Clephas

(Note: To be clear, this is an unfinished VN with over 500 chapters)
Hell Mode is the WN I recently began (and finished to the current point) reading.  It is another reincarnation one, where the protagonist was a heavy gamer who is one of those types that loves high-difficulty setups, reveling in grinding, conquering dungeons, and generally indulging in his desire to see more.  He goes to a website where he gets the choice of difficulty and his job, and he picks the hardest difficulty Hell Mode (where everything is 100x harder than Normal Mode) and the high-difficulty job, Summoner.  
The world he ends up in is one where people see jobs as 'talents' and talent determines how far a person can go (if they aren't a noble) in life.  However, it is also a world threatened by a demon lord, and much of the story past the first fifth of what has already been written is war against the demon king's forces.  
The protagonist has terrible 'gamer's brain' and thinks of everything in terms of gaming, to the point where he examines every aspect of his skills, those of his companions, the tools at hands, the powers of his enemies, etc.  One of the running jokes of the series is how he keeps dragging his friends into grinding in dungeons to gain levels and skill levels and their reactions to it when he passes certain limits. 
Honestly, this one was a fun read, and I'm looking forward to him finishing the latest volume (probably sometime in September, judging by his writing speed and how fast his previous entries were completed).  I have the feeling that there will be at least two more volumes after the one he is writing now, so give it a year to a year and a half, and this series will probably come to a conclusion.
One thing that might make people lose interest is that the protagonist has absolutely no interest in romance or the opposite (or same) sex in that way.  While there are a lot of indications that girls around him are infatuated with him, he doesn't even notice one way or the other.  So don't expect there to be any romance on his end or ecchi situations.  This is a story about a guy who loves figuring out how the world works and making it work for him and gains great joy from difficult situations.
Edit: There are other elements that made it attractive for me.  In particular, the existence of a friendly rival in the form of the hero Hermios, whose existence is oddly humorous despite the seriousness of the situations they meet in.  In addition, the main antagonist (so far) Kyuber is a surprisingly decent villain character who gives off the proper aura of the shadow behind the throne with his own agenda you want to see in any similar situation.  
A major downside I failed to mention is that the growth in the story is all grinding (as fits with the MMO-addict's methodology the protagonist loves), which sometimes made it a bit hard to follow the protagonist's gleeful heavy gamerism.

https://ncode.syosetu.com/n7471fo/34/
This is a very short WN I read on a whim over the course of a few hours.  It is complete for what it is, and what it is isn't what you'd think.  The protagonist is a reincarnator who was reborn in a game world, where he became a rootless traveling mage, sightseeing in the fantasy world he knew from the game.  One day, he comes across a collapsed Dragonkin girl, who turns out to be the demon lord from the game.
This story is one of romance and redemption, as a clumsy man approaching middle age does his best to be a friend to a girl who has lost everything.  To be honest, there were several times even in this short story that I cried, simply because the writer was so good at creating the character interactions between Spika and Sanson.  As Spika regains her humanity, it turns into an adorable romance that you can't help but cheer on.

Some people may have seen the relatively low-quality anime for Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou and are probably wondering why I am bothering to spout about this.  Lately I've been plowing through LNs and web novels because I ran out of interesting VNs, but this is the first one I feel a need to expound on at length.  Let's be clear, I am one of the freaks who enjoyed the anime, though I did so while wincing constantly at the animators' choices and the horrible monster CGs.  To me, Hajime's story just stood out as being that good, despite the crippling weakness of having used up half the season on the 'buildup arc' that is the content of the first LN.  
However, I wasn't anticipating just how high in quality the web novel version would be.  To be blunt, Ryo Shirakome is one of those rare Japanese writers who really is as good as the hype and has a very obvious love of the material he is writing.  More importantly, he is very consistent with how he portrays his characters and their growth. 
Story Intro
For those unfamiliar with this series, it focuses on Nagumo Hajime, a young man summoned with his class to another world, only to turn out to be the overall weakest of the group and in possession of a class that is both common and unsuited for battle.   In the beginning, Hajime is a kind-hearted, pacifistic young man with a great deal of courage (and enough of an otaku that it survives all his travails) but no standout abilities.  However, when delving into the depths of the Orcus Labyrinth, his fellow classmates get caught in a trap and they are all sent to a much lower floor... to face a Behemoth, a monster that is beyond their abilities.  Hajime, despite his weakness, manages to help greatly in holding it off, but just as he is about to make his own escape, one of his classmates betrays him, directing a fireball to stray and hit him so that he will fall into the abyss with the Behemoth.  
He survives the fall only to have his right arm eaten by one of the beasts in the depths in front of his own eyes.  In order to survive, he is forced into a corner where his previously kind heart is shattered and reforged in the fires of despair and hatred, reforming him into a man who sees the world in only two colors, those who are enemies and those who are not... and responds to enemies with death.  This is further reinforced when he eats a monster and has to endure immense agony as his body is broken and remade again and again, shaving away at his humanity with each cycle, until what remains is only one step short of a true monster.
Main Story assessment
That's a pretty bare bones prologue for you and essentially covers the content of the first episode of the anime and the first three chapters of the web novel.  Oddly, despite the horrific beginnings, this is as much a story about love as it is of hate and killing.  Yue, the story's main heroine, is the reason for this.  She is also the reason that this didn't turn into just another 'dark anti-hero goes out and gets revenge' story.  His meeting with Yue is one of several turning points in Hajime's growth as a character and one of the most well-orchestrated ones I've ever seen (regardless of whether it is the anime or the web novel).  Yue is the kindred spirit who helps Hajime stay one step away from the abyss of endless carnage he would otherwise have stepped into.  This is despite the fact that she is just as broken as he is, psychologically.  
The way this story uses the various heroines to help Hajime regain bits and pieces of his humanity is perhaps the most emotionally powerful aspect in retrospect.  Yue helps him stop short of losing his humanity, Shia (the bunny-girl) stops Yue and Hajime from becoming completely isolated from the rest of the world, Aiko reminds him of what it is to be human, and Kaori reconnects him to his past, solidifying his reasons for his journey.   Without all of these heroines, it is likely this story would not have been nearly as powerful, as Hajime's journey would have probably just been a series of 'kill this, kill that, have sex with Yue, kill more'.  
I didn't mention Tio, Shizuku and Myuu in the previous paragraph because they serve slightly different roles from the other girls.  Tio is pretty much just comedy relief as a character, despite being as in love with Hajime and the other girls.  Shizuku is, surprisingly, the most 'normal' girl in the group and the one who serves as the most solid connection between the self-isolating harem of girls who are mostly disinterested in anything other than Hajime (with Aiko being the exception, given her sense of duty to her students).  Myuu... well lets just say Myuu's role is fairly similar to Yue's, except that she awakens Hajime's obsessively protective instincts that come to define him later on.
The story itself is dark and brutal despite the frequent humorous interactions between the characters.  This is inevitable, as the world of Tortus is a world ruled by an insane god whose greatest pleasure lies in ruining the lives of his slaves.  There are a lot of hugely powerful battle scenes, crazy plot twists, and hilarious results of Hajime's trip through Tortus.  The ending of the main story (which will probably be published sometime next year in the LNs) is as hugely dramatic as the beginning.  
After Story Assessment
The After Story, which is still ongoing, is HUGE.  It is almost as big as the main story, but it is told in non-chronological order as a bunch of arcs and one-off postings rather than in order.  Despite this, the After Story has provided me with probably fifty times as many laughs as the main story did.  Part of this is because what trials and tribulations that occur are mostly overcome by Hajime's already beyond-divine power gained during the main story or the power of his OP friends, wives, allies, and classmates.   Whether it is Myuu attracting UMAs, demons, ghosts, and youkai like a bug lamp attracts flies or Kousuke falling deeper into the chuuni abyss as he builds his accidental harem in Hajime's service, I haven't stopped laughing in weeks.  
Of course, there are some deadly serious points, perhaps the most powerful of which are the stories involving Kouki, who struggles with the after-effects of his time on Tortus more than anybody else (for reasons that will be obvious to anyone who has already read the existing LNs or the main story of the web novel).  However, even in these, Shirokome does an excellent job of keeping the balance from taking you too far into grimdark to truly enjoy.  
Overall assessment up to the present
Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou does great at every aspect of what I want from this kind of story.  It has great feels, it has great comedy, it has awesome characters, and its plot is close to sublime.  More importantly, it is put together in such a way that all the elements enhance one another nearly to perfection.  If you like isekai with a wide dark streak that can make fun of itself, this is an excellent choice.

Some people may have seen the relatively low-quality anime for Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou and are probably wondering why I am bothering to spout about this.  Lately I've been plowing through LNs and web novels because I ran out of interesting VNs, but this is the first one I feel a need to expound on at length.  Let's be clear, I am one of the freaks who enjoyed the anime, though I did so while wincing constantly at the animators' choices and the horrible monster CGs.  To me, Hajime's story just stood out as being that good, despite the crippling weakness of having used up half the season on the 'buildup arc' that is the content of the first LN.  
However, I wasn't anticipating just how high in quality the web novel version would be.  To be blunt, Ryo Shirakome is one of those rare Japanese writers who really is as good as the hype and has a very obvious love of the material he is writing.  More importantly, he is very consistent with how he portrays his characters and their growth. 
Story Intro
For those unfamiliar with this series, it focuses on Nagumo Hajime, a young man summoned with his class to another world, only to turn out to be the overall weakest of the group and in possession of a class that is both common and unsuited for battle.   In the beginning, Hajime is a kind-hearted, pacifistic young man with a great deal of courage (and enough of an otaku that it survives all his travails) but no standout abilities.  However, when delving into the depths of the Orcus Labyrinth, his fellow classmates get caught in a trap and they are all sent to a much lower floor... to face a Behemoth, a monster that is beyond their abilities.  Hajime, despite his weakness, manages to help greatly in holding it off, but just as he is about to make his own escape, one of his classmates betrays him, directing a fireball to stray and hit him so that he will fall into the abyss with the Behemoth.  
He survives the fall only to have his right arm eaten by one of the beasts in the depths in front of his own eyes.  In order to survive, he is forced into a corner where his previously kind heart is shattered and reforged in the fires of despair and hatred, reforming him into a man who sees the world in only two colors, those who are enemies and those who are not... and responds to enemies with death.  This is further reinforced when he eats a monster and has to endure immense agony as his body is broken and remade again and again, shaving away at his humanity with each cycle, until what remains is only one step short of a true monster.
Main Story assessment
That's a pretty bare bones prologue for you and essentially covers the content of the first episode of the anime and the first three chapters of the web novel.  Oddly, despite the horrific beginnings, this is as much a story about love as it is of hate and killing.  Yue, the story's main heroine, is the reason for this.  She is also the reason that this didn't turn into just another 'dark anti-hero goes out and gets revenge' story.  His meeting with Yue is one of several turning points in Hajime's growth as a character and one of the most well-orchestrated ones I've ever seen (regardless of whether it is the anime or the web novel).  Yue is the kindred spirit who helps Hajime stay one step away from the abyss of endless carnage he would otherwise have stepped into.  This is despite the fact that she is just as broken as he is, psychologically.  
The way this story uses the various heroines to help Hajime regain bits and pieces of his humanity is perhaps the most emotionally powerful aspect in retrospect.  Yue helps him stop short of losing his humanity, Shia (the bunny-girl) stops Yue and Hajime from becoming completely isolated from the rest of the world, Aiko reminds him of what it is to be human, and Kaori reconnects him to his past, solidifying his reasons for his journey.   Without all of these heroines, it is likely this story would not have been nearly as powerful, as Hajime's journey would have probably just been a series of 'kill this, kill that, have sex with Yue, kill more'.  
I didn't mention Tio, Shizuku and Myuu in the previous paragraph because they serve slightly different roles from the other girls.  Tio is pretty much just comedy relief as a character, despite being as in love with Hajime and the other girls.  Shizuku is, surprisingly, the most 'normal' girl in the group and the one who serves as the most solid connection between the self-isolating harem of girls who are mostly disinterested in anything other than Hajime (with Aiko being the exception, given her sense of duty to her students).  Myuu... well lets just say Myuu's role is fairly similar to Yue's, except that she awakens Hajime's obsessively protective instincts that come to define him later on.
The story itself is dark and brutal despite the frequent humorous interactions between the characters.  This is inevitable, as the world of Tortus is a world ruled by an insane god whose greatest pleasure lies in ruining the lives of his slaves.  There are a lot of hugely powerful battle scenes, crazy plot twists, and hilarious results of Hajime's trip through Tortus.  The ending of the main story (which will probably be published sometime next year in the LNs) is as hugely dramatic as the beginning.  
After Story Assessment
The After Story, which is still ongoing, is HUGE.  It is almost as big as the main story, but it is told in non-chronological order as a bunch of arcs and one-off postings rather than in order.  Despite this, the After Story has provided me with probably fifty times as many laughs as the main story did.  Part of this is because what trials and tribulations that occur are mostly overcome by Hajime's already beyond-divine power gained during the main story or the power of his OP friends, wives, allies, and classmates.   Whether it is Myuu attracting UMAs, demons, ghosts, and youkai like a bug lamp attracts flies or Kousuke falling deeper into the chuuni abyss as he builds his accidental harem in Hajime's service, I haven't stopped laughing in weeks.  
Of course, there are some deadly serious points, perhaps the most powerful of which are the stories involving Kouki, who struggles with the after-effects of his time on Tortus more than anybody else (for reasons that will be obvious to anyone who has already read the existing LNs or the main story of the web novel).  However, even in these, Shirokome does an excellent job of keeping the balance from taking you too far into grimdark to truly enjoy.  
Overall assessment up to the present
Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou does great at every aspect of what I want from this kind of story.  It has great feels, it has great comedy, it has awesome characters, and its plot is close to sublime.  More importantly, it is put together in such a way that all the elements enhance one another nearly to perfection.  If you like isekai with a wide dark streak that can make fun of itself, this is an excellent choice.

