Clephas

Semiramis no Tenbin- Kamio Ami is the perfect example of the character you are looking for, a borderline sociopath who manipulates people as easily as breathing. Devils Devel Concept- While all the heroines in this game have a strong dark side, Amatsu Kanata fits your first profile perfectly. She is both passionate and cold-blooded, merciless and manipulative, a student forced to learn lessons in the nature of power at an age where most would have been learning the alphabet. Silverio Vendetta- Chitose Oboro Amatsu is a woman of contrasts. She is the cold-blooded leader of what amounts to be a secret police that specialize in purging internal threats as much as external ones, dealing with both spies and rebels with equal ruthlessness. At the same time, she is a passionate woman who holds to her single love with the particular yandere-ish desire that is typical of her family. Tokyo Babel- Lilith is the first temptress, Adam's first wife, and the mother of monsters. However, in the context of this game she is the penultimate manipulator, a demon in the truest sense. Ojousama no Hanbun wa Ren'ai de Dekiteimasu- Himehoshi Arika is an extremely manipulative young woman whose early childhood formed her into the sly paranoiac she is during the story. The plays with others like toys, whether they are adults or those of her own age, and she doesn't hesitate to break them. She rarely shows this side to the protagonist, Hajime, but it is apparent behind the scenes of the major events of the story. Fuukan no Grasesta- No one better fits the description of 'honey trap' than Ekthel Ciol, the elven beauty who entraps the men at the lowest levels of Grasesta with her beauty and seeming willingness.

The important routes are translated in the former case. The two untranslated routes were left that way because they aren't worth reading.

Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- I recommend this one (Shino, Tonoko, Miyabi routes) because the relationships develop slowly in stages. In particular, Tonoko's route is the one I recommend for what you desire. Komorebi no Nostalgica- I recommend this one because the characters are all friends at the beginning. They've known each other and been close for years, so there is no unnaturally fast part to the relationship. I might think of more later, but games where most of the paths have a solid friendship stage and no fantasy elements are pretty rare... the writers for ones with fantasy elements are generally several levels better than the ones who just write standard romance.

