Jump to content

Narcosis

Members
  • Posts

    2737
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    10

Reputation Activity

  1. Like
    Narcosis reacted to sanahtlig for a blog entry, Valve opens Steam to uncensored eroge and hentai games   
    Steam is now selling hardcore uncensored porn games. This has profound implications for eroge fans, developers, publishers, and distributors.
    Sanahtlig's Corner: Valve opens Steam to uncensored eroge and hentai games
  2. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Fiddle for a blog entry, Gahkthun in a nutshell   
  3. Like
    Narcosis reacted to kivandopulus for a blog entry, Touchuukasou 冬虫夏草 [Petit]   
    Foreword: Game had hardy any characteristics but "degraded Kizuato" and I did not plan to make a review of it. However, it managed to keep my attention till the end for over three hours. So maybe it's not really bad?
    Title: Touchuukasou
    Developer: Petit
    Date: 1998-07-17
    VNDB link:https://vndb.org/v15352
    Youtube walkthrough:https://youtu.be/adRAHxJVaBo

    Synopsis: In a rural town there has been a series of murders recently. Part of the bodies was lost as if it had been eaten by someone. Toshio Hiyama moved to this town 10 years ago and he was constantly bullied due to his introverted nature to the extent that there might be even another will lurking inside his consciousness...
    Structure: There are three heroines each with a route. The whole story takes three days.
    Length: 3 hours
    Game type: Action mystic beast transformation type.
    Difficulty: Very easy, there's basically just one big decision for each heroine to flag.
    Character Design rating: 7/10
    Protagonist rating: 6/10
    Story rating: 8/10
    Game quality: 5/10
    Overall rating: 7/10

    Rating comments: In my classification that's a masterpiece. Game is integral. It has simple but clean story-line, nice memorable characters, cool battles and most amusing BGM support. Protagonist is too ordinary though and game quality is lacking due to a really old engine with NO keyboard support and with 5 second freezes on BGM change.
    Protagonist: Hiyama Toshio is pretty much an average high school student Joe who sees strange drams. We don't see his face, so that's it for him.

    Characters: There are four main heroines. Short brown hair Yuka is your cute and caring imouto. Short black hair Makoto is your shy childhood friend who you meet after 10 years time. And long red hair Akane is... your fun-buddy, without any obligations. Fourth one is short gray hair girl, but she makes a very short appearance in core game time, so can't tell much about her without playing her route. I only played Makoto route since I'm not a fan of imouto and free love. Furthermore, Makoto seemed to have some early memories important for the plot. It turned out that those memories weren't exactly about Makoto, so any heroine of preference can be enjoyed without loosing much on the story. As for Makoto, her route is very sweet and there's a very nice satisfying ending after the battle. At some point she even abandons her shyness and confesses her circumstances which are rather curious. So I'm very impressed with her route, but I don't like other heroines roles and not ready to manually mouse click through their routes.

    Story: Events develop very fast here. Toshio and Yuka arrive to the school and barely have time to get acquainted with a newcomer Makoto when they get assaulted by a hooligan Shinichi. That's followed by promise to share bento with Makoto daily, some quality time with Akane and yet another same hooligan assault. The next day starts with a hooligan team trap that leads to a massacre. And lastly heroine specific part with a date ensues followed up by old enemy big fight finale. And something to put under a spoiler as well.
    CG: Very few from the start, but quite numerous closer to the ending.
    Sound: Somehow I really enjoyed the tunes and the voicing. Everyone but protagonist voiced.

    Themes:  
    1) Game is a bit simplistic and fast paced to suggest multiple themes, but the main theme of the game is werebeasts. It goes back to the story about 200 years before about how the wild dogs got massacred and how a shrine and a clan grew from that event in order to commemorate those beasts. There's a huge stone in the shrine connected to the event and it's the touch of the stone that actually raised the wild urges in males of the blood. It's actually very nicely pictured that the memories of clan ancestor are alive in Toshio Hiyama. Those memories and the mystery of the girl shown at the very first scene of the game were the main attraction point for me.
    2) What's right - to suppress the beast origin or to seek more power? Unexpectedly, game definitely chooses the second in contrast to Kizuato. In Kizuato hero is being judged of ill-behavior just for his dreams and headaches. In Touchuukasou hero is just destroyed in a bad ending if he tries to suppress his emotions. On the other hand, hero is the only suspect in the massacre where two people died and... he gets away with it very easily. So it's a very simple answer - kill or be killed.

    Overall comments: Game is not well known and is trashed for being Kizuato clone. And I strongly object to that. Games have absolutely different approach to the beast state. I actually give the preference to Touchuukasou for having an integral fast-paced story with adorable characters over the painfully crumbling structure of Kizuato where nothing big happens in ANY of the routes. Touchuukasou has lots of charming sides and I played the main heroine route to the end. However, I don't see how other heroines can contribute to the story and CG actually confirm that as there are mostly only additional fight CG and HCG of other heroines. [Petit] has grown a lot over the years and I call its last two games Sweepers and Touchuukasou masterpieces. It's really sad to see story-driven works of unique charm overpowered by charage/moege. 

  4. Like
    Narcosis reacted to kivandopulus for a blog entry, Kuon no Kizuna 久遠の絆 [FOG]   
    Foreword: There is a good number of English reviews on this game (1 2 3 4), but those are all kinda short and non-structured. Now I know why and mine won't be an exception. You'll know why soon enough as well.
    Title: Kuon no Kizuna
    Developer: FOG
    Date: 1998-12-03
    VNDB link:https://vndb.org/v2773
    Youtube walkthrough:https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLENAECnNmAq-CHIuWBfnU3DYzNCEcLjcV

    Synopsis: This story starts out from the perspective of a high school student. One day a transfer student comes to his school, and tells him she’ll kill him. At the same time, he starts seeing weird dreams and people mysteriously gets killed in his city. Soon he realizes that them two are incarnated personalities of a man and a goddess that fell in love 1000 years ago. Since then, they have been trapped in a cycle of reincarnation and a battle against an evil god.
    Length: Took me 66 hours for all routes.
    Game type: ADV with choices and couple easy battles.
    Difficulty: I followed walkthrough, so not too sure on difficulty. There are some fake choices, but there are also choices that lead to game over. And there are a LOT of choices, so it must be quite difficult.

    Character Design rating: 7/10
    Protagonist rating: 8/10
    Story rating: 6/10
    Game quality: 9/10
    Overall rating: 7/10
    Rating comments: This is one of the most ambitious projects I've ever seen. Just imagine - 66 hours. 66 hours of not raising stats, killing monsters or chasing girls over and over. 66 hours of pure text reading time. There's nothing like that in the 1990s and it won't be beaten till 2000s. You know, in many Japanese reviews of the time volume is a very important factor and there's often such criteria as cost-efficiency. Visual novels cost a lot and compared to solid books they used to lose all the time. But everything changed with Kuon no Kizuna. It became a paragon for both volume and visuals. 
    I liked protagonist and characters enough, but they don't become cozy. They remain transcendent beings piercing the veil of time in an epic story, not really likable characters who I could respect for their characters or decisions, that's why it's 7/10. The story is indeed epic, but it does not go smoothly. We jump from reality to three periods all the time and the shifts aren't really explained, they just happen. I also did not like it that the first half of the story is pretty much the same for all three heroines and we just have to read it three times with little variation. That makes story only 6/10. But the quality of the game is superb, especially with full voice (excluding the protagonist though). The graphics are stunning and visual effects amazing. No complaints with the quality.

    Protagonist: Mikado Takeru is a strong protagonist as he constantly has to protect those who are dear to him and he's the only one who can oppose demonic forces thanks to his demonic heritage. He's a one man army and hardly ever gets any help from the side. He'd be more realistic with voice, but he's quite cool even as he is now.
    Characters: There are three heroines who have their own routes.
    Takahara Mayou is our mysterious transfer student who greets Takeru for the first time with words "This time I will definitely kill you".
    Itsuki Shiori is a childhood friend who Takeru lives with under the same roof.
    Tokiwa Saya is the class teacher.

    Story: The rant part. So each heroine has her route... but it's the same route, at least for the first half of it. In the second half some periods are developed for each heroine, but still there's a very strong feeling that you're watching the same story and it irritates a lot. 
    There are four periods: Heian, Genroku, Bakumatsu, and the present. Present and Heian are really the same and those are the most boring parts, especially Heian. Heian focuses on a an ancient period of Japanese history where nothing really happened for dozens of years and that's why it's full of myths and legends - because there was nothing to do there. In Kuon no Kizuna Heian is when beasts invasion starts and it differentiates just a bit in the end depending on the heroine chosen throughout it. I especially liked Bakumatsu period for meeting and fighting alongside Shinsengumi (and sometimes against) and kunoichi. 

    But there is a great problem with these periods - they aren't really connected to each other. People can die there or love there and in next period everything starts from scratch. That creates the feeling of multiple stories and I really dislike that genre. Nothing really happens throughout those stories, then beasts arrive, the short drama and it's over. Heroines aren't really able to hold attention. But what's worse, the heroine of your choice have play very small role till the very end of each part. 
    But then comes the fantastic Special route №1 that arrived later with remake as an attempt to tighten the crumbling main story. Special route №1 lasts for some 7 hours, holds a totally new epic story with really great enemies and is a great ending for all the characters, so I can't praise it enough.
    The Special routes №2 and  №3 are there for comic relief after all that superserious narration.
    So overall the story really sucks, repeats itself in routes and has poor tempo. But the great special route makes up for it.

    CG: Just fantastic. See for yourself.
    Sound: I really appreciated full voicing and beautiful BGM. That kept me from sleeping.
    Overall comments: This game was created to surprise the imagination. It has huge length and astonishing visuals, but there still was no culture of such huge coherent stories - thus the multiple periods format with lousy links between them. Dialogues are long and not too meaningful, fights are inevitably dull and poorly written, heroines fail to catch attention and the absence of humor makes it all a real torture. The sudden jumps between periods only add to the confusion. But this game bears a huge importance for the industry as it made long story-driven visual novels without gameplay elements viable while only dating SIMs, charage and nukige governed the ball.

     
  5. Like
    Narcosis reacted to MaggieROBOT for a blog entry, Maki Fes! ~Maggie's nukige misadventures part 1~   
    As many (hopefully) of you know, I like to read a lot of different things, providing my stomach and the laws of my country allow it. My VNDB list will never reach Clephas level of completeness, so I'm aiming for something different instead: to have the most random, hipster, no prejudice, unlike any other VN list. Of course, as slow as I am, I can only hope to achieve this dream within the next 30 years or so, but hey I'm still young!
    I have conquered otomege, devoured BL, collected EVNs, discovered yuri, threaded in chuuni waters, tiptoed into nakige, read through memeges, tasted horror, and tried my hand with gameplay hybrids. But how can I call myself a Ultimate VN Reader if I never read a single nukige? No, I have to change that. I must to. So I decided to give a chance to the glorious fangame our friendly neighbors Asonn, Arcadeotic, Hanako, HMN, Jptje, Nandemonai, Zakamutt, and other sweeties (because the list is damn long), shared with the West: Maki Fes!
    What were the impressions of Maggie, guaranteed 12% female readership of Fuwa, someone who totally didn't went in for the memes and that totally knew something about Love Live beforehand? Find out now!
     

    There's a catchy song in the title screen, pretty much the only song I remember from the game.
     