Some people may have seen the relatively low-quality anime for Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou and are probably wondering why I am bothering to spout about this.  Lately I've been plowing through LNs and web novels because I ran out of interesting VNs, but this is the first one I feel a need to expound on at length.  Let's be clear, I am one of the freaks who enjoyed the anime, though I did so while wincing constantly at the animators' choices and the horrible monster CGs.  To me, Hajime's story just stood out as being that good, despite the crippling weakness of having used up half the season on the 'buildup arc' that is the content of the first LN.  
However, I wasn't anticipating just how high in quality the web novel version would be.  To be blunt, Ryo Shirakome is one of those rare Japanese writers who really is as good as the hype and has a very obvious love of the material he is writing.  More importantly, he is very consistent with how he portrays his characters and their growth. 
Story Intro
For those unfamiliar with this series, it focuses on Nagumo Hajime, a young man summoned with his class to another world, only to turn out to be the overall weakest of the group and in possession of a class that is both common and unsuited for battle.   In the beginning, Hajime is a kind-hearted, pacifistic young man with a great deal of courage (and enough of an otaku that it survives all his travails) but no standout abilities.  However, when delving into the depths of the Orcus Labyrinth, his fellow classmates get caught in a trap and they are all sent to a much lower floor... to face a Behemoth, a monster that is beyond their abilities.  Hajime, despite his weakness, manages to help greatly in holding it off, but just as he is about to make his own escape, one of his classmates betrays him, directing a fireball to stray and hit him so that he will fall into the abyss with the Behemoth.  
He survives the fall only to have his right arm eaten by one of the beasts in the depths in front of his own eyes.  In order to survive, he is forced into a corner where his previously kind heart is shattered and reforged in the fires of despair and hatred, reforming him into a man who sees the world in only two colors, those who are enemies and those who are not... and responds to enemies with death.  This is further reinforced when he eats a monster and has to endure immense agony as his body is broken and remade again and again, shaving away at his humanity with each cycle, until what remains is only one step short of a true monster.
Main Story assessment
That's a pretty bare bones prologue for you and essentially covers the content of the first episode of the anime and the first three chapters of the web novel.  Oddly, despite the horrific beginnings, this is as much a story about love as it is of hate and killing.  Yue, the story's main heroine, is the reason for this.  She is also the reason that this didn't turn into just another 'dark anti-hero goes out and gets revenge' story.  His meeting with Yue is one of several turning points in Hajime's growth as a character and one of the most well-orchestrated ones I've ever seen (regardless of whether it is the anime or the web novel).  Yue is the kindred spirit who helps Hajime stay one step away from the abyss of endless carnage he would otherwise have stepped into.  This is despite the fact that she is just as broken as he is, psychologically.  
The way this story uses the various heroines to help Hajime regain bits and pieces of his humanity is perhaps the most emotionally powerful aspect in retrospect.  Yue helps him stop short of losing his humanity, Shia (the bunny-girl) stops Yue and Hajime from becoming completely isolated from the rest of the world, Aiko reminds him of what it is to be human, and Kaori reconnects him to his past, solidifying his reasons for his journey.   Without all of these heroines, it is likely this story would not have been nearly as powerful, as Hajime's journey would have probably just been a series of 'kill this, kill that, have sex with Yue, kill more'.  
I didn't mention Tio, Shizuku and Myuu in the previous paragraph because they serve slightly different roles from the other girls.  Tio is pretty much just comedy relief as a character, despite being as in love with Hajime and the other girls.  Shizuku is, surprisingly, the most 'normal' girl in the group and the one who serves as the most solid connection between the self-isolating harem of girls who are mostly disinterested in anything other than Hajime (with Aiko being the exception, given her sense of duty to her students).  Myuu... well lets just say Myuu's role is fairly similar to Yue's, except that she awakens Hajime's obsessively protective instincts that come to define him later on.
The story itself is dark and brutal despite the frequent humorous interactions between the characters.  This is inevitable, as the world of Tortus is a world ruled by an insane god whose greatest pleasure lies in ruining the lives of his slaves.  There are a lot of hugely powerful battle scenes, crazy plot twists, and hilarious results of Hajime's trip through Tortus.  The ending of the main story (which will probably be published sometime next year in the LNs) is as hugely dramatic as the beginning.  
After Story Assessment
The After Story, which is still ongoing, is HUGE.  It is almost as big as the main story, but it is told in non-chronological order as a bunch of arcs and one-off postings rather than in order.  Despite this, the After Story has provided me with probably fifty times as many laughs as the main story did.  Part of this is because what trials and tribulations that occur are mostly overcome by Hajime's already beyond-divine power gained during the main story or the power of his OP friends, wives, allies, and classmates.   Whether it is Myuu attracting UMAs, demons, ghosts, and youkai like a bug lamp attracts flies or Kousuke falling deeper into the chuuni abyss as he builds his accidental harem in Hajime's service, I haven't stopped laughing in weeks.  
Of course, there are some deadly serious points, perhaps the most powerful of which are the stories involving Kouki, who struggles with the after-effects of his time on Tortus more than anybody else (for reasons that will be obvious to anyone who has already read the existing LNs or the main story of the web novel).  However, even in these, Shirokome does an excellent job of keeping the balance from taking you too far into grimdark to truly enjoy.  
Overall assessment up to the present
Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou does great at every aspect of what I want from this kind of story.  It has great feels, it has great comedy, it has awesome characters, and its plot is close to sublime.  More importantly, it is put together in such a way that all the elements enhance one another nearly to perfection.  If you like isekai with a wide dark streak that can make fun of itself, this is an excellent choice.

I've had numerous comments from people who were asking, 'Do you still play VNs?' in the last year or so because I hardly post anymore.   When I do, it is usually litrpg, random commentary, or maybe one game a month.  The short answer is yes.  The full answer is a bit more complicated.
First, I should note that a lot of this is about timing... to be slightly more specific, a confluence of factors that created a singularity of me just not posting anymore.  The events in question are my increasing intolerance for disinteresting themes and pure SOL (that is, slice of life without a central plot, even if it is loose); Coronavirus causing a dramatic drop in the release of non-nukige JVNs; and the resulting tendency I had for going back and replaying stuff I've already posted about in the past (sometimes multiple times).  
While the sheer number of VNs I play per year has gone down from 50-70 to about 20-30, a good portion of those are replays.  I'd say about a little over two-fifths of all the VNs I've played in the last year and a half have been ones I've already replayed multiple times, another fifth were ones I dug out of my archives, another fifth were kusoge not worth posting about, and the remaining fifth are the ones I posted on.  
A contributing factor to this is Coronavirus and the resulting depression in the non-nukige VN market for PC (which I play almost exclusively, since I don't want to mod  my consoles for the sake of VNs alone).  Companies that once put out games multiple times a year have maybe released one in the last year and a half, other companies have quietly gone out of business, and yet other ones had to drop projects because they couldn't work around the health restrictions.  Charage alone have seen an unprecedented decrease in production, with entire months going by with NO releases (something that would have been unthinkable before Coronavirus).  
The last major issue is that my burnout on pure SOL (at least high school SOL) has turned into a complete intolerance.  I once thought it would ease somewhat with time, but, if anything, it has gotten worse.  If there isn't something besides pure SOL in there to catch my interest (like nakige, utsuge, or plotge elements), I simply won't be able to finish them.  
If the protagonist is interesting, I can still (barely) play school life that have something in the way of non-SOL elements, but otherwise, they are unplayable to me.
 

Some people may have seen the relatively low-quality anime for Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou and are probably wondering why I am bothering to spout about this.  Lately I've been plowing through LNs and web novels because I ran out of interesting VNs, but this is the first one I feel a need to expound on at length.  Let's be clear, I am one of the freaks who enjoyed the anime, though I did so while wincing constantly at the animators' choices and the horrible monster CGs.  To me, Hajime's story just stood out as being that good, despite the crippling weakness of having used up half the season on the 'buildup arc' that is the content of the first LN.  
However, I wasn't anticipating just how high in quality the web novel version would be.  To be blunt, Ryo Shirakome is one of those rare Japanese writers who really is as good as the hype and has a very obvious love of the material he is writing.  More importantly, he is very consistent with how he portrays his characters and their growth. 
Story Intro
For those unfamiliar with this series, it focuses on Nagumo Hajime, a young man summoned with his class to another world, only to turn out to be the overall weakest of the group and in possession of a class that is both common and unsuited for battle.   In the beginning, Hajime is a kind-hearted, pacifistic young man with a great deal of courage (and enough of an otaku that it survives all his travails) but no standout abilities.  However, when delving into the depths of the Orcus Labyrinth, his fellow classmates get caught in a trap and they are all sent to a much lower floor... to face a Behemoth, a monster that is beyond their abilities.  Hajime, despite his weakness, manages to help greatly in holding it off, but just as he is about to make his own escape, one of his classmates betrays him, directing a fireball to stray and hit him so that he will fall into the abyss with the Behemoth.  
He survives the fall only to have his right arm eaten by one of the beasts in the depths in front of his own eyes.  In order to survive, he is forced into a corner where his previously kind heart is shattered and reforged in the fires of despair and hatred, reforming him into a man who sees the world in only two colors, those who are enemies and those who are not... and responds to enemies with death.  This is further reinforced when he eats a monster and has to endure immense agony as his body is broken and remade again and again, shaving away at his humanity with each cycle, until what remains is only one step short of a true monster.
Main Story assessment
That's a pretty bare bones prologue for you and essentially covers the content of the first episode of the anime and the first three chapters of the web novel.  Oddly, despite the horrific beginnings, this is as much a story about love as it is of hate and killing.  Yue, the story's main heroine, is the reason for this.  She is also the reason that this didn't turn into just another 'dark anti-hero goes out and gets revenge' story.  His meeting with Yue is one of several turning points in Hajime's growth as a character and one of the most well-orchestrated ones I've ever seen (regardless of whether it is the anime or the web novel).  Yue is the kindred spirit who helps Hajime stay one step away from the abyss of endless carnage he would otherwise have stepped into.  This is despite the fact that she is just as broken as he is, psychologically.  
The way this story uses the various heroines to help Hajime regain bits and pieces of his humanity is perhaps the most emotionally powerful aspect in retrospect.  Yue helps him stop short of losing his humanity, Shia (the bunny-girl) stops Yue and Hajime from becoming completely isolated from the rest of the world, Aiko reminds him of what it is to be human, and Kaori reconnects him to his past, solidifying his reasons for his journey.   Without all of these heroines, it is likely this story would not have been nearly as powerful, as Hajime's journey would have probably just been a series of 'kill this, kill that, have sex with Yue, kill more'.  
I didn't mention Tio, Shizuku and Myuu in the previous paragraph because they serve slightly different roles from the other girls.  Tio is pretty much just comedy relief as a character, despite being as in love with Hajime and the other girls.  Shizuku is, surprisingly, the most 'normal' girl in the group and the one who serves as the most solid connection between the self-isolating harem of girls who are mostly disinterested in anything other than Hajime (with Aiko being the exception, given her sense of duty to her students).  Myuu... well lets just say Myuu's role is fairly similar to Yue's, except that she awakens Hajime's obsessively protective instincts that come to define him later on.
The story itself is dark and brutal despite the frequent humorous interactions between the characters.  This is inevitable, as the world of Tortus is a world ruled by an insane god whose greatest pleasure lies in ruining the lives of his slaves.  There are a lot of hugely powerful battle scenes, crazy plot twists, and hilarious results of Hajime's trip through Tortus.  The ending of the main story (which will probably be published sometime next year in the LNs) is as hugely dramatic as the beginning.  
After Story Assessment
The After Story, which is still ongoing, is HUGE.  It is almost as big as the main story, but it is told in non-chronological order as a bunch of arcs and one-off postings rather than in order.  Despite this, the After Story has provided me with probably fifty times as many laughs as the main story did.  Part of this is because what trials and tribulations that occur are mostly overcome by Hajime's already beyond-divine power gained during the main story or the power of his OP friends, wives, allies, and classmates.   Whether it is Myuu attracting UMAs, demons, ghosts, and youkai like a bug lamp attracts flies or Kousuke falling deeper into the chuuni abyss as he builds his accidental harem in Hajime's service, I haven't stopped laughing in weeks.  
Of course, there are some deadly serious points, perhaps the most powerful of which are the stories involving Kouki, who struggles with the after-effects of his time on Tortus more than anybody else (for reasons that will be obvious to anyone who has already read the existing LNs or the main story of the web novel).  However, even in these, Shirokome does an excellent job of keeping the balance from taking you too far into grimdark to truly enjoy.  
Overall assessment up to the present
Arifureta Shokugyou de Sekai Saikyou does great at every aspect of what I want from this kind of story.  It has great feels, it has great comedy, it has awesome characters, and its plot is close to sublime.  More importantly, it is put together in such a way that all the elements enhance one another nearly to perfection.  If you like isekai with a wide dark streak that can make fun of itself, this is an excellent choice.

Princess x Princess is the sequel/extension of Rishia's route from Shuffle 2.  Essentially, it begins with Rishia enthusiastically searching out extra wives for Raito while he has difficulty adjusting to his girlfriend's values.  However, this quickly expands into a game that, to some extent, can actually be called a sequel rather than a fandisc.  This is similar to how the original Shuffle's 'extras' functioned more like true additions to the original game than fandiscs.
I'm going to be blunt... this is better than the original game, to a significant degree.  A lot of the things I hated about how they handled Shuffle 2 are done differently in this game, and the style in general is much closer to how the original Shuffle was put together in terms of humor and character interactions.  For fanboys of the original Shuffle who hated or just weren't satisfied with Shuffle 2, this game is a saving grace.
That said, this game has the characters traveling to different parallel worlds, where they are inserted into their own roles (with varying degrees of memory alterations) in them.  In each, there are differences big and small (there is even one world where every character holds a near-perfect replication of the personality and role of a corresponding heroine from the original Shuffle), but the theme is mostly centered around Raito dealing with the issues in his own life using the experiences he has in these parallel worlds.  
The 'paths' in this game are either threesome or harem combinations with Rishia, based on how Raito takes in his experiences in the various worlds.  There is a threesome with Selena, Ai, and Lapis, with a full-on harem path and a Rishia-only path put in for kicks.  
For fanboys of the original, this game also succeeds in clarifying the 'canon' of continuity to this game from the original Shuffle.  The canon apparently is that Rin married Shia but died a significant period of time before she did.  
Kurogane Kaikitan part 1
Kurogane Kaikitan is the port of the Vita game by Minato Carnival.  It is a somewhat more action-focused game than is the norm for Minato Soft and its subsidiaries, with a much more serious subject matter.  The protagonist, Habaki Masamune is the leader of a student anti-terrorist task force using mystical weapons called Kurogane that manifest certain 'recorded' phenomena that can be controlled by the user (this is not explained on the official website, which annoyed the hell out of me when I was reading up on the game beforehand).  Masamune is a heavily-scarred victim of terrorism that hates terrorists to an incredibly strong degree, to the point where he is willing to cut them down mercilessly at a moment's notice.  
In Kurogane Kaikitan's world, Manhattan was destroyed by a mysterious explosion, obliterating the city and allowing Japan to sign a peace treaty with more of its political and military power intact.  As a result of Wall Street being gone and America's resulting economic downturn, Japan was able to take the helm of the world's economy, becoming a special financial zone and the battleground for various countries proxy terrorist activities.  This necessitated the creation of units devoted to dealing with this, which at first was the Special Police but more recently a militarized unit called SWAM.  The protagonist and his comrades are in training to join the Special Police.
The first thing most people will notice on beginning the game is the horrid use of Live 2d that can't be turned off.  I will say that it was a huge quality of life crapfest that they didn't allow the turning off of the sprite motion system, since it isn't that good.  Normally, I don't comment on visual aspects, but this was worthy of mention for its negative impact on the experience.
The prologue/common route of the game is pretty long, at just over seven hours on its own (though I wasn't reading it hurriedly, so I probably could have shortened the experience to five or six if I tried).  In exchange, the first two paths I did, Amakuni's and Kotetsu's, were roughly four hours in length each.   The prologue does an excellent job of developing the cast of characters to the point where you know which heroine you want to pick first (though you have to do Amakuni's or Fusehime's path first), as well as introducing the most important elements of the setting and setting the stage for the events that follow.
Amakuni
Amakuni is the protagonist's childhood friend, who was sickly as a child but became healthy by the time the story begins.  She is a master of combat iaido (the action of drawing the katana, slashing, then returning it to the sheath), and she is the classic 'self-proclaimed fiance' heroine.  Her path has a good mix of action, ichaicha, and feels, with two arcs (a 'buildup arc' and a finishing arc) that succeed in making her path feel like an extension of the prologue instead of being a random story based loosely on what happened before (as is common with a lot of VNs).  Her ending is highly emotional and somewhat bittersweet (a theme for this game as a whole).
Kotetsu
Kotetsu is a different animal entirely from the aggressive and tennenboke Amakuni, as she begins as a quiet loner who turns into a koakuma heroine later on.  I mostly picked her for my second heroine because I was extremely curious about her reactions to various events in the prologue and Amakuni's path.  She is the type of heroine who, once she falls for the protagonist, becomes somewhat emotionally dependent on him.  Her path is cute up until the point where events start rapidly occurring and certain facts about what was going on behind the scenes come to light.  Kotetsu's situation is one that draws pity naturally from the reader, so don't be surprised if you find yourself tearing up or wanting to look away because of some of the events of the story.  The ending is somewhat less satisfying than Amakuni's unfortunately, but that was perhaps inevitable considering the situation in both paths.
Nene
Nene is the teacher of the protagonist's class and the overseer/handler of the Kurogane unit for the First School.  Her path is significantly more twisty and labyrinthine than Kotetsu's or Amakuni's paths, whose trials were mostly personal for the characters involved.  Nene is that classic 'older heroine who falls apart in private' that Minato Soft and its subsidiaries love to put into their games.  She is also the equivalent of this game's Momoyo (in other words, the trump card/ultimate power that can flip the game board if put into play), albeit with none of Momoyo's whims.  I enjoyed this path, but like Kotetsu's path, the epilogue was somewhat unsatisfying.
Tamane
Tamane is the oldest member of the Kurogane unit, a member of a military family famous for its skills with the bayonet and rifle.  She often plays the mature and stern older sister role in the group, except that she, like Nene, tends to fall apart in private due to her weakness to those she cares for.  Her path, like Nene's, is pretty twisty and complex in comparison to the first two routes I played.  I enjoyed this path (the action toward the end, in particular) a lot, and the epilogue for this path is as good or better than Amakuni's, with the parting point in taste being whether you want sweet or bittersweet.  
Fusehime
I don't like Fusehime.
I have messed around with a lot of heroines I didn't like over the years, especially in serious games, but Fusehime is this game's Victim A, an out of place character who should have been just another class member.  I know that there is this temptation to put a morally naive party member into every 'group of friends', no matter how dark the setting, but Fusehime is particularly bad this way.  Naive, idealistic, and full of delusions about what her job is about... just about everything about her rubbed me wrong.  So, don't be surprised that I skipped this path, bwahahaha!
Kaikitan Path
This is the game's true path, devoid of romance.  It is also the path where a lot of the story's hidden elements come into the open and some of the best battles occur.  However, it is also a path that is somewhat rough emotionally on the reader if they came to like the main cast.  Honestly, I thought it was a bit too predictable compared to what it could have been with a little bit less teasing in the other routes.  
Extra Endings
All the heroines have extra path/endings after the Kaikitan path, based in a different timeline (specifically stated).  Like the original timeline, it is a 'what-if' world that is meant for those who like happy endings.  These secondary paths are actually reasonably enjoyable, but I honestly enjoyed the main game's paths more.
Conclusion
An enjoyable game based in a what-if world.  The world it is based in isn't the one of Majikoi, Tsujidou, and Tsuyokiss, for those who are curious.  It could have been a great deal better if they spent less time on SOL, but considering that this is Minato Soft (well, one of their subsidiaries), I suppose it was inevitable that it wouldn't be like that.  In a lot of ways, the version of Japan portrayed in the game reminds me of a Japanese-flavored America, in that it suffers from many of the same problems.

