Plk_Lesiak

Being a trash weeb is a bad thing? I think it's something to embrace. And staying true to this topic, I really, really enjoyed Gabriel DropOut. Such a nicely balanced, cute show, which just focuses on the humour instead of delivering pointless fanservice or going overboard with "moe". The setting is pretty shallow and characters only get basic amount of development (but to be completely fair, it's still more than most episodic comedy shows do in this regard...), but they work perfectly within the formula and the actual length of the show. It might also be because I'm a sucker for this kind of "role reversal" setups, but I simply had such a great time with it... It doesn't surprise me it was made by a studio that had its hands in Yuru Yuri and New Game!, I enjoyed those shows to a similar degree. ...I'll probably also give Yuru Camp another try, considering how tired and sleep-deprived I was in the last few days, I don't really trust the impressions I've shared above.

Trying to find something easy and relaxing, I've stalled Bunny Senpai for a bit and tried watching Yuru Camp. It might literally be the first anime I've explicitly decided to drop, after 5 episodes. Usually, I stall things and promise myself to come back one day, but somehow I completely couldn't get into this one. I've enjoyed the Encouragement of Climb series in the past, so I thought this one would be just as enjoyable... But it just tries so hard to be moe and character's mannerisms are so over-the-top. I thought I'm quite ok with the "cute girls doing cute things" formula and thoroughly enjoyed shows like New Game!, but this is just so empty and over-stylized... I don't get how it can have an 8.3 rating on MAL. :s Ehm... Going to try Gabriel Dropout, I guess? Trash comedy anime will never fail me.

A while ago I’ve made a Shovelware Adventures episode about NewWestGames, a one-person studio from Canada creating primarily erotic yuri titles. For the first time since I’ve started doing my semi-serious (and borderline mockery) short reviews, I was actually approached by the developer and had an opportunity to discuss my criticism of their games, in a respectful and constructive manner, that was probably way more forgiving than the tone of my original post would warrant. After a brief exchange, I proposed to take this discussion public, giving Katie, the person behind the NewWestGames label, a chance to respond to my commentary on her work and talk a bit about the general ideas behind her VNs. I also decided it was a good moment to take a look at the NWG titles I haven’t reviewed before, completing my coverage of the studio’s catalogue and giving Katie the ability to comment on it in full. So, without further ado, I hope you’ll all enjoy my reviews and the conversation that comes after them! Frequent Flyer: A Long Distance Love Story Frequent Flyer, released on Steam in March 2018, went unnoticed by most EVN readers and received mixed reviews, mostly due to its simplistic visuals and a relatively brief, linear storyline. It is, however, arguably one of the most interesting NewWestGames titles, telling a story about a toxic relationship between two girls with some apparently autobiographical elements. The protagonist, Emi, is an average-looking girl, living in a large American city and working as a freelance journalist. Rejected by her family due to her sexual orientation, depressed because of her failed ambitions of becoming a writer and recovering from another failed relationship, she decides to go for a trip to Scotland, hoping that a change of scenery and an opportunity to meet a close online friend can invigorate her. There, while watching an evening stand-up comedy show at a local bar, she meets Isobel, a gorgeous and charismatic young Scotswoman. The two quickly forms a connection, leading to an affair that first restores Emi’s happiness and then crushes it in the most disturbing ways. Those that experienced a toxic relationship with a mentally-unstable person themselves or know stories of such couples, will find many elements in Frequent Flyer familiar – all the lies, manipulation and emotional blackmail involved, along with Emi’s reactions to more and more obvious betrayal from the person she loves, are portrayed in a believable and properly heart-wrenching manner. The minimalistic & inconsistent presentation might take away from the overall impact of the story, and many of the events are pretty easy to predict, at times making the whole experience feel a bit like a PSA, rather than a “proper” piece of fiction. Still, it is a game with an important story to tell and an underlying message that is worth hearing out, and despite all the gripes I had with its execution, I couldn’t help but appreciate it. Final Score: Recommended Read the full article at evnchronicles.blogspot.com

Well, it's more like Valve never gave them any chance to appeal the banning of the game, at least from what I heard about it. Hopefully, the publicity from that whole mess will boost their sales at least a little bit.