    In Maki Fes!, you play as Matt yourself! The boyfriend (wait, it should be girlfriend if I had to play as myself. Well, I can stick with Matt just fine) of the cute red haired tsundereish Maki! How lucky are you? Nukige convenience is convenient, alright! Not a bad start to be honest, I was expecting something more stupid, but Maki Fes already proved itself as above average intellectual level than my preconceived opinion of what constitutes an average nukige. Anyway, Maki needs to write a song and you, as a good boyfriend, agree to help her get some inspiration. And yeeeeeees, that means lots of porn!
    Maki is pretty much the only character you'll meet through the entire game, since more girl means harem or yuri, right? And that's not what this doujinge is about. And she's fully voiced! The actress does a very good job for most part, except during those background moans that goes like a machine gun shooting fast going "a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a" that got annoying after two loops. The art is also quite pleasant to look at, Maki pouting and smiling are just the cutest. I enjoyed her character, but I don't know the original to say if she's going too OOC.
    So! The game provide you with the following scenarios, and all of them leads to porn. Yes, some of these choices leading to porn is quite creative, I know. The twist would be if the last option didn't, but that's not what happens here.
     

    Choices, oh choices.
     
    If you don't want to be spoilered, stop reading right here! Not that I consider sexual position a spoiler, but hey, there's weird folks of all kinds out there! So let's go over what I get out of each scenes. And no, it wasn't masturbatory material.
    "Let's recall our first time!": Exactly what it says on the tin. It was quite a sweet scene, where Matt the protagonist was mindful of Maki, and if she was feeling comfortable. Of course, she had to say the typical "you can be more rough, I know you're holding yourself back", but hey, at least they discussed it! Relationship is all about two people understanding and being respectful with each other after all! Another thing that I have to praise this game is that the classic "Cum inside/Cum outside" option only affect the CG right after it, and not the ending, so I could pick "Cum outside" to my heart's content.
    "Wear your maid outfit!": This one was nice too, as far as h-scenes goes. It's a blowjob scene and HEY, it have simple ANIMATIONS (*insert here the face of a surprised girl that never saw a animated VN before)! The translation of this scene was pretty good too, I was amazed with how many different porn sound effects this guy could came (get it? ) up with. It also had a marriage proposal discussion there that I liked, but I can guess 80% of the people that played this game didn't even noticed it.
    "Our good luck charm!": This was one of the last scenes I read, so there wasn't much of my patience left. I think it was something about writing good luck wishes on Maki's butt. Yep. Of course, not with a pen or a penis, but with his finger. Oh yeah, this guy goes on and on about Maki's cellulite free butt but this game don't have a single anal scene. For shame, game, for shame!
    "I'm hungry!": I can only say one thing. How Maki decided she wanted to feed this guy and do it like this???????????
     

     
    "Dancing is inspiring!": Probably, but it was the very last scene I read and at that point I just wanted the game to end. Four scenes is my limit for h-scenes one after another. Multiple rounds indeed is a lie. Oh yeah, the scene. I think it was a cowgirl scene and... that's it.
    "Use traditional elements!": Was it on that scene that Maki came with the penetration alone? God, that was dumb. This guy have such lame foreplay skill it's a wonder Maki can even come once. Oh yeah, there's pee in this scene, weird that Zaka didn't work on this. How does her pee makes an arc in the air though? Pretty sure you need a penis to do that...
    "You need some excitement!": Man, this scene have one weird dick. It looked like a fishing hook. Animating it didn't make it any better. But I think this scene had some well crafted puns cumversation, so it was somewhat amusing.
    "I wanna fuck!": (Chorus: FUCK!)* Now that's a scene where Matt truly shines! And Maki as well. How could a forget when she uttered my favorite quote of the game, "My nipples are playing the blues!"? Now that's what I call talented nipples!
    *Joke stolen from ZakaTM 
    After seeing all scenes, you can finally watch the desired True Ending, that I'll not spoil here. That was... tiring to be honest, but also educational (?) to say the least. It helped me to understand some before unexplored corners of the VN fandom. And I can't really doubt that it must be a nice game if used as intended. Should I be ashamed that this was my first contact with anything related to Love Live? Maybe. But now I can proudly (??) say that my VNDB list is one step closer to perfection. And since I already ticked the nukige checkbox, I can safely remove any other nukiges/games tagged with high sexual content from my wishlist!
    ...Wait, that one nukige is BL.
    ...
    Guess I'm making a nukige misadventures part 2.

    Unrelated PS: No, I didn't forget about Dankaronpa, chapter 4 is halfway done. Maybe next week!
  6. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, Koi wa Sotto Saku Hana no you ni   
    A few words before I get into this...
    As my previous post spells out, I will no longer be doing the VN of the Month column, and this VN was the one that was the straw that broke the camel's back.  That said, it isn't like I didn't enjoy what I played of it once I got past the sticking points (date scenes).  If anything, this game is a definite increase over the quality seen in Ensemble's works since Gokigen Naname blew me away. 
    That said, when it comes down to it, this game is SOL all the way.  The protagonist is the son of the owner of a small but stylish restaurant cafe and what amounts to the assistant cook.  He has a firm grasp on what he wants out of life (to become a fully accredited cook), and he is also very responsible and good-hearted in general. 
    The common route is basically one typical harem-building element after another, ranging from meeting a girl who constantly gives off 'I'm sickly but trying to hide it poorly' vibes (the protagonist doesn't notice, of course) to a seemingly strong-willed and free-spirited oneesama who shows off her fragile side at odd times.  By the time it was over, even though it wasn't really long, I was so happy that I wanted to thank the  magic bunnies for releasing me from that cliched hell. 
    It needs to be said that there are too many heroines in this game, and Ensemble's current art team has such a limited range of facial designs that I honestly found it hard to tell the 'normal heroine' trio (Iori, Sanae, and Misato) apart from visuals at times.   This was one of the reasons that my first impression of the game was blandness, despite the characters having dynamically different personalities, for the most part.
    Before I go any further, I'll say that the paths I played were the omake Nazuna path and Youko's path.  This was because those were the only heroines I became interested in during the common route, which is probably the best reason possible.
    Youko's path is surprisingly long (it looks like the short common route is compensated for by longer and more complex heroine routes), and it is pretty emotional.  While there were some definite moments where I winced at the predictability of certain events, I did manage to enjoy it to the end... which brings up the ending, which is actually excellent, because it is a 'four years down the road' ending that sees Youko having grown past her hangups and living happily with the protagonist... a definite benefit of an epilogue that goes forward significantly in time.
    Nazuna's path is an omake path, but it shouldn't have been.  Nazuna is probably the cutest character in the game (other than possibly baby Minamo or a certain character who pops up in Youko's epilogue), and she is a rare yamato nadeshiko type to boot.  However, she is cursed with an omake path that is short, feels forced, and ends without an epilogue.  The decision not to make Nazuna a central heroine was a horrible one, and it isn't one I'm going to forgive anytime soon, lol.
  7. Like
    Narcosis reacted to kivandopulus for a blog entry, To Heart PSE [Leaf/Aquaplus]   
    Foreword: It took me a while to get interested in this grandfather of all modern charage and moege. It took even longer to finish all the routes. I doubt I will ever pick a moege for review, but I need to see fundamentals with my own eyes. There are quite many reviews found, but only one of them (7nightstranslations) actually was reviewing a finished game, but still it was too short and only touched a few heroines. I'll have a word about each heroine at least.
    Title: To Heart
    Developer: Leaf /Aquaplus
    Date: 1997-05-23
    VNDB link:https://vndb.org/v18
    Youtube walkthrough:https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLENAECnNmAq8UD0quvrBnBr1LySRroX7Z

    Synopsis: In this game, you play as Fujita Hiroyuki, a high-school student who seems to have more interest in romance than in his studies. In his school there are several pretty girls, and his goal is to be nice to one of them, to make the right decisions when talking to her, and ultimately to win her heart.
    Structure: Game lasts roughly two months from beginning of March to beginning of May with events happening almost daily.
    Length: Took me 34 hours for all routes.
    Game type: Map selection ADV.
    Difficulty: Only the two main heroines routes are tricky, the others are easy.
    Character Design rating: 8/10
    Protagonist rating: 5/10
    Story rating: 5/10
    Game quality: 8/10
    Overall rating: 7/10
    Rating comments: Let's say honestly - from modern point of view game is trash. It's a very generic school moege without plot or any interesting character development. It's a torture to go through and there's little satisfaction in beating the game. So why did I rate it as masterpiece? The whole point of charage and moege is in characters and this game indeed has two very nice character stories. About that in proper section.
    Protagonist: Fujita Hiroyuki is a very generic high school protagonist who can't sneeze without our command.

    Characters: There are 10 characters for capture. I rate the routes from best to worst in the following sequence: Multi > Shiho > Ayaka > Aoi > Tomoko > Lemmy > Akari > Kotone > Rio > Serika.
    Serika is our ojousama with interest in magic. Her route is one of the most boring ones, but what actually makes it unbearable is that she does not talk. Well, as I counted, she said 8 phrases overall with most of them being one word phrases. Her final like included as much as three words! "Fujita-san, suki...". It's surprising how she even continued to stand up after such long phrase. Really, her seiyu should be omitted from credits.  The whole route I was feeling that I read 1997 year original work without voicing.
    Rio is a poor girl who has to earn money for mother's operation and to take care of her younger brother at the same time. It's the weakest story plot-wise since Fujita did not actually move a finger to help her, only encouraged her to work harder at all her jobs. What a bastard!
    Kotone is our esper. Fujita first tries to persuade her that she's a normal girl without powers and when fails at that wants her to teach him to gain same powers. He fails at that either the very minuscule drama resolution of the route really leaves unsatisfactory feeling.
    Akari is the main heroine, but she's too much of a failure. First of all, her sprites aren't all beautiful. Secondly, it's kind of a rule that childhood friend should be of genki type, but Akari just nags and cries. The main feature of her route - drums, drums, drums - is changing hairstyle! What kind of drama move is that? Akari does not have her own will and that leads to pretty ugly resolution. 
    Lemmy is totally cool half-american heroine, but her route is one of the weakest, it's basically not about Lemmy, but about her big crazy family.
    Tomoko is our diligent class representative megane type. It's pretty cool how her snobbish attitude averts class members from her. Even Fujita only gains bad gazes in return at every move. But as her circumstances become evident there's quite a lot of sympathy towards her in the end.
    Aoi is our cute martial artist. There's nothing even to add here. Route is full of cuteness and trainings resulting in impressive match. 
    Ayaka is our cool martial artist, sister of Serika. Ayaka is the mature version of Aoi and is the only character not available from the start - first Aoi and Serika routes need to be beaten. Ayaka route is pretty cool is there's a change of pace from the school grounds - heroes spar daily at the riverbank. Ayaka is both genki and free spirit. Her sprites are often weird, but voicing is perfect. So Ayaka takes the third prize.
    Shiho is our second main heroine as her presence pierces all the other routes and because she's main friend of Akari. Shiho route is also very tricky to trigger since it's the route that has little to do with love and is entered upon meeting seemingly illogical prerequisites. Shiho is of genki type. She also is a rumor house and the queen of karaoke. The three songs she sings during her route are very impressive - those are old opening theme, new opening theme and totally new song. The main feature of Shiho route is love triangle and she's the total opposite of Ogiso Setsuna from White Album 2 if you know what I mean. But what delivers the most is the ending - absolutely cool and mature one.
    Multi is the true queen of the game. Her route is compressed to just 8 days and thus feels the most integral. She's an android of new type. Almost every scene with her has some cute element or situation, so it's the only route that I could read without distractions. It's the only must have route to play, so would not want to spoiler here.