Ototsuki is one of the few, in fact the only, Ensemble trap protagonist game I hadn't at least tried.  There were a number of reasons for this, but the biggest one was that it came out after my burnout on SOL reached its peak.  By that time, I had no energy for any kind of SOL VNs, even ones in genres I normally liked.  In retrospect, I'm glad I waited until I recovered before playing this, because this is the game that proves that Ensemble still has potential as a company, despite the last five years of mediocrity.
Ototsuki focuses on a servant-ojousama pair, to be specific, Yuuki Touya (the protagonist and servant) and Shijou Ran (the ojousama).  Ran is a genius in science and maths, as well as an extremely capable athlete.  She is also extremely eccentric, walking her own path to a degree that would probably drive most of us crazy.  Yuuki, who grew up beside her, is used to dealing with her eccentricities and acts as the ideal servant for her type, occasionally restraining her and at others merely assisting.  However, one of Ran's bad habits becomes a central point of the game's story, when she goes to an all-girls school and forces Yuuki to cross-dress and come with her, and while they are there, Ran and Yuuki regularly switch places (they have mastered dressing up as one another) as needed to make Ran look good, lol.
The choice to create such an intimate situation for the main heroine and protagonist was, in my mind, the reason why this game stands out from the rest of Ensemble's games made in the last half-decade.  Ran and Yuuki's synchronicity and odd couple dynamic make for an ideal situation for this type of game.  There are downfalls to this approach (such as it being difficult to consider heroines other than Ran), but the benefits are rather obvious.
Still, this game is rather straight-out as a charage, albeit with a few minor twists to make it feel like it actually has an overarching plot (technically, there is something going on behind the scenes, but its relevance varies by path).  
Ran
I knew that Ran was the main heroine of the game, but I couldn't stop myself from playing her path first.  The intimacy of Ran and Yuuki's relationship and how it deepens into romance is the major draw of this path, though it probably doesn't happen the way you would think it would.  Ran's tendency toward being straightforward to the point of bluntness and unapologetic about it (she isn't the type to be bothered by others' reactions to her) is one of her major draws as a heroine.  The climax of this path has some nice drama, and I honestly liked how it concluded.  However, typical of Ensemble and its endless fandisc-preparation, there was not a significant after-story/epilogue.
To elaborate on Ran's personality, since she is a relatively rare type of character, she technically falls into the 'arrogant genius' archetype.  However, her character doesn't come across as being abrasive, most likely because there isn't even a scrap of contempt or prejudice on her part.  Rather, she simply doesn't have a humble bone in her body... which, combined with the fact that she really is as capable as she says she is (for the most part), makes it hard to be offended by her personality.
Shizune
Shizune is one of the ojousama heroines in this game, the daughter of the head of the school board of directors, and a member of the student council.  Despite all these titles, she is fundamentally a humble, kind-hearted girl who always puts others first.  Unfortunately, her family name and tendency to be strict with herself make her somewhat less than approachable for common students.  She is paired with the game's 'other' servant, Iroha, who serves her with obvious affection and devotion.  Shizune is pretty much the picture of the 'total innocent' when it comes to life outside of the wealthy old families of Japan, to the point where she honestly had never experienced such common things as shopping for herself or using a bus.  
Shizune's path probably isn't what anybody would expect from this description, lol.  I won't spoil it for you, but I appreciated the departure from tradition in this path, though in another way it uses a common trope (drawing a 'special status' character out of their usual life).  The romance is fairly cute and relatively innocent for this type of game, and I appreciated the 'revelation drama' as being just right.  It isn't at the top of my list for trap protagonist game paths, but it is pretty good.  I did have to laugh at how she found out, though.
Iroha side-story
After completing Ran's and Shizune's paths, Iroha's side-story popped up, and I read it, curious about the details.  This path is an H-scene free path that focuses mostly on what was going on behind the scenes of Ran's and Shizune's path, and it also has a pretty big revelation with some mild catharsis along the way.  Honestly, it was nice to have the gaps filled in, though the game as a whole probably would have been better if these revelations could have been somehow integrated into the main paths instead of being told in a side-story.
Conclusion for now
I blasted through two paths of this game, but I'm pretty sure I'll come back to the other paths eventually, if only to experience the commoner heroines' stories.  My current conclusions based off of what I have played are that this is one of Ensemble's more memorable games, taking third place overall behind Koi no Canvas and Gokigen Naname so far.  While the story in this game is not spectacular, it provides enough variation from the usual norms of the niche trap protag genre without alienating the fanbase.  I liked the heroines, and I felt their paths were well-designed.  I am a bit annoyed, as I usually am, that it was made with fandiscs in mind, but the quality of the heroines I bothered with is such that I didn't mind as much as I usually would have.
 

This game is a peculiar one.  This is the third time I've played the game, and the second time I've posted on it.  If you want to see my original review, please look here: 
 
I'm going to focus here on coloring in some of the details of why I like this game and think it is underrated amongst Western readers of untranslated VNs.  First, the factors that lead to it being underrated.
1) The protagonist takes on a man-whore role through large swathes of the game and isn't a pure-hearted boy by any standard.  For some reason, man-whores aren't received very well by a lot of Western readers, especially ones that are calculating and intentionally act that way.  
2)  The visual style of the game differs significantly, if subtly, from the more common styles of the post-2010 era.  It is rougher in some places and more elegant in others.  
3)  A large portion of the readers don't like Arika.  Now, there are good reasons not to like her in many's eyes.  She is whimsical, manipulative, and lazy as all hell when she isn't interested in an activity.  However, she is also hyper-intelligent, intuitive, and has the same kind of super-luck that Cap did in Majikoi.  Unfortunately, she is the kind of character that seriously divides readers.
4)  People's expectations of trap protagonists.  Most people going into a trap protagonist game expect a lot of comedy antics related to the cross-dressing.  However, Hajime doesn't bungle things and doesn't panic the way a lot of trap protagonists do.  In addition, 'calculating' is a quality that many who actually like trap protagonist games don't like in them... and Hajime is nothing of not calculating.
5)  The surprising darkness of the setting.  People go into trap protagonist games thinking they will be comedic and moe-moe festivals.  Ojomasu is neither.  There isn't a lot of comedy in the game, and there is very little in the way of moe fanservice. 
6)  The prologue H-scene.  Probably the thing that annoys a lot of people is the h-scene in the prologue and how it came to be.  For people that go into this game with a 'I want to see pure love romance from beginning to end' attitude, this is a huge downer.  That it is followed by Hajime using the affections of a number of other women during the course of the story only enhances this impression for this part of the crowd.
7)  Ginko isn't one of the heroines.  Yes, in any other game, Ginko would have been one of the heroines.
The things that make this game worth playing.
1)  Everything above.  Seriously, the fact is that a lot of the people who play this game aren't the intended audience.  In some ways, this is a more down-to-earth version of the 'guy infiltrates a girls' school' trope.
2)  Despite only having three heroines, those heroines provide a full spectrum of personalities.  The whimsical Arika, the stoic and straightforward Benio, and the sweet-natured Peko provide a lot of variety without any real overlap.  If Ginko or Rion (the ones the largest part of the fanbase seemed to want routes for) were heroines in this game, it would distract from things greatly.  Moreover, there is way too much overlap between Ginko and Arika personality-wise.
3)  There is just enough darkness to the setting and story to create a firm contrast to the soft atmosphere of the girls' school.  In a lot of cases with these 'girls school infiltration' VNs, there is a sense of unreality created as a result of poor buildup of the setting.  
4)  This game doesn't even attempt to imitate the success of other companies.  I honestly think they should have named this game something else, because the title makes it seem like a game that should be a soft romance rather than the more complex story it is.
5)  Hajime is a protagonist you can enjoy self-inserting into.  He is capable, intelligent, and ambitious, a combination that is a refreshing change from most VN protagonists in general.

This game is a peculiar one.  This is the third time I've played the game, and the second time I've posted on it.  If you want to see my original review, please look here: 
 
I'm going to focus here on coloring in some of the details of why I like this game and think it is underrated amongst Western readers of untranslated VNs.  First, the factors that lead to it being underrated.
1) The protagonist takes on a man-whore role through large swathes of the game and isn't a pure-hearted boy by any standard.  For some reason, man-whores aren't received very well by a lot of Western readers, especially ones that are calculating and intentionally act that way.  
2)  The visual style of the game differs significantly, if subtly, from the more common styles of the post-2010 era.  It is rougher in some places and more elegant in others.  
3)  A large portion of the readers don't like Arika.  Now, there are good reasons not to like her in many's eyes.  She is whimsical, manipulative, and lazy as all hell when she isn't interested in an activity.  However, she is also hyper-intelligent, intuitive, and has the same kind of super-luck that Cap did in Majikoi.  Unfortunately, she is the kind of character that seriously divides readers.
4)  People's expectations of trap protagonists.  Most people going into a trap protagonist game expect a lot of comedy antics related to the cross-dressing.  However, Hajime doesn't bungle things and doesn't panic the way a lot of trap protagonists do.  In addition, 'calculating' is a quality that many who actually like trap protagonist games don't like in them... and Hajime is nothing of not calculating.
5)  The surprising darkness of the setting.  People go into trap protagonist games thinking they will be comedic and moe-moe festivals.  Ojomasu is neither.  There isn't a lot of comedy in the game, and there is very little in the way of moe fanservice. 
6)  The prologue H-scene.  Probably the thing that annoys a lot of people is the h-scene in the prologue and how it came to be.  For people that go into this game with a 'I want to see pure love romance from beginning to end' attitude, this is a huge downer.  That it is followed by Hajime using the affections of a number of other women during the course of the story only enhances this impression for this part of the crowd.
7)  Ginko isn't one of the heroines.  Yes, in any other game, Ginko would have been one of the heroines.
The things that make this game worth playing.
1)  Everything above.  Seriously, the fact is that a lot of the people who play this game aren't the intended audience.  In some ways, this is a more down-to-earth version of the 'guy infiltrates a girls' school' trope.
2)  Despite only having three heroines, those heroines provide a full spectrum of personalities.  The whimsical Arika, the stoic and straightforward Benio, and the sweet-natured Peko provide a lot of variety without any real overlap.  If Ginko or Rion (the ones the largest part of the fanbase seemed to want routes for) were heroines in this game, it would distract from things greatly.  Moreover, there is way too much overlap between Ginko and Arika personality-wise.
3)  There is just enough darkness to the setting and story to create a firm contrast to the soft atmosphere of the girls' school.  In a lot of cases with these 'girls school infiltration' VNs, there is a sense of unreality created as a result of poor buildup of the setting.  
4)  This game doesn't even attempt to imitate the success of other companies.  I honestly think they should have named this game something else, because the title makes it seem like a game that should be a soft romance rather than the more complex story it is.
5)  Hajime is a protagonist you can enjoy self-inserting into.  He is capable, intelligent, and ambitious, a combination that is a refreshing change from most VN protagonists in general.

Raillore is 3rdeye's  most recent chuunige, made back in 2019.  At the time, I tried to play it and dropped it after the prologue, for a number of reasons.  The primary reason was the lack of narration in combat scenes... For some reason, 3rdEye has almost no narration in this game, comparative even to charage.  Instead, battle scenes are done using CGs, brief animations, and sound-effects.  Unfortunately, this means you generally have no idea of what is going on, due to the limitations of such things.  The second issue was the second protagonist, who is your classic sorta former-criminal dameningen, Grey.  Grey is... very familiar.  He is the type of guy who has frustrated anime, manga, and LN fans for decades with being the lazy and feckless bastard who is only good at tricking people.  This type of protagonist makes for a very predictable story that is not in the least bit interesting, at least in my experience.  The last was the pacing... which is generally awful.  Though, it is hard not to be awful when no real effort is put into explaining the world outside of the ever-increasing number of encyclopedia terms hidden behind the game's clunky menu.
Supposedly, Raillore is at least a few generations later than us, after some kind of apocalypse that destroys civilizations and leaves pockets of people with weak superpowers excavating the ruins of their ancestors living in primitive cities like Raillore.  At some point before the story began, some people began losing their original superpower and gaining the power to transform relics of the old civilization into working artifacts.  Unfortunately, due to several incidents, these poor individuals experience extreme persecution and, at first, are hunted to death then later are inserted into a machine that erases their power and memories.
The first of the protagonists is Reno, one of the two boys in the prologue, who has been through enough hell that his personality seems to have been cut down until he became a machine-like warrior existing only to follow orders.  He is a Snatcher, (so is Grey), his power allowing him to take others' superpowers temporarily and convert them into power to fuel is much more powerful superpower, which increases all of his physical abilities in exchange for transforming his personality into a berserker of sorts.  Since Reno is already at Cloud (from FF7) levels of physical ability even before the transformation, this means stone buildings blowing apart at a blow and tiles cracking just from him running around, lol.  
Snatchers seem to suffer under a similar - if less intense- level of prejudice from the population of the city.  Snatchers are generally feared and used as weapons by the authorities, partnering them with powerful supers who are tasked with judging when is best to give them permission to 'Plunder' others' powers.  
All of this means that if I hadn't had to dig for every, single, frigging detail by going through the encyclopedia there was an immense amount of potential for this setting.  There is a lot that could be played with to make the story interesting, but the fact that you have to actually search for even vague details means that there is no real enjoyment from the world-building aspect.
Similarly, this game's story should have been interesting, the battles should have been epic, and the characters should have been memorable...
Unfortunately, 3rdEye's approach to the game meant that none of these promises were fulfilled.  In a VN, especially an action VN and/or a plotge, narration is the foundation of the story.  You can fool around with visuals all you want to color in the gaps and give people something to build on, but it is the narration that makes the story.  The near-complete lack of narration in this game, particularly in battle scenes and important story scenes, is fatal to this game's quality.  
 

