[VN of the Month March 2015 - Hana no No ni Saku Utakata no]

11gatsu was an attempt to make a plotge with a bunch of charage paths tacked on for fanservice.  I'm not saying it was a horrible choice, but this game would have been much better if they'd gone one way or the other.

Anekouji Naoko to Gin'iro no Shinigami is the most dramatic failure of Minato Soft to date.  It still saddens me to recall how awful this game turned out to be.

Debate School 9 was an attempt to be clever by including a debate club into a charage... and it failed miserably.

Hana no No ni Saku Utakata no is a first-class nakige worth playing for anyone who wants some nice catharsis.

Hanasaki Work Spring is one of Saga Planets less plot-centric games, and as a result it is less quirky and eccentric as such works as Hatsyuki Sakura.  Unfortunately, quirky and eccentric is one of the elements that defines the company, so it wasn't a good thing, though the game itself is decent.

Sengoku Hime 6... was dramatically lower in quality (story-wise) than 5.  Since the games all cover the same era, that is essentially me telling you to just stick with Sengoku Hime 5 rather than any of the earlier or later entries in the series (at least so far).

Shirogane Spirits is a battle royale combined with a charage, something that was verging on becoming a theme in 2014 and 2015.  It has its high points, but it fell well behind Hana no No and evne Hanasaki Work spring in my estimation.

Yuki Koi Melt... is forgettable.

Valkyrie Runabout is one of my go-to games for replaying, for a number of reasons.  One of them is simply that it is Agobarrier's last work and he did an excellent job in bringing it to life.  However, another big reason is that it pulls off the combined comedy and catharsis elements sufficient to make you care about the characters early in the game.  It feels, in some ways, like if you were to add a complete harem rom-com with nakige elements onto the end of a 'protagonist gets summoned to save the world' story (the beginning being where it turns into a rom-com, lol).

[VN of the Month February 2015 - Silverio Vendetta]

This was a pretty active month.  As such, there are a ton of games worth talking about.

Akuma Musume is yet another poor-quality simulation VN made by Softhousechara.  Honestly, they should have stuck with dungeon crawlers and strategy rpgs.

Boku no Hitori Sensou I gave a decent rating, but the game is disturbing at best, distasteful at worst.

Kujiragami no Tearstilla is another step downward into the abyss of mediocrity for Whirlpool.

Marrybell wa Shinda to Papa ni Tsutaete was released in a package with Rakuen no Shugosha, both of them unique VNs that don't fit into any existing genre.  Marrybell is a game where a bunch of kids are transported to another world, where otherworlders are common and commonly used as tools by local governments due to their literacy and the broad general knowledge they tend to bring to the table.  It is mostly focused on how the group's members deal with the loss of everything they know in a world that is not kind to them in any way, shape, form or fashion.

Rakuen no Shugosha is an utsuge without any sort of H-content based in a world where a small portion of the world's population (both human and animal) have gained superpowers sufficient to make mundane weapons obsolete.  It is full of pretty high quality violence, with excellent storytelling.

Sakura Synchronicity is a kusoge of a charage from Whitesoft.

I don't really feel a need to get into Sanoba Witch, since anyone with the money can play it in English now.

Soreyori no Prologue is a high-quality plotge... but it is also by Minori, which means there are a ton of wince-worthy moments from the protagonist and incomprehensible reactions from the heroines.

Silverio Vendetta... at this point do I even need to tell you how good this game is?  There is a reason why I've already replayed this game four times in the years since it came out.

 

 

[VN of the Month January 2015 - Tokeijikake no Ley Line -Asagiri ni Chiru Hana-]

Natsu no Iro no Nostalgia is a decent plotge with an empath for a protagonist.  It isn't a kamige, nor is it really exceptional.  However, it is good enough to be worth playing once.

I dropped Gakuen Butou no Folklore because it was such a crapfest from the beginning.

The Leyline series is the Leyline series.  I dislike it when games are split up in this manner, and I hate the ladder-style story structure.  It also isn't written as well as Purple Soft's games, so it isn't good enough to overcome my distaste for this kind of thing.  

