PiggiesGoMoo

Took a mini break from Fureraba, to clear out a short game from my backlog.
To the Moon isn't technically a VN. It's a story driven RPGMaker game. It has such an emotionally impactful story though. So for all intents and purposes, To the Moon can be counted as a VN (even if it isn't technically).
Some of the silly memes (including a DBZ reference) had me cracking up.
On the other hand, the topic of autism hit very close to home for me. The game even mentions one Tony Attwood, a real life expert on autism ....... and I was diagnosed by him personally.
So ....... yeah.
The music was pretty good too (it's somewhat similar to ef - a fairy tale of the two).
I'll give it a 9/10
Well worth it if you're after a 6/7 hour game.

Being one of the voices that pushes this VN the most loudly as Purple Soft's single best work (by several degrees), I was immensely glad to see that this was getting a localization from Mangagamer.  This was my VN of the Year for 2013 and it has by far the best soundtrack I've ever seen in a VN, period.  Not only that, but I've never come across a VN that utilized its soundtrack so effectively to stimulate emotion in-sync with the story before, so it was in some ways my awakening to the fact that there were still music directors who could 'do the work' around outside of the makers of the Drakengard and Nier jrpg series. 
This VN focuses on the reality-blurring experiences of Tohru, a young man who sees nothing but lucid dreams (dreams where you are aware that you are in a dream) and suffers from physical and mental health issues as a result, and his group of female friends/acquaintances.  The VN itself is something of a mindfuck experience, mostly because the line between dreams and reality is so vague to the protagonist himself. 
If you want my translation of the first scene, go here (the narrated videos are dead, but meh):

 
I also did introductions for the protagonist and Maia, two of the major characters.

 

 
 

Pretty hyped about this one for a change. I waited a long time for it. 
Well, I'm not really worried about this one, since my tastes in VN's seem rather different from his. I mean, he also considers Kara no Shoujo just an average VN while Himawari is the best kamige ever written for him. That's pretty much the complete opposite of my opinion. 
That's not to say I'd expect Hapymaher to be perfect. It'll most likely have similar flaws like Chrono Clock had, although I do expect it to be better.

I just finished Sakura no Kisetsu

It was nice romcom VN - I can see how it stood out in the '90s among the sea of translated nukiges It has quite well-written characters, some funny dialogue, and isn't focused on h-scenes, which appear (one per girl) only in the epilogues. There are eight heroines. The routes share most of the events, and they branch based on "affection points", but differences aren't big - some different dialogues, and - in case of some routes - additonal events.
I think that my favorite routes/endings were Kiyomi (I like girls with glasses ), Ruri and Aki (with Ruri's and Aki's endings being most emotional in whole game). 
Some more screenshots from these three:
Weakest one (and the shortest) was Shoko's (pink haired girl), who didn't have much of a route actually
Reiko and Mio - two blue haired girls - were nice too, but their routes didn't stand out that much. Nevertheless I liked them.
Nice, and no too common thing, is that your comic-relief friend (Makoto) gets the girl too in some endings
Now let's talk a little about technical aspects. The game looks really good despite suffering from VGA limitations. I really like character design. I know that they are almost directly lifted from popular anime shows of the time (MKR, Evangelion and Saint's Tail), but I just like that style. I'd actually like to see similar character designs and art style in some modern VN. Another nice thing are little details used to liven-up the sprites - although they only have one pose (except for CGs of course), there are numerous facial expressions and outfits for each girl, and the faces have little animations - like eyes blinking, or anime-tears flowing  - nice touch . The backgrounds also change slightly depending on time of the day (lighting) and situation (like classroom can be empty or have some students and/or teacher in it).
The gameplay is that of modern text-adventure games (like Eric the Unready for example) - so there's no parser, but you choose from set of commands like "look", "talk" etc. It can be quite tiresome - I'd actually prefer the style of modern VNs, when there are only choices. As it is, to listen to whole dialogue you often have to click "TALK">"character" numerous times. OTOH - no one can say "This isn't a game!"
Localization is actually decent. There are some grammar errors and mislabeled lines, but nothing game-breaking. It is perfectly readable. Funny thing is, how JAST dealt with characters being in high-school. Instead of putting standard warning ("This is a work of fictioin, all characters are +18 yadayadayada") they tried to rewrite story - by changing HS to "prep school" between HS and college, and renaming "principal" to "dean", and yet at the same time failing miserably right at one of the first screens

Overally - it was nice read, with likeable and beautiful girls. 7/10 - give it a try if you have some time (and use a walkthrough )
Next one to read will be either Crescendo or Hatsukoi after stories.