Rise of the Ronin is an open-world game that covers important events from 1853-1868 from the perspective of a ronin (masterless samurai) of the fallen Kurosu-han (fictional). This period of history is often called the 'Bakumatsu' (TL: The End of the Shogunate) or the events leading up to the Meiji Restoration beginning with the opening of Japan (signing of unequal treaties) and ending with the surrender of Edo to the Satsuma-Choshu forces. Your character is one of a pair of twins (you can choose male or female) who has a chance encounter with Sakamoto Ryouma before he enters Yokohama, and much of the central story is told from your outside perspective interacting with important individuals in one of four periods of the time: The anti-foreigner movement and Ansei Purges, the rise of the Anti-Shogunate movement, the breakout of open conflict in the streets of Kyoto (the Ikeda-ya incident and the first Choshu Rebellion), and the Boshin War. What I didn't like There were two major issues I had with the game, not having to do with the gameplay but rather with the story. The first was the blatant favoritism of the scenario team toward the anti-Shogunate side of things. The second was the blatant historical inaccuracies that were just plopped in. To be blunt, from the very beginning, you are encouraged (and not subtly so) to side with the Anti-Shogunate (Tobaku in future mentions) forces. It is at its most blatant in the prologue and first chapter, where your main character's homeland is destroyed by the Shogunate (Bakufu in future references) after a failed assassination attempt on Admiral Perry. In the first chapter, you meet a lot of famous and interesting figures in the Tobaku's historical membership, Sakamoto Ryouma, the silly drunkard Katsura Kogoro, the gambler Takasugi Shinsaku, and the idealistic young hero Kusaka Genzui, and for much of the main story you are basically following the major points of Ryouma's journey, even as you go off to do side-quests and the like along the way. In addition, the main Bakufu characters are a Geisha with a creepily subtle approach to things and an old man who seems like he'd order your death without a blink if he felt like it. The problem is that this deliberate placing of extremely likeable and idealistic characters on one side and a slightly creepy group on the other makes it natural to just choose the Tobaku side from the beginning. While later chapters introduce more interesting characters on the other side, such as Katsu Kaishu, the Shogun Yoshinobu, and the Shinsengumi, you are still encouraged at key points to take the side of the Tobaku, and it isn't even subtle. The second issue, historical revisionism, is actually tied in with the issue above. Two key points that I need to stress are the enthronement of Yoshinobu and the death of Kondou Isami of the Shinsengumi. The former, the enthronement of Tokugawa Yoshinobu as Shogun, is something that - in actual history - didn't occur until August of 1866, whereas in Rise of the Ronin he is already Shogun in 1858, when Yoshida Shoin is executed. This might seem like a minor revision, but considering how it was the internal disorganization caused by his predecessor's illness and inability to rule that led to Ii Naosuke having the power to order the Ansei Purges that martyred a lot of Tobaku philosophers and activists, the only reason I can see to treat his character the way they did was to make him seem incompetent, thus leading to more favorable impressions of the Tobaku side in comparison. The latter is less of an issue, except as a convenience for those who wanted the story wrapped up neatly in the second Edo chapter. However, losing Kondou early in the sequence of events (since he was still active after the surrender of Edo), was a somewhat questionable decision. I will admit that the event itself was incredibly emotional to watch in video, and a certain mission involving the Shinsengumi survivors afterward was equally so. What I did like The gameplay is the first thing that comes to mind. There are so many different ways to fight your battles in this game, from utilization of its nine different main weapon types (including bare fists), to the varying combat styles (particularly in the katana and nodachi styles), to the use of the hang-glider and horses to get around. The mini-games are interesting without being intrusive, and they include hang-gliding courses, target-shooting with a rifle, horse-archery, and mock fights in the dojo with NPC unique characters, all of them for prizes. For side-quests, you have collection quests for each region: treasure chests, Usugumo Dayu's cats, cleansing of violent ronin, and taking pictures of scenery. I should note that the cats and dogs in this game are ridiculously cute and a constant source of easy items that can at the very least be disassembled for upgrade parts. Completing all the quests in an area of a region gives you a reward that helps you advance your character or your bonds with NPCs. Your home, a small longhouse that is on the edge of town in each region, is a good place to meet random friend NPCs and interact with them without going to them. It is also the place where you initiate pilgrim dog and cat service missions, both of which are a steady source of income without effort. You can redecorate it with your favorite weapon, a picture or scroll, and six curios that attract different personality types amongst the NPCs you've met so far. In your house, you can also put together an ensemble through the redesign feature that lets you look less like a murder hobo. Story-wise, there are a ton of extremely emotional moments. This was a period of Japanese history that was full of heroes on both sides, many of them tragic and glorious at the same time. The fact that it is possible to save three major tragic heroes from their fates (Sakamoto Ryouma, Okita Soji, and Takasugi Shinsaku) earned points with me. The battle of Toba-Fushimi is a perfect illustration of why the samurai caste was doomed, as men with swords fought against others armed with rifles, gatling guns, and cannons. Being able to fight this battle and other key scenes from both sides without replaying the game from the beginning made the story as a whole come to life. Though I was a bit annoyed that your efforts don't make any difference in the final result (I love it when historical games let you break history), but the personal story was decent enough, in the end. Conclusion Rise of the Ronin is one of the better open-world games I've played, making others like Assassins Creed seem stale and boring in comparison. This might be because I'm a weeb and tired of AC's stale plotline, though. The story is impactful and emotional in a way purely western-made games never seem to manage for some reason, and it showed off why Team Ninja is one of the better game developers out there.

