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lunaterra

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Posts posted by lunaterra

    Create a vndb profile based on your IRL self using vndb tags

    in Members' Lounge

    Posted

    Hair - Brown, Curly, Long, No Bangs
    Eyes - Blue
    Body - Freckles, Left Handed, Pale, Tall, Young-Adult
    Clothes - Glasses, Jeans, Sports Shoes, T-Shirt
    Items - Gaming Console, Handbag, Mobile Phone
    Personality - Absentminded, Atheist, Curious, Eccentric, Emotional, Girls' Love Fan, Idealist, Moody, Romantic, Sensitive, Shy, Sleepyhead, Timid, Tomboy
    Role - American, Asexual, E-Friend, Gamer, German, Poor, Unemployed, Writer, Younger Sister
    Engages in - Coming Out, Computering, Daydreaming, Medication, Online Chatting, Reading, Sarcasm
    Subject of - Anemia, Clinical Depression, Debt, Disappointment, Grief
    Engages in (Sexual) - Not Sexually Involved
    Subject of (Sexual) - Not Sexually Involved

    Blogs, articles, videos about editing (VN and otherwise)?

    in Creative Corner

    Posted

    Editing is a thankless job. Most VN writers think they don't need an editor or copy editor/proofreader. Even if they do realize they need an additional pair of eyes, occasionally I see "editors" with such a poor grasp of English that their input makes the text worse. Oh, and sometimes people decide to just throw out your changes for no reason but keep your name on the final product. That's fun.

    Usually people send me either a Google doc with their script in it or they send me their .rpa file directly (so it's a good idea to have basic knowledge/understanding of Ren'Py syntax so you don't accidentally break your client's game). Other game writers use Excel or another spreadsheet tool to write scripts. Once, someone I worked with simply sent me the WIP build of their game and had me note which lines needed to be changed...never again.

    For general editing, I'd recommend checking out stuff linked by the EFA (Editorial Freelancers Association) and SfEP (Society for Editors and Proofreaders) Twitter accounts.

    Visual Novel Steam Sales Declining?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    If there's been a drop in Steam sales for VNs, I think it's most likely a side effect of Valve's algorithm changes benefiting already-popular/AAA games and being detrimental to indie and niche games rather than anything to do with the VN scene itself. While the article focuses on Western indie games, I think it's applicable to "non-indie" VNs too--they're still very niche products that don't sell enough for a sales-based recommendation system to benefit them.

    Sol Press now selling visual novels directly on the Discord store, starting with Under One Wing and Newton.

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    Sekai Project is selling games on Discord now too:

    https://discordapp.com/store/skus/555830991168733204/heart-of-the-woods

    https://discordapp.com/store/skus/555812072969994260/a-magical-high-school-girl

    But I have to wonder, how many people actually buy games on Discord? I own exactly one game on there (King of the Hat), and that's only because of a free promotion. The fact that Discord seems to be trying to kill its own store (unless you already have a direct link to the game, you can only find games by going to the Server Discovery section and finding a relevant verified server...but Sol Press' server isn't verified, so I don't know how that works for them?) doesn't help.

    Normally I'd say that any exposure helps, but I'd be surprised if they got any sales at all from Discord, tbh.

    What other content would you want to see from the visual novel community as a whole? (Not just more translations)

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    I'd like to see less of a divide between EVNs and JVNs. The thing is, I can understand why someone would have a preference for one or the other--the JVNs that get translated into English tend to have higher production values but also tend to be more expensive as a result; EVNs are more accessible (to English speakers) but have a much wider spectrum of quality (since, by and large, we don't get the worst JVNs). JVNs also tend to be longer than EVNs, which can be either a good thing or a bad thing depending on your preference. But I think that dismissing a VN solely because of the language it was originally written in is just plain silly.

    Do You Prefer Happy Endings Or Bittersweet/More Realistic Endings?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    I don't like the idea that happy endings are necessarily unrealistic. Like, yeah, bad stuff happens IRL...but so does good stuff.

    If the writers pull a deus ex machina or something equally trite, then I can understand it--those are definitely unsatisfying, and since they often break the laws of that work's universe, those types of endings often contain weird/horrific implications for everyone else in the setting.