Hehe, it was a pretty absurd concept, but I'm somewhat glad I went with it. It just fits the shameless fun and ridiculousness of the whole formula and the games it involves. I explained it a bit in the first post of this kind. :>

We can't know for sure. And what I meant, is that I really like finding playthroughs of obscure VNs and the fact there's only one on your channel... Regrettable. Shameful even. Record more. If you ever feel like it, that is. No pressure. :<

Yes, yes, I see that my unpronounceable nickname still works perfectly against foreigners of all skill levels and backgrounds. The one thing that I find rather disturbing is that the playthrough didn't become a thing. I'll take the playlist with that never-finished OELVN, but that amount of content feels highly inadequate.

Having deleted all the last few non-VN video games from my computer (I guess we're getting into the epilogue part of my years-long struggle) and having no better idea on how to spend my evening, I've watched the first half of the Bunny Senpai show. From what I read about it, I was worried it's going to be an overly-convoluted mess, but so far, it's actually pretty balanced. There's a lot of supernatural phenomena, but every piece of it is more or less a setup for really well-written and heartwarming drama. I'm sure there was a metaphor or two in it that went over my head, but considering how dense I can be when it goes to following philosophical mumble effectively, I've found everything in it fairly straightforward. I also very much like that it doesn't go overboard with the drama, establishing the main couple very early on and doing things much more interesting than just throwing hurdles at their feet. It's not your typical romantic comedy that is fueled by pointless contrivance and misunderstandings. All the problems in it, even if "fantastical" in their expression, feel rather believable and the chemistry between main characters is just lovely. All in all, it's engaging, but in a way that nearly reminds me of various "healing" anime - it made me feel all kinds of positive emotion and bond with the characters nearly instantly. We'll see whether it can keep it up past episode 6, but I don't think it'll leave me disappointed despite all the hype.

How long is the full script? I wonder what kind of playtime will actually be left after removing the gameplay. Also, just wanted to say that project is one of the best things ever. In general. Among all kinds of things. It's the best.

I'm finally catching up with this season's shows... Mob Psycho II looks like it's going to be better than the first one and that is saying a lot, even though I wouldn't rate the first one as high as many people do. If nothing breaks, it's going to be a solid 9/10 - it seems they're going for some more character development and less sheer weirdness and it might be just the kind of slight rebalance the show needed. Slime Isekai is just the same fluffy fun it always was, playing IMO on all the right tropes. Not sure how the introduction of airhead-loli demon lord with world-ending power will play out, but I have yet to see a development in this show which wasn't turned into something at least slightly amusing. Kaguya-sama's opening episode was hilarious. I guess it's exactly my kind of romantic comedy, but I wonder whether they can keep it this over-the-top for long without the formula getting old. We'll see... Still have to get to watching Neverland and possibly going to pick up The Rising of the Shield Hero... Suddenly this season looks interesting and I'm not watching any stinkers? Weird... :s EDIT: Holy crap, the opening episodes of Shield Hero... Just excellent. Finaly, FINALY an interesting isekai protagonist, along with a meaningful twist to the formula. So glad I've decided to give it a try.