[VN of the Month December 2014 - Teito Hiten Daisakusen]

Kadenz Fermata was a very poor quality sequel to Fortissimo.  It is rare for me to completely bash a chuunige, but this is one of those that is deserving fully of being called a kusoge.

Kami no Ue no Mahoutsukai is a plotge with a pretty creepy story.  Honestly, it isn't my favorite game, but it was definitely VN of the Month material for this particular month.  

Tsuriotsu 2 proved the rule that Navel is incapable of making a truly good sequel with new characters.  My primary complaints (though they aren't the only ones) were the way the protagonist's personality (which was the best part of the game) and abilities were suddenly downgraded in each heroine path and the low quality of the heroines in comparison to the original series.  While not having anyone to match Luna in quality is perhaps understandable, I would have liked to see at least one heroine who could have competed with the others.

Unionism Quartet is an oddball VN with a strong battle royale element that reminds me a lot of Appare Tenka Gomen in style and execution.  It is a decent read, but not near kamige level.  

I later played Teito Hiten... but like with a lot of Liar-soft games, my feelings are mixed.  For Liar-soft fans, this is like their drug of choice, as it hits all the high points of a Liar-soft game.  For people who find Liar-soft's tongue-twisting and repetition annoying, this game is wince-worthy.  It is also worthy of note that this game lampoons the 'dark fantasy' anime of the 1980's and 1990's in a way that will feel very, very familiar with anime fans who got started in that era but will make no sense to people in later eras (mostly because dark fantasy anime in that era didn't even try to make sense or fill in the plot holes).

[VN of the Month November 2014 - Zannen na Ore-tachi no Seishun Jijou.]

Aokana... my opinion on this game tends to vary greatly from what most Western VN readers seem to think.  It isn't a kusoge, but it is extremely derivative of a much better game, Walkure Romanze.  The only real difference is that the cast isn't as interesting in Aokana and the setting.  Oh and the protagonist in Walkure Romanze actually gets back into the game in most of the paths, lol.

Zannen na Oretachi is a nice comedy charage that is worth playing if you want some laughs and a decent SOL.  

Venus Blood Hypno is the peak of the series.  It has the best story and the most refined gameplay of the VB series, with the story in particular far surpassing anything in the previous games or those that came later.

Koi no Aria is yet another  mediocre release from Ensemble made to appeal to fans of its early successes without having any soul.

Kimi no Tonari de Koishiteiru is an oddball romance charage by Alcot Honeycomb.  Like most Alcot Honeycomb games, it is a mid-price game that is somehow better than most other companies' high-priced or normal-priced games.  Edit:  This is romance SOL, but it is excellent romance SOL.  I'm not saying this is something on the level of a kamige, but it does what it was meant to do quite well.  This is the peculiarity shared by most Alcot Honeycomb games, in that they are about as high quality as you could possibly expect within the price range.

I dropped Harukaze Sensation despite its fantasy setup because 1) the protagonist grated on my nerves 2) It started out with the fake girlfriend trope.

 

[VN of the Month October 2014 - Mayoeru Futari to Sekai no Subete]

Unmei Senjou no Phi is one of several kusoge LoS has produced in the last ten years.  For some reason, for every excellent game the company puts out, they get some weird ideas and put out at least one steaming pile of bad-smelling game.  

Mayoeru Sekai is a relatively poor-quality chuunige done in classic Lass style... which means it retains most of the flaws of early-era chuunige without really improving on the formula or doing anything exceptional.  I rated this as an average-quality game for a reason.

Hakoniwa Logic, though I gave it a slightly lower rating than Mayoeru Sekai, is actually a much better game as a whole, when I reflect on it.  Like most Cabbit games, it is idiosyncratic, creepy at times, and puts in just enough standard-issue SOL to make you wonder what kind of game you just played.

At the time of its release, I didn't play Doshikuro.  However, I did play it almost a year later, wondering if I'd missed out on something... and I had.  This game is actually a relatively high quality fetish plotge hiding under a charage facade.  However, its beginning is off-putting to people like me, who have seen similar beginnings a hundred times before (literally).