    Story: None. Choose the portraits of the target heroine and give good answers when needed. The rest depends on the route.
    CG: Each heroine has about 10 CG in PSE version which is quite enough. 
    Sound: BGM is fine and praised a lot, but after so many routes it really started to irritate. Voicing is mostly great.
    Overall comments: Now that was a short review. Can't say I enjoyed the game, but I definitely feel like I understand eroge history better now. Could not get it before why Comic party anime had so many references to Multi doujins. It's the first fundamental charage and there are some inevitable mistakes made, but at least two routes are worth reading to get to understand the media better.

  8. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, A VN of the Month Announcement   
    I've been considering this for some time, but it has suddenly become a reality.
    To be blunt, I've come to my limit when it comes to playing pure SOL games.  Oh, I can still enjoy many of them, but if you asked me whether I can look at them without my resentment of 'normal' SOL content blinding me, the answer is no.  If I have to read through one more template date scene or see another osananajimi climb through the window from next door, I'm going to start tearing out the last remaining hairs atop my head.
    *coughs* Ahem, now that I've got that out, it needs to be said that I've been doing this since September of 2012... a ridiculous amount of time to be playing roughly 80% of all non-nukige VNs that come out (I'm figuring those I dropped or just couldn't play because they were just that bad into the twenty percent). 
    Just to be clear, I will still continue to play VNs and comment on/review them in this blog.  However, I will no longer play as many outside my tastes, nor will I go out of my way to seek gems from companies I hate reading from. 
    I realized while I was playing Koisaku (Ensemble's latest game), that a few years ago, I would have read this game without any real problems, and I wouldn't even have blinked at the crap that now drives me up the wall.  Oh sure, Ensemble's base quality has fallen massively, but when I took a step back, this is actually one of the better amongst their more recent games, with plenty of indications of real stories for the heroines in the background.  However, I found I just couldn't tolerate it.
    It hit me in the date scene that occurs in the common route... I have no tolerance for date scenes at all anymore.  Scenes like that exist for every heroine in every SOL VN, and they all turn out in almost an identical fashion.  Reading it, even though it was basically a 'friend date', was like dragging my brain through mud.  I just couldn't do it.
    I promised myself that I wouldn't BS myself on this particular matter years ago... and I knew the limit was coming.  I just didn't realize that it would be this soon.
    So, I have to announce that this is the end of my VN of the Month column.  Now, all that remains is my Random VNs and whatever VNs I choose to play each month.
    I will continue to play what I'm interested in, and that will probably include slice-of-life at times.  However, I will no longer play SOL out of a sense of duty to my readers. 
    My original reasons for starting VN of the Month
    When I first started Clephas' VN of the Month, it was because vndb gives nothing to you for info on their games beyond poor tls of the game summary from Getchu, character profiles, and sometimes tags (that might or might not be accurate).  I felt that that didn't do most games justice, and I hated the way I had to go into a game blind on so many occasions.  As such, I started putting up commentaries on just what kind of VN I was playing, with few or no spoilers.  This was a need that, at the time, was not being fulfilled (and as far as I know, still isn't, since most reviewers include major spoilers because they are inconsiderate). 
    Over time, my routine each month started with figuring out which games weren't nukige and which I would play first...  and picking out which one was the best after I played them (the latter of course being entirely a matter of my opinion, informed as it might be). 
    However, it is time to set down my burden.  I tried handing off my work to others, and that worked for a while (thanks to @Dergonu@fun2novel@BookwormOtaku@Kiriririri for their help over the last year - yes, even you, Kiriririri).  In the end, though, I'm just one man... and one middle-aged man with increasingly bad health isn't going to be able to keep this up any longer.  Heck, I'm amazed i kept going this long.
    I do hope someone else takes up the torch of at least informing people of what to expect in newer games (and not just the ones from popular companies), but that isn't my job anymore. 
    Thanks for reading,
    Clephas
     
  9. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, Curio Dealer   
    This is the latest VN by AXL, and it is also the latest in its 'swords fantasy' (there is very little magic in these games) series (I say series, but they are just a line of similarly-designed games).  The previous games in this series include Princess Frontier, Hyakka Ryouran Elixir, Racial Merge, and Ou no Mimi ni wa Todokanai.  This is also AXL's fifteenth game, making it one of the most prolific companies (ignoring subsidiaries) still active. 
    Like all the games in this series, it is based in a world whose tech level is medieval with bits and pieces of higher levels of technological development here and there.  This one falls in an area similar to Ou no Mimi, rather than Princess Frontier or Hyakka Ryouran, meaning it has a somewhat more violent turn almost from the beginning.  The protagonist is an antique dealer (thus the game's name) named Rowan who, due to the loss of his parents during an adventure at the highest levels of the tower, has had to deal with an aversion to the tower that is at the center of the town that serves as the center of the game's story.  This changes when a young girl bearing a greatsword named Linaria comes into the picture, and he finds himself guiding a young group of adventurers through the lower levels of the tower.
    Rowan is not only an antique dealer but an exceptionally talented dagger-user and toolmaker.  He is also the only individual in the town that can repair the various machines that come down from the tower.  If I were to pick his class, I'd consider him to be a cross between an engineer and a rogue, with excellent crowd-control techniques and stuns.  Like a lot of mature protagonists, there is a disconnect between his emotions and rational behavior, and as a result, he will often take the logical path, even when it conflicts with what his heart wants, thus leading to him being a bit dense about emotions in general. 
    The tower is much like a lot of roguelike rpg towers (though this game isn't an rpg) where people climb the tower to gather treasure, fighting monsters and robot-like Guardians as they do so.  The power gems taken from the Guardians can be used in various devices made from parts taken from the tower, and this is the source of most of the setting's higher technology.  The tower itself is self-repairing and self-defending, deploying seemingly endless numbers of Guardians and monsters.  No one knows how high it goes.
    The three heroines are the young princess Karin, the protagonist's adoptive sister Mira, and the newbie adventurer girl Linaria.  Karin is a sort-of tsundere who very obviously is in love with Rowan from the beginning.  Her father is the second King of the country (that consists of the tower, the town, and the land around it), but she only realized she was a princess at a relatively late age due to the closeness of the royal family to the people.  Mira is a responsible girl who takes care of most of the chores and the account books at Rowan's shop... and has an unnatural attachment to the spiky ball and chain she uses as a weapon (the first time you see her flushing after squashing an enemy says everything).  Linaria is the daughter of a deceased adventurer who came to find out why her father abandoned his family in order to seek fame and wealth in the tower.  Though she resents adventurers as a profession, she is too kind-hearted to actually take it out on anyone.
    Common Route
    The common route mostly accounts the trials and tribulations of Rowan and company as they rise through the lower levels of the tower to be acknowledged as full-fledged adventurers (novices are called 'virgins' until they reach town on the Twentieth Floor).  If you like AXL games' style of character interaction, you'll like the slice-of-life elements, and the battles are actually tactically interesting (something that is unusual for AXL).  There are a few emotional moments dealing with Rowan's past, but the common route mostly serves to familiarize you with the characters. 
    Normal Ending
    This is an ending you get if you fail to pick one of the three main heroines.  It is basically a joke ending where the results of his actions in the common route come home to roost, lol.
    Karin
    Karin's path starts out with a lot of light ichaicha and a somewhat annoying get-together sequence.  However, at roughly the halfway point, it suddenly turns dark and violent... and outright bloody.  The violence in this path startled me a bit, as it is out of character for AXL (AXL generally restricts violence to one or two scenes in a given path, and never on this kind of scale).  However, the story was interesting, and I left the path feeling satisfied.  The actual progression from lighter atmosphere to darker one is common on AXL's games, and anyone who has played one will probably recognize the pattern...  That didn't bother me, though, since it was interesting in and of itself.
    Linaria
    I recommend that anyone that plays this game play this path last.  The reason is is that this is the only path that deals with the tower itself and climbing to the top as its subject matter.  It is also the only path where certain major issues involving the protagonist are completely and finally resolved in a direct manner.  This is perhaps not surprising, seeing as Linaria was being presented as the 'main heroine' almost from the beginning.  However, it is a situation where anyone who plays this path will be a bit displeased with the other two if they played it first.  The path itself is a lot less bloody than Karin's (to be blunt, Karin's path is the only one that gets bloody and serious to that degree), but it is still a good path, with a more emotional focus than Karin's.
    Mira
    Mira is my favorite of the three heroines, so I left her for last this time.  She is the protagonist's adoptive little sister, and she falls under the archetype of the 'imouto who scolds her beloved oniichan but adores him'.  Mira is a serious girl who cares deeply about the antique shop they are running, and as a result, most of her path deals with the economic issues of the city and the tower.  It was when I finished this path that I came to the conclusion that Mira's path is the 'merchant' path, Karin's is the 'nation' path, and Linaria's is the 'adventurer' path. 
    Mira's path is full of secrets and conspiracies, and it has some really good moments for Verbena (who is incidentally my favorite character in this game).  It is also frequently humorous in ways the other two paths didn't manage, which was a plus for me.
    Some thoughts
    A few thoughts/complaints about this game.  I honestly liked this game a great deal... but it seriously needed a grand route to put the themes of the other paths into a single one.  The issues in each path weren't going to go away just because they weren't dealt with in those individual paths, and it bugs the hell out of me that there was no single path that brought them all to a resolution.
    I also think Verbena should have had a path other than the normal ending.  Sure, she is a slut, a heavy drinker, and takes pleasure in unleashing her spiky weapons (ranging from morning stars to kusarikama)... but her personality is just awesome.  Seeing that kind of character go all deredere is one of my favorite AXL events (AXL does really good 'haraguro' heroines).
    Conclusion
    If you liked any of the other 'swords fantasy' AXL games, you'll like this one.  It has all the elements that make those games great, such as the protagonist being equally or more important than the heroines, decent action without being focused on the action, and a mix of light humor and serious story that keeps slice of life from getting out of hand.  I'll be the first to admit that AXL doesn't change its art style or character archetypes, but that never seems to effect whether their games are good or not.
     
  10. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from kivandopulus for a blog entry, Otomimi ∞ Infinity   
    Yeah, exactly that.
     
    Title: オトミミ∞インフィニティー (Otomimi ∞ Infinity)
    Developer: Applique -Sister-
    Released: 2011/09/22
    Genre: Social Fiction
    Rating: 18+
    website (overseas IP's are currently blocked because Akabei Soft3 are a bunch of faggots)
    trial version
    Trailer:
     
    Despite being a very popular trope in japanese pop culture, mimikkos don't appear that often in visual novels. Sure - they aren't uncommon as side characters or a single addition to the game's cast, but that's pretty much where it ends in most cases. Games focusing on these are a rarity and it's ever harder to find one that tries to be more accurate and ambitious, rather than focusing on their moe and fetish aspects. I wanted to play one of such games for longer while, so when @Clephas mentioned Otomimi Infinity around a year ago, I couldn't restrain myself from elevating this visual novel to the top of my backlog. And in all honesty, I couldn't chose any better, as the game prove to be far more interesting than I expected at first.
     