    But in general, I find well-done happy endings to be the most satisfying. Not everything has to be absolutely perfect, but there has to at least be hope for the future.

    The Shadows That Run Alongside Our Car

    in Unformatted Walkthroughs

    Posted

    3anQa3.png

    The Shadows That Run Alongside Our Car

    official free/PWYW download

     

    Description

    Quote

    The road is long.

    Two strangers sit side by side as night falls over. The car speeds down the open highway.

    Without a soul around them, everything seems to slip away. On a journey to no one knows where, all they have is words and time. And that time is dwindling fast.

    The shadows are chasing.

    Character Routes

    The Shadows That Run Alongside Our Car follows a slightly unusual format. Rather than choosing a love interest, you pick a protagonist to see the story through. Both protagonists are nameable, but for simplicity's sake, I'll use the default names here. Each protagonist has 3 possible endings, for 6 total endings.

    These aren't the only ways to obtain these endings, but following this guide will allow you to see all the content in the game.

    75383.jpg

    Shelby

    Ending #1

    Spoiler

    That was weird.
    Pause.
    That's deep.
    White lie.

    Ending #2

    Spoiler

    That was weird.
    Immediately change the subject.
    He's just trying to sound cool.
    Be honest.

    Ending #3

    Spoiler

    Whatever.
    Pause.
    That's deep.
    White lie.

    75384.jpg

    Dustin

    Ending #1

    Spoiler

    Dodge the question.
    Ignoring me, huh?
    Ask if she's nauseous.
    Let her be.

    Ending #2

    Spoiler

    Dodge the question.
    Ignoring me, huh?
    Ask if she's nauseous.
    Rest hand on hers.

    Ending #3

    Spoiler

    Bend the truth.
    Sore topic, huh?
    Comment on her hand.
    Let her be.

     

    What are you playing?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    • 6. Sound of Drop - fall into poison -, ~6 hours. I know that this VN has somewhat of a mixed reception among people, but I enjoyed it for what it was, even if some of the explanations for stuff were a bit silly.
    • 7. Us Lovely Corpses, ~30 minutes, about a witch rescuing her friend from the monster who regularly locks her in her attic. To be honest, even though this is a horror game, I didn't find it that scary. It works well as a drama, though, and the limited palette is interesting.
    Spoiler

    I related a lot to Marisol and her struggles with her mental illness. Some of those roses hurt to listen to, ouch.

    What are you playing?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    • 5. Bad End, ~2 hours long, about a visual novel that kills players who reach a bad end. It's a bit silly at times, and the translation is clunky, but not the worst way I've spent two hours.
    • 6. We Know the Devil, ~1½ hours long, about three teenagers at a Christian summer camp who are sent to a cabin overnight to fight off the devil. The catch? With each choice, you pick two characters to pair together, and one to be left out. There is a true ending, but that's its own flavor of creepy. I'm impressed by how the writing manages to pull off both "down-to-earth" and "surreal," along with the unique aesthetic.

    What are you playing?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted · Edited by lunaterra

    It is! There's a lot of little details about the setting that make me wish it were longer so that it could go more into the magical girl culture. But as it is, I'm really impressed that it was only made in 2 weeks. It's definitely a unique little VN regardless.

    -

    I'm keeping track of the VNs I've been reading for #HorrorGameOct (which will mostly be short, free games) on Twitter, but for the record:

    1. Tim's Birthday - VN/point-and-click hybrid, ~1 hour long, about a girl stuck in a time loop where her little brother is brutally murdered at 2:18 PM on his birthday. The main reason this took me an hour is because I missed something obvious in the P&C section. Has a kinda weird moral.
    2. The Doll and the Spider - Kinetic novel, ~15 minutes long, about a magical doll who needs to get inside to protect her little girl from the monsters of the witch's hour, and the pet tarantula who takes her there. The font's hard to read and the art isn't that great, but it has an unexpected ending.
    3. Painting Your Skin - Kinetic novel, ~20 minutes long, about a sleepover between best friends that gets crashed by monsters. The title of the game doesn't make sense until the very end.
    4. White Worm - Kinetic novel, ~15 minutes long, about a normal person with a very abnormal ailment. Creepy as hell, and pretty gross at points, but why didn't the protagonist even consider going to a doctor? The black-and-white-and-red coloring and the hand-drawn aesthetic add to the atmosphere.

