adamstan

@Seraphim Thanks for your review. I guess I'll skip Muramasa then - most of the things you mentioned would probably bother me as well, no matter how smoothly written it is.

I just finished first episode of 9 -Nine-. I found it really engaging and enjoyable. If that was indeed the weakest part, then I see that I'm in for a treat And while some people say that Miyako makes for a rather bland heroine, I found her absoutely cute, and could definitely fall in love with her . Besides, the confession scene was amazing - very awkward and at the same time feeling very natural. I'd probably act very similar in such situation The way how the relationship between siblings Kakeru and Sora is portrayed was also brilliant - I loved their constant banter. Another nice thing was acknowledging of the other "branches" directly in the story, making routes and different endings part of the setting. I'm playing All-ages Japanese release, so cannot say much about H-stuff, but as for this episode I don't think anything was lacking, and I don't feel like this would be better as an eroge Kissing scene did very good job to convey the intimacy. And I dread at the mere thought of H-scenes between Kakeru and Sora in the next episode - that's one of the reasons I chose All-ages version There were some points that could see some improvement, but overally it was very good start. So it's 7.5 for the first episode, and I'm looking forward to the rest

Yesterday I started 9 -Nine- and reached the end of the prologue of the first episode. (BTW, in Complete Edition you select the episode at the "New Game" screen, but each episode needs to be unlocked by finishing previous one) It seems very promising - I like this kind of "School-slice-of-life suddenly turned upside down by supernatural danger" settings. Other VNs where I enjoyed that were Folklore Jam, World End Syndrome or Amber Quartz - although, at least for now, 9 -Nine- seems to be more lighthearted than those - if not for other reasons, then because of the Sophitia And Yoichi is one of the weirder Sunohara variants I saw so far - a pervert with a cute face of a "good boy" Character designs are cute - as expected from Tsubasu-sensei Voiced protagonist is also nice addition. The only thing I'm missing are some background characters - like people walking on the street, other students in the classroom etc. This level of details is a trademark of Sprite (Koichoco, Aokana), but also some Yuzusoft titles feature this in their backgrounds - like the Parquet I read just before, or Natsuzora Kanata. But that's just a minor issue, and I'm aware, that what I'm expecting is kind of luxury and not a norm. I'm looking forward to see how the story unfolds BTW while Complete Edition is 1080p, I'm playing it in 900p window to leave some space at the bottom for Chiitrans window for looking up words

Meanwhile, the 9 -Nine- Complete Edition has just arrived in glorious All-Ages 1080p HD Let's see what all the hype is about

I think he meant using MTL features of the Textractor...

Yesterday I finished Parquet. (It took me 19 hours) It was better than I expected. It had some flaws, like some pacing issues and a bit anticlimactic/underdeveloped "showdown" with the antagonist. And I think those two are connected - the shift from SoL and investigation to the action was a little too sudden - it wouldn't hurt to stretch it over a few more scenes. But then it turned out that it wasn't meant to be the finale of the story , and the equally important part, focused directly on relationship between two heroines (Rino and Tsubasa) starts from there, so I can forgive that. Rino and Tsubasa are both cute and charming in their own way, even though they are different like night and day I especially liked shy and somewhat cold Rino, and how she gradually warmed up. The ending, at least for me, was very emotional, and as heartwarming as only the best moeges get - even though Parquet isn't focused on romance at all. The short afterstories with brief branch for each girl showing a hint of a budding love were also cute and fun, but they were just an addition - more like a teaser for a fandisc, or as if the whole VN was just a common route of something bigger Reading some other reviews I often saw that people complain about protagonist being too "wooden" and lacking personality. I didn't have that impression, but I was reading Japanese version. I briefly checked the translation for a few scenes - and to me it seems like some of the MC's personality might have been lost in translation. Somehow in English version he feels much more hollow than in Japanese. But then it's also possible that my Japanese simply sucks, and I read the things that weren't there or misread some nuances So, to sum it up - gorgeous art and music, engaging story and cast of characters, heartwarming ending - that's an 8/10 in my book. ***************************************** EDIT: This review posted on r/vn describes nicely the problems I had with the "showdown" part: https://old.reddit.com/r/visualnovels/comments/pg0nzh/what_are_you_reading_sep_1/hc0l5o4/ Although I disagree about the protagonist **************************************** Today my physical copy of 9 -nine- Complete Edition should finally arrive, so perhaps this is going to be my next read.

