alpacaman

Alternative works well enough as a standalone story. There is very little exposition in Extra or Unlimited that you need to understand the plot of Alternative and it's not that hard to fill in the blanks yourself. That being said I'd still heavily recommend reading MuvLuv first as otherwise you won't get the protagonist's complete arc and his motivation remains kind of abstract when you haven't seen him and certain characters in their original environment. Also there is some emotional payoff in Alternative that works better when you've been through Extra.

After having read the remaining routes I stand by my criticisms for the most part. There was just a lot of wasted potential and I think Chaos;Child could have really benefitted from redrafting the script at least one more time. There were just too many plot threads that either go nowhere or have a clunky resolution, twists for the sake of having a twist, dispensable heroines and villains and poorly explained character motivations that could have been solved by some restructuring and rewriting. To name a the major issues I had: Several of these things seem to me like they are remains from earlier plot drafts the writers didn't know how to fit into the narrative anymore but still wanted to include for some reason. The character routes could have been cut completely imo. What little they add could just as easily be worked into the main route. Still you spend a lot of time just skipping through text to select the correct delusion triggers to reach the routes, and then you spend another few hours on some side stories that aren't that great to begin with. It's just really frustrating to read something that had the potential to be great but takes so many wrong turns that you start to ask yourself what the creators were thinking. I would really love to read a reworked version of C;C that addresses its problems, kind of like they did with Chaos;Head. But I guess that won't happen given how happy people seem to be with the game they already got, at least according to vndb. Next up for me is... probably not Himawari, considering ChaosRaven compared it to C;C in this thread. Maybe Fatal Twelve?

Hatoful Boyfriend. Not a masterpiece by any means but way better and funnier than a cheap parody game has any right to be.

You have to reach the true end first afaik. Also you just unlock some bonus content by jumping, it's not necessary for completing the story. In case you get stuck there's a walkthrough in this forum.

Finished the Chaos;Child common route and that finale really was... something. I didn't hate it as much as ChaosRaven did but yeah, the twists and reveals were pretty bad. I'll just mention one huge issue I had, because picking apart everything wrong with the last third would probably take me hours (spoilers for C;C and Hatoful Boyfriend ahead): Despite how little sense the plot made in the last third, it was still paced well enough that it was an engaging read for me. But maybe it was just because I was mentally prepared for things getting stupid down the line from the point Despite all my ranting, I still kind of like C;C's common route, especially its overall atmosphere and the way it built suspense.

That depends on what you do when you go to a café. At least in Germany a tall coffee in a café costs something between 2,50€ and 4€ (3$-5$) depending on where you go. 20$ (18€) is closer to what you pay for a pizza plus soda and a small side dish in a restaurant. 50+ hour VNs usually cost 27-40€ (31-46$) on Steam so they are affordable (although not cheap) for most people. I think it's more about the size of the target audience and its willingness to pay these prices than people not being able to pay for VNs (the reasons have already been discussed in this thread). Also these prizes are still high enough to deter people outside the fanbase since spending 30€ for something you are not really sure if you're going to like it at all is still something most people aren't willing to do.

So I finished 428 yesterday and everything I wrote about it previously still holds true. Seems I really swallowed that red herring. In general, if there is one thing 428 is really great at it's setting up and paying off plot devices, especially when it comes to the showdown on Shibuya Scramble. It definitely deserves all the praise coming its way as it's probably one of the best constructed VNs out there. I didn't fall in love with it like I did with my absolute favourite VNs but I still fully recommend it to anyone who likes visual novels since I can't find a single reason not to like it.

Reading 428 Shibuya Scramble (just reached 16:00) and so far this is the best VN I've read so far regarding the implementation of a choice system. Seeing choices by one protagonist impact the fate of another is really fascinating, even though the plot itself doesn't actually branch beyond wrong choices leading to bad ends. On a few occasions the degree to which everything is intertwined feels a bit forced and just seems to be there to include a few more choices and bad ends, but even the bad ends are worth watching as they often give you a nice scene that either is pretty funny (the cockroach end!) or gives some nice character development. Beforehand I was a bit sceptical about the use of real photographs instead of drawn sprites and backgrounds as it reminded me of Plumbers Don't Wear Ties (which, btw, would qualify as a VN if it just had textboxes), but 428's art direction is just really well done making this is one of the few visual novels that have actual visual storytelling beyond reaction shots and simple visual effects. Other than that, so far it's a good thriller (?). It gets bonus points for its Twin Peaks references although I hope my theory involving them turns out wrong that (spoilers for Twin Peaks and 428 ahead)

I guess that's supposed to be the launch week discount they announced beforehand but they messed up properly indicating it on the shop page.