 

[VN of the Month September 2014 - Nanairo Reincarnation]

Minamijuujisei Renka was Studio Ryokucha's last truly great VN.  While some people might have issues with it, it is nonethless a near-perfect example of the good that can come from giving a charage a real story.

Sekasuku was one of the last two Agobarrier works made before his death.  It is a fairly decent fantasy comedy VN with a tennen protagonist who is a bit overpowered and heroines that fall for him like dominos... you know, classic Agobarrier stuff.

Nanairo Reincarnation was my VN of the Year for 2014.  I had very good reasons for making it so, because it is the sole kamige of that year.  

Yakimochi Stream is a kusoge.

Kanojo ga Ore ni Kureta mono is Mecha-con's third game.  Like all the Mecha-con series, they are true harem-ge where the protagonist forms a harem early on due to a law that requires people above a certain financial tier to have larger families to spread out their wealth and fight the collapse of Japan's population.  The whole series is pretty fun to read, even if they aren't the best of games in general.  

[VN of the Month August 2014 - Satsukoi ~Yuukyuu Naru Koi no Uta~]

First it needs to be said... when I hit this month, I badly wanted to play Sougeki no Jaeger, so when it was a total kusoge, I finally gave into the realization that Propeller was doomed without Higashide or Shumon Yuu.

Dekina Watashi ga, Kurikaesu is a nakige by Akabeisoft3 that borders on an utsuge at times.  I cried a lot for this game, enough that I usually recall it when someone asks for a VN that can make them cry.

Primal Hearts... is the epitome of a comedy erotic charage (I emphasize erotic because the H in this game is ridiculously good for a relatively unknown charage).  The game is amusing in general, but it is more a group of friends style game than a true romantic drama or anything like that.

Satsukoi... Satsukoi is a very unique game.  Especially since the main heroine needs and wants to eat the protagonist to live.  One of the characters in this game is actually present in Kanojo wa Tenshi de Imouto de as the mother of one of the main heroines.  

[Sweets Castle Meister Review]

Amayui is middle of the road quality for games outside of the IM series (which are inevitably higher quality than Eushully's other games).  It has a relatively easy to understand gameplay system, a decent to good quality story (meaning that the good points are good but the rest tends to meander), and a good cast of characters.  However, it falls well short of Fuukan no Grasesta or even Soukoku no Arterial, both of which had better gameplay and story.  A lot of it is that the game can't seem to decide whether to go with a happy-go-lucky atmosphere or the grimmer atmosphere that tends to poke its head up on a regular basis.  Eushully is usually at its best on the grimmer side of things, so Fia's personality often makes the game lighter than it should be.  The other issue is that the main conflict of the story is just a little too on the obscure side for a strong emotional investment in it.  I found the main antagonist of the story uninspiring, whereas the protagonist side was a bit too goofy much of the time.

 

[VN of the Month July 2014 - AstralAir no Shiroki Towa]

AstralAir no Shiroki Towa was an excellent game by Favorite.  As per Favorite's style, it is a serious nakige with a cast of moe heroines.  Honestly, if it weren't for the makers being lolicons, I could praise most of this company's games unreservedly.  

GIB (girls in black) is another VN that illustrates Whirlpool's gradual collapse into mediocrity.  

I stalled on Hoshi Ori Yume Mirai due to my hangups about nameable protagonists and the fact that the game is so frigging long.  I did finish one path, and it was very, very good.  Unfortunately, it also caused me to overdose on SOL romance so I couldn't do any more.

Love Revenge is what I have frequently called 'an idealized form of the rom-com charage'.  If you want a feeling of what classic charage were like at their best, Love Revenge is an ideal game to play.

Neko Masshigura... the fact that I only gave it a 7, despite the nekomimi, really says everything.

Shin'en no Hitomi is a game that couldn't decide where it wanted to go and thus was a horrible read as a result.  I dropped it toward the end of one of the paths.

 

[VN of the Month March 2014 - Endless Dungeon]

8 hours ago, littleshogun said:

 

Clover Days - I still remember that Astro did his best to translate this, only to have the project was in torpor because he was too busy to handle this. And turned out that his project was already dead because Nekonyan did announce this back at January last year. As for the progress, so far it's been good and if all goes well we may have Nekonyan managed to fulfill their target to release Clover Days at this year. Anyway translation history aside, this VN was focused on the twins and all of the heroines here are twin siblings, and yes it's including the two heroines who have different name.