Welcome back to the Shovelware Adventures, the series that most likely no one was missing, but it came back regardless! It's been a while since I last delved into the Sakura series, so with only a few of those games still not reviewed, and staying true to my grossly counter-chronological coverage of the Winged Cloud’s trashy catalogue, let’s finish it where everything started. When Sakura Spirit appeared on Steam in mid-2014, on what was still a fairly barren EVN landscape, it quickly became something akin to a viral sensation – achieving not only sale numbers that most likely no one ever expected, but also popping up frequently on YouTube and becoming popular enough on Twitch to quickly get officially banned. It also established a peculiar variant of ecchi formula, which took the fanservice usual for eroge and trashy anime, and dedicated every CG and the whole plot to showing it off, without ever going into actual porn to stay within Steam’s, at the time, strict adult content policy. Before Winged Cloud made a transition into actual hentai games, this model spawned an impromptu franchise that turned "sakura" into a dirty word for most Western VN fans, with a total of six "all ages" fanservice VNs released within it. Today, I’ll take a look at first three of those not-quite-porn Sakura games – in a distastefully biased manner, considering my relative taste for fanservice and cliched romance, and dislike for hentai. Sakura Spirit Sakura Spirit has been ridiculed countless times, but apart from the immense amount of typos and terribly implemented popcultural references, it’s actually not the worst thing Winged Cloud has even created (even not counting the obviously-trash-tier free games like Sakura Clicker). It offers both a semi-coherent, low-fantasy isekai story (although, of course, a poorly executed one with a highly anticlimactic ending), and a somewhat appealing cast of heroines (two fox spirits, who helps the protagonist after his accidental travel to a parallel world, and two human girls acting as village guards) which could all work as a decent basis for an enjoyable ecchi VN. However, it strangely doesn’t utilize the biggest strength of visual novels as a medium, offering pretty much no meaningful choices, very little romance and an inconclusive harem ending straight out of a shitty fanservice anime. Read the full article at evnchronicles.blogspot.com

Yeah, they're alive, but some Alienwork people also got heavily involved in other projects, like Studio Elan... It might still be a while. I think just their quality first going stale and then dropping consistently was a bit too much even for their fans to swallow (I wrote a lot on how they devolved in the "Shavelware Adventures" posts on my blog). Basically, the Sakura games only got shorter, dumber and more basic over time, so even the good art couldn't save them. Maybe the studio's founder earned enough money to retire and just doesn't care anymore? We can only guess. :] And be sure that the scourge of Michael Bay movies is felt all around the world. Well, not sure what kind of business you're thinking of, but Watercress probably have little to no money to make deals with people (their jokes about "paying in exposure" weren't that far from the truth). In general, the EVN studios are still universally small companies that will keep a close watch on their resources. If you want to work with them in some capacity, you might need to approach many to make it sustainable (not that I know much about business, but that's my general impression).

Wow, that's a big topic... There's many, although most of them are small and there are dozens of circles that pretty much came together for a single project and never produced a VN after that. Also, many OELVN labels are pretty much a single person, making their own VNs with help of commissioned artists, programmers etc (you'll find Hanako Games, Razzart or ebi-hime in this category, even though they have a major impact on the EVN scene). If you check out the list of Steam Homepages I've compiled lately and scan the EVN-related entries, you'll get a decent impression on what the EVN scene looks like. Watercress is not there, as they're actually not a commercial studio and don't publish on Steam, AFAIK. Most of the things I've labelled as "EVN development studios" are actually alive and working on new projects. If you want something more specific, I would most likely point to Love in Space (Sunrider and Shining Song Starnova people) and PixelFade (Ace Academy and Crystalline) as biggest and most active EVN studios. There are some notable aspiring teams, like yuri-focused Studio Elan, but they have to yet release a full game. You also have ecchi factories such as Dharker or Winged Cloud, although the latter really seems to be dying out. It's strange, as the Sakura series must've been super-successful commercially, but both their output and marketing are absolutely anemic nowadays.

They are on the list (the external version, that is).

It's a lovely day to dabble into the dark art of thread necromancy, isn't it? It so happens that I've made something that could be considered a final version of the list. Check it out here and if you know of homepages that should be included, but are not there, please let me know. :3

@Happiness+, the event was on Sekai's Discord because the organizer is also a Sekai employee. I also enjoyed the Conference a lot, even though I missed a few initial talks (will have to check some of them on YouTube later). Also, I earlier thought that @NaiDriftlin got some tickets to distribute from the organizer, but then Aginyan mentioned that he simply buys extra tickets to give away every year. That insanely generous of you Nai, thank you! I owe you a lot of good time and 10 Twitter followers. I'd love to boycott all the evil tech corporations, but I'm afraid I'm not yet ready to throw away my computers and start living in a cave.