Tensei Shitara Slime Datta Ken- One of my favorite anime, it tends to waver between iyashikei fantasy and something more action-focused depending on the episode. Regardless, the slime is overpowered. Goblin Slayer- It was really, really weird watching this at the same time as Tensei Shitara, given the massive difference between goblins in this and in Slime, lol. Anyway, a few important bits. This anime takes on the style choice of no-name characters (characters are either named for their roles or not at all), and the action in it is more D&D than modern fantasy. Casters and clerics only have a few uses of their spells, and weapons dull and get broken over time. Goblin Slayer's ruthless pursuit of greenskin genocide is both justified and gory to watch, even as his companions try to revive his humanity. Uzamaid- This is a comedy anime following a lolicon maid and the half-Russian hikkikomori loli she is taking care of. It is pretty funny, but it isn't something I'd want to watch repeatedly.

Tokyo Babel maybe? https://vndb.org/c15447 Edit: To be clear, this is literally the only VN that came to mind when I put together 'black hair, non-standard art-style, demonic heroine, and technically human protagonist'.

I hate to say it, but that doesn't really narrow it down. Demon and half-demon heroines are pretty common in visual novels. What color was her hair? Her eyes? What kind of story was it?

To my mind, space sci-fi represents the optimism for the future that has yet to be repressed by people's increasingly negative outlook on our civilization's future. They are futures full of exploration, danger, and wonder, with cultures both different and the same. While many space sci-fi are dark in atmosphere, that doesn't get around the fact that even in the darkest space science-fiction, there are wonders and horrors that stimulate the mind and the spirit. I usually don't make distinctions between types of future sci-fi (as opposed to modern day sci-fi), incidentally. Space sci-fi is relatively rare in JVNs, which are my specialty. One that comes to mind is Fake Azure Arcology, where people were forced to flee from a massive storm of asteroids that devastated Earth's surface, forming unique civilizations within the arcologies they fled to. In a mix of high technology and restrictive lifestyle, it describes the unchanging human condition, even in circumstances that are drastically different. Komorebi no Nostalgica, one of my favorite sci-fi VNs of all time, is based in a world where humans warred against their AI slaves until the slaves won freedom, at the cost of taking the bullet for humanity destroying its own history for the convenience of politicians. It is a world where, interestingly, history is mostly lost to the younger generation, with the older generation only having faded memories of what was destroyed. In this game, society has almost become a blank slate, and the game extensively explores the troubles and possibilities of human-like AI in the two different types - the ancient android Cinema, , and the victorious Metocell, whose emotional emulation evolves over time and experience. More familiar to English-speaking readers is the dystopian worldscape of the Baldr series, where people have practically fled into the virtual world to escape the limitations of the physical. While the Baldr series is a fun read, it is also the most cynical and pessimistic approach to sci-fi I've seen in VNs. It shows the nastiness of human nature, the poor decision making of those with power, and the inevitable failures of a society that lost its way long ago again and again. In the Baldr series, AI alternates between 'ghosts' of the deceased, god-like beings that are omniscient in their own way, and monstrous amalgams that blindly follow their programming with only a surface imitation of flexibility and thought. Sci-fi can be a wonder or horror, but it is always looking at the future.

Did you make sure to change the installation folder to one outside of 'program files'? If you didn't, it likely isn't saving properly because the save data folder is in the same location. Try starting the game on admin, and if that doesn't work move the installation outside of either of the 'program files' folders (if that is the problem). This is a problem that pops up a lot in JVNs where the default save folder is in the installation folder.

The two girls you listed above have deliberately designed speech patterns, incidentally. That particular type of deliberately cute speech pattern in VAs went out of fashion back in 2006, so if you are looking for more distinctive stuff like 'uguu' and the like, you probably won't find it.

Anything by Key or Favorite will have similar characters. Also, I would be more careful with your choice of thread titles... it sounds like you want girls you can trick into bed instead of asking for a VN recommendation.

mmm... As a dark parody of the 'friend' trope: https://vndb.org/v18142 In that one, the protagonist is cursed to be the 'best friend/childhood friend/etc' (Sunohara role) for a bunch of eroge protagonists. He has to deal with the darkness that lies behind eroge and the fates of heroines who aren't chosen.