    The plot
     

    This is literally what you're greeted with within the first minute of the game and it doesn't look that cheerful, contrary to the game's cover.
    The story is based on an alternate near-future setting, where vast scientific achievements lead to creation of artificially engineered hybrids, which are half-people, half-animals. The reasons for this are more or less left unknown, but the beast-people (as being referred to within the story) live now amongst humans for a longer while, resulting in at least one or two generations co-existing with each other to a better or worse degree. Sadly - due to many different factors - the relationships between humans and beast-people have been gradually getting more awful as of late, mostly because humans consider them to be inferior and as such, try to limit their presence and rights as citizens. One of the major problems is that humans can actually reproduce with beast-people and many are worried about potential future implications this might bring. As such, relationships between both races are shunned and having a beast-girl or a beast-man as a partner or love interest is considered immoral and perverted.
    Our protagonist - Yamato Sagawa - lives on a remote island (which basically consists of two small islands connected through a large bridge), located somewhere south of Japan, where racial conflicts increase to such point, where a prominent politician figure and the island's currently residing governor - Touchiji Iwahara - manages to successfully and easily pass down a law (which is more or less a martial law, involving the island's peace keeping forces), encouraging actual segregation of beast-people from humans, all for the well-being of two races. Our protagonist, being an actual beast-people lover isn't obviously happy with such turn of events (actually, he's incredibly pissed). Needless, to say he has more fitting problems at the moment, which include constant love attacks from his older sister with a severely-developed brother complex. During one of such events, while he was trying to get away from Chizuru, he is run over by a yankee beast-girl, Ryouko - and somehow, ends up at the shipping company she's the owner of. There's a bunch of other beast-gals living there, each of them with different circumstances. Thankful for rescue and tired of both his sister and family, but without livelihood, he decides to agree with Ryouko's offer and begins working at the company. As it soon turns out, he's a really capable worker, who's genuinely interested in company's well-being, much more than Ryouko herself, which instantly grabs attention of some of the girls working in the company - mainly Kon and Mayoi - and slowly takes over the responsibilities of actual manager. Meanwhile, statute enforced by Iwahara is increasing in power to the point where government decides to slowly enforce it; the only reason it doesn't affect them directly is because they are located within the middle part, which has been considered a "neutral zone" between both races doing business for a long time. Needless to say, Ryouko suddenly disappears one day without a trace, leaving both the company and girls living on it's premises in Yamato's hands. At this point, Yamato decides to stay, take care of both the company and girls and with their help, oppose Iwahara and his government's plan to segregate beast-people from humans.
     
    The cast
    Main characters:
    Yamato Sagawa - The game's protagonist. He comes from an affluent family that had a major saying in many aspects of island's life, which he himself considers more of a burden, than a blessing. He is generally an independent, kind albeit cautious, hard-working person (supposedly after his father, whom he actually despises as a politician) with enough common sense to see through people and situations far better than most of his peers and as such, capable to work out solutions in circumstances, others typically fail at. He often complains about his family and how intrusive his older sister is, wishing for a more average, normal life. He is also a huge beast-girl lover (they are his fetish) and unlike many other people, doesn't see them any different or more ridiculous than humans, wishing for humans and beast-people to co-exist in peace.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chachako Koya - The dog-girl heroine, Chachako is a rather clumsy and airheaded, hyperactive ball of fluff to the point you'd love to hug her for the rest of your life. She wants to be as helpful as possible within the company, but because she often acts ahead before thinking, her efforts utterly end up in disasters, others have to usually clean up after her. Even though she's a bit of a birdbrain and her puppy-like lack of common sense can be staggering at times, her kindness and near child-like trust and acceptance towards others, including humans allow Chachako to easily form bonds with new people she meets, including Yamato. Despite her seemingly flawed personality and childish behaviour, she can be surprisingly sharp at times - even more so than Kon.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Hanemi Kusahara - The pink haired bunny-girl, Hanemi is shy, timid and similarly to Yamato - a hard-working person that often puts the well-being of others above her own. Due to events from her past, she gets lonely very easily, often to the point of suffering from anxiety attacks and feels uncomfortable, when left alone for extended periods of time. Likewise, she's probably also the most reliable girl from the whole bunch and often helps Yamato to run the entire business, including dealing with clients and company's accountancy. Hanemi is also very close to Ryouko, almost to the point they consider themselves sisters. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHE SHOULD BE EVER ALLOWED TO CONTROL ANY VEHICLES, unless you're ready to face the consequences.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Kon Miyama - A true "kitsune" in every sense, Kon is a sly and intelligent, mature girl with a good grasp of human psychology and a gift of speech unlike any other, allowing her to easily smooth-talk through most of the problems arising throughout the story and often to company's benefit. Within the Otomimi Transportation, she acts mostly as an elderly sister figure and it's not rare to see other characters holding her opinions in high regard. Unfortunately, Kon has a weak constitution and suffers from illness, which causes her to vomit blood in stressful situations. Due to difference in opinions, she often argues with Tetora and takes great enjoyment from teasing others, especially Yamato.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Tetora Byoubu - The resident tiger-girl of the group, Tetora is a genetically enhanced, hot-blooded baby boomer. She was born with an outstanding intellect making her a tech junkie genius, but also made it more difficult for her to admit to mistakes through pride and as such, resulting in her being very insecure and vulnerable to teasing which she responds to in a typical tsun fashion... and boy, oh boy is she cute when that happens. When she doesn't work or play with her gadgets, you can find her constantly bickering with Kon to the point where people in the company don't use alarm clocks anymore, because these two are typically the first to wake up, haha. In all honesty, I consider herself the hottest female character in the whole story.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chizuru Sagawa - Yamato's older sister, who currently manages the whole Sagawa household. She's both reliable and shrewd, but also unforgiving and strict when it comes to business, making her a prominent character in terms of island's political scape and definitely a person not to be trifled with. As adult-like and mature she acts, everything about her changes with Yamato around. Chizuru is an insane brocon, to the point where she's capable to order her family's security forces to stalk Yamato, controlling various aspects of his life through deceit and even waiting for him half-naked in his bed, when he goes back home from school. It's pretty obvious her feelings for Yamato extend far beyond those of siblings.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mayoi Suzune - The game's true heroine. Mayoi is a rather solitary and lazy (leisurely would be more fitting) cat-girl with an incredibly foul mouth who dislikes working, gets vexed easily and doesn't care that much for humans, or anyone else in particular aside from those really close to her heart. She's also an avid otaku with a particular fondness for jrpgs and chuuni stuff, as well as cute (moe) anime girls. Completely indifferent and rather reluctant towards Yamato at start, she gradually opens up to him throughout the events of the game, revealing her different, warm side. Her past is tied with events, which ultimately lead to current situation on the island. Personally, she's my favourite heroine, perhaps because I found her the easiest to relate with.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Side characters:
    Ryouko Nagumo - Originally Otomimi Transportation's first manager, Ryouko is a cool-headed and laid back tanuki chick with a troubled past, who's efforts to increase her own well-being lead her to creation of the company and bringing in the other girls with similar life problems. As much as she acts very mature at times (she understands there are circumstances people have no control over and have to live with), she ends up being a completely irresponsible and lazy klutz most of the remaining time, much to Yamato's disappointment. Her past ties many of the characters together; my only gripe is that she didn't got a route of her own she really deserved, not to mention she's definitely the second most sexy character after Tetora, which is a big loss for the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Ryouzou Daikoku - One of the school's teachers, Ryouzou himself is a powerful elephant beast-man and the home room teacher of Yamato's class. He's very much a fatherly figure - both as helpful, as unforgiving and a peculiar example of a beast-person, who doesn't wish bad to humans and understands the circumstances of the entire conflict, which pretty much earned himself both admiration and respect amongst his human peers and students. When not busy with teaching, he's typically found patrolling the school premises bringing swift demise to all sorts of delinquents and troublesome students (including Yamato, who's notorious for entering school through the gate reserved for beast-people, for obvious reasons), fiery temper and bamboo sword included.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Dr. Foresto, aka prof. Hakumi / Hakumi Sensei - The ultimate scientific genius, also being one of the youngest characters within the story. Dr. Foresto is a cute, quirky and cunning (or at least that's what she thinks) owl-girl, balancing between something akin to an evil scientist delivering cheesy one-liners, intellectual recluse and insecure child. Much like an ancient troll, she lives somewhere under the great bridge and ordered her robotic creation - Mio to not let anyone carrying meat through, unless they hand it over, which obviously includes Otomimi Transportation (actually, it pretty much only involves their transports as of late). Considering her intellect and figure, I wouldn't find her gluttonous attitude surprising.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mio (also known as F-30) - Dr. Foresto's creation, Mio is an android driven by high-grade AI prototype, capable of self-thought and learning, as well - as shown within the story - genuine emotions. Despite that, she still falls under the very same pitfalls of all applied AI mechanics, including pre-programmed routines and need to follow orders in a straight fashion (more commonly know as "watch what you ask for"), much to her guardian's annoyance. Her main job is to steal meat from Otomimi Transportation company's shipments, which she always fails in one way or another because both Yamato and Kon find it really easy to trick her, whilst Tetora would love to take her apart to learn how she functions. Despite being rivals, Mio is often found helping Yamato at school, especially whenever Sango's involved. She also self-destructs in a large detonation, when left in severely unfavourable conditions.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Sango Tomajiri - The shark-girl that also attends the same school as Yamato and rest of characters. A typical girl by day, leader of a notorious gang of shark pirates otherwise - her actions definitely shape a large portion of the story, as she tries to subdue Otomimi Transportation's speed boat, which carries goods between island and mainland. Those events, which almost always end up in spectacular failures for Sango and her gang, led her to treat Yamato both with admiration as the company's manager, as much as hatred to the point of them becoming ultimate rivals. When she's not busy with pirating, she typically stalks Yamato at school, trying to slash him with her sword or shouting how she'll never forgive Yamato, barging inside even in the middle of a class, much to Ryouzou's annoyance.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Touchiji Iwahara - The game's main antagonist, Iwahara is a prominent politician figure and current governor of the island our characters live on. His decisions more or less shape the political and social landscape of the entire region. From a personal standpoint, he is a typical representation of japanese politics, including bluntness and far-reaching arrogance (an actual jab from the dev team towards real life Japan politics, in fact). As the story moves on, players will learn there's actually far more behind his decisions to segregate the island's residents than human well-being and aversion towards beast-people... including some, which are both really personal and tied to his past, when he was still a young man.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Akutaa - An applied AI module once made by Tetora, found in warehouse trash and stuffed inside a large hamster plushie. He unintentionally becomes the company's mascot. Akutaa (his name is indeed written with kanji, meaning trash/garbage) is the sole character, which brings hilarity and sexual humour into this game not found in anything I've previously played. A hardcore masochist and pervert the Earth hasn't seen so far, Akutaa's sole reason of existence boils down to either fluster and embarass all the female workers of Otomimi Transportation, or make them step on him with a various degree of success. While his dirty jokes remain super effective against Hanemi and Mayoi, both Tetora and Mayoi retaliate with passion, which nearly always ends up with him being thrown outside the window, stomped, punched or flushed down the toilet. Even so, it's noteworthy to say that despite his constant antics, he's really caring for everyone in the company and an actually reliable AI partner in business. He wins the award for best voice acting in the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Thoughts
    There's a lot of things I could talk about, which raise this game above the crowd of many, similar titles and overall sea of mediocrity in visual novels.
    One of them is definitely how writer handled the game's main themes - racism and prejudice against different species. Similar to Bloomkamp's District 9 alien race, beast-people are often portrayed in a very unfavourable position, ranging from being called a burden of society, "dutch wives" in regards to females (this is actually quite relevant in regards with game's premise) to plain subhuman trash. Younger beast-people are often bullied at schools by their human classmates (Mayoi being a prime example and it happens literally in the beginning of the story). They can't feel comfortably outside the streets and it's not uncommon for them to be treated with disdain or contempt. Obviously, not everyone behaves like that, but with time it became somewhat of a publicly accepted behaviour for humans to treat them in such way. Likewise, beast-people aren't without their share of negative traits - by being mostly hot-blooded, they often get easily provoked by humans, which only turns things worse in the process, making them spiral down into sort of situations, where they can be easily jailed. The overall situation on the island is definitely not the best, but certain fragments indicate, there are actually places in the world, where things became much worse, with beast-people being devoid of their most basic human rights. Regardless, the islanders are faced with many problems and their future is left uncertain. Kon even states at certain part of the game that if the segregation law gets enforced, it will become nearly impossible for many of them to find jobs or homes and as such, sustain themselves which might prompt the government to take further measures and it's not hard to imagine what might happen. It's a rather bleak, if not nearly dystopian portrayal of future, which also goes perfectly along with modern day issues we're currently facing in real life as societies, especially in Europe and United States. Thank gods Mayoi's route concludes everything on a rather positive, if not slightly bittersweet note.
    There's something really warm and fuzzy in the way how game managed to portray work at Otomimi Carrying Company, with Yamato and girls struggling hard everyday not only for their own benefit, but also well-being of the whole island they live on. After all, they are not only doing this for themselves, but recalling Yamato's words "The well-being of many companies and people on the island depends on our ability to deliver goods in perfect shape to right places and on time". Who wouldn't want to work in such a nice shipping company, being surrounded by so many cute female co-workers? I presume this sort of idealised image of working environment can be treated equally to otaku idealization of youth, prevalent within school settings. In the same way school setting-based visual novels let us relive those most cherished and nostalgic moments of our lives (at least, for most of us), games like Otomimi Infinity with their intricate portrayal of adult labour lets us - older players, who actually became a part of actual society - self-indulge in those dreams of a perfect workplace, while our real life jobs are often rarely as beautiful and fulfilling. I found this particular side of the game really enjoyable, knowing there's this part probably only we - older players - will be able to truly understand.
    This game has a lot of great, enjoyable moments, plenty of laughs as well as plenty of situations, where you will sit on the edge of your seat, which is quite surprising for a game - which despite it's themes - is still being kept in a rather bright tone for most of the time. Some of the fragments made me genuinely feel for the characters and the way the game is made - despite my overall dislike towards ladder-structured scenarios - easily keeps exploring the different angles through each of character routes. I was distraught after Chizuru's route, which can be definitely considered the worst possible ending in the game, while both Chachako's and Hanemi's endings were particularly bittersweet. Tetora's and Kon's endings are more light-hearted, whilst Mayoi's route leads to the penultimate ending - both extremely bittersweet and charming in itself - that will definitely both surprise and leave everyone satisfied.
    Otomimi Infinity presents a particularly high level for a game from the modern eroge period of 2011; It's probably one of the last games, that were presented in an SD format, although the game's assets were already HD. The game's graphics are beautiful - particularly character sprites themselves, backgrounds look very nice and there's lot of panning and additional effects that enhance the visual experience. The soundscape is thick and works well to build atmosphere - everything from small details like characters leaving rooms, closing/opening the car doors (repeated properly by number of characters) to various silly anime sfx are all present and add a lot to the game. The soundtrack is very good - and even if a bit generic to an extent in a typical, anime fashion (lots of instrumental tunes, a bit of electro/trance and even some rock) - provides an extremely good background for all the in-game scenes. The OP song  "Megumira -Megumira-", sung by Marie's bright voice will probably become one of the very few OPs I will actually remember and I found myself already whistling the tune a couple times. Speaking of scenes, the game's direction deserves a particular praise, with proper character placing on screen (there's so many different character sprite variations!), movement and animations - it all creates an unique feeling, not to mention there's so many things going on at the screen in certain moments, you feel the characters might even pop out of your monitor at any moment.
    In overall, this is a great game that shouldn't be omitted by anyone, least by fans of mimikkos or animal anthropomorphism.
     