Saga Frontier is one of the most oddball rpgs to have been released on the ps1, and the ps1 was long considered the 'era of classics' for all jrpg-dom, with remakes of the earlier major names and innumerable newer classics being released for the system.  The Saga series in general is something of an acquired taste, due to the sheer opaqueness of the leveling mechanics and odd, often nonsensical experimentation with random game elements.  
In terms of game mechanics, Saga Frontier is easily the most well-explored of the series.  It's devoted cult of fanboys and -girls have revealed everything of consequence about the original version over the years, so how much is this changed from the original?
First of all, for those of you who have played the original, a number of quality of life improvements.  The ability to quicksave and autosaves at important points mean you are far less likely to trap yourself into having to spend hours regaining progress.  The immense expansion of save slots makes it possible to backtrack when you underleveled for the final zones.  As important in its own way, the spark trees and probabilities for weapon/fist techniques have been unified into a single one usable by all human and half-mystic characters.   Last of all, New Game+ lets you bring over character progress, money, skills, and items between paths, making it unnecessary to keep re-leveling them each time you start a new character path.
However, for true fanboys, the true wow moment is the added content.  Now, Saga Frontier is a game that is very sparse on active storytelling.  It has the same 'silent presentation of the environment' that can be seen in a lot of the pre-2000 jrpgs taken to extremes, and this is the primarily element that takes the Saga series into a niche of its own.  More than anything, I loved that they added in all the cut-out content from the original... especially a ton of content in Asellus's story, which was my favorite and most painful (leveling Asellus is painful at first) path from the original.  This includes extra ways to get out of the first area (depending on your method, you end up in different places and have slightly different experiences), the fixing of the old Asellus path bug that sometimes made it difficult to get the Half-mystic or human endings, and a general polishing of the experience in general.  
The other chunk of added content is the Fuse path.  In the original game, Fuse was a curiosity of a character usually gained too late for him to be of any use (the method for obtaining him requires confronting a firebird on steroids who can incinerate your party in one hit).  In this game, he has his own path, which is essentially his case files on each of the characters where his own work intersected with theirs.  Since these are always told from his - slightly narcissistic - point of view, they are highly amusing to someone who has finished all the other paths.  While this path doesn't add anything story-wise, it is still funny to go through.
Now for my assessment of the base game...
First, the most opaque of the game mechanics, the Battle Rank System.  To be honest, this is perhaps the easiest way for someone new to the series to self-sabotage.  Every battle you undertake, whether it is against a slime or a dragon, upgrades your Battle Rank (which is unseen), eventually unleashing upon you a new tier of enemies for you to fight.  To be blunt, if you sit around in the first area killing the same things, the game punishes you with monsters that can one-shot you in the next area, because you raised the battle rank too high.  This means that grinding essentially requires you to leave whatever dungeon you are in every once in a while to upgrade the enemies into something you can actually gain upgrades off of.
That brings me to the second unusual mechanic, the leveling system.  Saga Frontier and the series in general doesn't have linear numbered leveling such as is seen in Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy.  Instead, depending on probability mechanics and what you did in the battle (hit stuff with the sword alone, used techniques, used magic, etc) you gain a stat upgrade of some sort at the end of battle, though this slows if you are fighting enemies below your character's (hidden) level.  What adds an element of annoyance to this is that the probability of whether you get any gains or not is heavily dependent on the enemy group you encounter.  This makes only a few of the scaling areas attractive for grinding (pretty much just the Bio Research Lab, which always has the top tier of the battle rank).  
Last of all is sparking... which is the process of gaining new skills, techniques, and magic.  If you use a sword in combat, your character will not only gain physical stats at the end of battle, but there is also a chance - based on the enemy's 'spark value' (a hidden factor) that your character will be inspired and obtain a new tech or magic.  Sword and fist techniques are sparked randomly based on which tech or whether you simply used the weapon devoid of techs.  Gun techniques are based off of you using a gun and are given to you after battle.  Sparking magic requires that the character using the magic have its 'gift' (gained through quests), have used that school of magic during the battle, and the character's intelligence stat.  
For story, Saga Frontier will always be a somewhat disappointing game, despite the sheer beauty of its visuals.  There will be innumerable times any given player will have wished for a few extra lines to flesh out a dialogue or for clearer hints to find the next place you need to go.  The fact that NPC dialogue doesn't really change significantly between paths says a lot in and of itself, and this is a common complaint for people who play any Saga game.
The fact that I found this to be an immensely enjoyable game is as much nostalgia as the game's actual worth.

I've had numerous comments from people who were asking, 'Do you still play VNs?' in the last year or so because I hardly post anymore.   When I do, it is usually litrpg, random commentary, or maybe one game a month.  The short answer is yes.  The full answer is a bit more complicated.
First, I should note that a lot of this is about timing... to be slightly more specific, a confluence of factors that created a singularity of me just not posting anymore.  The events in question are my increasing intolerance for disinteresting themes and pure SOL (that is, slice of life without a central plot, even if it is loose); Coronavirus causing a dramatic drop in the release of non-nukige JVNs; and the resulting tendency I had for going back and replaying stuff I've already posted about in the past (sometimes multiple times).  
While the sheer number of VNs I play per year has gone down from 50-70 to about 20-30, a good portion of those are replays.  I'd say about a little over two-fifths of all the VNs I've played in the last year and a half have been ones I've already replayed multiple times, another fifth were ones I dug out of my archives, another fifth were kusoge not worth posting about, and the remaining fifth are the ones I posted on.  
A contributing factor to this is Coronavirus and the resulting depression in the non-nukige VN market for PC (which I play almost exclusively, since I don't want to mod  my consoles for the sake of VNs alone).  Companies that once put out games multiple times a year have maybe released one in the last year and a half, other companies have quietly gone out of business, and yet other ones had to drop projects because they couldn't work around the health restrictions.  Charage alone have seen an unprecedented decrease in production, with entire months going by with NO releases (something that would have been unthinkable before Coronavirus).  
The last major issue is that my burnout on pure SOL (at least high school SOL) has turned into a complete intolerance.  I once thought it would ease somewhat with time, but, if anything, it has gotten worse.  If there isn't something besides pure SOL in there to catch my interest (like nakige, utsuge, or plotge elements), I simply won't be able to finish them.  
If the protagonist is interesting, I can still (barely) play school life that have something in the way of non-SOL elements, but otherwise, they are unplayable to me.
 

Duelist Engage is one of a number of VNs I was pretty sure I underrated relative to my time doing VN of the Month.  The fact that the VN stuck in my mind even almost a decade later says that this supposition was most likely correct.  Thankfully, after replaying it (after so long it was mostly new to me) I found that this supposition was correct.
Before I dig into story and character issues, I need to note that one way this VN stands out over modern charage is the expressiveness of the heroine sprites.  Before I went back and played this, I never realized just how much the expressiveness of VN sprites has decreased over the years, as well as the lack of any individuality.  Certain restrictive conventions that came into place later on (no bangs overhanging the eyes, no extreme changes in posture, etc) are not found in this VN, and it is surprising the degree to which this gives each character sprite more impact.  Monaka and Tomoe (his mother) in particular have extremely expressive sprites with a distinctive style and posture that is notably different from what you see in later VNs, even those just three or four years later.
It needs to be said that this is an old-style VN.  That comes with positives and negatives.  Old-style VNs tended to have stronger heroine routes than newer ones, and characterization was often more extreme to emphasize charm points of the various heroines.  Newer VNs tend to be a bit more subtle with heroine characterization, and there is a lot less reliance on dramatic entrances and extreme personality traits.  This led to a tendency - particularly in charage - for everyday life dominating VNs, versus the comedy drama that tended to be more ever-present in earlier VNs.  It's a matter of opinion as to which approach is better, but I generally prefer the older style.
In this VN, the protagonist, Yukito, for the sake of saving his mother's restaurant, has to marry someone from Colangrein (initially his arranged fiance, Violetta) in order to gain access to an inheritance from his father.   However, Violetta is a knight and immediately challenges him to a duel, with a ballooning series of antics going out from there as more and more heroines get dragged into a traditional 'shuraba' (numerous girls competing for a single - usually donkan - guy's attention).  I'm not going to go into individual heroine routes, so I'll just give you an idea of what the game is like in general.
The heroines include: his fiance Violetta; his childhood friend Monaka; the aggressive loli (one year younger) Erica; the mysterious former student council president, Tsubaki; and the meek but surprisingly big-hearted Hina.  
Violetta is your traditional stick-up-the-rear-end heroine, who refuses to marry anyone weaker than herself and is driven to achieve her ambition of becoming the next Knight King of Colangrein.  While she is essentially good-hearted, her competitive side dominates her most of the time, and she naturally takes control of most situations just by being present.  On the other hand, she is needlessly stubborn and surprisingly cute when she thinks no one is watching.
Monaka is the protagonist's osananajimi (tsundere due to the fact that Yukito is as dense as a warship's hull).  Like a lot of early such relationships, the protagonist goes to wake her up at the neighbor's house every morning and feeds her as naturally as one would a pet.  That said, Monaka isn't as much of a wild child as others of this particular achetype tend to be.  While she can be aggressive, she is surprisingly thoughtful when it comes to others' feelings, which drives her crazy when Yukito fails utterly to notice her infatuation with him.
Erica is the token loli of the VN (token lolis were almost universal in old-style VNs, even chuunige).  Like a lot of such characters, she is as childish as her physical appearance would indicate.  However, this comes from her upbringing being a mixture of mental abuse and extreme sheltering.  Her family isn't exactly warm-hearted, and her bodyguards are constantly trying to rein her in, thus leaving her devoid of anyone close enough to really serve as a mentor or role model.
Tsubaki is your standard Yamato Nadeshiko heroine... on the surface.  She has a lot of things roiling beneath that calm and elegant exterior, not the least of which being an extremely aggressive personality that is a good match for that of Violetta, when provoked.   She is also desperately poor, living in the belltower of the school, despite being a relative to a wealthy family.  
Hina is the most 'normal' of the heroines (even compared to Monaka).  At first she merely seems meek and timid, and this is a valid assessment much of the time.  However, she has the force of personality necessary to remain next to someone like Erica without being overpowered, and she is perhaps the most honest with herself of all the heroines, especially when it comes to Yukito.  
One thing that struck me when I played through the paths was the consistency of the main storyline.  Like many early charage, this game has a solid main storyline that continues into the various heroine routes (albeit with dramatically different events following the split), and no relevant element of the setting is left ignored.  The fights/duels, while not on the level of a true action VN, are still of some interest when they happen.  In addition, this VN was really good at creating an emotional attachment to the heroines, which is an area where most charage tend to fail in the last five years or so.
Conclusion
Duelist x Engage is an excellent example of the best of the nascent era of charage, when they were just gaining momentum as a genre.  As a result, it stands out greatly when compared to the charage of today, which tend to be more bland and mundane in comparison.  For those who want a bit more substance to their charage, this is an excellent choice.

This is the newest game by Minato Soft, the makers of Majikoi.  As per usual, I'll be straight with yall and say that I thought this would end up essentially being a slice-of-life failure like a lot of Minato Soft's non-Majikoi VNs.  However, this game is actually much closer to a chuunige in nature than I anticipated.  In the end, I gave this one of the highest ratings I've given in a long while, but there are some issues, which I'll mention farther along.
Wagahime's protagonist is a young lad from the frontier called Shaon, the adopted son of the Great Tenken Master Figaro.  Shaon is, personality wise, very much like the harem protagonists you see so often in charage.  However, he does have the will to fight when necessary and the ability to commit to a course of action when needed, so he definitely stands well above that crowd.  At the beginning, Shaon contracts with the Artificial God, Minjara, and gains the power to fight like, well... a god for three minutes every three days, in addition to his pre-existing Tenken, which lets him heal and strengthen others.  He then sets off on a journey to see the world and find a wife, along with his little sister Ebiita and his father's friend Peta (a sapient rabbit-type person).  
One negative I have to put forth about this VN, though it makes sense considering that the Tenmazoku route is the true one, is that the route order is locked, forcing you to do the Empire and Federation before you can do the Tenmazoku (Krone).  There is no common route.  Instead, there is a storyline for each country, with a single heroine (and a bunch of fake endings with other girls that just consist of H-scenes).  In the case of the Empire, it is the Empress Noa.  In the case of the Federation, it is the proxy PM, Erin; and in the case of the Tenmazoku, it is the Tenmaou (Queen of the Tenma) Krone.  
Empire
The Empire route is the most SOL-friendly of the three routes, focusing on Shaon journeying across the empire, then his time in the capital, before the climax of the story.  Due to events early on, Shaon gets his foot in the door and meets Noa in a fashion that is relatively realistic, albeit only within the setting (it requires suspension of disbelief that a 700 year-old Empire would fail to insulate their royals better from the nobility and commoners).  Shaon, given his bond with Minjara, of course quickly manages to gain the interest of a number of players in the political game, making his stay there the most complicated of the three, in terms of personal relationships.  
In many ways, this path justifies the locking of the paths the most.  The drama here would lose most of its impact if you were aware of the events of the Tenmazoku path, and the drama is pretty good.  Action scenes here are very similar to those of Majikoi, albeit often longer-lasting (Momoyo not being there to end things in an instant and most people being on more even terms when it comes to power).  The romance portions are pretty innocent as these things go, though the issue of social status does come up (and is promptly squished).
The Federation
The Federation path starts a bit more abruptly than that of the Empire.  The Federation is a nation formed on the old frontiers of the Empire by escaped slaves and dissidents from one of the darker eras of that nation.  It is a nation of numerous races with a system whereby each province selects a governor, who then votes for the PM.  The PM is more of a 'first amongst equals' than a true federalist leader, and the elections are often... lively beforehand.  
This path is more action-packed from beginning to end than either of the other two paths, for reasons that make perfect sense as part of the story.  Erin, the heroine of this path, is an elf and a politician, through and through.  That is not to say she is black-hearted.  Rather, she is perfectly willing to use every opportunity to gain positive publicity in the course of pursuing the good of her nation.  The protagonist's role here is a bit more specialized (outside of the romance).
As I said before, this path is more action packed than the other two paths, mostly because Erin is so desperately moving around to get elected as the next PM, which results in her personal subordinates having to deal with a lot more in the way of tribulations on a daily basis.  Romantically, the issues here are predictable to anyone who has read enough high fantasy with relationships between races with different lifespans.  
Tenmazoku
The Tenmazoku path's heroine, Krone is a lot like Momoyo (except about five times as powerful) if she didn't have her grandfather to rein her in and everybody around her encouraged her bad habits instead of restraining them.  At the same time, she has the same intensity to everything she does, her affection bringing back memories of Majikoi for me.   Honestly, this was my favorite path (obviously), and it was apparent from the beginning that this was intended to be the true path, at least to me.
This path is very revealing about a lot of the setting's peculiarities, certain characters' motivations, and a number of other issues.  There are a lot of good action scenes, a lot of familiar comedy routines (to those who played Majikoi), and I honestly liked the parts on Rancage (the Tenmazoku continent) for the sheer contrast to the mainland countries.  That said, I believe this path could have been greatly enhanced if more detail went into the early parts of this path after the arrival at Rancage, because it felt like there was an excessive focus on Krone's obsession with Shaon, lol.
The last stretch of the story (the romance is pretty much just an evolution from the main part of the path) is pretty much solid drama and action, and while it lacks the sheer impact of something written by Nitroplus or Light, it was still an enjoyable experience.  
The Negative
I'm going to be straight here... they set this game up for a Majikoi-style fandisc or discs.  The other 'endings' are simply brief event and h-scenes that cut off abruptly once they've done the deed, which is less than pleasing for me, since I was looking forward to the possibility of actual heroine routes for some of the sub-characters, like Youksha.
Conclusion
Overall, if you liked Majikoi and Minato Soft's style, you'll like this game.  If you didn't, there is a good chance you'll have the same issues here.  This game has first-class production values and characters, but if you don't like the style, it might be hard to enjoy.  The issue with the sub-heroines is a seriously annoying one, albeit one that is likely to be solved in a year or four with a fandisc or two.  I gave this game a pretty high rating, and I don't regret it.  I also don't doubt that some people will hate on this game, hard.