*Clephas nods with satisfaction as Mitchhamilton is enveloped in her new purple tentacle suit, knowing he has once again done a good deed.*

*Clephas bestows the Fragilistic Perfectio Shining Twinkling Mega-Frazzlestick upon Mitchhamilton's replace- clon*

Clephas opens his mouth and a wave of kilometer-thick tentacles emerge, enveloping Mitchhamilton, who mysteriously turns into a gigantic mahou shoujo before being dragged inside the open jaws. A moment later, Clephas spits out a small tentacle, which grows into a perfect mahou shoujo clone of Mitchhamilton, who takes over the account with a dead smile* The only opinion that matters is the gigantic tentacle monster's, lol

I put the above in spoilers because it is somewhat negative commentary from someone who only played the game halfway through, so if you want to ignore it, I have no problems with it in this case. For more positive commentary, the ero was good (better than most h-anime these days, which have become so similar to each other that you can't tell the difference between different series anymore).

Isekai Maou-... Kvan, that was another inappropriate assessment. Except in that it is an isekai anime, it has nothing to do with Konosuba, which is an anime that uses ridiculous situations and characters to lampoon isekai. Please actually watch the anime in question before you make comments like that. This is an ecchi-oriented isekai with a communication-challenged protagonist who stays in his character from the MMO he was playing when he was summoned. It has a decent story and is well-presented. The first season is actually really well-done, but the second season was a disappointment. Satsuriku no Tenshi- A pretty incomprehensible death-game style horror where most of the main characters are murderous psychopaths. Yuragi-sou no Yuuna-chan- Ecchi comedy focused around a ghost inhabiting a ryokan and a psychic protagonist. Lots of lucky-sukebe moments and slapstick humor. Hyakuren no Haou- A pretty cruddy isekai anime that starts in the middle of the story, leaving the watcher detached from what is going on. Jashin-chan- Brutal slapstick comedy in the style of the early 2000's, if a bit more extreme than anything other than Bokusatsu Tenshi. Happy Sugar Life- Psychopathic yandere yuri lolicon heroine murders people like crazy to hide her relationship with the little girl she has locked up in an apartment owned by one of the people she killed. It was like watching a train-wreck in slow motion.

My first JVN in Japanese was Jingai Makyou. I stumbled over some of the language in Dies Irae at the time, because most of my vocab was standard textbook and anime-related stuff at that point. A lot of Dies Irae's difficulty lies in Masada's wider vocabulary and his tendency to write like a regular novel-writer (not a light novel writer). As a result, whether it is his characters' dialogue or the narration, the language difficulty tends to be higher than you would see in most other VNs.

For me, about twenty-two to twenty-nine hours on Dies Irae, seventeen hours for a complete playthrough (all endings) of Paradise Lost. Edit: I'm not a good reference though. Those times were from my most recent playthroughs in 2018 and 2015 respectively. My first playthrough for Dies Irae took 43 hours, when I was first starting to play VNs in Japanese back around the time Acta Est Fabula version came out.

Polyamory, whether it is harem or multi-directional, is a difficult issue for people raised in the modern era in first-world countries. While it is beginning to be normalized in some countries, it has been demonized for so long that it will probably be a long time before the stigma associated with it fades away, if ever. In VNs, I think the one that takes polyamory to its ideal end is Draculius, one of my favorite VNs. While Jun, the protagonist, is central to things, each of the heroines has a defined role within the family that can't be played by any of the other girls. Belche is the mother, Xeno is the protector, Rika is the attacker, and Lian is the representative. I do agree that in most cases a harem should stop at three (one primary and two secondaries with a relationship aside from that possessed by the primary). To be blunt, there is only so much time one person can put into other people, and expanding to the ridiculous size some VN harems have is just undoable. Traditionally, there were any number of reasons for a harem to exist. One was in the case of royals and high nobles, where numerous heirs were necessary to solidify power and ensure passage down to the next generation. Then there were rich merchants and leaders of settlements. In both cases, this prevented too much wealth being permanently settled into one bloodline and reduced resentment from the population at large. It also provides a larger supporting family for the raising of children, reducing individual burdens for child-rearing and making things more flexible without going outside the family group. Generally speaking, early human civilizations didn't place emphasis on and in some cases didn't even have the concept of romance. That is why some cultures retain arranged marriages and defacto polyamorous relationship setups. (for JVN fans, the example would be the way it is tacitly understood that powerful Japanese men - like high-ranking politicians and corporate leaders - will have lovers outside of their wives).