    Final Verdict:
    Impressive / Highly recommended
    Guilty pleasure
     
    Pros:
    Mimikkos galore! Protagonist, who's not a donkan dumbass or incompetent hetare crybaby Cast of diverse, colourful characters Enjoyable story, being a well-balanced mix of drama, comedy and action with surprisingly good twist at the end Mayoi's route, which also serves as the true ending of the whole story Great art (character designs!) and soundtrack, good direction and use of sound all deserve praise as well excellent voice acting brings characters to life Akutaa; Seriously, his antics lead to some really hilarious moments Plenty of the h-scenes are hot as damn Cons:
    Ladder-based scenario structure with large portions of the story being either repeated or shared throughout character routes detracts from the overall experience Chizuru's obsessive behaviour towards Yamato can get annoying after a while Some of the work and slice of life portions tend to drag on a bit too much As much as Dr. Foresto's and Sango's fragments are fun in the beginning, they get stale after a while The romance part of the game is mostly neglected; coupled with such lovely characters it leaves you with sense of unfulfilled expectations Love scenes are rather shallow for the most part and there's little to no emotional development. Yes, it's the kind of porn even Yuzusoft wouldn't be embarrassed about People having issues with willing suspension of disbelief will probably get annoyed by plenty of small details, like characters driving vehicles despite still being students or maintaining a difficult business at such a young age Game has one of the longest and most unrealistic orgasm scenes I've seen in my entire life
  11. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Dergonu for a blog entry, Otomimi ∞ Infinity   
    Yeah, exactly that.
     
    Title: オトミミ∞インフィニティー (Otomimi ∞ Infinity)
    Developer: Applique -Sister-
    Released: 2011/09/22
    Genre: Social Fiction
    Rating: 18+
    website (overseas IP's are currently blocked because Akabei Soft3 are a bunch of faggots)
    trial version
    Trailer:
     
    Despite being a very popular trope in japanese pop culture, mimikkos don't appear that often in visual novels. Sure - they aren't uncommon as side characters or a single addition to the game's cast, but that's pretty much where it ends in most cases. Games focusing on these are a rarity and it's ever harder to find one that tries to be more accurate and ambitious, rather than focusing on their moe and fetish aspects. I wanted to play one of such games for longer while, so when @Clephas mentioned Otomimi Infinity around a year ago, I couldn't restrain myself from elevating this visual novel to the top of my backlog. And in all honesty, I couldn't chose any better, as the game prove to be far more interesting than I expected at first.
     
    The plot
     

    This is literally what you're greeted with within the first minute of the game and it doesn't look that cheerful, contrary to the game's cover.
    The story is based on an alternate near-future setting, where vast scientific achievements lead to creation of artificially engineered hybrids, which are half-people, half-animals. The reasons for this are more or less left unknown, but the beast-people (as being referred to within the story) live now amongst humans for a longer while, resulting in at least one or two generations co-existing with each other to a better or worse degree. Sadly - due to many different factors - the relationships between humans and beast-people have been gradually getting more awful as of late, mostly because humans consider them to be inferior and as such, try to limit their presence and rights as citizens. One of the major problems is that humans can actually reproduce with beast-people and many are worried about potential future implications this might bring. As such, relationships between both races are shunned and having a beast-girl or a beast-man as a partner or love interest is considered immoral and perverted.
    Our protagonist - Yamato Sagawa - lives on a remote island (which basically consists of two small islands connected through a large bridge), located somewhere south of Japan, where racial conflicts increase to such point, where a prominent politician figure and the island's currently residing governor - Touchiji Iwahara - manages to successfully and easily pass down a law (which is more or less a martial law, involving the island's peace keeping forces), encouraging actual segregation of beast-people from humans, all for the well-being of two races. Our protagonist, being an actual beast-people lover isn't obviously happy with such turn of events (actually, he's incredibly pissed). Needless, to say he has more fitting problems at the moment, which include constant love attacks from his older sister with a severely-developed brother complex. During one of such events, while he was trying to get away from Chizuru, he is run over by a yankee beast-girl, Ryouko - and somehow, ends up at the shipping company she's the owner of. There's a bunch of other beast-gals living there, each of them with different circumstances. Thankful for rescue and tired of both his sister and family, but without livelihood, he decides to agree with Ryouko's offer and begins working at the company. As it soon turns out, he's a really capable worker, who's genuinely interested in company's well-being, much more than Ryouko herself, which instantly grabs attention of some of the girls working in the company - mainly Kon and Mayoi - and slowly takes over the responsibilities of actual manager. Meanwhile, statute enforced by Iwahara is increasing in power to the point where government decides to slowly enforce it; the only reason it doesn't affect them directly is because they are located within the middle part, which has been considered a "neutral zone" between both races doing business for a long time. Needless to say, Ryouko suddenly disappears one day without a trace, leaving both the company and girls living on it's premises in Yamato's hands. At this point, Yamato decides to stay, take care of both the company and girls and with their help, oppose Iwahara and his government's plan to segregate beast-people from humans.
     