 

Astro bailed and then Ittaku redid the entire translation on his own before handing it over to the Neko people.

[VN of the Month June 2014 - Semiramis no Tenbin]

Semiramis no Tenbin has a unique place in my heart, not the least of which because no other VN I've ever played has had such a unique story or atmosphere.  For fanatic weaboos, this can be a painful VN to read, because it is brutally honest about Japan's societal flaws.  

Harvest Overray is the only non-Baldr Giga game I honestly thought might have been VN of the Month worthy (in another month).  Giga is famous for high visual production values, but their teams' talent for SOL VNs hovers in the range of permanent mediocrity.  

Kagami no kuni is a kusoge.  The end.

SakuSaku is a translated nakige of relatively high quality... so I'm not going to bother making any comments on it.

Love Relation is a low quality charage not worth mentioning.

Ore ga Yamata no Orochi nara is a really poor attempt at mixing charage with Japanese mythology that became a total mess.

Reminiscence RE:Collect is an excellent sequel to the original Reminiscence, with a strong plot and a major extension to the setting.  The only downside is that there wasn't a third game, lol.

Scramble Lovers is another kusoge.

 

[VN of the Month May 2014 - Houkago no Futekikakusha]

Golden Marriage was one of Ensemble's better - yet still stumbling - attempts at making a good ojousama-ge.  There are so many ways this game could have been tweaked to make it better and give it more depth, but Ensemble, as usual, managed to botch it, at least partly.  That's not to say this is not a good VN (it is), but it suffers from issues with the endings and some rather forced-feeling plot twists.

Houkago  no Futekikakusha is a VN I recommend to people who want a 'hard' utsuge.  This game is all about despair-related catharsis.  The situation the protagonist in is one of the worst, emotionally, that it is possible to imagine, and he is already broken when the story begins.  

I still don't understand why anyone bothered to translate the surrealist mess that is Majo Koi Nikki.  While I normally endorse plotge getting translated, I make this one an exception, because it never manages to escape that 'dreamy' atmosphere that kept me from connecting with any of the characters.

Sakigake Generation is easily one of the best charage of 2014.  I say this because, like most Clochette games, it maintains an extremely high level of base quality despite the company's reputation as existing solely to encourage otakus to go out and have children with busty girls (seriously, I'm pretty sure there are subliminal messages in these games).  This is a prequel to one of the company's classic games, Suzunone Seven, taking place two generations before the events in that game.

 

[VN of the Month April 2014 - Racial Merge]

 Love Sweets is a below-average charage with nothing unique to recommend to it.

Racial Merge is one of Axl's fantasy SOL games.  It is decent but unfortunately doesn't reach the level of being excellent.

Sora Tobu Hitsuji is... well, it is hard to describe what it is.  It's a fantasy VN with a silly concept and silly characters that is moderately amusing but rather lacking in content.

Tenbin no La Dea is the remake of the original Ikusa Megami by Eushully.  It is about what you'd expect from Eushully when it was at its height, a high quality gameplay VN with a solid story and multiple - greatly varying - endings.

Umisora no Fragments is a mediocre plotge that is primarily memorable for what it didn't manage to do... which was fascinate me or impress me.

[VN of the Month March 2014 - Endless Dungeon]

ArNosurge is the second half of the somewhat unknown prequel to Ar Tonelico.  While it does provide some interesting background information the main series was lacking, as a story it is only just above average.

Alia's Carnival is the first in a series of charage by NanaWind that manages to make fantasy boring.  Oh, there are signs of potential all throughout this game, but it never really evolves into something memorable.

Baldr Sky Zero 2 is the conclusion of the duology, adding in two paths, including the true one.  As should be expected, it reveals everything the first episode concealed, but I should warn you that it is also even longer than the first half.  In addition, while the first episode's paths could be loosely connected as a true prequel to Baldr Sky, both of these paths are absolutely and completely 'alternate universe' material.

