreed. Incredibles 2 was a snooze-fest, saying nothing new about superheroes or the characters of The Incredibles. It's a rehash, a plain cash-grab, a nostalgia-trip.

Doki Doki seemed like a meme/joke VN to me, so I'm not surprised it's chock-full of cheap shock value. I didn't bother finishing past the first route because it's so stale and generic. Most of its "shock value" content was already spoiled by the ubiquitous Doki Doki memes anyway.

Well, yeah, that's problematic too, but it doesn't necessarily have to be about a girl meeting a bad fate because you weren't there for her. That's just one of the many types of consequences that can happen in a VN. For example, in Aoishiro, if you don't score enough points with a certain heroine (it's a yuri VN, so there's no knight in shining armor, but that's irrelevant), then the protagonist would have a bad end herself when fighting the "bad guy." Therefore, it can go both ways, having the protagonist suffer as well if she doesn't arm herself with the proper allies. Normally, this works more effectively in an action story like Aoishiro. What you and I mentioned just now in regards to YMK, that's a romance story, so yeah, it can have more problematic implications with choice and consequences. Action stories, on the other hand, would work more like an RPG, where you suffer if you don't have the proper allies, or if you pick the wrong path.

"Somewhat averted" is right. I was reading "The Labyrinth of Grisaia" the other day, and there was this scene

Yeah, unfortunately. That's why I do appreciate a VN even more when it is a good fit. School Days might not have been the best example, but the consequences still exist, so it at least forms the skeleton/foundation of what such a VN might look like. But really, it doesn't even have to be something as complex as School Days. Something simple like YMK showed well enough that by skipping routes, the other girls can have a bad time. The VN itself actively lets you know that certain characters have met a tragic end. Unfortunately, it didn't bother doing anything more meaningful than that, like getting the protagonist to visit the other girls after each route ends. I would have written it like that myself.

You have a point, but I still stand by what I said and prefer the YMK structure. Putting realism aside, the choices you make (AKA which route you choose) just have more weight when it matters that the route you didn't choose have consequences. Otherwise, you might as well be reading a book with multiple protagonists (which, while I know is what a visual novel essentially is at its core, I still prefer VNs that feel like a game more than a story, like School Days and Aoishiro, hence why School Days is among my favorites in spite of its story quality). A story with stakes based on what you choose is just a lot more intriguing to me that way. The happy endings feel more gratifying, and the sad endings feel more tragic. There's a deeper personal connection because you were the one responsible for those choices. Anyway, shouldn't this be in Visual Novel Talk?

YMK and Kanon come to mind, in that if you skipped a girl's route, she's pretty much met with trauma and a bad end. When I thought about that while playing those VNs, yeah, it did bum me out a little, but on the other hand, you can't really save everyone in real life either, so I like the realism of such a structure design. Having everything wrapped up nicely like the Kanon anime is just way too contrived and silly for my taste.

Thanks for forever ruining breakfast for all the hungry children of the world.

I feel like first impressions matter, so if I start with the route I would hate the most... sayonara. Bye bye. Never see you again in two to three years, when I MIGHT get interested in reading you again. A story being interesting is necessary to coax someone like me into reading on. In that sense, TexasDice's advice makes the most sense - enter a route that would keep you reading for some time, then read those you might not enjoy as much, and work your way from there to keep yourself engaged for as long as possible 'till the end.

There's also the problem of not remembering the story from when you last dropped it. This is a problem even with sequels like "The Labyrinth of Grisaia", where you might not remember what have happened in the first one. When I dropped something like Umineko or Ever17, I didn't play them again for years. So to return years later, I either have to read up what I forgot through Google (meaning I'm exposed to spoilers), or I would have to skimp through the entire VN again. So yeah, it can be a pain. So one should be careful, especially with VNs that are plot-focused. Even charages too, since you'll have to remember their backstories to enjoy the VN.

Yeah, I did feel like he (and especially Sunohara) were acting like dicks... but in a way, that's also why I felt myself relating to them when I was a kid, because they have such a flawed and selfish personality, almost antisocial, not caring about others. That kind of bitter resentment towards everyone reflected my own, so it felt comforting in a way. Tomoya even admitted that he knew he was acting like an antisocial arsehole, indifferent to society and everyone. They were pretty much delinquents, especially Sunohara. I don't think you're even supposed to treat them as a better human being than that, especially Sunohara (in spite of his role as comic relief).

Well, when all is said and done, the most important thing is that you enjoy yourself. No point reading at all if you're not having fun.