    The cast
    Main characters:
    Yamato Sagawa - The game's protagonist. He comes from an affluent family that had a major saying in many aspects of island's life, which he himself considers more of a burden, than a blessing. He is generally an independent, kind albeit cautious, hard-working person (supposedly after his father, whom he actually despises as a politician) with enough common sense to see through people and situations far better than most of his peers and as such, capable to work out solutions in circumstances, others typically fail at. He often complains about his family and how intrusive his older sister is, wishing for a more average, normal life. He is also a huge beast-girl lover (they are his fetish) and unlike many other people, doesn't see them any different or more ridiculous than humans, wishing for humans and beast-people to co-exist in peace.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chachako Koya - The dog-girl heroine, Chachako is a rather clumsy and airheaded, hyperactive ball of fluff to the point you'd love to hug her for the rest of your life. She wants to be as helpful as possible within the company, but because she often acts ahead before thinking, her efforts utterly end up in disasters, others have to usually clean up after her. Even though she's a bit of a birdbrain and her puppy-like lack of common sense can be staggering at times, her kindness and near child-like trust and acceptance towards others, including humans allow Chachako to easily form bonds with new people she meets, including Yamato. Despite her seemingly flawed personality and childish behaviour, she can be surprisingly sharp at times - even more so than Kon.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Hanemi Kusahara - The pink haired bunny-girl, Hanemi is shy, timid and similarly to Yamato - a hard-working person that often puts the well-being of others above her own. Due to events from her past, she gets lonely very easily, often to the point of suffering from anxiety attacks and feels uncomfortable, when left alone for extended periods of time. Likewise, she's probably also the most reliable girl from the whole bunch and often helps Yamato to run the entire business, including dealing with clients and company's accountancy. Hanemi is also very close to Ryouko, almost to the point they consider themselves sisters. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHE SHOULD BE EVER ALLOWED TO CONTROL ANY VEHICLES, unless you're ready to face the consequences.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Kon Miyama - A true "kitsune" in every sense, Kon is a sly and intelligent, mature girl with a good grasp of human psychology and a gift of speech unlike any other, allowing her to easily smooth-talk through most of the problems arising throughout the story and often to company's benefit. Within the Otomimi Transportation, she acts mostly as an elderly sister figure and it's not rare to see other characters holding her opinions in high regard. Unfortunately, Kon has a weak constitution and suffers from illness, which causes her to vomit blood in stressful situations. Due to difference in opinions, she often argues with Tetora and takes great enjoyment from teasing others, especially Yamato.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Tetora Byoubu - The resident tiger-girl of the group, Tetora is a genetically enhanced, hot-blooded baby boomer. She was born with an outstanding intellect making her a tech junkie genius, but also made it more difficult for her to admit to mistakes through pride and as such, resulting in her being very insecure and vulnerable to teasing which she responds to in a typical tsun fashion... and boy, oh boy is she cute when that happens. When she doesn't work or play with her gadgets, you can find her constantly bickering with Kon to the point where people in the company don't use alarm clocks anymore, because these two are typically the first to wake up, haha. In all honesty, I consider herself the hottest female character in the whole story.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chizuru Sagawa - Yamato's older sister, who currently manages the whole Sagawa household. She's both reliable and shrewd, but also unforgiving and strict when it comes to business, making her a prominent character in terms of island's political scape and definitely a person not to be trifled with. As adult-like and mature she acts, everything about her changes with Yamato around. Chizuru is an insane brocon, to the point where she's capable to order her family's security forces to stalk Yamato, controlling various aspects of his life through deceit and even waiting for him half-naked in his bed, when he goes back home from school. It's pretty obvious her feelings for Yamato extend far beyond those of siblings.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mayoi Suzune - The game's true heroine. Mayoi is a rather solitary and lazy (leisurely would be more fitting) cat-girl with an incredibly foul mouth who dislikes working, gets vexed easily and doesn't care that much for humans, or anyone else in particular aside from those really close to her heart. She's also an avid otaku with a particular fondness for jrpgs and chuuni stuff, as well as cute (moe) anime girls. Completely indifferent and rather reluctant towards Yamato at start, she gradually opens up to him throughout the events of the game, revealing her different, warm side. Her past is tied with events, which ultimately lead to current situation on the island. Personally, she's my favourite heroine, perhaps because I found her the easiest to relate with.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Side characters:
    Ryouko Nagumo - Originally Otomimi Transportation's first manager, Ryouko is a cool-headed and laid back tanuki chick with a troubled past, who's efforts to increase her own well-being lead her to creation of the company and bringing in the other girls with similar life problems. As much as she acts very mature at times (she understands there are circumstances people have no control over and have to live with), she ends up being a completely irresponsible and lazy klutz most of the remaining time, much to Yamato's disappointment. Her past ties many of the characters together; my only gripe is that she didn't got a route of her own she really deserved, not to mention she's definitely the second most sexy character after Tetora, which is a big loss for the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Ryouzou Daikoku - One of the school's teachers, Ryouzou himself is a powerful elephant beast-man and the home room teacher of Yamato's class. He's very much a fatherly figure - both as helpful, as unforgiving and a peculiar example of a beast-person, who doesn't wish bad to humans and understands the circumstances of the entire conflict, which pretty much earned himself both admiration and respect amongst his human peers and students. When not busy with teaching, he's typically found patrolling the school premises bringing swift demise to all sorts of delinquents and troublesome students (including Yamato, who's notorious for entering school through the gate reserved for beast-people, for obvious reasons), fiery temper and bamboo sword included.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Dr. Foresto, aka prof. Hakumi / Hakumi Sensei - The ultimate scientific genius, also being one of the youngest characters within the story. Dr. Foresto is a cute, quirky and cunning (or at least that's what she thinks) owl-girl, balancing between something akin to an evil scientist delivering cheesy one-liners, intellectual recluse and insecure child. Much like an ancient troll, she lives somewhere under the great bridge and ordered her robotic creation - Mio to not let anyone carrying meat through, unless they hand it over, which obviously includes Otomimi Transportation (actually, it pretty much only involves their transports as of late). Considering her intellect and figure, I wouldn't find her gluttonous attitude surprising.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mio (also known as F-30) - Dr. Foresto's creation, Mio is an android driven by high-grade AI prototype, capable of self-thought and learning, as well - as shown within the story - genuine emotions. Despite that, she still falls under the very same pitfalls of all applied AI mechanics, including pre-programmed routines and need to follow orders in a straight fashion (more commonly know as "watch what you ask for"), much to her guardian's annoyance. Her main job is to steal meat from Otomimi Transportation company's shipments, which she always fails in one way or another because both Yamato and Kon find it really easy to trick her, whilst Tetora would love to take her apart to learn how she functions. Despite being rivals, Mio is often found helping Yamato at school, especially whenever Sango's involved. She also self-destructs in a large detonation, when left in severely unfavourable conditions.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Sango Tomajiri - The shark-girl that also attends the same school as Yamato and rest of characters. A typical girl by day, leader of a notorious gang of shark pirates otherwise - her actions definitely shape a large portion of the story, as she tries to subdue Otomimi Transportation's speed boat, which carries goods between island and mainland. Those events, which almost always end up in spectacular failures for Sango and her gang, led her to treat Yamato both with admiration as the company's manager, as much as hatred to the point of them becoming ultimate rivals. When she's not busy with pirating, she typically stalks Yamato at school, trying to slash him with her sword or shouting how she'll never forgive Yamato, barging inside even in the middle of a class, much to Ryouzou's annoyance.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Touchiji Iwahara - The game's main antagonist, Iwahara is a prominent politician figure and current governor of the island our characters live on. His decisions more or less shape the political and social landscape of the entire region. From a personal standpoint, he is a typical representation of japanese politics, including bluntness and far-reaching arrogance (an actual jab from the dev team towards real life Japan politics, in fact). As the story moves on, players will learn there's actually far more behind his decisions to segregate the island's residents than human well-being and aversion towards beast-people... including some, which are both really personal and tied to his past, when he was still a young man.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Akutaa - An applied AI module once made by Tetora, found in warehouse trash and stuffed inside a large hamster plushie. He unintentionally becomes the company's mascot. Akutaa (his name is indeed written with kanji, meaning trash/garbage) is the sole character, which brings hilarity and sexual humour into this game not found in anything I've previously played. A hardcore masochist and pervert the Earth hasn't seen so far, Akutaa's sole reason of existence boils down to either fluster and embarass all the female workers of Otomimi Transportation, or make them step on him with a various degree of success. While his dirty jokes remain super effective against Hanemi and Mayoi, both Tetora and Mayoi retaliate with passion, which nearly always ends up with him being thrown outside the window, stomped, punched or flushed down the toilet. Even so, it's noteworthy to say that despite his constant antics, he's really caring for everyone in the company and an actually reliable AI partner in business. He wins the award for best voice acting in the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Thoughts
    There's a lot of things I could talk about, which raise this game above the crowd of many, similar titles and overall sea of mediocrity in visual novels.
    One of them is definitely how writer handled the game's main themes - racism and prejudice against different species. Similar to Bloomkamp's District 9 alien race, beast-people are often portrayed in a very unfavourable position, ranging from being called a burden of society, "dutch wives" in regards to females (this is actually quite relevant in regards with game's premise) to plain subhuman trash. Younger beast-people are often bullied at schools by their human classmates (Mayoi being a prime example and it happens literally in the beginning of the story). They can't feel comfortably outside the streets and it's not uncommon for them to be treated with disdain or contempt. Obviously, not everyone behaves like that, but with time it became somewhat of a publicly accepted behaviour for humans to treat them in such way. Likewise, beast-people aren't without their share of negative traits - by being mostly hot-blooded, they often get easily provoked by humans, which only turns things worse in the process, making them spiral down into sort of situations, where they can be easily jailed. The overall situation on the island is definitely not the best, but certain fragments indicate, there are actually places in the world, where things became much worse, with beast-people being devoid of their most basic human rights. Regardless, the islanders are faced with many problems and their future is left uncertain. Kon even states at certain part of the game that if the segregation law gets enforced, it will become nearly impossible for many of them to find jobs or homes and as such, sustain themselves which might prompt the government to take further measures and it's not hard to imagine what might happen. It's a rather bleak, if not nearly dystopian portrayal of future, which also goes perfectly along with modern day issues we're currently facing in real life as societies, especially in Europe and United States. Thank gods Mayoi's route concludes everything on a rather positive, if not slightly bittersweet note.
    There's something really warm and fuzzy in the way how game managed to portray work at Otomimi Carrying Company, with Yamato and girls struggling hard everyday not only for their own benefit, but also well-being of the whole island they live on. After all, they are not only doing this for themselves, but recalling Yamato's words "The well-being of many companies and people on the island depends on our ability to deliver goods in perfect shape to right places and on time". Who wouldn't want to work in such a nice shipping company, being surrounded by so many cute female co-workers? I presume this sort of idealised image of working environment can be treated equally to otaku idealization of youth, prevalent within school settings. In the same way school setting-based visual novels let us relive those most cherished and nostalgic moments of our lives (at least, for most of us), games like Otomimi Infinity with their intricate portrayal of adult labour lets us - older players, who actually became a part of actual society - self-indulge in those dreams of a perfect workplace, while our real life jobs are often rarely as beautiful and fulfilling. I found this particular side of the game really enjoyable, knowing there's this part probably only we - older players - will be able to truly understand.
    This game has a lot of great, enjoyable moments, plenty of laughs as well as plenty of situations, where you will sit on the edge of your seat, which is quite surprising for a game - which despite it's themes - is still being kept in a rather bright tone for most of the time. Some of the fragments made me genuinely feel for the characters and the way the game is made - despite my overall dislike towards ladder-structured scenarios - easily keeps exploring the different angles through each of character routes. I was distraught after Chizuru's route, which can be definitely considered the worst possible ending in the game, while both Chachako's and Hanemi's endings were particularly bittersweet. Tetora's and Kon's endings are more light-hearted, whilst Mayoi's route leads to the penultimate ending - both extremely bittersweet and charming in itself - that will definitely both surprise and leave everyone satisfied.
    Otomimi Infinity presents a particularly high level for a game from the modern eroge period of 2011; It's probably one of the last games, that were presented in an SD format, although the game's assets were already HD. The game's graphics are beautiful - particularly character sprites themselves, backgrounds look very nice and there's lot of panning and additional effects that enhance the visual experience. The soundscape is thick and works well to build atmosphere - everything from small details like characters leaving rooms, closing/opening the car doors (repeated properly by number of characters) to various silly anime sfx are all present and add a lot to the game. The soundtrack is very good - and even if a bit generic to an extent in a typical, anime fashion (lots of instrumental tunes, a bit of electro/trance and even some rock) - provides an extremely good background for all the in-game scenes. The OP song  "Megumira -Megumira-", sung by Marie's bright voice will probably become one of the very few OPs I will actually remember and I found myself already whistling the tune a couple times. Speaking of scenes, the game's direction deserves a particular praise, with proper character placing on screen (there's so many different character sprite variations!), movement and animations - it all creates an unique feeling, not to mention there's so many things going on at the screen in certain moments, you feel the characters might even pop out of your monitor at any moment.
    In overall, this is a great game that shouldn't be omitted by anyone, least by fans of mimikkos or animal anthropomorphism.
     