This might seem like an odd choice for a blog post, but it should be noted that, after more then twelve years and seven hundred VNs, remembering each and every one is impossible.  In fact, I hardly recall roughly 70% of all the VNs I've played, and less than 10% are memorable enough that I consider replaying them once in a great while.  I'm somewhat infamous for my lists, but I figured one more wouldn't hurt.  Remember, these are the VNs I still remember to the point where I can state almost everything about what I like and hate about each.  This list is going to be split into two parts, the VNs I loved and the VNs I loved to hate.
The VNs I loved to Hate
Suburashiki Hibi- Yes, I hate this VN.  In truth, I hate almost everything written by Sca-ji that I've read.  Sca-ji's style drives me up the wall (for some reason, it presses all the wrong buttons), and his love of unreliable narrators only makes it worse.  Suburashiki Hibi is just the most obvious example of a VN I can't forget, even though I want to, badly.  I can admit that Suburashiki Hibi is interesting... but to me that just doesn't stop me from hating it anyway.
Aiyoku no Eustia- For a chuunige fan like me to actually outright hate a chuunige is actually fairly difficult.  90% of the reason I eventually came to hate Eustia was because of its true/Eustia route.  I didn't like Caim's rapid personality change, the fact that elements of the setting introduced in Eustia's path make all other paths impossible, and I absolutely loathed Eustia herself (what is it with the love for the helpless and frail heroine in some games?).  That said, it doesn't change the fact that I liked most of the game before I got onto Eustia's path... but it does mean that I will never admit this is a truly great game.
Ryuusei World Actor- Similarly to above, this is a chuunige I love to hate, despite it being memorable.  There is one simple reason for this... it was made to be a prequel rather than a whole game in and of itself.  There is no sense of completion, no satisfaction to be gained by completing this story.  In addition, it was only recently that its sequel was - finally - announced.  Worse, Kinugasa Shougo's style of never really explaining the setting, except in the most oblique of fashions, greatly harms the enjoyment of this game's plot.  In the case of his previous works, it was relatively easy to extrapolate and speculate yourself into an understanding of the setting based on what was there, but there is a definite sense that way too much is left unsaid about this setting.
Sakura no Uta- Oddly, this is a game I thought I would have loved, given the twisted relationships and messy backstory involved.  However, once again Sca-Ji's style of presentation and love of unreliable narrators drove me nuts.  Not to mention the constant abuse of foreshadowing and repetition
VNs I Love so much they are unforgettable
Dies Irae- Obviously, Dies Irae is one of the penultimate chuunige ever made.  While I personally think Masada turned into a complete incompetent after KKK, there is no denying the quality of Dies Irae's narrative, its characters, and the way it seems to age so well.  Dies Irae is one of those rare VNs that doesn't suffer at all from the passing of a decade or more between its original release and now.  That isn't to say it hasn't been left behind somewhat by the conventions of the genre, but in the end, that doesn't matter as much as you would think it would.
Fate/Stay Night- Arguably the VN that turned chuunige from a mere curiosity to an actual niche genre.  While many people have a love/hate relationship with Shirou and the Nasuverse, there is no denying that much of the game is enjoyable and it embodies most of the virtues and flaws of the early era of the genre.
Draculius- The VN that changed my viewpoint on the harem ending and actually did vampires right (outside of the comedy, anyway).  In all honesty, before I picked it up at random, I had no idea this would become one of my most-replayed VNs of all time.  While this game has aged poorly in some ways, in others it's presentation is almost ideal.
Evolimit- In my mind, this game is Higashide's masterpiece, the defining game of his career, whereas others will argue that it was Ayakashibito.  However, for all that I enjoyed Ayakashibito, this is the game I go back to play over and over, whenever I want my faith in JVNs revived.
Devils Devel Concept- No, this is not the best game out there.  It is a total niche within a niche game.  I love its characters and setting, but most people would probably drop it solely based on the artwork.  Devils Devel Concept taught me that the protagonist didn't need to be the good guy to be interesting and that heroines didn't need to be fainting lilies to make a chuunige work.
Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- Let's be clear... visually this game has aged horribly.  It is from a much earlier era than most of the games on this list and it shows.  However, I  have to note that it is one of the single best nakige ever made.  I can still go back and cry for Tonoko, Shino, and Miyabi no matter how many times I replay it, and the sense of salvation after the end of one of those three paths, the catharsis is so strong that my stress buildup is perfectly lanced afterward.
Houkago no Futekikakusha- I frequently give this as an example of the ideal 'hard' utsuge.  The situation the protagonist is in is hopeless from the beginning, and his suffering his pre-determined.  Moreover, when the story begins he is already broken almost beyond repair.  The way it is presented provides great catharsis, though like many hard utsuge, the setting is all over the place.
Konata yori Kanata Made- Many consider the first Konakana to be the ideal for the 'soft' utsuge genre, and I don't generally bother to argue with them.  While similar games were made later on occasion, one can always feel the influence of this game in them, often to the point where it feels like they are almost plagiarizing parts of it.  
Akatsuki no Goei- I have a love/hate relationship with Kinugasa Shougo.  He hates completing stories, he never explains anything unless he has to, and his endings are always open-ended unless he is coerced to make them not so.  Akatsuki no Goei (the series) embodies him at his best, with Kaito being a complex character that only appears to be your typical 'dameningen' protagonist if you aren't paying attention.
Hapymaher- What often comes back to me about Hapymaher, compared to later Purple Soft games, was the ideal synchronicity of its aesthetic and its music.  It is very, very rare for me to bother complementing a VN on its music, since most essentially use rearrangements of old BGMs without accounting for unique themes and atmosphere.  While there are some severe obstacles to making this an easily replayable game (the Christmas arc is overwhelmingly boring the second time around), it is still a VN worth experiencing.
Semiramis no Tenbin- Semiramis no Tenbin is an oddity.  It is a game based in a school setting in modern Japan that doesn't gloss over Japan's social flaws or exaggerate them to excess.  I say this because the Japanese are as good at pretending certain issues don't exist as we white Americans have been at pretending racism doesn't exist.  Not to mention that the beginning of this game locked it in my memory eternally.
Nanairo Reincarnation- This is one of the few games in my VN experience that I actually out and out named a kamige on first playthrough.  I don't regret it today, and I don't think I ever will.  I could put down any number of reasons to love this game, but it is better, in this case, for readers to make their own conclusions.
Akeiro Kaikitan- I mostly chose to keep multiple VNs by the same author and team off this list.  However, I should note that I have actually replayed Akeiro six times since its original release... despite it having been released in 2016, a mere six years ago.  I play it about once, sometimes twice a year.  Why?  Because it is still interesting no matter how many times I read it.  The presentation of the various paths is about as close to the storyteller's ideal as it is possible to get, making it difficult to get truly bored of if you put some time in between replays.
Komorebi no Nostalgica- Say what you like about Takaya Aya, but his moments of brilliance definitely leave an impression.  Komorebi no Nostalgica is easily the best (mostly) non-action sci-fi VN I've ever read.  Ironically, the primary reason for this is how the central non-heroine character, Cinema is handled in the various paths.  It is impossible to fully explain to someone who hasn't played the game just how powerful a role Cinema plays as a supporting character as well as the game's central character, and I'm not even going to try here.
Ayakashibito- While Evolimit is my favorite Higashide game, I can't fail to mention Ayakashibito here.  Ayakashibito is the work of a genius, and it most definitely shows.  It was also the VN that first showed Higashide's basic style, which almost always utilizes a protagonist with an intimate relationship with the true heroine that continues to thrive regardless of heroine choice.  Ayakashibito is less refined than Evolimit, but in exchange, it also feels more freeform than some of his later works.  It also established his creation of high-quality antagonists (Kuki Youkou, Shannon Wordsworth, etc).
Ruitomo- Ruitomo is probably the most famous of all the Akatsuki Works games, for good reason.  It is a high-quality classic plotge from an era where such games were relatively plentiful, and its style was the one that defined the expectations of fans for the company's games, though they later took things in a more action-focused direction.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier- This VN is one I push for weaboos who like the romanticized eras (Sengoku Jidai, Bakumatsu era, etc).  It is based in an alternate world where young Japanese women are sometimes chosen by 'demon-aura stones' that grant them immense physical powers and heightened intelligence in exchange for being unable to have children and being naturally more aggressive than is the norm.  As a result, these women are generally adopted by samurai families and raised to be bodyguards, assassins, and in various other roles normally reserved for men.  The protagonist is a young man raised by a feminized version of Kondou Isao and Hijikata Toshizo and is essentially Okita Soujirou.  It begins previous to the formation of the Roshigumi and branches off after the initial stages of the rebellion that began the collapse of Tokugawa power.  
Sekien no Inganock- This is pretty much the only Liar Soft game I didn't have trouble playing.  In retrospect, it isn't as good as I remember it being, but it is still enjoyable.
Majikoi- Say what you want about Majikoi.  Various people either love or hate it and everything by Minato Soft, but I personally think it was an excellent base that they used effectively to milk the setting.  Later games and fandiscs added depth to the characters and expanded the cast, and this, the original was a great game (in my eyes) in itself.
Grisaia- Probably the most popular VN to introduce VNs to newbies now that Tsukihime and FSN have become so dated as to be almost unreadable for new people.  Like many VNs that got translated, it has a lot of people either worshipping or hating on it, but its quality (in Japanese) is undeniable.
Soukou Akki Muramasa- Easily the best game Nitroplus has ever produced.  While it is a heavy read, it is also a VN worth reading at least once, if you have the mastery of Japanese to do so.  However, it is also emotionally draining, so many who start it never finish it.
Hello, Lady- I could have chosen any of Akatsuki Works' chuunige, but with the final version of the game that includes the FD routes and the new true route, this game has easily become my favorite Hino Wataru game.
Kitto Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo- A game by Shumon Yuu.  Nothing else needs to be said.  Play it, or you aren't a true JVN fanboy.
Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide- An oddball sort of chuunige by Shumon Yuu.  This one is fully voiced (protagonist included) and has a solid story and cast of characters.  
Silverio Trinity- of the three Silverio games, I'll say right off that this is the one I liked the most.  While Vendetta has some great moments, Trinity is where I thought the setting first came alive truly.
Sakura, Moyu- Honestly, I think this is the best VN, by far, that Favorite has produced.  I cried more while I played this game than in all the other games combined, and I was more emotionally invested in the story than any of them by far.
 

This is the newest game by Minato Soft, the makers of Majikoi.  As per usual, I'll be straight with yall and say that I thought this would end up essentially being a slice-of-life failure like a lot of Minato Soft's non-Majikoi VNs.  However, this game is actually much closer to a chuunige in nature than I anticipated.  In the end, I gave this one of the highest ratings I've given in a long while, but there are some issues, which I'll mention farther along.
Wagahime's protagonist is a young lad from the frontier called Shaon, the adopted son of the Great Tenken Master Figaro.  Shaon is, personality wise, very much like the harem protagonists you see so often in charage.  However, he does have the will to fight when necessary and the ability to commit to a course of action when needed, so he definitely stands well above that crowd.  At the beginning, Shaon contracts with the Artificial God, Minjara, and gains the power to fight like, well... a god for three minutes every three days, in addition to his pre-existing Tenken, which lets him heal and strengthen others.  He then sets off on a journey to see the world and find a wife, along with his little sister Ebiita and his father's friend Peta (a sapient rabbit-type person).  
One negative I have to put forth about this VN, though it makes sense considering that the Tenmazoku route is the true one, is that the route order is locked, forcing you to do the Empire and Federation before you can do the Tenmazoku (Krone).  There is no common route.  Instead, there is a storyline for each country, with a single heroine (and a bunch of fake endings with other girls that just consist of H-scenes).  In the case of the Empire, it is the Empress Noa.  In the case of the Federation, it is the proxy PM, Erin; and in the case of the Tenmazoku, it is the Tenmaou (Queen of the Tenma) Krone.  
Empire
The Empire route is the most SOL-friendly of the three routes, focusing on Shaon journeying across the empire, then his time in the capital, before the climax of the story.  Due to events early on, Shaon gets his foot in the door and meets Noa in a fashion that is relatively realistic, albeit only within the setting (it requires suspension of disbelief that a 700 year-old Empire would fail to insulate their royals better from the nobility and commoners).  Shaon, given his bond with Minjara, of course quickly manages to gain the interest of a number of players in the political game, making his stay there the most complicated of the three, in terms of personal relationships.  
In many ways, this path justifies the locking of the paths the most.  The drama here would lose most of its impact if you were aware of the events of the Tenmazoku path, and the drama is pretty good.  Action scenes here are very similar to those of Majikoi, albeit often longer-lasting (Momoyo not being there to end things in an instant and most people being on more even terms when it comes to power).  The romance portions are pretty innocent as these things go, though the issue of social status does come up (and is promptly squished).
The Federation
The Federation path starts a bit more abruptly than that of the Empire.  The Federation is a nation formed on the old frontiers of the Empire by escaped slaves and dissidents from one of the darker eras of that nation.  It is a nation of numerous races with a system whereby each province selects a governor, who then votes for the PM.  The PM is more of a 'first amongst equals' than a true federalist leader, and the elections are often... lively beforehand.  
This path is more action-packed from beginning to end than either of the other two paths, for reasons that make perfect sense as part of the story.  Erin, the heroine of this path, is an elf and a politician, through and through.  That is not to say she is black-hearted.  Rather, she is perfectly willing to use every opportunity to gain positive publicity in the course of pursuing the good of her nation.  The protagonist's role here is a bit more specialized (outside of the romance).
As I said before, this path is more action packed than the other two paths, mostly because Erin is so desperately moving around to get elected as the next PM, which results in her personal subordinates having to deal with a lot more in the way of tribulations on a daily basis.  Romantically, the issues here are predictable to anyone who has read enough high fantasy with relationships between races with different lifespans.  
Tenmazoku
The Tenmazoku path's heroine, Krone is a lot like Momoyo (except about five times as powerful) if she didn't have her grandfather to rein her in and everybody around her encouraged her bad habits instead of restraining them.  At the same time, she has the same intensity to everything she does, her affection bringing back memories of Majikoi for me.   Honestly, this was my favorite path (obviously), and it was apparent from the beginning that this was intended to be the true path, at least to me.
This path is very revealing about a lot of the setting's peculiarities, certain characters' motivations, and a number of other issues.  There are a lot of good action scenes, a lot of familiar comedy routines (to those who played Majikoi), and I honestly liked the parts on Rancage (the Tenmazoku continent) for the sheer contrast to the mainland countries.  That said, I believe this path could have been greatly enhanced if more detail went into the early parts of this path after the arrival at Rancage, because it felt like there was an excessive focus on Krone's obsession with Shaon, lol.
The last stretch of the story (the romance is pretty much just an evolution from the main part of the path) is pretty much solid drama and action, and while it lacks the sheer impact of something written by Nitroplus or Light, it was still an enjoyable experience.  
The Negative
I'm going to be straight here... they set this game up for a Majikoi-style fandisc or discs.  The other 'endings' are simply brief event and h-scenes that cut off abruptly once they've done the deed, which is less than pleasing for me, since I was looking forward to the possibility of actual heroine routes for some of the sub-characters, like Youksha.
Conclusion
Overall, if you liked Majikoi and Minato Soft's style, you'll like this game.  If you didn't, there is a good chance you'll have the same issues here.  This game has first-class production values and characters, but if you don't like the style, it might be hard to enjoy.  The issue with the sub-heroines is a seriously annoying one, albeit one that is likely to be solved in a year or four with a fandisc or two.  I gave this game a pretty high rating, and I don't regret it.  I also don't doubt that some people will hate on this game, hard.