Clover Day's... really Ittaku would be a better person to assess this comedy charage, as he was the translator.  However, I'll mention that I was unimpressed, though I'm aware this VN has become something of a classic in the eyes of charage/moege fans.

Endless Dungeon, the harem epilogue to the Tiny Dungeon series is basically a nearly pure-comedy extension of the original series.  Typical of Agobarrier, more heroines are added to the harem and things are about as crazy as you'd expect from him.

Hello Lady is a VN I love, though I love its final version the best.  This version is fine... but the extra true ending and the paths for Hishiya and Mitori make all the difference.  Narita Shinri is a great protagonist (reminds me of Lelouch, except even more self-absorbed) with a justified arrogance and a pervert's heart.

Hikoukigumo no Mukougawa I primarily recommend because of the Eiri path.  You can ignore the other two paths entirely, because Eiri's path is so much better than either of them that there is literally no possibility for a fair comparison.

Juukishi... to be honest, I never realized that moe could even make guns boring.

Koisuru Natsu no Last Resort... well, since it is translated, I'm sure many of you have already played it.  However, I should point out that it is an outright copy of the concept for KamiShino without the sheer brilliance and quality writing (for the main school heroines).

 

[VN of the Month February 2014 - Soushuu Senshinkan Gakuen Hachimyoujin]

The first VN I should recommend here would be the Hapymaher FD.  Hapymaher is the sole VN that Purple Soft has made an FD for since the company actually started making a name for itself, and for good reason.  Hapymaher's FD is more of a true extension than anything else.  The core story is a direct sequel to the true path of Hapymaher, with branches off to see the results of what happened after the other paths.  This FD provides an actual path for 'true Alice' and a true conclusion to Tooru's 'Nightmare full of Happiness'.

Baka Moe Heart is that rarest of things... a true comedy VN.  While many VNs have comedic elements, almost none are truly devoted to their comedy.  

Koi Suru Doll to Omoi no Kiseki is a powerful nakige with yandere elements.  I honestly enjoyed this one both times I played it.  Good catharsis.

Hachimyoujin... is the first of two games in Masada's most boring series.  I'm going to come out and say this... this game isn't replayable for me.  While I enjoyed my first playthrough, I found that Yoshiya just wasn't a good fit for me as a protagonist and that this game tried to draw too much from Dies Irae's atmosphere without creating characters of equal quality.  While Masada's writing is still very high quality, I felt that this game had no need of a sequel (in fact, the sequel ruined things for me in retrospect).  The antagonist/villain is a much higher-quality character, even if he is somewhat of a caricature who draws too much from Reinhardt Heydrich's personality.  Oddly, the best 'protagonist side' character in the game is Mizuki, whose internal conflict defines so much of the game, whereas Yoshiya never really manages to escape that really trite and boring personality type of his.  

 

[VN of the Month January 2014 - Bradyon Veda]

Aisare Roommate is a kusoge.

12 no Tsuki no Eve is a halfway-decent VN by Minori.  Like all Minori VNs, it has extremely high visual quality.  However, their love of messy romances was the big downer for me with this and most of their other VNs.  Technically it is a fantasy VN (though it doesn't seem like it until the true path).

Kimi to Boku to no Kishi no Hibi is a weird plotge VN with a concept that was all over the place.  That's not to say it wasn't a good VN, but I honestly felt that they didn't know what they wanted to do with this game.

Shin Shirogane is easily the worst Soleil Game.  I say this up front, because all of the Soleil games have some kind of issue that keeps them from kamige level, but this was the only one that I thought fell below a certain baseline level of quality.  First, the pacing is godawful... for a good portion of the game, there are these rapid shifts in tension that feel forced.  Another issue is that they went out of the way to confuse you with the relationship to the original Shirogane.  Yes, there is a relation, but it is difficult to parse at best.  Last of all, it was obscure to the very end.