    Final Verdict:
    Impressive / Highly recommended
    Guilty pleasure
     
    Pros:
    Mimikkos galore! Protagonist, who's not a donkan dumbass or incompetent hetare crybaby Cast of diverse, colourful characters Enjoyable story, being a well-balanced mix of drama, comedy and action with surprisingly good twist at the end Mayoi's route, which also serves as the true ending of the whole story Great art (character designs!) and soundtrack, good direction and use of sound all deserve praise as well excellent voice acting brings characters to life Akutaa; Seriously, his antics lead to some really hilarious moments Plenty of the h-scenes are hot as damn Cons:
    Ladder-based scenario structure with large portions of the story being either repeated or shared throughout character routes detracts from the overall experience Chizuru's obsessive behaviour towards Yamato can get annoying after a while Some of the work and slice of life portions tend to drag on a bit too much As much as Dr. Foresto's and Sango's fragments are fun in the beginning, they get stale after a while The romance part of the game is mostly neglected; coupled with such lovely characters it leaves you with sense of unfulfilled expectations Love scenes are rather shallow for the most part and there's little to no emotional development. Yes, it's the kind of porn even Yuzusoft wouldn't be embarrassed about People having issues with willing suspension of disbelief will probably get annoyed by plenty of small details, like characters driving vehicles despite still being students or maintaining a difficult business at such a young age Game has one of the longest and most unrealistic orgasm scenes I've seen in my entire life
  12. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Plk_Lesiak for a blog entry, Otomimi ∞ Infinity   
    Yeah, exactly that.
     
    Title: オトミミ∞インフィニティー (Otomimi ∞ Infinity)
    Developer: Applique -Sister-
    Released: 2011/09/22
    Genre: Social Fiction
    Rating: 18+
    website (overseas IP's are currently blocked because Akabei Soft3 are a bunch of faggots)
    trial version
    Trailer:
     
    Despite being a very popular trope in japanese pop culture, mimikkos don't appear that often in visual novels. Sure - they aren't uncommon as side characters or a single addition to the game's cast, but that's pretty much where it ends in most cases. Games focusing on these are a rarity and it's ever harder to find one that tries to be more accurate and ambitious, rather than focusing on their moe and fetish aspects. I wanted to play one of such games for longer while, so when @Clephas mentioned Otomimi Infinity around a year ago, I couldn't restrain myself from elevating this visual novel to the top of my backlog. And in all honesty, I couldn't chose any better, as the game prove to be far more interesting than I expected at first.
     
    The plot
     

    This is literally what you're greeted with within the first minute of the game and it doesn't look that cheerful, contrary to the game's cover.
    The story is based on an alternate near-future setting, where vast scientific achievements lead to creation of artificially engineered hybrids, which are half-people, half-animals. The reasons for this are more or less left unknown, but the beast-people (as being referred to within the story) live now amongst humans for a longer while, resulting in at least one or two generations co-existing with each other to a better or worse degree. Sadly - due to many different factors - the relationships between humans and beast-people have been gradually getting more awful as of late, mostly because humans consider them to be inferior and as such, try to limit their presence and rights as citizens. One of the major problems is that humans can actually reproduce with beast-people and many are worried about potential future implications this might bring. As such, relationships between both races are shunned and having a beast-girl or a beast-man as a partner or love interest is considered immoral and perverted.
    Our protagonist - Yamato Sagawa - lives on a remote island (which basically consists of two small islands connected through a large bridge), located somewhere south of Japan, where racial conflicts increase to such point, where a prominent politician figure and the island's currently residing governor - Touchiji Iwahara - manages to successfully and easily pass down a law (which is more or less a martial law, involving the island's peace keeping forces), encouraging actual segregation of beast-people from humans, all for the well-being of two races. Our protagonist, being an actual beast-people lover isn't obviously happy with such turn of events (actually, he's incredibly pissed). Needless, to say he has more fitting problems at the moment, which include constant love attacks from his older sister with a severely-developed brother complex. During one of such events, while he was trying to get away from Chizuru, he is run over by a yankee beast-girl, Ryouko - and somehow, ends up at the shipping company she's the owner of. There's a bunch of other beast-gals living there, each of them with different circumstances. Thankful for rescue and tired of both his sister and family, but without livelihood, he decides to agree with Ryouko's offer and begins working at the company. As it soon turns out, he's a really capable worker, who's genuinely interested in company's well-being, much more than Ryouko herself, which instantly grabs attention of some of the girls working in the company - mainly Kon and Mayoi - and slowly takes over the responsibilities of actual manager. Meanwhile, statute enforced by Iwahara is increasing in power to the point where government decides to slowly enforce it; the only reason it doesn't affect them directly is because they are located within the middle part, which has been considered a "neutral zone" between both races doing business for a long time. Needless to say, Ryouko suddenly disappears one day without a trace, leaving both the company and girls living on it's premises in Yamato's hands. At this point, Yamato decides to stay, take care of both the company and girls and with their help, oppose Iwahara and his government's plan to segregate beast-people from humans.
     
    The cast
    Main characters:
    Yamato Sagawa - The game's protagonist. He comes from an affluent family that had a major saying in many aspects of island's life, which he himself considers more of a burden, than a blessing. He is generally an independent, kind albeit cautious, hard-working person (supposedly after his father, whom he actually despises as a politician) with enough common sense to see through people and situations far better than most of his peers and as such, capable to work out solutions in circumstances, others typically fail at. He often complains about his family and how intrusive his older sister is, wishing for a more average, normal life. He is also a huge beast-girl lover (they are his fetish) and unlike many other people, doesn't see them any different or more ridiculous than humans, wishing for humans and beast-people to co-exist in peace.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chachako Koya - The dog-girl heroine, Chachako is a rather clumsy and airheaded, hyperactive ball of fluff to the point you'd love to hug her for the rest of your life. She wants to be as helpful as possible within the company, but because she often acts ahead before thinking, her efforts utterly end up in disasters, others have to usually clean up after her. Even though she's a bit of a birdbrain and her puppy-like lack of common sense can be staggering at times, her kindness and near child-like trust and acceptance towards others, including humans allow Chachako to easily form bonds with new people she meets, including Yamato. Despite her seemingly flawed personality and childish behaviour, she can be surprisingly sharp at times - even more so than Kon.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Hanemi Kusahara - The pink haired bunny-girl, Hanemi is shy, timid and similarly to Yamato - a hard-working person that often puts the well-being of others above her own. Due to events from her past, she gets lonely very easily, often to the point of suffering from anxiety attacks and feels uncomfortable, when left alone for extended periods of time. Likewise, she's probably also the most reliable girl from the whole bunch and often helps Yamato to run the entire business, including dealing with clients and company's accountancy. Hanemi is also very close to Ryouko, almost to the point they consider themselves sisters. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHE SHOULD BE EVER ALLOWED TO CONTROL ANY VEHICLES, unless you're ready to face the consequences.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Kon Miyama - A true "kitsune" in every sense, Kon is a sly and intelligent, mature girl with a good grasp of human psychology and a gift of speech unlike any other, allowing her to easily smooth-talk through most of the problems arising throughout the story and often to company's benefit. Within the Otomimi Transportation, she acts mostly as an elderly sister figure and it's not rare to see other characters holding her opinions in high regard. Unfortunately, Kon has a weak constitution and suffers from illness, which causes her to vomit blood in stressful situations. Due to difference in opinions, she often argues with Tetora and takes great enjoyment from teasing others, especially Yamato.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Tetora Byoubu - The resident tiger-girl of the group, Tetora is a genetically enhanced, hot-blooded baby boomer. She was born with an outstanding intellect making her a tech junkie genius, but also made it more difficult for her to admit to mistakes through pride and as such, resulting in her being very insecure and vulnerable to teasing which she responds to in a typical tsun fashion... and boy, oh boy is she cute when that happens. When she doesn't work or play with her gadgets, you can find her constantly bickering with Kon to the point where people in the company don't use alarm clocks anymore, because these two are typically the first to wake up, haha. In all honesty, I consider herself the hottest female character in the whole story.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chizuru Sagawa - Yamato's older sister, who currently manages the whole Sagawa household. She's both reliable and shrewd, but also unforgiving and strict when it comes to business, making her a prominent character in terms of island's political scape and definitely a person not to be trifled with. As adult-like and mature she acts, everything about her changes with Yamato around. Chizuru is an insane brocon, to the point where she's capable to order her family's security forces to stalk Yamato, controlling various aspects of his life through deceit and even waiting for him half-naked in his bed, when he goes back home from school. It's pretty obvious her feelings for Yamato extend far beyond those of siblings.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mayoi Suzune - The game's true heroine. Mayoi is a rather solitary and lazy (leisurely would be more fitting) cat-girl with an incredibly foul mouth who dislikes working, gets vexed easily and doesn't care that much for humans, or anyone else in particular aside from those really close to her heart. She's also an avid otaku with a particular fondness for jrpgs and chuuni stuff, as well as cute (moe) anime girls. Completely indifferent and rather reluctant towards Yamato at start, she gradually opens up to him throughout the events of the game, revealing her different, warm side. Her past is tied with events, which ultimately lead to current situation on the island. Personally, she's my favourite heroine, perhaps because I found her the easiest to relate with.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Side characters:
    Ryouko Nagumo - Originally Otomimi Transportation's first manager, Ryouko is a cool-headed and laid back tanuki chick with a troubled past, who's efforts to increase her own well-being lead her to creation of the company and bringing in the other girls with similar life problems. As much as she acts very mature at times (she understands there are circumstances people have no control over and have to live with), she ends up being a completely irresponsible and lazy klutz most of the remaining time, much to Yamato's disappointment. Her past ties many of the characters together; my only gripe is that she didn't got a route of her own she really deserved, not to mention she's definitely the second most sexy character after Tetora, which is a big loss for the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Ryouzou Daikoku - One of the school's teachers, Ryouzou himself is a powerful elephant beast-man and the home room teacher of Yamato's class. He's very much a fatherly figure - both as helpful, as unforgiving and a peculiar example of a beast-person, who doesn't wish bad to humans and understands the circumstances of the entire conflict, which pretty much earned himself both admiration and respect amongst his human peers and students. When not busy with teaching, he's typically found patrolling the school premises bringing swift demise to all sorts of delinquents and troublesome students (including Yamato, who's notorious for entering school through the gate reserved for beast-people, for obvious reasons), fiery temper and bamboo sword included.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Dr. Foresto, aka prof. Hakumi / Hakumi Sensei - The ultimate scientific genius, also being one of the youngest characters within the story. Dr. Foresto is a cute, quirky and cunning (or at least that's what she thinks) owl-girl, balancing between something akin to an evil scientist delivering cheesy one-liners, intellectual recluse and insecure child. Much like an ancient troll, she lives somewhere under the great bridge and ordered her robotic creation - Mio to not let anyone carrying meat through, unless they hand it over, which obviously includes Otomimi Transportation (actually, it pretty much only involves their transports as of late). Considering her intellect and figure, I wouldn't find her gluttonous attitude surprising.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Mio (also known as F-30) - Dr. Foresto's creation, Mio is an android driven by high-grade AI prototype, capable of self-thought and learning, as well - as shown within the story - genuine emotions. Despite that, she still falls under the very same pitfalls of all applied AI mechanics, including pre-programmed routines and need to follow orders in a straight fashion (more commonly know as "watch what you ask for"), much to her guardian's annoyance. Her main job is to steal meat from Otomimi Transportation company's shipments, which she always fails in one way or another because both Yamato and Kon find it really easy to trick her, whilst Tetora would love to take her apart to learn how she functions. Despite being rivals, Mio is often found helping Yamato at school, especially whenever Sango's involved. She also self-destructs in a large detonation, when left in severely unfavourable conditions.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Sango Tomajiri - The shark-girl that also attends the same school as Yamato and rest of characters. A typical girl by day, leader of a notorious gang of shark pirates otherwise - her actions definitely shape a large portion of the story, as she tries to subdue Otomimi Transportation's speed boat, which carries goods between island and mainland. Those events, which almost always end up in spectacular failures for Sango and her gang, led her to treat Yamato both with admiration as the company's manager, as much as hatred to the point of them becoming ultimate rivals. When she's not busy with pirating, she typically stalks Yamato at school, trying to slash him with her sword or shouting how she'll never forgive Yamato, barging inside even in the middle of a class, much to Ryouzou's annoyance.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Touchiji Iwahara - The game's main antagonist, Iwahara is a prominent politician figure and current governor of the island our characters live on. His decisions more or less shape the political and social landscape of the entire region. From a personal standpoint, he is a typical representation of japanese politics, including bluntness and far-reaching arrogance (an actual jab from the dev team towards real life Japan politics, in fact). As the story moves on, players will learn there's actually far more behind his decisions to segregate the island's residents than human well-being and aversion towards beast-people... including some, which are both really personal and tied to his past, when he was still a young man.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Akutaa - An applied AI module once made by Tetora, found in warehouse trash and stuffed inside a large hamster plushie. He unintentionally becomes the company's mascot. Akutaa (his name is indeed written with kanji, meaning trash/garbage) is the sole character, which brings hilarity and sexual humour into this game not found in anything I've previously played. A hardcore masochist and pervert the Earth hasn't seen so far, Akutaa's sole reason of existence boils down to either fluster and embarass all the female workers of Otomimi Transportation, or make them step on him with a various degree of success. While his dirty jokes remain super effective against Hanemi and Mayoi, both Tetora and Mayoi retaliate with passion, which nearly always ends up with him being thrown outside the window, stomped, punched or flushed down the toilet. Even so, it's noteworthy to say that despite his constant antics, he's really caring for everyone in the company and an actually reliable AI partner in business. He wins the award for best voice acting in the game.
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Thoughts
    There's a lot of things I could talk about, which raise this game above the crowd of many, similar titles and overall sea of mediocrity in visual novels.
    One of them is definitely how writer handled the game's main themes - racism and prejudice against different species. Similar to Bloomkamp's District 9 alien race, beast-people are often portrayed in a very unfavourable position, ranging from being called a burden of society, "dutch wives" in regards to females (this is actually quite relevant in regards with game's premise) to plain subhuman trash. Younger beast-people are often bullied at schools by their human classmates (Mayoi being a prime example and it happens literally in the beginning of the story). They can't feel comfortably outside the streets and it's not uncommon for them to be treated with disdain or contempt. Obviously, not everyone behaves like that, but with time it became somewhat of a publicly accepted behaviour for humans to treat them in such way. Likewise, beast-people aren't without their share of negative traits - by being mostly hot-blooded, they often get easily provoked by humans, which only turns things worse in the process, making them spiral down into sort of situations, where they can be easily jailed. The overall situation on the island is definitely not the best, but certain fragments indicate, there are actually places in the world, where things became much worse, with beast-people being devoid of their most basic human rights. Regardless, the islanders are faced with many problems and their future is left uncertain. Kon even states at certain part of the game that if the segregation law gets enforced, it will become nearly impossible for many of them to find jobs or homes and as such, sustain themselves which might prompt the government to take further measures and it's not hard to imagine what might happen. It's a rather bleak, if not nearly dystopian portrayal of future, which also goes perfectly along with modern day issues we're currently facing in real life as societies, especially in Europe and United States. Thank gods Mayoi's route concludes everything on a rather positive, if not slightly bittersweet note.
    There's something really warm and fuzzy in the way how game managed to portray work at Otomimi Carrying Company, with Yamato and girls struggling hard everyday not only for their own benefit, but also well-being of the whole island they live on. After all, they are not only doing this for themselves, but recalling Yamato's words "The well-being of many companies and people on the island depends on our ability to deliver goods in perfect shape to right places and on time". Who wouldn't want to work in such a nice shipping company, being surrounded by so many cute female co-workers? I presume this sort of idealised image of working environment can be treated equally to otaku idealization of youth, prevalent within school settings. In the same way school setting-based visual novels let us relive those most cherished and nostalgic moments of our lives (at least, for most of us), games like Otomimi Infinity with their intricate portrayal of adult labour lets us - older players, who actually became a part of actual society - self-indulge in those dreams of a perfect workplace, while our real life jobs are often rarely as beautiful and fulfilling. I found this particular side of the game really enjoyable, knowing there's this part probably only we - older players - will be able to truly understand.
    This game has a lot of great, enjoyable moments, plenty of laughs as well as plenty of situations, where you will sit on the edge of your seat, which is quite surprising for a game - which despite it's themes - is still being kept in a rather bright tone for most of the time. Some of the fragments made me genuinely feel for the characters and the way the game is made - despite my overall dislike towards ladder-structured scenarios - easily keeps exploring the different angles through each of character routes. I was distraught after Chizuru's route, which can be definitely considered the worst possible ending in the game, while both Chachako's and Hanemi's endings were particularly bittersweet. Tetora's and Kon's endings are more light-hearted, whilst Mayoi's route leads to the penultimate ending - both extremely bittersweet and charming in itself - that will definitely both surprise and leave everyone satisfied.
    Otomimi Infinity presents a particularly high level for a game from the modern eroge period of 2011; It's probably one of the last games, that were presented in an SD format, although the game's assets were already HD. The game's graphics are beautiful - particularly character sprites themselves, backgrounds look very nice and there's lot of panning and additional effects that enhance the visual experience. The soundscape is thick and works well to build atmosphere - everything from small details like characters leaving rooms, closing/opening the car doors (repeated properly by number of characters) to various silly anime sfx are all present and add a lot to the game. The soundtrack is very good - and even if a bit generic to an extent in a typical, anime fashion (lots of instrumental tunes, a bit of electro/trance and even some rock) - provides an extremely good background for all the in-game scenes. The OP song  "Megumira -Megumira-", sung by Marie's bright voice will probably become one of the very few OPs I will actually remember and I found myself already whistling the tune a couple times. Speaking of scenes, the game's direction deserves a particular praise, with proper character placing on screen (there's so many different character sprite variations!), movement and animations - it all creates an unique feeling, not to mention there's so many things going on at the screen in certain moments, you feel the characters might even pop out of your monitor at any moment.
    In overall, this is a great game that shouldn't be omitted by anyone, least by fans of mimikkos or animal anthropomorphism.
     