As planned, yesterday I started reading Parquet. I'm now in the Chapter 3-2, and so far I find it very enjoyable. Both heroines and side characters are nice, and I quickly got along with them There's also right balance between main story and SoL stuff, at least for me. The premise itself is also interesting. But I think I can see how it might be difficult to find target audience for this title, and why it might disappoint many readers. First, it isn't exactly typical modern Yuzusoft game (which means moege with quite prominent ero content), so die-hard Yuzusoft fans might frown upon it. Hardcore Sci-Fi/Cyberpunk fans also won't be satisfied, since to some extent the premise is used just as an excuse to tell the story - so there definitely are some "unrealistic" / "unscientific" things going on in there. I think in that regard it's similar to ATRI. Nevertheless I find it quite engaging. I got Steam edition, but I'm playing it in Japanese - it's very nice that it is included Of course that means that my speed is much slower - currently I have 9 hours on the Steam clock - while apparently with normal reading speed I should have it completed by that time But OTOH I must admit, that while part of it is of course due to looking up unknown words and parsing the text, I recently also just enjoy the slower pace while reading. Especially when it comes to narration or protagonist's internal monologue - I sometimes will stop at a line for a moment even when I don't need to check it up - just to think a little about it or to soak in the atmosphere. And, while we're at atmosphere - I find both music and art very nice and enjoyable

And so I just finished my third reading of Princess Evangile - for the first time in Japanese (PSP version). It was still great fun, and very nostalgic experience - like coming to see old friends again. Ritsuko is still the best girl, and Ayaka has the best route - that hasn't changed One could perhaps say that I'm almost as naive as the girls from Vincennes, and that's why I love this game, but whatever - I loved it despite reading it for the third time. It's actually interesting experience, because when you know some twists, sometimes earlier scenes appear in different light, or you can see some subtle foreshadowing. I can to some extent agree with those that criticize the story for the fact that "villains" gain their "redemption" too easily - but this story is, for me at least, kind of fairy tale, so I can forgive that. And besides, the scene of still squeezed a few tears from my naive eyes Also, this is perhaps one of the best done "All Ages" (actually +15) versions I've ever played. I wrote more about that aspect in my previous post, after my second play through in December 2018 So, to sum it up, it's still 8.5/10 VN for me . And it definitely become my "Comfort VN" Now I'm probably going to try Parquet.

I noticed interesting thing while playing PSP version of Princess Evangile using emulator. It seems, that some of the CGs (just a few) are stored in their original resolution - and when emulator is set up to render in double resolution, they actually show up in that higher res. But it's just a few frames - often even then next frame of the same CG is downscaled to PSP's native resolution. Have a look on those two pictures below. The first one is the "upscaled" frame, while the second one is the next frame, in PSP resolution. PPSSPP is set up for double resolution: (they are the pictures from the middle part of Ayaka's route - one of the scenes with Kayoko) If memory serves, another such "upscaled" CG was first frame of the first meeting with Ruriko in common route.

Thanks for review Should I watch anime, or can those VNs be enjoyed standalone?