All Best Wishes to @Eclipsed! :3

A short while ago I’ve reviewed PixelFade’s Crystalline, expressing my disappointment at what was a visually brilliant, but rather hollow experience, in many ways inferior to that studio's first project, Ace Academy. While AA, a mecha-themed game set in near future’s Japan, mixed convincing drama, a cast of archetypical, but compelling heroines and great SoL sections, providing a fairly balanced and enjoyable game, Crystalline focused much more on comedy and despite the fantasy adventure framework, failed to produce an engaging plot or characters interesting enough to make the whole experience satisfying. The genuine chemistry between Ace Academy’s characters and its compelling atmosphere let me even forgive its anticlimactic ending – PixelFade struggled heavily with that game's development, being forced to cut a large portion of the plot and rush the conclusion, infuriating many fans. The cuts and omissions were definitely visible, for me however, what was already there was simply too good to disregard and I still consider AA as one of the best EVNs I’ve ever read. As you can imagine, it was hard for me not to get excited when, shortly after Crystalline’s release, the studio announced Kaori After Story – a spin-off to Ace Academy, continuing the romance arc of Kaori, arguably the primary heroine of the first game. Using the Live 2D engine and animations from Crystalline, it promised to be another eye-candy, this time directed to the fans of PixelFade's debut title. What worried me, however, was that it was also described by the devs as primarily a comedy, most likely ignoring the bitter-sweet climate of the original and its somewhat ambivalent ending. Thankfully, as much as some might be disappointed with this game’s obvious disinterest in continuing Ace Academy’s main intrigue, connected to protagonist’s father’s scientific research and tragic death, there are many things here they should find highly satisfying – and even I, as reserved as I was when approaching KAS, couldn’t help but to enjoy it quite a lot. Read the full article at evnchronicles.blogspot.com

That's actually unfair to JAST. Their delays are insane for sure, but the quality is pretty reliable and they work on a reasonable number of projects, getting painfully slow, but observable progress on most of them. With Sekai, there's no rhyme or reason to what they actually get done and to what effect, when it goes to major projects at least. The only thing they do right is releasing small doujins thay take way less resources and long-term effort to translate properly.

So, the Winter season is already starting and its probably the most alienating one I remember. Outside of the continuation of the Slime Isekai (is there something or someone the protagonist CAN'T devour?) and the second season of Mob Psycho 100 there's very little that catches my eye. Well, not completely nothing though. Kaguya-sama: Love is War is apparently based on a really highly-rated manga and is a seinen, so it might be intriguing. And.. There's pretty much nothing else? Apart from SAO also still continuing. So, do you guys see anything else worthwhile? What are you going to watch? I might actually do some legitimate catching up on older series this time.

I, for one, wouldn't be that happy about it because of their role as EVN and doujin publisher, with probably no company that would be able/willing to fill the void. Plus, them going down wouldn't necessarily mean the licences they already have would get any kind of smooth transition to another publisher. I just wish they'd at least get their translation quality fixed, delays are annoying, but I see them as little more than minor inconveniences if the final product properly delivers. Although if they already mismanaged themselves into bankrupcy and are only delaying the inevitable with the restructuring etc, it wouldn't be that surprising. After all, if the mess on the outside is in any way indicative of how the company functions internally... "A mess" would probably be a pretty generous description here.

Maitetsu, for one, is a loli game through and through, so it wouldn't pass on Steam in uncensored version even with the new rules. Plus, there are still benefits from releasing an all-ages version, as the game will be still visible to people that have 18+ games filtered out, and you can usually add the 18+ content as an optional DLC. Sekai especially has a policy of releasing the all-ages versions cheap, boosting sales on that, and asking a steep premium for the h-scenes. Quite a shrewd tactic IMHO, even if pretty scummy, as in general cheap VNs sell way better on Steam.

I wouldn't mind having a ticket. I'll probably miss a lot of it, considering the timezone difference and other obligations of mine, but I'm super-appreciative for the whole event and will definitely watch as much as I can.

Just for the variety's sake, I'll recommend you some EVNs: Ace Academy Everlasting Summer (free) Sepia Tears (free) And if you don't mind yuri: Highway Blossoms Love Ribbon Starlight Vega

I'd vote for Monmusu without a second thought. Both of those Sayori cash-in games are more cynical than even most of the Winged Cloud's crap.