    What are you playing?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    Sunrider: Liberation Day - Reads like mediocre fanfiction for a high school anime in a military sci-fi AU...except for the H-scenes, which are just plain terrible. The plot quickly becomes extremely ridiculous, especially in the DLC, and the characters aren't interesting enough to make up for that (read: most of the characters are anime stereotypes). Also, I managed to die twice in a row on one level despite playing on the easiest difficulty.

    Mahou Show-Jo - A short (~40 minutes) kinetic novel about a retired magical girl. Cool pastel aesthetic, nice music (even if I still don't really understand vaporwave). The ending's pretty abrupt, but since this was a game jam game made in 2 weeks, I can forgive that. I'd love to see a longer, more complete game in this setting.

    Spooky VN Challenge Palooza

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted · Edited by lunaterra

    I'm not huge on horror (especially the type that involves jumpscares), but here are a few free horror EVNs I enjoyed:

    Not horror but still appropriate for the season:

    Looking at my backlog, I can try to get through at least some of these:

    Attack Helicopter Dating Simulator on Steam

    in Recommendations

    Posted

    The problem with the attack helicopter meme is that the well has been poisoned. It doesn't particularly matter if the original intent was malicious, because so many people have used it in a derogatory way that the derogatory meaning is what most people will think of when they see it.

    "Traps" are a slightly different but related issue. I'd like to reiterate that I'm not trans, and someone who is would be a better reference for the issue than I would, but if the usage was solely limited to cis male crossdressers, I don't know if it would be that much of an issue. But, again, the well has been poisoned. Many people view trans women as just men in dresses, and refer to characters or even real trans women as "traps." When I know that people use the term in that way, it's hard not to associate even the "benign" usage with the derogatory usage.

    I'm not sure what Mormons or otherkin have to do with anybody's points. I guess mocking Mormons is kind of an assholish thing to do (it's something I would have done when I first started identifying as an atheist, but wouldn't bother with now--I have better things to do), but it's not like they're an oppressed group anymore. And otherkin...meh. If someone identifies as a deer, I guess it's a bit silly, but why should I care?

    Attack Helicopter Dating Simulator on Steam

    in Recommendations

    Posted

    The attack helicopter meme was already unfunny a decade ago.

    Spoiler

    Yes, I know that the meme didn't exist 10 years ago. That's the joke.

    The problem with jokes like these is that they're harmful regardless of their intent. It's like stepping on someone's foot and breaking their toe. The fact that you didn't intend to step on their foot doesn't change the fact that you broke their toe. You're still responsible for the hurt you caused that person.

    And like it or not, emotional hurt is harmful to a person's well-being just like physical hurt is. Maybe not in the same ways, and not always to the same extent, but not everyone can just decide that having their identity mocked and invalidated doesn't affect them--nor do I think that people should have to make that choice. I'm not trans myself, but I am bi, and I've been told (or heard other bi people told) that I'm actually just a closeted lesbian, that I'm just a straight girl looking for attention, that everyone picks a side eventually, so on and so forth. It's exhausting to live in a world where people think that gay and straight are the only possible orientations out there when you're neither, and I don't think that I or any other bi/pan/ace/etc person should be responsible for others' decisions to be assholes. And likewise, if someone makes derogatory jokes about trans and/or non-binary identities (and like it or not, the attack helicopter meme is inherently disrepectful towards trans and non-binary people), people who are hurt by those jokes shouldn't be blamed for that hurt, and people who make those jokes shouldn't expect to say those things without receiving criticism simply because Free Speech. Freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences.

    I'm not saying that being bi and being trans are the same thing (although obviously there are bi trans people out there), but in this particular issue they can be similar. I know plenty of trans and non-binary people both online and IRL, some of whom I consider dear friends, so I don't like watching people making fun of their identities.