This might seem like an odd choice for a blog post, but it should be noted that, after more then twelve years and seven hundred VNs, remembering each and every one is impossible.  In fact, I hardly recall roughly 70% of all the VNs I've played, and less than 10% are memorable enough that I consider replaying them once in a great while.  I'm somewhat infamous for my lists, but I figured one more wouldn't hurt.  Remember, these are the VNs I still remember to the point where I can state almost everything about what I like and hate about each.  This list is going to be split into two parts, the VNs I loved and the VNs I loved to hate.
The VNs I loved to Hate
Suburashiki Hibi- Yes, I hate this VN.  In truth, I hate almost everything written by Sca-ji that I've read.  Sca-ji's style drives me up the wall (for some reason, it presses all the wrong buttons), and his love of unreliable narrators only makes it worse.  Suburashiki Hibi is just the most obvious example of a VN I can't forget, even though I want to, badly.  I can admit that Suburashiki Hibi is interesting... but to me that just doesn't stop me from hating it anyway.
Aiyoku no Eustia- For a chuunige fan like me to actually outright hate a chuunige is actually fairly difficult.  90% of the reason I eventually came to hate Eustia was because of its true/Eustia route.  I didn't like Caim's rapid personality change, the fact that elements of the setting introduced in Eustia's path make all other paths impossible, and I absolutely loathed Eustia herself (what is it with the love for the helpless and frail heroine in some games?).  That said, it doesn't change the fact that I liked most of the game before I got onto Eustia's path... but it does mean that I will never admit this is a truly great game.
Ryuusei World Actor- Similarly to above, this is a chuunige I love to hate, despite it being memorable.  There is one simple reason for this... it was made to be a prequel rather than a whole game in and of itself.  There is no sense of completion, no satisfaction to be gained by completing this story.  In addition, it was only recently that its sequel was - finally - announced.  Worse, Kinugasa Shougo's style of never really explaining the setting, except in the most oblique of fashions, greatly harms the enjoyment of this game's plot.  In the case of his previous works, it was relatively easy to extrapolate and speculate yourself into an understanding of the setting based on what was there, but there is a definite sense that way too much is left unsaid about this setting.
Sakura no Uta- Oddly, this is a game I thought I would have loved, given the twisted relationships and messy backstory involved.  However, once again Sca-Ji's style of presentation and love of unreliable narrators drove me nuts.  Not to mention the constant abuse of foreshadowing and repetition
VNs I Love so much they are unforgettable
Dies Irae- Obviously, Dies Irae is one of the penultimate chuunige ever made.  While I personally think Masada turned into a complete incompetent after KKK, there is no denying the quality of Dies Irae's narrative, its characters, and the way it seems to age so well.  Dies Irae is one of those rare VNs that doesn't suffer at all from the passing of a decade or more between its original release and now.  That isn't to say it hasn't been left behind somewhat by the conventions of the genre, but in the end, that doesn't matter as much as you would think it would.
Fate/Stay Night- Arguably the VN that turned chuunige from a mere curiosity to an actual niche genre.  While many people have a love/hate relationship with Shirou and the Nasuverse, there is no denying that much of the game is enjoyable and it embodies most of the virtues and flaws of the early era of the genre.
Draculius- The VN that changed my viewpoint on the harem ending and actually did vampires right (outside of the comedy, anyway).  In all honesty, before I picked it up at random, I had no idea this would become one of my most-replayed VNs of all time.  While this game has aged poorly in some ways, in others it's presentation is almost ideal.
Evolimit- In my mind, this game is Higashide's masterpiece, the defining game of his career, whereas others will argue that it was Ayakashibito.  However, for all that I enjoyed Ayakashibito, this is the game I go back to play over and over, whenever I want my faith in JVNs revived.
Devils Devel Concept- No, this is not the best game out there.  It is a total niche within a niche game.  I love its characters and setting, but most people would probably drop it solely based on the artwork.  Devils Devel Concept taught me that the protagonist didn't need to be the good guy to be interesting and that heroines didn't need to be fainting lilies to make a chuunige work.
Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- Let's be clear... visually this game has aged horribly.  It is from a much earlier era than most of the games on this list and it shows.  However, I  have to note that it is one of the single best nakige ever made.  I can still go back and cry for Tonoko, Shino, and Miyabi no matter how many times I replay it, and the sense of salvation after the end of one of those three paths, the catharsis is so strong that my stress buildup is perfectly lanced afterward.
Houkago no Futekikakusha- I frequently give this as an example of the ideal 'hard' utsuge.  The situation the protagonist is in is hopeless from the beginning, and his suffering his pre-determined.  Moreover, when the story begins he is already broken almost beyond repair.  The way it is presented provides great catharsis, though like many hard utsuge, the setting is all over the place.
Konata yori Kanata Made- Many consider the first Konakana to be the ideal for the 'soft' utsuge genre, and I don't generally bother to argue with them.  While similar games were made later on occasion, one can always feel the influence of this game in them, often to the point where it feels like they are almost plagiarizing parts of it.  
Akatsuki no Goei- I have a love/hate relationship with Kinugasa Shougo.  He hates completing stories, he never explains anything unless he has to, and his endings are always open-ended unless he is coerced to make them not so.  Akatsuki no Goei (the series) embodies him at his best, with Kaito being a complex character that only appears to be your typical 'dameningen' protagonist if you aren't paying attention.
Hapymaher- What often comes back to me about Hapymaher, compared to later Purple Soft games, was the ideal synchronicity of its aesthetic and its music.  It is very, very rare for me to bother complementing a VN on its music, since most essentially use rearrangements of old BGMs without accounting for unique themes and atmosphere.  While there are some severe obstacles to making this an easily replayable game (the Christmas arc is overwhelmingly boring the second time around), it is still a VN worth experiencing.
Semiramis no Tenbin- Semiramis no Tenbin is an oddity.  It is a game based in a school setting in modern Japan that doesn't gloss over Japan's social flaws or exaggerate them to excess.  I say this because the Japanese are as good at pretending certain issues don't exist as we white Americans have been at pretending racism doesn't exist.  Not to mention that the beginning of this game locked it in my memory eternally.
Nanairo Reincarnation- This is one of the few games in my VN experience that I actually out and out named a kamige on first playthrough.  I don't regret it today, and I don't think I ever will.  I could put down any number of reasons to love this game, but it is better, in this case, for readers to make their own conclusions.
Akeiro Kaikitan- I mostly chose to keep multiple VNs by the same author and team off this list.  However, I should note that I have actually replayed Akeiro six times since its original release... despite it having been released in 2016, a mere six years ago.  I play it about once, sometimes twice a year.  Why?  Because it is still interesting no matter how many times I read it.  The presentation of the various paths is about as close to the storyteller's ideal as it is possible to get, making it difficult to get truly bored of if you put some time in between replays.
Komorebi no Nostalgica- Say what you like about Takaya Aya, but his moments of brilliance definitely leave an impression.  Komorebi no Nostalgica is easily the best (mostly) non-action sci-fi VN I've ever read.  Ironically, the primary reason for this is how the central non-heroine character, Cinema is handled in the various paths.  It is impossible to fully explain to someone who hasn't played the game just how powerful a role Cinema plays as a supporting character as well as the game's central character, and I'm not even going to try here.
Ayakashibito- While Evolimit is my favorite Higashide game, I can't fail to mention Ayakashibito here.  Ayakashibito is the work of a genius, and it most definitely shows.  It was also the VN that first showed Higashide's basic style, which almost always utilizes a protagonist with an intimate relationship with the true heroine that continues to thrive regardless of heroine choice.  Ayakashibito is less refined than Evolimit, but in exchange, it also feels more freeform than some of his later works.  It also established his creation of high-quality antagonists (Kuki Youkou, Shannon Wordsworth, etc).
Ruitomo- Ruitomo is probably the most famous of all the Akatsuki Works games, for good reason.  It is a high-quality classic plotge from an era where such games were relatively plentiful, and its style was the one that defined the expectations of fans for the company's games, though they later took things in a more action-focused direction.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier- This VN is one I push for weaboos who like the romanticized eras (Sengoku Jidai, Bakumatsu era, etc).  It is based in an alternate world where young Japanese women are sometimes chosen by 'demon-aura stones' that grant them immense physical powers and heightened intelligence in exchange for being unable to have children and being naturally more aggressive than is the norm.  As a result, these women are generally adopted by samurai families and raised to be bodyguards, assassins, and in various other roles normally reserved for men.  The protagonist is a young man raised by a feminized version of Kondou Isao and Hijikata Toshizo and is essentially Okita Soujirou.  It begins previous to the formation of the Roshigumi and branches off after the initial stages of the rebellion that began the collapse of Tokugawa power.  
Sekien no Inganock- This is pretty much the only Liar Soft game I didn't have trouble playing.  In retrospect, it isn't as good as I remember it being, but it is still enjoyable.
Majikoi- Say what you want about Majikoi.  Various people either love or hate it and everything by Minato Soft, but I personally think it was an excellent base that they used effectively to milk the setting.  Later games and fandiscs added depth to the characters and expanded the cast, and this, the original was a great game (in my eyes) in itself.
Grisaia- Probably the most popular VN to introduce VNs to newbies now that Tsukihime and FSN have become so dated as to be almost unreadable for new people.  Like many VNs that got translated, it has a lot of people either worshipping or hating on it, but its quality (in Japanese) is undeniable.
Soukou Akki Muramasa- Easily the best game Nitroplus has ever produced.  While it is a heavy read, it is also a VN worth reading at least once, if you have the mastery of Japanese to do so.  However, it is also emotionally draining, so many who start it never finish it.
Hello, Lady- I could have chosen any of Akatsuki Works' chuunige, but with the final version of the game that includes the FD routes and the new true route, this game has easily become my favorite Hino Wataru game.
Kitto Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo- A game by Shumon Yuu.  Nothing else needs to be said.  Play it, or you aren't a true JVN fanboy.
Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide- An oddball sort of chuunige by Shumon Yuu.  This one is fully voiced (protagonist included) and has a solid story and cast of characters.  
Silverio Trinity- of the three Silverio games, I'll say right off that this is the one I liked the most.  While Vendetta has some great moments, Trinity is where I thought the setting first came alive truly.
Sakura, Moyu- Honestly, I think this is the best VN, by far, that Favorite has produced.  I cried more while I played this game than in all the other games combined, and I was more emotionally invested in the story than any of them by far.
 

This is the newest game by Minato Soft, the makers of Majikoi.  As per usual, I'll be straight with yall and say that I thought this would end up essentially being a slice-of-life failure like a lot of Minato Soft's non-Majikoi VNs.  However, this game is actually much closer to a chuunige in nature than I anticipated.  In the end, I gave this one of the highest ratings I've given in a long while, but there are some issues, which I'll mention farther along.
Wagahime's protagonist is a young lad from the frontier called Shaon, the adopted son of the Great Tenken Master Figaro.  Shaon is, personality wise, very much like the harem protagonists you see so often in charage.  However, he does have the will to fight when necessary and the ability to commit to a course of action when needed, so he definitely stands well above that crowd.  At the beginning, Shaon contracts with the Artificial God, Minjara, and gains the power to fight like, well... a god for three minutes every three days, in addition to his pre-existing Tenken, which lets him heal and strengthen others.  He then sets off on a journey to see the world and find a wife, along with his little sister Ebiita and his father's friend Peta (a sapient rabbit-type person).  
One negative I have to put forth about this VN, though it makes sense considering that the Tenmazoku route is the true one, is that the route order is locked, forcing you to do the Empire and Federation before you can do the Tenmazoku (Krone).  There is no common route.  Instead, there is a storyline for each country, with a single heroine (and a bunch of fake endings with other girls that just consist of H-scenes).  In the case of the Empire, it is the Empress Noa.  In the case of the Federation, it is the proxy PM, Erin; and in the case of the Tenmazoku, it is the Tenmaou (Queen of the Tenma) Krone.  
Empire
The Empire route is the most SOL-friendly of the three routes, focusing on Shaon journeying across the empire, then his time in the capital, before the climax of the story.  Due to events early on, Shaon gets his foot in the door and meets Noa in a fashion that is relatively realistic, albeit only within the setting (it requires suspension of disbelief that a 700 year-old Empire would fail to insulate their royals better from the nobility and commoners).  Shaon, given his bond with Minjara, of course quickly manages to gain the interest of a number of players in the political game, making his stay there the most complicated of the three, in terms of personal relationships.  
In many ways, this path justifies the locking of the paths the most.  The drama here would lose most of its impact if you were aware of the events of the Tenmazoku path, and the drama is pretty good.  Action scenes here are very similar to those of Majikoi, albeit often longer-lasting (Momoyo not being there to end things in an instant and most people being on more even terms when it comes to power).  The romance portions are pretty innocent as these things go, though the issue of social status does come up (and is promptly squished).
The Federation
The Federation path starts a bit more abruptly than that of the Empire.  The Federation is a nation formed on the old frontiers of the Empire by escaped slaves and dissidents from one of the darker eras of that nation.  It is a nation of numerous races with a system whereby each province selects a governor, who then votes for the PM.  The PM is more of a 'first amongst equals' than a true federalist leader, and the elections are often... lively beforehand.  
This path is more action-packed from beginning to end than either of the other two paths, for reasons that make perfect sense as part of the story.  Erin, the heroine of this path, is an elf and a politician, through and through.  That is not to say she is black-hearted.  Rather, she is perfectly willing to use every opportunity to gain positive publicity in the course of pursuing the good of her nation.  The protagonist's role here is a bit more specialized (outside of the romance).
As I said before, this path is more action packed than the other two paths, mostly because Erin is so desperately moving around to get elected as the next PM, which results in her personal subordinates having to deal with a lot more in the way of tribulations on a daily basis.  Romantically, the issues here are predictable to anyone who has read enough high fantasy with relationships between races with different lifespans.  
Tenmazoku
The Tenmazoku path's heroine, Krone is a lot like Momoyo (except about five times as powerful) if she didn't have her grandfather to rein her in and everybody around her encouraged her bad habits instead of restraining them.  At the same time, she has the same intensity to everything she does, her affection bringing back memories of Majikoi for me.   Honestly, this was my favorite path (obviously), and it was apparent from the beginning that this was intended to be the true path, at least to me.
This path is very revealing about a lot of the setting's peculiarities, certain characters' motivations, and a number of other issues.  There are a lot of good action scenes, a lot of familiar comedy routines (to those who played Majikoi), and I honestly liked the parts on Rancage (the Tenmazoku continent) for the sheer contrast to the mainland countries.  That said, I believe this path could have been greatly enhanced if more detail went into the early parts of this path after the arrival at Rancage, because it felt like there was an excessive focus on Krone's obsession with Shaon, lol.
The last stretch of the story (the romance is pretty much just an evolution from the main part of the path) is pretty much solid drama and action, and while it lacks the sheer impact of something written by Nitroplus or Light, it was still an enjoyable experience.  
The Negative
I'm going to be straight here... they set this game up for a Majikoi-style fandisc or discs.  The other 'endings' are simply brief event and h-scenes that cut off abruptly once they've done the deed, which is less than pleasing for me, since I was looking forward to the possibility of actual heroine routes for some of the sub-characters, like Youksha.
Conclusion
Overall, if you liked Majikoi and Minato Soft's style, you'll like this game.  If you didn't, there is a good chance you'll have the same issues here.  This game has first-class production values and characters, but if you don't like the style, it might be hard to enjoy.  The issue with the sub-heroines is a seriously annoying one, albeit one that is likely to be solved in a year or four with a fandisc or two.  I gave this game a pretty high rating, and I don't regret it.  I also don't doubt that some people will hate on this game, hard.