Ah, that might be true, yeah. Well, I still have some hopes for it, even if it won't be great. "Good" will be enough for this I read three VNs from Yuzusoft so far - Noble Works, Sanoba Witch and Natsuzora Kanata, and while I rated all three at 8 for various reasons, I think I liked the latter (Natsukana) the most - which, incidentally, is the oldest from the three, and most different from the "standard" Yuzusoft, since it's not high-school moege So I don't think I count exactly as "Yuzusoft fan" - I'm just the guy who happened to enjoy some of their games As for the price - at least PARQUET is much cheaper than "full-sized" titles - when I bought it on Steam, it cost around 40% of the price of "big" JVN releases there

Yeah, but there also seems to be quite big spread when it comes to ratings. It also seems that some people downvoted it on principle just because they got angry that this is an all-ages game I don't think it will be as good as ATRI (which for some reasons came to my mind when I saw PARQUET), but I'm still going to give it a chance.

Yeah, me too. I already bought it. Since it's short, maybe I'll try it after I finish my current re-read of PE.

Okay, it isn't "main" Yuzusoft, but still... PARQUET Steam description: The game is available on Steam in Japanese, English and Chinese. English translation is made by NekoNyan.

Yes, that wouldn't surprise me, because indeed lots of marketplace sellers don't ship overseas. But I also had the "We're unable to ship this item to your current address" error message on some items sold directly by amazon - and I couldn't find any connection between them.

Sakura no Kisetsu:

I bought some adult editions of VNs from amazon.jp as well - no problem there. It's just that for some reasons they refuse to ship some products - but that applies both to all-ages and adult versions, and seems pretty random. As for online shops and digital versions - I have bought them from DLSite and getchu, but had no luck with DMM.

Nice I like that kind of cheese

What makes Amatsu Misora ni different from the others? (I got curious since it sits in my backlog/wishlist together with Suzunone Seven)

Thanks, works like a charm And thanks for the RegEx explanation/example

I have one more question. What is exact syntax for replace function? For example, I'd like to filter out ruby text/furigana. In case of this game, it means removing "<R*/" (with * here acting as a wildcard) and ">". What arguments should I provide to replace function?

Now it works correctly, and doesn't cut off at those points Thanks

It seems that they fixed it in all-ages version. There, if you enter Rikako's true route without completing others (especially Ema's true, and Rikako's normal, that is kind of a glimpse or foreshadowing of true ending) you get bad ending: Apparently they wasted too much time and budget on h-scenes In the all-ages version the story got expanded a bit here and there, and with the porn interludes removed it felt perhaps more coherent, but still there could be more. I guess that's my main gripe with h-scenes in this title. Like I mentioned in my pseudo-review - when reading all-ages edition I thought, that perhaps a little bit of H wouldn't hurt. But sadly the scenes are IMO very badly placed and they feel exactly like porn interludes starring the MC and chosen heroine - they follow common porn/hentai cliches and tropes too much. To put it in other words - those aren't MC and his girl making love to each other, but MC and his girl performing a porn scene. The distinction might be weird, but that's how I felt about it. There were some VNs I've read where I didn't feel this disconnection, or it wasn't as pronounced - but there aren't many of them... +1000, I hate that system too. At least in non-remake versions, you get the flowchart, where each event is marked and after you complete the route, it also lists all conditions connected with it - such as "this event is neccessary to get X route, and to unlock it you have to first see event Z" etc. However my dislike for map movement taken to the extreme like in this game (and other GIGA's titles written by Maruto, such as Parfait's prequel Curio or Kono Aozora ni Yakusoku o) is based on the fact that it makes common route extremely fragmented, and kind of DIY thing The obscurity of conditions itself doesn't bother me that much, because, taught by past experience, I always play VN's with a walkthrough on hand

That's why sex right after confession is bad trope Yep, I had the same feelings. Game repeatedly suggested that MC and Rikako share some (troubled) past, but as a heroine she didn't seem that interesting, especially compared to Rea But the actual route was amazing.

Still going through Princess Evangile for the third time. Konomi's lines are pure gold 「手を繋ぐ……これはきっと、子作りの第一歩なのでしょうか……」 "Holding hands - that surely is the first step towards making babies..."