Bradyon Veda is undeniably the jewel for this month.  It is a high-quality chuunige with its own unique visual style, as well as an extremely good plot that is just multi-layered enough to make you seriously think without leaving you confused to the very end (the key with mindfuck elements is to never make them so obscure as to be incomprehensible even to the end).  I'm not going to delve into the characters, because this is one of those games where romance/love bears only the most limited of influences on the progression of the story.  The problem with this game for many is that it is a very difficult read, requiring a great deal more base knowledge of concepts (not just the language) than is normal.  If you didn't get at least decent grades in science, you are probably going to be looking stuff up constantly.

[VN of the Year 2013]

Garden of the Fifth Zoa was a game that got buried in a year of top-quality releases.   In a normal year, it would have at least made VN of the Month, if not VN of the Year (VN of the Year is a much higher hurdle, in my mind).  However, 2010-2013 was the period when the VN industry was still riding the peak, before the gradual collapse that led to today.  If I were to be frank, many of the VNs I named VN of the Month in later years would have easily lost out to ones that lost it to others in this particular year or the ones before.  While there were usually at least 3 VN of the Year candidates in any year until 2018 (where there really was only Haru to Yuki and Maoten if you ignore Fuukan no Grasesta being the last good Eushully game and the only one since Tenbin).  

Top-quality VNs slowed down significantly after 2016, when things started to go to shit.  You started to see a higher proportion of bland and uninteresting works and even a fall in nukige quality (which was startling in itself, since the average for nukige has been the same since eroge first came into existence).  This made works that would have been considered average in previous years look much better than they should have.

[VN of the Year 2013]

Chuushingura is an excellent choice for VN of the Year, though it wasn't mine.

At the time, I wavered between Komorebi and Hapymaher.  I gave Hapymaher the win because its excellent soundtrack was used to enhance its most emotional scenes perfectly, with the rest creating a general atmosphere unique to the game.  In retrospect, Komorebi has edged its way slightly ahead of Hapymaher, in my mind, because Komorebi is much better when replaying.  Hapymaher's Christmas arc is fine the first time, but it puts me to sleep every time when I try to replay the game.  Its value on the first playthrough came from not knowing what was real and what was a dream, and the knowledge you gain from finishing the game reduces the replayability of that particular scenario way too much. 

[VN of the Month December 2013 - Sengoku † Koihime ~Otome Kenran ☆ Sengoku Emaki~]

If you are going to play any game in the Sengoku Hime or Sangoku Hime series by Gesen, Sengoku Hime 5 is the single best, in every way.  It has the best gameplay balance, the best story for each path, and my favorite Nobunaga path by miles.

Sengoku Koihime (especially after the X version was released a year later) is the best of the Koihime Musou series.  I say this because they actually made the protagonist central to every aspect of the story and made him capable enough to feel 'real' instead of being a hanger-on that occasionally contributes.

Magicalic Sky High was one of several mediocre charage that Whirlpool made during this period of time.

Senjou no Folklore is a very, very old-style srpg/VN.  It had the potential to be good, but the mediocre staff at Debonosu worked their magic on it effectively, giving us their usual sub-par result that somehow sells like hotcakes anyway.

Tsuyokiss Next is a series based half a decade after the original Tsuyokiss, with a protagonist who is related to Kani and a decent set of heroines.  Like all Tsuyokiss games, it is very old-style rom-com with no attempt to be anything else.

Timepiece Ensemble is a high-quality plotge that is also related to 1/2 Summer.  While this game isn't the greatest VN of all time, it is pretty enjoyable.

[VN of the Month November 2013 - Electro Arms -Realize Digital Dimension-]

Another month with a ton of non-nukige releases.  I played a total of 9 games from this month over the years... compare that to maybe three releases a month now, and you'll see how things are slowing down in the industry.

Aka-san to Kyuuketsuki was supposed to be an attempt by Alcot to shoehorn vampires into a charage setting.  Unfortunately, it turned out to be abominable bad, something that was a first for me with something by Alcot.

Electro-Arms would be one of my two choices for a VN of the Month from this month, along with Izayoi no Fortuna.  I say this because Electro-arms is easily the most 'mainstream' game I've seen from Light.  The concept is that of an AR game that has the actual ability to intrude into real life, for those with the program installed on their phones.  Reiji, the protagonist, is very much like Shirou from Dies Irae, without the whiney Ren to hold him back and without Mercurius fiddling with fate.  He is wild, unbelievably clever, and an inveterate thrill seeker.  Generally, regardless of which path you are on, it is an enjoyable story.  There are three main stories with a bunch of sub-heroine 'normal' endings.  