It's kind of hard to answer this question without spoiling major twists. For non-spoilers, Fault - milestone 2 has one pretty cool 4th wall breaking scene and the Danganronpa series has a lot of 4th wall breaking jokes.

I have more or less completely finished Little Busters (including the after-content except for the hidden Saya endings). I really liked it. It has all the things people love about Key like a good cast, funny SoL, a great soundtrack, and a few of the obligatory crying-your-eyes-out-moments. Imo Clannad did most of these things a little bit better, but LB improves a lot on Clannad's weaknesses, primarily the paceing of the common route. The added gameplay and general setting of having a group of friends the heroines are integrated in makes the world seem a lot more lively. It definitely was a good choice to put the routes for the heroines who weren't part of the Little Busters into the after content, so you weren't forced to read content completely disconnected from the main plot to reach the true end like in Clannad, even though in LB's case this means keeping my favourite route (Sasasasasa) as well as my favourite heroine (Saya) out of the main game. LB has one major flaw though imo: nearly all routes have kind of messy third acts, including the true route. In many of them, the conflict/drama of the third act either isn't properly established or doesn't have that much to do with their respective heroine's arc, or the plot device causing the drama seems kind of artificial. In other routes, the resolution just seems rushed. The last part sadly is also also applies to the true route. The big tearjerker twist scene is one of the best Key has pulled of so far but after that

Just having finished Little Busters myself I can assure you it does. Not necessarily so much in the character routes which I personally found a bit disappointing for the most part, but Refrain is peak Key.

I'm so happy I got a physical copy of this masterpiece for christmas

2018 was the year I really started reading VNs on a regular basis, and it also happened to be a year where I had a lot of time to kill, so I finished about 18 of them (including several long titles), and started a few without finishing them. So my list obviously contains well known ones since so far I mostly read those. 1. Umineko. I don't even know where to begin with this one. Both parts are only sitting at a 9.5 on my vndb list because each one suffers from some minor flaws, but as a whole it's closer to a 10.5. Also gave us Goat-kun and Erika wearing a pirate hat. 2. Steins;Gate. Great in every aspect. It's a shame they had to cut 4°C for the anime adaptation. 3. Muv Luv Alternative. Has the highest quantity of "holy sh*t"-moments ever. And Meiya. 4. Clannad. I love Clannad despite thinking it isn't that good. Has several mediocre routes and heavy pacing issues, but it still got me on a personal level in a way I didn't expect, mostly because I just love 90% of the characters. 5. The House In Fata Morgana. Soo much pain and suffering. As for honourable mentions, I'd pick VA-11 HALL-A and fault Milestone 2 (side: above).

I did through sheer luck without even knowing most of the baseball terminology. Got slaughtered the second and third time though.

COUNT DRACULA IS MY LANDLORD?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

The way a depression evolves in most cases doesn't lend itself to a three act story structure that well. Light depression either disappears by itself or after a short time of psychotherapy and doesn't make for an especially interesting narrative anyway. Medium and heavy depression either takes several months to years of therapy (sometimes supported by medication) to cure or at least for the patient to be able to handle the illness properly and improvements usually happen incrementally and wavelike so it doesn't fit the typical "something sad happens but it helps the character find their determination" third act. And as soon as you reach a degree where the character has suicidal episodes the author needs to have lots of skill and tact, and in my limited experience being tactful is not the strong suit of most VN authors (at least in Japan). Another thing is that the way characters work in Japanese VNs and anime often follows a rather simple cause and effect logic. The reason someone doesn't act "normal" almost always has to do with some event or circumstances in their past, so either eliminating the cause or or at least changing the character's view on it "cures" them. This might make engaging fiction, but it's not the way depression works. Depression can be triggered by specific events, but you can't cure it by having someone change their view on something or life in general (at least in its more serious forms).