This might seem like an odd choice for a blog post, but it should be noted that, after more then twelve years and seven hundred VNs, remembering each and every one is impossible.  In fact, I hardly recall roughly 70% of all the VNs I've played, and less than 10% are memorable enough that I consider replaying them once in a great while.  I'm somewhat infamous for my lists, but I figured one more wouldn't hurt.  Remember, these are the VNs I still remember to the point where I can state almost everything about what I like and hate about each.  This list is going to be split into two parts, the VNs I loved and the VNs I loved to hate.
The VNs I loved to Hate
Suburashiki Hibi- Yes, I hate this VN.  In truth, I hate almost everything written by Sca-ji that I've read.  Sca-ji's style drives me up the wall (for some reason, it presses all the wrong buttons), and his love of unreliable narrators only makes it worse.  Suburashiki Hibi is just the most obvious example of a VN I can't forget, even though I want to, badly.  I can admit that Suburashiki Hibi is interesting... but to me that just doesn't stop me from hating it anyway.
Aiyoku no Eustia- For a chuunige fan like me to actually outright hate a chuunige is actually fairly difficult.  90% of the reason I eventually came to hate Eustia was because of its true/Eustia route.  I didn't like Caim's rapid personality change, the fact that elements of the setting introduced in Eustia's path make all other paths impossible, and I absolutely loathed Eustia herself (what is it with the love for the helpless and frail heroine in some games?).  That said, it doesn't change the fact that I liked most of the game before I got onto Eustia's path... but it does mean that I will never admit this is a truly great game.
Ryuusei World Actor- Similarly to above, this is a chuunige I love to hate, despite it being memorable.  There is one simple reason for this... it was made to be a prequel rather than a whole game in and of itself.  There is no sense of completion, no satisfaction to be gained by completing this story.  In addition, it was only recently that its sequel was - finally - announced.  Worse, Kinugasa Shougo's style of never really explaining the setting, except in the most oblique of fashions, greatly harms the enjoyment of this game's plot.  In the case of his previous works, it was relatively easy to extrapolate and speculate yourself into an understanding of the setting based on what was there, but there is a definite sense that way too much is left unsaid about this setting.
Sakura no Uta- Oddly, this is a game I thought I would have loved, given the twisted relationships and messy backstory involved.  However, once again Sca-Ji's style of presentation and love of unreliable narrators drove me nuts.  Not to mention the constant abuse of foreshadowing and repetition
VNs I Love so much they are unforgettable
Dies Irae- Obviously, Dies Irae is one of the penultimate chuunige ever made.  While I personally think Masada turned into a complete incompetent after KKK, there is no denying the quality of Dies Irae's narrative, its characters, and the way it seems to age so well.  Dies Irae is one of those rare VNs that doesn't suffer at all from the passing of a decade or more between its original release and now.  That isn't to say it hasn't been left behind somewhat by the conventions of the genre, but in the end, that doesn't matter as much as you would think it would.
Fate/Stay Night- Arguably the VN that turned chuunige from a mere curiosity to an actual niche genre.  While many people have a love/hate relationship with Shirou and the Nasuverse, there is no denying that much of the game is enjoyable and it embodies most of the virtues and flaws of the early era of the genre.
Draculius- The VN that changed my viewpoint on the harem ending and actually did vampires right (outside of the comedy, anyway).  In all honesty, before I picked it up at random, I had no idea this would become one of my most-replayed VNs of all time.  While this game has aged poorly in some ways, in others it's presentation is almost ideal.
Evolimit- In my mind, this game is Higashide's masterpiece, the defining game of his career, whereas others will argue that it was Ayakashibito.  However, for all that I enjoyed Ayakashibito, this is the game I go back to play over and over, whenever I want my faith in JVNs revived.
Devils Devel Concept- No, this is not the best game out there.  It is a total niche within a niche game.  I love its characters and setting, but most people would probably drop it solely based on the artwork.  Devils Devel Concept taught me that the protagonist didn't need to be the good guy to be interesting and that heroines didn't need to be fainting lilies to make a chuunige work.
Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- Let's be clear... visually this game has aged horribly.  It is from a much earlier era than most of the games on this list and it shows.  However, I  have to note that it is one of the single best nakige ever made.  I can still go back and cry for Tonoko, Shino, and Miyabi no matter how many times I replay it, and the sense of salvation after the end of one of those three paths, the catharsis is so strong that my stress buildup is perfectly lanced afterward.
Houkago no Futekikakusha- I frequently give this as an example of the ideal 'hard' utsuge.  The situation the protagonist is in is hopeless from the beginning, and his suffering his pre-determined.  Moreover, when the story begins he is already broken almost beyond repair.  The way it is presented provides great catharsis, though like many hard utsuge, the setting is all over the place.
Konata yori Kanata Made- Many consider the first Konakana to be the ideal for the 'soft' utsuge genre, and I don't generally bother to argue with them.  While similar games were made later on occasion, one can always feel the influence of this game in them, often to the point where it feels like they are almost plagiarizing parts of it.  
Akatsuki no Goei- I have a love/hate relationship with Kinugasa Shougo.  He hates completing stories, he never explains anything unless he has to, and his endings are always open-ended unless he is coerced to make them not so.  Akatsuki no Goei (the series) embodies him at his best, with Kaito being a complex character that only appears to be your typical 'dameningen' protagonist if you aren't paying attention.
Hapymaher- What often comes back to me about Hapymaher, compared to later Purple Soft games, was the ideal synchronicity of its aesthetic and its music.  It is very, very rare for me to bother complementing a VN on its music, since most essentially use rearrangements of old BGMs without accounting for unique themes and atmosphere.  While there are some severe obstacles to making this an easily replayable game (the Christmas arc is overwhelmingly boring the second time around), it is still a VN worth experiencing.
Semiramis no Tenbin- Semiramis no Tenbin is an oddity.  It is a game based in a school setting in modern Japan that doesn't gloss over Japan's social flaws or exaggerate them to excess.  I say this because the Japanese are as good at pretending certain issues don't exist as we white Americans have been at pretending racism doesn't exist.  Not to mention that the beginning of this game locked it in my memory eternally.
Nanairo Reincarnation- This is one of the few games in my VN experience that I actually out and out named a kamige on first playthrough.  I don't regret it today, and I don't think I ever will.  I could put down any number of reasons to love this game, but it is better, in this case, for readers to make their own conclusions.
Akeiro Kaikitan- I mostly chose to keep multiple VNs by the same author and team off this list.  However, I should note that I have actually replayed Akeiro six times since its original release... despite it having been released in 2016, a mere six years ago.  I play it about once, sometimes twice a year.  Why?  Because it is still interesting no matter how many times I read it.  The presentation of the various paths is about as close to the storyteller's ideal as it is possible to get, making it difficult to get truly bored of if you put some time in between replays.
Komorebi no Nostalgica- Say what you like about Takaya Aya, but his moments of brilliance definitely leave an impression.  Komorebi no Nostalgica is easily the best (mostly) non-action sci-fi VN I've ever read.  Ironically, the primary reason for this is how the central non-heroine character, Cinema is handled in the various paths.  It is impossible to fully explain to someone who hasn't played the game just how powerful a role Cinema plays as a supporting character as well as the game's central character, and I'm not even going to try here.
Ayakashibito- While Evolimit is my favorite Higashide game, I can't fail to mention Ayakashibito here.  Ayakashibito is the work of a genius, and it most definitely shows.  It was also the VN that first showed Higashide's basic style, which almost always utilizes a protagonist with an intimate relationship with the true heroine that continues to thrive regardless of heroine choice.  Ayakashibito is less refined than Evolimit, but in exchange, it also feels more freeform than some of his later works.  It also established his creation of high-quality antagonists (Kuki Youkou, Shannon Wordsworth, etc).
Ruitomo- Ruitomo is probably the most famous of all the Akatsuki Works games, for good reason.  It is a high-quality classic plotge from an era where such games were relatively plentiful, and its style was the one that defined the expectations of fans for the company's games, though they later took things in a more action-focused direction.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier- This VN is one I push for weaboos who like the romanticized eras (Sengoku Jidai, Bakumatsu era, etc).  It is based in an alternate world where young Japanese women are sometimes chosen by 'demon-aura stones' that grant them immense physical powers and heightened intelligence in exchange for being unable to have children and being naturally more aggressive than is the norm.  As a result, these women are generally adopted by samurai families and raised to be bodyguards, assassins, and in various other roles normally reserved for men.  The protagonist is a young man raised by a feminized version of Kondou Isao and Hijikata Toshizo and is essentially Okita Soujirou.  It begins previous to the formation of the Roshigumi and branches off after the initial stages of the rebellion that began the collapse of Tokugawa power.  
Sekien no Inganock- This is pretty much the only Liar Soft game I didn't have trouble playing.  In retrospect, it isn't as good as I remember it being, but it is still enjoyable.
Majikoi- Say what you want about Majikoi.  Various people either love or hate it and everything by Minato Soft, but I personally think it was an excellent base that they used effectively to milk the setting.  Later games and fandiscs added depth to the characters and expanded the cast, and this, the original was a great game (in my eyes) in itself.
Grisaia- Probably the most popular VN to introduce VNs to newbies now that Tsukihime and FSN have become so dated as to be almost unreadable for new people.  Like many VNs that got translated, it has a lot of people either worshipping or hating on it, but its quality (in Japanese) is undeniable.
Soukou Akki Muramasa- Easily the best game Nitroplus has ever produced.  While it is a heavy read, it is also a VN worth reading at least once, if you have the mastery of Japanese to do so.  However, it is also emotionally draining, so many who start it never finish it.
Hello, Lady- I could have chosen any of Akatsuki Works' chuunige, but with the final version of the game that includes the FD routes and the new true route, this game has easily become my favorite Hino Wataru game.
Kitto Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo- A game by Shumon Yuu.  Nothing else needs to be said.  Play it, or you aren't a true JVN fanboy.
Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide- An oddball sort of chuunige by Shumon Yuu.  This one is fully voiced (protagonist included) and has a solid story and cast of characters.  
Silverio Trinity- of the three Silverio games, I'll say right off that this is the one I liked the most.  While Vendetta has some great moments, Trinity is where I thought the setting first came alive truly.
Sakura, Moyu- Honestly, I think this is the best VN, by far, that Favorite has produced.  I cried more while I played this game than in all the other games combined, and I was more emotionally invested in the story than any of them by far.
 