Izayoi no Fortuna is unique in my experience... the closest parallels I can draw all come from four or five years before, with the possible exception of Tasogare no Sinsemilla.  It is a summer-themed game, but thankfully the protagonist isn't a student.  Rather, he is a traveller and something of a vagrant who settles in the town temporarily, thus sparking the events of the story.  If this sounds like a setup similar to Air by Key, you would not be entirely wrong, though it isn't as overt as all that.

HHG's sequel is an excellent finale for those who liked the original but hated the true ending.

Imouto no Okagede Motesugite Yabai is one of the 'Yabai' series of harem-ge/charage made by Hulotte.  This series is known for its humor and vague indications that they all coexist in the same setting.  Regardless, they are generally amusing, even if they aren't VN of the Month material.

Sakura Mau Otome no Rondo is yet another of Ensemble's pathetic attempts to make a decent ojousama-ge.  I say this because they managed it twice, despite themselves, and they have been trying to recapture the magic with random writers ever since (as if that would work).

Soshite Kirameku Otome no Himitsu is another kusoge of a charage released in this month.  It really isn't worth noting except to warn the charage fans away, since it isn't even good for the genre.

Venus Blood Gaia a dungeon-invasion version of the VB series based in a world ruled by giant spirit-beasts.  The protagonist is a researcher who discovered a way to create a new form of energy he then used to create life... in a mad scientist sort of way.  The story is good but I can't bring myself to really praise any of the tentacle-impregnation VB games, because they manage to make a perfectly good fetish seem like work.

Wagaya no Himegami-sama is the final game I played for this month.  As I recall, it was an average-quality charage with fantasy elements.  It isn't really worth going out of your way to play, unless you already ran out of better stuff to cherry-pick from bygone eras.

[VN of the Month October 2013 - Getsuei Gakuen -kou-]

The Walkure Romanze FD adds on two extra (and high quality) paths for girls that were highly popular in the original.  It is thus  more of a true extension than just an H-append disc.

Chiisana Kanojo is one of the few games I label as a 'pure moege', because it is nothing but fluff from beginning to end.

Cocoro@Function- A moderately good quality VN that was stunted to an extent by the unwillingness of the writer to go farther with the game's concept.  

I really, really wish they'd offered a non-ero version of Monobeno Happy End... because if you essentially close your eyes, turn off the sound, and skip all ero-related content, it is actually a ridiculously high quality game.  

Usotsuki Ouji is one of a number of mediocre charage that Whirlpool produced during this time period.  It really isn't anything to write home about.

 

[VN of the Month August 2013 - Innocent Bullet -The False World-]

The Tsujidou Fandisc has a lot to add to the original game, not the least of which is paths for a number of sub-heroines who were interesting in the previous game.

Innocent Bullet is what I like to call a 'classic-style' chuunige.  A classic-style chuunige is essentially a 'high schooler with no skills gets thrown into battle despite being incompetent' situation.  These VNs were the most prevalent throughout VN history, but they tended to fall short of those who got rid of the high schooler tropes when it came to quality on all levels.  Innocent Bullet is no exception, being a nice place-holder while waiting for a Light or Akatsuki works game but unworthy of repeated playthroughs.

Hakugin no Agreement came to the US as Pygmalion, but this is a VN that failed on every level.  This is something only those playing in Japanese ran across, but the game had numerous points where it would crash, freeze, or jitter for no apparent reason.  The story itself was disjointed, the premise confusing, and the characters disinteresting.  It was inevitable that Propeller would fall apart without Higashide, but I remember crying in despair after playing this abomination.

Aozora Stripe is a fun rom-com VN by the makers of Erect.  It has an identical visual aesthetic and a similar focus on sensuality in its heroines (which can be distracting when trying to read at times).  Great if you want a stronger ero-focus in your charage, not so much if you want to sit down and read through actual rom-com.