So, I finished the side stories, so The House in Fata Morgana: Requiem for Innocence is officially finished for me. And, though not without some flaws, it was quite a fantastic experience.
First of all, I doubt anybody on this forum would attempt that, but I really wouldn't recommend reading this fansidisc before the original VN. Since it is a prequel to the original game, the main story works well on its own, but if you attempt that you will be spoiled on several very important plot-twists from the original game. What I personally like about RFI is that, unlike how it is with most fandiscs, it doesn't try to add meaningless filler to the original original VN, but instead, basically, serves as an extended backstory for a certain important character which was mentioned in the original game but never actually shown. And, you know, if you want more Fata Morgana, you'll get it here. For me personally the most important thing in all types of fiction I consume is the characters. I love watching how they develop in different circumstances and how they interact with each other, and both Fata Morgana and RFI literally excel at showing this.
They main flaw for me personally is actually the same thing that bugged me about the original game. You may consider it nitpicking, but I feel like the characters in this VN are simply way too modern for somebody in living in the Middle Ages. Well, I understand that showing this story and being completely faithful to the time period would be impossible, so it's not an important thing for me, but this could be a deal breaker for some people.
As for the other episodes, I'm honestly a bit disappointed. They are very short and don't have time to show anything meaningful, and I felt like they were basically trying to artificially continue the story that was already over. Well, that's exactly the reason why I'm generally not a fan of fandiscs.
And thus, the overall score is 9/10 for the main story, 6/10 for the sub episodes, and 8/10 overall.

Common route was good. I liked how they introduced characters and didn't rush with the story to let us get used to them, to know their personalities. Enjoy Michiru's route, it may surprise you. It was rather heartwarming for me. As for Amane - at first i also thought that she's your usual cliche anime girl, but for some reason later i changed my mind a bit and discovered that she's not bad at all. And her route even my fav one, still remember deep impressions i got reading it.
Also i like how all these girls form such an interesting and funny (in slice of life moments) group that you feel it would be lacking something if one girl is to be removed. They just complement each other, and in result we have great VN with unique characters, each with their own personal background.

Have been reading Grisaia.  I'm really impressed by the writing in all of the slice-of-life scenes. Not just the humor, but in the way that it explores the depths of personality of the characters.  That includes the common route. So far I've done the routes of Makina and Amane, and am currently in Michiru's.  I saved Sachi and Yumiko's routes for later because I was very curious about WTF is wrong with Michiru... a very unusual character lol. Michiru's character + route might end up being my favorite. The only character I find kind of uninteresting is Amane, although her route is very riveting (it felt like I was reading a totally different VN).
 
I also read Cartagra recently, and it was decent. It almost felt like I was reading a nukige, with all of the very short routes and h-scenes.  Looking forward to KNS 1 & 2.

On one hand, comedy and loveable characters makes me smile (and I need reasons to laugh). Ditto for well written dialogue. On the other hand, dark suspenseful stories, plot twists, and tearjerker scenes are unforgettable for me, and I like that as well.
Sounds contradictory. But dark and serious makes the comedy stand out more. And vice versa.

I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt for two reasons:
Valve changed their privacy options not too long ago so that a user can choose to hide their game collection. This makes it impossible to get an accurate estimate of how many people own a game. (Note how large of a range 100,000-200,000 is.) If My Heart Had Wings was part of a Humble Bundle a few months ago. Many of those owners (including myself) likely bought that bundle for Higurashi, not for IMHHW. There's no way of knowing how many people bought IMHHW directly vs. just getting it in that bundle.

So I wrote a bunch here but deleted it because it was long and runny.  TLDR was that I had been spending a while saving for the game (being a student and all makes it that much harder) and now that I bought it I learned that there literally is no 18+ patch, and I also learned about how scummy MoeNovel is so I refunded it, might get the game elsewhere if that's possible and play it, although that much sadder that I won't be able to play with the wholesome love scenes. (basing that off of IMHHW standards, btw.  let's admit it, they're pretty wholesome)
Anyways, I was wondering what the hell we can do about it.  I'm obviously new here and I have no idea what has already been done, but I do know that a boycott has been attempted, and seeing as they've just released another game, something tells me that it didn't exactly work out (although a good thing I guess is that it literally only has 16 reviews on Steam which is telling me that nobody has really bought it, but on the other hand they are all positive reviews, so...)
It's a huge shame IMO because Konno Asta is an amazing writer and he manages to hit home very well.  I absolutely hate the fact that MoeNovel is locking the whole "Climax" (get it? but no really, there are like two stories in his works (similar to IMHHW) and MoeNovel is pretty much locking one of the "climaxes" behind a language and regional barrier) behind a regional/linguistic barrier, because IMO everyone deserves a chance to read the story(ies) without interruption.
Is it 100% certain that these VN's will never be TL'd fully (not just for 12 year old french girls) and that it will have to be left to Fans?  Or are they willing to change, if they receive enough backlash?
One thing I've learned over the years of being involved with game developers is that they will literally not give a single shit about their consumers so long as they're making money, or have already made all the money they needed.  I'm not certain if they're in this position but if they are... well, you get the idea.
Please educated a simpleton about MoeNovel and what we can do is the TLDR of this topic, I guess.  Also, is it worth learning Japanese so I can try and TL stuff, officially or as a fan?  TY