Mashiro-Iro Symphony is often mentioned as being the peak of the company's moege/charage era games. It was made during the latter-stages of the 'golden age of JVNs', in 2009 (The 'golden age' is generally seen as being from 2005 or 2006 to 2011 or 2012, depending on who you ask), and it was an example of quality in a time when VNs had only just branched out into distinctive genres and sub-genres but before the templates had been set in stone. As games of the type go, it is an excellent choice for localization.

I was hesitant about Hakkenden because the original story of the nineteenth century novel by Kyoukutei Bakin was a bit too moralistic for my tastes. It was the second Japanese classic novel that I read (after Genji Monogatari). It was also the most annoying to read, since the version I got hadn't been redone in modern language (unlike the version of the Tale of Genji I read), probably because the original version was still readable (barely). Lots of bad memories there...

Basically, UQ Holder is a sequel focusing on the after-effects of the manga-only chapters that led to the end of the original series. The most important remaining character from the original is Evangeline. It is a more action-focused and darker-natured series than the original Negima.

Ragnarok is decent, but it definitely falls a step behind Frontier story-wise. Normally, in Venus Blood games, you are presented with a choice between Chaos and Law (more direct translation being Conquest and Rulership), with numerous available endings on either end. However, Ragnarok is the first game to directly add in the 'Ruin' element to the story. Certain choices in heroine scenarios are presented that can incur Ruin as well as Chaos or Law. In order to get the Chaos path, you have to have a certain amount of Ruin, whereas the opposite is true of Law. Sadly, if you fall short of either, you get a bad ending at the game's turning point. Ruin is generally incurred by choices that would 'break' the heroines (think of it as being similar to the Madness choices in Hypno/Hollow) past the standard 'turn to darkness' level. Generally speaking, the story of Ragnarok would be 'average' for the series as a whole, being better than Empire but falling short of Frontier or Hollow. The gameplay is basically a slight update on Hollow's (and like all new VB games, whether it is an improvement is entirely subjective). Given a choice, I would probably skip to Lagoon, because it is just more interesting, but I suppose they have their reasons.

Death March- Despite it being a rather abortive attempt to put a great LN/web novel series into anime form, there are some good points to this anime. The animation itself is good, as is the characterization. The everyday life parts are first class, and the animation (if not the action itself) in the action scenes is pretty good. The reason most people don't like it is because the story never goes anywhere and it is a bit too much of a slow life anime. This is a hazard inherent in making anime out of incredibly long book series, so it isn't surprising in retrospect, but this was about when they began seriously overdoing isekai, so this series became a victim of the excesses of the time. Grandcrest Senki- Decent action high fantasy anime. However, it never goes beyond being decent. Killing Bites- People have genetically-altered humanoids combined with animals fight each other for entertainment. Generally doesn't go anywhere, though the action is good at times. Beatless is an example of what NOT to do when making a sci-fi anime. The AI characters are too alien to be relatable (including the supposed main heroine) and the protagonist is too much of a simpleton. It makes it impossible to invest emotionally into the story, so the watcher generally isn't interested in the results. Overlord II is more Overlord. If you liked the first season, you'll like the second. Sword Gai- Random sword monster rampages, no real story beyond that. Saiki Kusuo 2- It's Saiki Kusuo. If you like the series' humor, you'll love it, if you don't, you'll fall asleep. I laughed.