I think it has more to do with a different approach to fiction than being more open minded about sex. Most western magazines for women below a certain age contain sex advice and some cheap erotica like Fifty Shades of Grey can become a mega-seller in western countries. Japanese culture values personal space very highly and prying into someone elses business is considered impolite, so people don't complain about fiction they are not the intended audience for. And Japanese media seems heavily targeted at certain demographics. So when companies release a game or VN they think more about what the target audience wants than what is socially acceptable. Most Japanese young male shut-ins (as seems to be the way eroge-readers are seen) like porn scenes with their waifus so developers include them because they lead to higher sales and nobody who is not part of the target audience is going to complain, like it would happen in western countries. That doesn't mean there is no social stigma towards these things in Japan, it's just that it affects consumers (by getting socially isolated) of such media, not the creators. As to why some voice actresses do porn scenes, my guess would be that it's hard to make a living in this job in Japan if you don't do it. edit: Reading my post again I think I didn't get my point across that well. What I was trying to say is that in Japan disapproval against certain content doesn't show itself through public outcry since that would mean openly shaming consumers which would be considered overstepping your boundaries. Instead these consumers suffer from social stigma which has more subtle consequences.

It can't possibly be a coincidence I mix my first proper cocktail since god knows when around the same time you decide to return to the forum I'm a bit nerdy when it comes to food and drinks but I'm not a real expert. I'm able to distinguish between higher and lower quality alcoholic drinks and know the basic taste profile of most spirits, but it doesn't go much further than that. That being said, Coors Light is a bad choice period. When you just want get drunk there's cheaper beer that tastes like water as well and when you want to drink tasty alcohol there's way better stuff.

I recently decided to stock up my cocktail bar again. It's not terribly expensive, at least when you're not a heavy drinker, if you can live with being able to mix a limited variety of drinks at a time and if you don't live in a country with a high alcohol tax (thank you, German beer lobby!). I decided to buy one liquor each month, alternating between base spirits like Gin, Whiskey, Rum,... and complementary stuff like fruit or herbal liquors and bitters. This year for Christmas I'm making mustard with honey and whiskey as a present for my dad, so I thought this was a good opportunity to spend some money on a more or less proper US whiskey (since they tend to be more cocktail-friendly than Scotch) and bought a bottle of Bulleit Rye. Rye Whiskey is quite hard to find in Germany and most people only know two US whiskeys (Jim Beam and Jack Daniels) so I was really surprised my local supermarket had it in stock. It turns out Rye goes best with rather specific components like absinth or sweet vermouth (which a don't have at home) but it's still a great base for more simple standard whiskey drinks like an Old Fashioned or a Whiskey Sour. One of my absolute favorite drinks is the New York Sour, which is a regular Whiskey Sour topped with a little red wine. It looks and tastes great as the red wine makes the drink more dry and complex and it's even better when you use spicey Rye instead of sweet Bourbon.

Some people don't have a credit card so they need to use a store that supports PayPal.

I just listened to the first minute or so. I don't understand everything but I think it's mostly because of pronounciation. The singer obviously doesn't speak any German, but the grammar didn't seem too terrible. The mistakes were mostly ones even some more advanced learners make, like mixing up genders or constructing side clauses wrongly. Japanese is not that great a first language to learn other languages from since it few phonems when compared to other languages and having every syllable end on a vowel (except for n) makes learning the pronounciation of especially European languages very difficult. To take an example from the song the singer pronounces "er|in|nerst" (hyphenation in German is between the phonetic units (I hope that's the correct term, I'm not a linguist)) as something like "eeanas". While pronouncing an "r" like a muted "a" (or something like the u in "hut", for the English speakers who wonder how to pronounce an "a" in German)) when it comes after a vowel is something that's even done in many parts of Germany (especially in the northwest, where I'm from), she still has to turn it into two syllables thus swallowing the i (pronounced like the i in "hit") to keep up with the song although it's supposed to be the stressed syllable. Pronouncing the "er" at the end of the word like an "a" is again something that's also done in some parts of Germany, but not something you would expect a German professional singer to do. The same goes for dropping the "t" at the end of the word. On a side note: nobody in Germany actually speaks exactly the German you learn in school since there are many regional differences, even when it comes to pretty common expressions. Hochdeutsch or High or Standard German is something that the first countrywide news show after WWII invented because they had to decide when to use northern or southern German terminology and how to pronounce certain letters. And people from Bavaria are still usually not able to speak it properly because they tend to roll the "r" and have a tendency to turn straight vowels into diphtongs. I still don't know why Bavarian is considered a German dialect and not its own language because the difference between High German and Bavarian are not that much smaller than the one between Polish and Russian for example.