It's hard to lose a award in Japan when you have the biggest concentration of E+ boobs per meter of the universe.

Not in the next several decades, at least. Probably never. And, well, there are generally two problems with that:
Nobel Prize is actually a very politicized award. Even prizes in Physics are often given to the countries rather than the people. And it's especially true for Nobel Prize in literature. There's no way something as niche as VNs is going to get it. With all honesty, VNs right now are still not at the level to actually compete with the best literature works. Whether it's going to change in the future is very much debatable and depends on too many factors, so I'm not going to comment on that.  

The tags are not giving you an accurate picture. While there is certainly dark content, there is specifically no "girls raped by zombies" content, for one thing. The game is certainly very H-heavy, and I won't really try to defend it on that front; it is what it is. But at the same time, the game takes itself very seriously as a zombie survival story, and that's what I ended up finding interesting about it (in between editing pages and pages of H).
I will say, I've recently realized that every single time I've tried to figure out whether I'll like a VN based on people's descriptions, I've found the experience of actually playing the game to be utterly different from my expectations, to the point that I almost think it isn't worth seeing what people are saying about a game, beyond the basics of who liked it and who didn't. It's also entirely possible that I just don't know my own preferences very well, or that they're always evolving, though. Not really sure where I'm going with this, except maybe "don't judge a book by its cover"? And that probably goes double for me saying positive things about it, heh, since I obviously have a vested interest in it!

https://denpasoft.com/blogs/news/announcing-a-new-upcoming-title
https://vndb.org/v16802
 
I edited it, so I'd be pretty stoked regardless, but it's a cool game and pretty far off the beaten path in terms of themes and execution, for the VN medium. I'm looking forward to you all getting to play it, and I hope I get to work on the sequels and the prequel!

..... my VN backlog is already big enough! Why must an interesting game like this come out?
This looks like a read that won't hesitate to punch you in the feels

Those violin transitions are stunning and seem to be a staple in Tenmon's music  He surely loves his violin.
Now, today I'll go with this: 
Cry bitches, cry!
 

Just had to drop these. Really loved them:
 
 

Can't wait. Hopefully they do a decent job like always. 

Fiction Positive Effects on Brain: Books>LN (caveat: well-written)=>VNs>Manga>Anime.  Why?  Imagination.  Imagining what is going on in a fictional story is the part that expands your brain.  LNs and VNs are interchangeable for obvious reasons.

I think you have synesthesia

You're living in the golden age English wise. 

I can just imagine a GOG curator reading DDLC with a checklist:
Good ❌
Old ❌
Game ❌

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Great offers for a lot of titles, especially on Grisaia no Kajitsu (50% off) and Chrono Clock (20% off).
Those who haven't gotten these 2 games, buy it while the sale lasts
 
Edited: Got the Denapsoft sales news in my email. Dug around for a bit and found out that Sekai Project is having a similar sale:
https://mailchi.mp/sekaiproject/sekai-project-steam-spring-sale
 
Found something interesting on the pricing on Grisaia steam vs Grisaia unrated though:
Grisaia no Kajitu Sekai Project spring sale
Grisaia no Kajitsu Denpasoft 2018 spring sale
Wtf ....
 
Edited 2: The pricing (sales or normal) for this Saku Saku is extremely interesting as well:
Saku Saku Sekai Project Sping Sale
Saku Saku Denpasoft Spring Sale

I've been analysing the sexual content of VNs, what's become more common, what gets the best ratings, and what content tends to come together; and thought I'd present some of my results in a slightly different way: in a quiz! Using the extensive character database on vndb, I tracked which appearance and personality traits were more or less likely to engage in types of sexual activity, and put the results in a quiz format so you can enter the tropes and it'll tell you how the percentages diverge from the average.
This is a slightly silly way to present the results, but I thought you guys might enjoy it.
You can try the quiz here.