    In short, I agree with just about everything @Funyarinpa said.

    Also, personally, I've never really took anything that complains about "SJWs" seriously, but there have been two incidents which have convinced me that the phrase has no meaning beyond "person I disagree with":

    • a Tumblr post years ago on which I witnessed people sincerely calling a neo-Nazi an SJW for saying "it's okay to be afraid of black people"
    • an argument I had on Reddit a few months ago where the other person called a right-wing group SJWs because their goal is social change

    Are Console Versions Worth it?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    If you like otome games, a Vita is a good investment. The stuff that's out in English is generally well-regarded (especially Code:Realize and Collar x Malice).

    A Switch may also be a good option for otome gamers, at least in the future. Otomate (the biggest otome game developer) recently shifted their focus away from the Vita and onto the Switch. However, the only English options right now are mobile ports that aren't considered particularly good.

    (It might be less worth it for developers/publishers, though...we're starting to see previously console-only VNs coming to PC. Amnesia and Hakuoki both have PC ports, Nightshade got a PC port just for the English market and never had its Vita version released outside Japan, Psychedelica of the Black Butterfly will be getting a PC port sometime in the future, and London Detective Mysteria is going to get a simultaneous Vita/PC release.)

    Is yuri "big" on the JP eroge market?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    2 hours ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

    Well, I think they are that in the West too - there might be much more media presence of lesbians here, including public figures etc, but the fetishistic male fantasy of lesbians is alive and well. Plus it's still something quite detached from most people's experience, if you look outside of the media fandoms or the leftist university groups. :>

    *I read that レズビアン is a proper word in Japanese nowadays. :P

    From what I understand, lesbians in Japan prefer the term ビアン (bian) to refer to themselves. レズ (rezu) is an insult roughly equivalent to calling someone a lesbo.

    There's a great article about the history of the term "yuri" and other ways Japanese creators refer to GxG works here. tl;dr: "yuri" is the term used by the Japanese lesbian community; "girls love" was coined by publishers who wanted an analogue to the "boys love" term.

    I can't really speak to the topic of the thread, but I would bet that there are more yuri VNs by WLW in Japan's doujin scene, similar to how LGBTQ+-themed games in the West are pretty much exclusively the domain of indie games. But because doujin games almost never get translated, we don't hear about them.

    How can we make visual novels more popular in the west?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    I took issue with lolicon specifically because of how accepted it is among VN fans.

    And yes, unfortunately, BL games tend to be rather rapey. :/ I'm not a fan of that kind of content either. I wouldn't recommend it without a content warning, though honestly, I probably wouldn't enjoy something with rape very much anyway. I also don't think it should be banned.

    I specifically said I wasn't advocating for a lolicon ban. That's outside the scope of this topic, and my own feelings on the matter are complex. The OP asked what we, as fans, can do to lure people into the medium...and that'd be a helluva lot easier if we didn't have so many people advocating for VNs with child sex in them.

    How can we make visual novels more popular in the west?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    I never said that loli content should be banned. I said that we, as VN fans, shouldn't promote it. I consider this a moral issue, not just a reputation issue. Promoting that content (especially without adequate warnings) alienates actual, real life victims of child sexual abuse--this is why the Fuwa recommendation site (which I help out with) includes all loli/shota content under the "underage sexual content" warning, regardless of the characters' actual ages; someone who's upset by pictures of children in sexual situations is unlikely to be comforted by "oh, but she's actually 120, not 12!"

    Comparing lolicon to LGBT+ content is totally ridiculous. What's the worst thing that could happen by someone discovering BL? They discover that they're gay? Oh no, the horror.

    How can we make visual novels more popular in the west?

    in Visual Novel Talk

    Posted

    The biggest one: We need to stop treating VNs like they're Video Games Lite. I think we're all guilty of this (myself included), but by doing so, we're effectively limiting VNs' potential reader base to just gamers.