This might seem like an odd choice for a blog post, but it should be noted that, after more then twelve years and seven hundred VNs, remembering each and every one is impossible.  In fact, I hardly recall roughly 70% of all the VNs I've played, and less than 10% are memorable enough that I consider replaying them once in a great while.  I'm somewhat infamous for my lists, but I figured one more wouldn't hurt.  Remember, these are the VNs I still remember to the point where I can state almost everything about what I like and hate about each.  This list is going to be split into two parts, the VNs I loved and the VNs I loved to hate.
The VNs I loved to Hate
Suburashiki Hibi- Yes, I hate this VN.  In truth, I hate almost everything written by Sca-ji that I've read.  Sca-ji's style drives me up the wall (for some reason, it presses all the wrong buttons), and his love of unreliable narrators only makes it worse.  Suburashiki Hibi is just the most obvious example of a VN I can't forget, even though I want to, badly.  I can admit that Suburashiki Hibi is interesting... but to me that just doesn't stop me from hating it anyway.
Aiyoku no Eustia- For a chuunige fan like me to actually outright hate a chuunige is actually fairly difficult.  90% of the reason I eventually came to hate Eustia was because of its true/Eustia route.  I didn't like Caim's rapid personality change, the fact that elements of the setting introduced in Eustia's path make all other paths impossible, and I absolutely loathed Eustia herself (what is it with the love for the helpless and frail heroine in some games?).  That said, it doesn't change the fact that I liked most of the game before I got onto Eustia's path... but it does mean that I will never admit this is a truly great game.
Ryuusei World Actor- Similarly to above, this is a chuunige I love to hate, despite it being memorable.  There is one simple reason for this... it was made to be a prequel rather than a whole game in and of itself.  There is no sense of completion, no satisfaction to be gained by completing this story.  In addition, it was only recently that its sequel was - finally - announced.  Worse, Kinugasa Shougo's style of never really explaining the setting, except in the most oblique of fashions, greatly harms the enjoyment of this game's plot.  In the case of his previous works, it was relatively easy to extrapolate and speculate yourself into an understanding of the setting based on what was there, but there is a definite sense that way too much is left unsaid about this setting.
Sakura no Uta- Oddly, this is a game I thought I would have loved, given the twisted relationships and messy backstory involved.  However, once again Sca-Ji's style of presentation and love of unreliable narrators drove me nuts.  Not to mention the constant abuse of foreshadowing and repetition
VNs I Love so much they are unforgettable
Dies Irae- Obviously, Dies Irae is one of the penultimate chuunige ever made.  While I personally think Masada turned into a complete incompetent after KKK, there is no denying the quality of Dies Irae's narrative, its characters, and the way it seems to age so well.  Dies Irae is one of those rare VNs that doesn't suffer at all from the passing of a decade or more between its original release and now.  That isn't to say it hasn't been left behind somewhat by the conventions of the genre, but in the end, that doesn't matter as much as you would think it would.
Fate/Stay Night- Arguably the VN that turned chuunige from a mere curiosity to an actual niche genre.  While many people have a love/hate relationship with Shirou and the Nasuverse, there is no denying that much of the game is enjoyable and it embodies most of the virtues and flaws of the early era of the genre.
Draculius- The VN that changed my viewpoint on the harem ending and actually did vampires right (outside of the comedy, anyway).  In all honesty, before I picked it up at random, I had no idea this would become one of my most-replayed VNs of all time.  While this game has aged poorly in some ways, in others it's presentation is almost ideal.
Evolimit- In my mind, this game is Higashide's masterpiece, the defining game of his career, whereas others will argue that it was Ayakashibito.  However, for all that I enjoyed Ayakashibito, this is the game I go back to play over and over, whenever I want my faith in JVNs revived.
Devils Devel Concept- No, this is not the best game out there.  It is a total niche within a niche game.  I love its characters and setting, but most people would probably drop it solely based on the artwork.  Devils Devel Concept taught me that the protagonist didn't need to be the good guy to be interesting and that heroines didn't need to be fainting lilies to make a chuunige work.
Haruka ni Aogi, Uruwashi no- Let's be clear... visually this game has aged horribly.  It is from a much earlier era than most of the games on this list and it shows.  However, I  have to note that it is one of the single best nakige ever made.  I can still go back and cry for Tonoko, Shino, and Miyabi no matter how many times I replay it, and the sense of salvation after the end of one of those three paths, the catharsis is so strong that my stress buildup is perfectly lanced afterward.
Houkago no Futekikakusha- I frequently give this as an example of the ideal 'hard' utsuge.  The situation the protagonist is in is hopeless from the beginning, and his suffering his pre-determined.  Moreover, when the story begins he is already broken almost beyond repair.  The way it is presented provides great catharsis, though like many hard utsuge, the setting is all over the place.
Konata yori Kanata Made- Many consider the first Konakana to be the ideal for the 'soft' utsuge genre, and I don't generally bother to argue with them.  While similar games were made later on occasion, one can always feel the influence of this game in them, often to the point where it feels like they are almost plagiarizing parts of it.  
Akatsuki no Goei- I have a love/hate relationship with Kinugasa Shougo.  He hates completing stories, he never explains anything unless he has to, and his endings are always open-ended unless he is coerced to make them not so.  Akatsuki no Goei (the series) embodies him at his best, with Kaito being a complex character that only appears to be your typical 'dameningen' protagonist if you aren't paying attention.
Hapymaher- What often comes back to me about Hapymaher, compared to later Purple Soft games, was the ideal synchronicity of its aesthetic and its music.  It is very, very rare for me to bother complementing a VN on its music, since most essentially use rearrangements of old BGMs without accounting for unique themes and atmosphere.  While there are some severe obstacles to making this an easily replayable game (the Christmas arc is overwhelmingly boring the second time around), it is still a VN worth experiencing.
Semiramis no Tenbin- Semiramis no Tenbin is an oddity.  It is a game based in a school setting in modern Japan that doesn't gloss over Japan's social flaws or exaggerate them to excess.  I say this because the Japanese are as good at pretending certain issues don't exist as we white Americans have been at pretending racism doesn't exist.  Not to mention that the beginning of this game locked it in my memory eternally.
Nanairo Reincarnation- This is one of the few games in my VN experience that I actually out and out named a kamige on first playthrough.  I don't regret it today, and I don't think I ever will.  I could put down any number of reasons to love this game, but it is better, in this case, for readers to make their own conclusions.
Akeiro Kaikitan- I mostly chose to keep multiple VNs by the same author and team off this list.  However, I should note that I have actually replayed Akeiro six times since its original release... despite it having been released in 2016, a mere six years ago.  I play it about once, sometimes twice a year.  Why?  Because it is still interesting no matter how many times I read it.  The presentation of the various paths is about as close to the storyteller's ideal as it is possible to get, making it difficult to get truly bored of if you put some time in between replays.
Komorebi no Nostalgica- Say what you like about Takaya Aya, but his moments of brilliance definitely leave an impression.  Komorebi no Nostalgica is easily the best (mostly) non-action sci-fi VN I've ever read.  Ironically, the primary reason for this is how the central non-heroine character, Cinema is handled in the various paths.  It is impossible to fully explain to someone who hasn't played the game just how powerful a role Cinema plays as a supporting character as well as the game's central character, and I'm not even going to try here.
Ayakashibito- While Evolimit is my favorite Higashide game, I can't fail to mention Ayakashibito here.  Ayakashibito is the work of a genius, and it most definitely shows.  It was also the VN that first showed Higashide's basic style, which almost always utilizes a protagonist with an intimate relationship with the true heroine that continues to thrive regardless of heroine choice.  Ayakashibito is less refined than Evolimit, but in exchange, it also feels more freeform than some of his later works.  It also established his creation of high-quality antagonists (Kuki Youkou, Shannon Wordsworth, etc).
Ruitomo- Ruitomo is probably the most famous of all the Akatsuki Works games, for good reason.  It is a high-quality classic plotge from an era where such games were relatively plentiful, and its style was the one that defined the expectations of fans for the company's games, though they later took things in a more action-focused direction.
Kikan Bakumatsu Ibun Last Cavalier- This VN is one I push for weaboos who like the romanticized eras (Sengoku Jidai, Bakumatsu era, etc).  It is based in an alternate world where young Japanese women are sometimes chosen by 'demon-aura stones' that grant them immense physical powers and heightened intelligence in exchange for being unable to have children and being naturally more aggressive than is the norm.  As a result, these women are generally adopted by samurai families and raised to be bodyguards, assassins, and in various other roles normally reserved for men.  The protagonist is a young man raised by a feminized version of Kondou Isao and Hijikata Toshizo and is essentially Okita Soujirou.  It begins previous to the formation of the Roshigumi and branches off after the initial stages of the rebellion that began the collapse of Tokugawa power.  
Sekien no Inganock- This is pretty much the only Liar Soft game I didn't have trouble playing.  In retrospect, it isn't as good as I remember it being, but it is still enjoyable.
Majikoi- Say what you want about Majikoi.  Various people either love or hate it and everything by Minato Soft, but I personally think it was an excellent base that they used effectively to milk the setting.  Later games and fandiscs added depth to the characters and expanded the cast, and this, the original was a great game (in my eyes) in itself.
Grisaia- Probably the most popular VN to introduce VNs to newbies now that Tsukihime and FSN have become so dated as to be almost unreadable for new people.  Like many VNs that got translated, it has a lot of people either worshipping or hating on it, but its quality (in Japanese) is undeniable.
Soukou Akki Muramasa- Easily the best game Nitroplus has ever produced.  While it is a heavy read, it is also a VN worth reading at least once, if you have the mastery of Japanese to do so.  However, it is also emotionally draining, so many who start it never finish it.
Hello, Lady- I could have chosen any of Akatsuki Works' chuunige, but with the final version of the game that includes the FD routes and the new true route, this game has easily become my favorite Hino Wataru game.
Kitto Sumiwataru Asairo yori mo- A game by Shumon Yuu.  Nothing else needs to be said.  Play it, or you aren't a true JVN fanboy.
Tenshi no Hane o Fumanaide- An oddball sort of chuunige by Shumon Yuu.  This one is fully voiced (protagonist included) and has a solid story and cast of characters.  
Silverio Trinity- of the three Silverio games, I'll say right off that this is the one I liked the most.  While Vendetta has some great moments, Trinity is where I thought the setting first came alive truly.
Sakura, Moyu- Honestly, I think this is the best VN, by far, that Favorite has produced.  I cried more while I played this game than in all the other games combined, and I was more emotionally invested in the story than any of them by far.
 

Everybody Loves Large Chests (the series) by Neven Iliev is probably the most horrifying dark comedy fantasy I've ever read.  I laughed almost constantly throughout the first five books (what I've read) of this series... simply because it is just so far out there that it insulates you from the sheer horror of what is going on.
This series is focused on the antics and life of an aberrant, sociopathic, homicidal and ever-hungry mimic (yes, the treasure-chest monster) named Boxxy T Morningwood (yes, that's its name, lol).  It begins with the nearly brainless creature devouring a hapless adventure... and gaining a few levels and some intelligence in short order.
I say intelligence, but Boxxy is pretty much an idiot savant with a gift for homicidal mayhem, torture, and somehow always making out better than it should have been able to.  While Boxxy begins passively killing and eating 'tasty' adventurers and collecting 'shinies' in a dungeon, it quickly progresses to... doing the exact same thing (with added flair) outside the dungeon (well, with 'tasty' extending to just about everything along the way).  This ever-hungry idiot savant is somehow one of the single most hilarious protagonists I've encountered... anywhere.  Some of the things he gets up to (actually, most of them) are straight out of a Clock Up VN, and he only gets more horrifyingly evil as time goes on.  
Even though he does get more intelligent as he levels and evolves, his central interests forever focus on 'shiny' and 'tasty'.
Let's be clear, if I didn't make it so above... Boxxy is evil.  There is no redeeming value to him, despite what you might think of him at times.  He likes eating things, collecting shiny things, and killing to level up.  However, he proves that evil can be hilarious, if you know what you are doing.

This is the third game in Crystalia's series based on a world where a sport has grown up around using spiritual swords and a prequel to the original game, Kizuna Kirameku Koi Iroha.  For those who haven't played the other games, I can say that you might or might  not get more out of this game by playing the others first, as playing the original spoils you on the winner of the tournament and a few other issues.  On the other hand, this game also fills in a lot of gaps on characters from the original, such as Miyako and Tsubaki.
I'm going to come out and say this outright... this game is probably the best of the three.  Why?  The more obvious reason is that the battles are generally better quality than the other two games.  However, the larger reason is the way it is structured.  Ninety-percent of the game is actually a straightforward seishun drama based around a class of talented dropouts and a teacher protagonist.  Romance doesn't change the outcome, and actual heroine paths are actually in the 'omake' section of the game, rather than being the main focus.  
This comes as a trade-off.  For those who want romance to be the central element of their VNs, this game will probably be a disappointment.  However, if you like seishun drama with fierce competition and lively interaction between the characters, this is a first-class game.  
The protagonist, Murakaki Iori, is a member of the JSDF's Tenju Tokka unit (wields Origami and Tenju as part of their tactics), and he gets pulled for a side mission involving educating a class full of talented individuals who normal teachers can't seem to handle.  Iori is, on the surface and for the most part, a good-hearted and hotblooded teacher with a true belief in acting in the best interests of his students and treating them equally.  However, he does have a somewhat traumatic past and that past isn't ignored during the story.
Takamine Setsugekka is your classic 'aho no ko', also known as the 'idiot child' or 'airheaded' heroine.  She wields a close-in style wielding a ninjatou and hand-to-hand combat, and she starts out at the lowest point of all the heroines in terms of skill.  She occasionally, when hurt or driven to rage, goes berserk and wields immense power, but in this state she is easy to handle for an appropriately skilled opponent.  Typical of this kind of story, she grows the most in skill as time goes on.
Suzakuin Momiji is, on the surface, a competent and cool swordswoman who focuses on taking apart her opponent's style and habits until she can predict and lead them down the path to destruction.  She wields a long katana similar to that of Sasaki Kojirou from Fate/Stay Night.  She is Tsubaki's (from the original) eldest sister.  However, behind the scenes she is a lazy young woman who can't be bothered to pick up her own trash or get out of bed if she isn't forced to.  In all honesty, the first time I saw her chugging non-alcoholic beer (apparently, when at her family home, she goes for the real stuff) with sashimi in her other hand, I fell in love, so I favored her from the beginning (yes, I'm a bit weird sometimes with my heroine preferences).
Kuki Asahi is the younger sister of Iori's best friend and former rival, Kuki Takahisa.  From a very young age, she has been in love with Iori, but for some reason she has grown up into a very yandere-ish Iori-worshipper who will ruthlessly act to protect her hold on him.  Her preferred style is 'iai-battou', a defensive style where the user counters their enemies with draw-slashes.  Emotionally, she is perhaps the most volcanic of the characters, though I imagine some will say Setsugekka is.
Tobe Ririmu is a gyaru swordswoman who has a rather unique style that is very-dance like, combining Tenju illusions with unusual steps with a difficult to predict rhythm.  In all honesty, I felt bad for how this game treats her toward the end.  While she has a strong presence throughout much of the game, that presence fades almost to nothing due to the events of the tournament near the end.  In a very real way, she is a character that existed solely to provide emotional firewood for certain events near the end.  She is something of a free-spirit, with a desire to combine fashion with Jindou, designing combat costumes and Origami skins.  In many ways, she is like your typical 'slightly delinquent-like child' character, especially when it comes to dealing with teacher-student issues.

This is the third game in Crystalia's series based on a world where a sport has grown up around using spiritual swords and a prequel to the original game, Kizuna Kirameku Koi Iroha.  For those who haven't played the other games, I can say that you might or might  not get more out of this game by playing the others first, as playing the original spoils you on the winner of the tournament and a few other issues.  On the other hand, this game also fills in a lot of gaps on characters from the original, such as Miyako and Tsubaki.
I'm going to come out and say this outright... this game is probably the best of the three.  Why?  The more obvious reason is that the battles are generally better quality than the other two games.  However, the larger reason is the way it is structured.  Ninety-percent of the game is actually a straightforward seishun drama based around a class of talented dropouts and a teacher protagonist.  Romance doesn't change the outcome, and actual heroine paths are actually in the 'omake' section of the game, rather than being the main focus.  
This comes as a trade-off.  For those who want romance to be the central element of their VNs, this game will probably be a disappointment.  However, if you like seishun drama with fierce competition and lively interaction between the characters, this is a first-class game.  
The protagonist, Murakaki Iori, is a member of the JSDF's Tenju Tokka unit (wields Origami and Tenju as part of their tactics), and he gets pulled for a side mission involving educating a class full of talented individuals who normal teachers can't seem to handle.  Iori is, on the surface and for the most part, a good-hearted and hotblooded teacher with a true belief in acting in the best interests of his students and treating them equally.  However, he does have a somewhat traumatic past and that past isn't ignored during the story.
Takamine Setsugekka is your classic 'aho no ko', also known as the 'idiot child' or 'airheaded' heroine.  She wields a close-in style wielding a ninjatou and hand-to-hand combat, and she starts out at the lowest point of all the heroines in terms of skill.  She occasionally, when hurt or driven to rage, goes berserk and wields immense power, but in this state she is easy to handle for an appropriately skilled opponent.  Typical of this kind of story, she grows the most in skill as time goes on.
Suzakuin Momiji is, on the surface, a competent and cool swordswoman who focuses on taking apart her opponent's style and habits until she can predict and lead them down the path to destruction.  She wields a long katana similar to that of Sasaki Kojirou from Fate/Stay Night.  She is Tsubaki's (from the original) eldest sister.  However, behind the scenes she is a lazy young woman who can't be bothered to pick up her own trash or get out of bed if she isn't forced to.  In all honesty, the first time I saw her chugging non-alcoholic beer (apparently, when at her family home, she goes for the real stuff) with sashimi in her other hand, I fell in love, so I favored her from the beginning (yes, I'm a bit weird sometimes with my heroine preferences).
Kuki Asahi is the younger sister of Iori's best friend and former rival, Kuki Takahisa.  From a very young age, she has been in love with Iori, but for some reason she has grown up into a very yandere-ish Iori-worshipper who will ruthlessly act to protect her hold on him.  Her preferred style is 'iai-battou', a defensive style where the user counters their enemies with draw-slashes.  Emotionally, she is perhaps the most volcanic of the characters, though I imagine some will say Setsugekka is.
Tobe Ririmu is a gyaru swordswoman who has a rather unique style that is very-dance like, combining Tenju illusions with unusual steps with a difficult to predict rhythm.  In all honesty, I felt bad for how this game treats her toward the end.  While she has a strong presence throughout much of the game, that presence fades almost to nothing due to the events of the tournament near the end.  In a very real way, she is a character that existed solely to provide emotional firewood for certain events near the end.  She is something of a free-spirit, with a desire to combine fashion with Jindou, designing combat costumes and Origami skins.  In many ways, she is like your typical 'slightly delinquent-like child' character, especially when it comes to dealing with teacher-student issues.