Hoshi no Ne Sanctuary is a game that I, quite frankly, underrated at the time.  Oh, it isn't a kamige, but it is still a high quality charage worth playing along with a hundred or so others for fans of the umbrella genre.

PriministAr... well, it is Hook Soft, but if you were to choose a Hook Soft 'fuwafuwa' charage, this wouldn't be the one I recommend.  It is the worst of the lot, to be frank.

 

[VN of the Month September 2013 - Yume ka Utsutsu ka Matryoshka]

Sangoku Hime 3 is easily the best of the Sangoku Hime series, taking the best of both worlds with an improved battle system over the previous two and better visuals than later entries in the series.  However, like all of the Sangoku Hime/Sengoku Hime series the story inevitably becomes disjointed due to the inherent limitations of a conquest strategy game.

Noblesse of Rouge is an annoyingly long charage that has very little content to it despite its length.  Reading it was pure torture back in the day.

Magical Marriage Lunatics is a classic example of what I like to call 'nerfing the supernatural girls'.  Essentially, all negative elements of the various heroines are weakened to make their relationships with the protagonist easier, and the drama was thus reduced to an insignificant level.  About the only positive thing I can say about that aspect is that there is a bad ending for the witch girl that occurs due to a choice during an H-scene, lol.   Otherwise, it is mostly standard rom-com fluff.

Karumaruka Circle is a game I'd almost completely forgotten in the time since it came out, because I never had an urge to replay it.  Yes, I named it VN of the Month at the time, but that doesn't mean it was kamige material.  For Saga Planets, which is known for its consistent high quality, this VN was on the lower end of its curve, though not its worst game.  If you haven't played other VNs by this company, you should pick them over this one.

Ichiban Janakya Dame Desu Ka is a hilarious VN by Rosebleu, containing the usual slapstic+tsukkomi+sitcom humor Agobarrier specialized in.  It isn't his best work, but it is still quite enjoyable.

Baldr Sky Zero is the first half of the series, a gameplay VN with an 'updated' battle system (for Heart, the battle system returned to the old version) with a polygon instead of pixel style.  While the frenetic pace of Baldr combat was left unchanged, I'm sorry to say that those using translation or parsing tools will find the game freezes constantly, so, despite the difficulty of the text, your best option is to read the Japanese without help.  Unfortunately, this makes the game feel far longer than it is, for those accustomed to using the aid of parsers, lol.  Story-wise, this game is top quality.  It does, however, make for a better experience if you play it with the other half.

Yume ka Utsutsu is a surprisingly (and so I said at the time) decent plotge with a good setting and characters.  Unfortunately, it is also a game that wasn't put together as professionally as one might hope, leading to criticism from those who nitpick to excess.  From what I recall, the untranslated readers association (the nonexistent organization on irc otherwise known as the 'it is only good if I like it' group, tlwiki's fanboys, etc) were bashing it for some reason at the time.  I imagine they had their reasons, but I also remember it annoying me when some idiot sent me a pm with the logs from their irc bashing me personally for liking it.

[VN of the Month June 2013 - Gensou no Idea ~Oratorio Phantasm Historia~]

Bunny Black 3 is easily the worst of the series, which is probably why SofthouseChara stopped there.

Akabanzu is a mid to high-quality charage (depending on the reader) with strong sci-fi elements (albeit 'soft' ones).

Futagoza no Paradox is a kamige of a mindfuck story.  I recommend it and its sibling game Owaru Sekai to Birthday to people who like this kind of stuff.  Downside is that one of the heroines has a severe learning disability.

Gensou no Idea is one of 3rdEye's better works, with a solid main protagonist and secondary one.  Downside is that this was the VN by them where there is really only one ending but they insert epilogues for all heroine characters despite that.

Grimoire no Shisho is a sort-of, kind-of decent borderline nukige/plotge similar to Kyonyuu Fantasy.  

Natsukumo was the second high-quality mindfuck game released in this particular month (if it helps, the heroines aren't 'true' lolis, and there is a very specific - and evil -, in-story reason why they look that way).  It one of two sister games to Harumade, Kururu.