    An assumption I see often is that gameplay VNs like Ace Attorney or Danganronpa are inherently more newbie-friendly than normal VNs or especially kinetic novels. This only makes sense if you're assuming that you're trying to market VNs to gamers. I'm not saying that it's bad to try to get gamers into VNs, but why should we limit ourselves to that? Why are they the only audience that we're trying to get?

    Other groups who might be interested in visual novels:

    • Regular novel readers. Yes, they still exist. This is such an obvious thing to me (after all, we're trying to promote visual novels) that it almost amazes me that almost nobody considers that people who like to read might be interested in...well, reading.
    • Comics fans, especially fans of indie comics. We're seeing a tiny bit of overlap between indie comics and EVNs already. I read a short yuri VN named Serre by Adrienne Bazir not too long ago that does really nice things with CGs and sprite animations (especially considering she did everything except the music/sound effects). There's also an interactive graphic novel (which I haven't had the opportunity to buy yet) that came out recently named It Will Be Hard that I've seen get a good reception. I don't know if it'd be called a VN per se, but surely it'd be of interest to people who are interested in interactive storytelling? There's a lot of things that our mediums could learn from each other if we bothered to expand outside our normal horizons.
    • People with disabilities who can't/don't want to play "normal" video games. After all, 99% of VNs have no interactivity beyond clicking to advance the text and possibly making choices. This makes them inherently more accessible than 99% of video games. There are some things to keep in consideration (for example, making sure you can access the menu easily; adding screen reader or text-to-speech support for visually-impaired readers; adding an option to use a dyslexic-friendly font like OpenDyslexic), but overall, making a VN accessible is much easier than making your average video game accessible.

    More things that would help VNs' reputation and encourage people to check out the medium:

    • Stop pretending that porn is a necessary component to VNs. I'm not saying "drop the porn" (that'd be hypocritical of me, since I've wished for more 18+ otome in the past), but it's off-putting to a lot of people, and a lot of time it's shoehorned in anyway. Sex in VNs should be treated the same way as it is in books: some books have sex in them, in some books (erotica) sex is the whole point, but you don't need to have sex in a novel for it to be considered literature, nor does having a sex scene in it automatically disqualify a book from being literature.
    • Longer is not always better. I personally like long stories, but a lot of people just don't have the time (or, yes, attention span) for a 50-hour epic. There's value in shorter VNs that tell a good story not just despite, but because of their length...similarly, by holding longer works up on a pedestal, we're encouraging creators to add pointless shit to pad the length of their stories, which just wastes everyone's time.
    • We need to support diverse VNs by diverse creators. Diverse settings, diverse characters, diverse plots, diverse artwork. Basically have something for everyone. There's nothing wrong with high school stories, but it's boring when it seems like that's the only setting that people will read. Part of this is supporting EVNs and EVN creators, who may not have the budgets that the big Japanese eroge creators do, but who are still doing cool stuff. (There's this weird perception that EVNs try too hard to be like JVNs and are all set in Japanese high schools, which hasn't been the case for years? Katawa Shoujo and DDLC aren't representative of the EVN scene as a whole, for a lot of reasons. I will say that there's a disproportionately high number of anime-style EVNs, but even then there  are  plenty  of  exceptions. That's just the first few I found when going through my VNDB collection.) I think the reaction to this year's AX announcements really shows how much pushback there can be against stories that don't fit into the mold of "normal" eroge: JAST USA announced three BL VNs, and MangaGamer announced one BL and one yuri VN, and people are complaining about this year's AX being "overly gay," or about how MG has supposedly "abandoned" the "traditional eroge audience" (never mind that they also announced two Rance games and already have plenty of "normal" eroge in the pipeline) and is now a "fujoshi paradise." I understand the appeal of self-inserting, but some of my favorite stories have been about people very different from me--in fact, a fully-fleshed character who's very different from me can be easier to relate to than a blank-slate protagonist. Basically, if I can read through VNs with straight male protagonists and manage to enjoy them, a straight guy can read through an otome or BL game without...dying, or whatever you think will happen if you touch something not aimed at straight men.
    • Don't promote lolicon/shotacon stuff. This creeps out the vast majority of people, myself included. Maitetsu was a mistake. Just because it's legal (in the US) doesn't mean we have to support it.
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