    Final Verdict:
    Impressive / Highly recommended
    Guilty pleasure
     
    Pros:
    Mimikkos galore! Protagonist, who's not a donkan dumbass or incompetent hetare crybaby Cast of diverse, colourful characters Enjoyable story, being a well-balanced mix of drama, comedy and action with surprisingly good twist at the end Mayoi's route, which also serves as the true ending of the whole story Great art (character designs!) and soundtrack, good direction and use of sound all deserve praise as well excellent voice acting brings characters to life Akutaa; Seriously, his antics lead to some really hilarious moments Plenty of the h-scenes are hot as damn Cons:
    Ladder-based scenario structure with large portions of the story being either repeated or shared throughout character routes detracts from the overall experience Chizuru's obsessive behaviour towards Yamato can get annoying after a while Some of the work and slice of life portions tend to drag on a bit too much As much as Dr. Foresto's and Sango's fragments are fun in the beginning, they get stale after a while The romance part of the game is mostly neglected; coupled with such lovely characters it leaves you with sense of unfulfilled expectations Love scenes are rather shallow for the most part and there's little to no emotional development. Yes, it's the kind of porn even Yuzusoft wouldn't be embarrassed about People having issues with willing suspension of disbelief will probably get annoyed by plenty of small details, like characters driving vehicles despite still being students or maintaining a difficult business at such a young age Game has one of the longest and most unrealistic orgasm scenes I've seen in my entire life
  13. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Chronopolis for a blog entry, Revised rating system and the eroge food chain or "why certain genres can't attain enlightment"   
    I've been meaning to do this for a longer while now, but various circumstances always prevented me from making it.
    Before we start, let me make this clear. I dislike value-based rating systems, where numbers are supposed to be an estimate on how "good" something is, or how much quality there is to it. In my opinion, those systems are all fair and square but don't really work the way we'd like them to, not to mention a simple number is vague as hell and doesn't really provide anything except a scale between "good", "bad" and "mediocre" in-between. Why is that? Because vns don't work that way, sadly. You can't really rate a visual novel in the same exact manner as a standard Hollywood movie, plastering a number on top of it; it's because vns are insanely diversified works with many unique sub-genres, built with particular audiences in mind. It's a world, where one fan's treasures are another fan's trash, often within the same genre trees. The same can be said about almost every other work medium belonging to japanese pop culture. Discarding this tiny nuance might actually have a pretty detrimental result in terms of ratings, that are either too vague, unfair or way too hedonist, without actually trying to get the gist of what the game actually is and to whom it is addressed. I'd rather want to think of actual ratings as something that helps in deciding how much a game is in line with one's personal interests and how high that goes. Different groups of players have different needs, therefore it's probably easier to explain the whole thing in form of a diagram:

    Don't think of it as "things consuming things", but more as "things supporting other things". Moege aren't particularly worse than high-rated vns, they simply have a completely different target audience, with completely different set of tastes and demands. Obviously, certain genres are more common - because there's a much higher demand for those, but at the same time it means lowering standards to match tastes of a far wider audience, which uniquely leads to genre blandness (this happened to moege and majority of charage already). The games higher on the list in terms of complexity are more streamlined and niche, requiring more refined tastes and greater knowledge in a variety of topics, which leads to them being far less approachable by majority of players. This by default leads to subsequent categorization and further alienation which is one of the major reasons why it's so hard to get into those games and communities that surround them.
    Those tiers are permanent and games belonging to them remain forever bound to their respective positions within the chain. It can't be changed, nor affected in any way, as accessibility by ease of understanding is the sole factor that decides about their fate. This also lead me to believe, that a proper rating system should actually take this into consideration. As much as you play a high-tier chuunige for it's cool story and characters, you play a simple charage not for the plot, but for character interactions and protagonist finally connecting with one of the heroines; you want to see where their relationships will lead to and it's the only actual thing you will care about. It's not really possible to compare both through the same exact value-based rating system.
    Obviously, we could argue about this forever, so without further ado - I present my new rating system, I'll be using onwards for my vn reviews.
     
    Basic ratings go as follows:
    Awful - When things get so bad, you might as well ask yourself what kind of wrong have you committed to end up with such game in your hands. Somehow, you ended up picking it along the way - maybe because it had a cute maid on the cover or a synopsis, which looked particularly interesting; who knows. The point is - the more you play, the less impressed you are and by the time you reach the end, you might be banging your head against the desk in utter disappointment and resentment you ever got yourself into vns. Looks can be deceiving, after all. Avoid whenever possible, since there's probably a thousand things more worth wasting your time on, than crap in p(r)etty disguise.
    Hopefully, I won't ever stumble upon a game, that will prompt me to give it a lower score.
    Imperfect - Games that strive to be good, but fail somewhere along the way - in one or more aspects. Typically a result of many problems piling up on the dev side of things, including lack of proper knowledge, skills, financial aspects, neglect, and/or faggotry. Those titles might (and prolly will) be enjoyable, but often most, the amount of issues outweighs positive aspects, successfully lowering the enjoyment factor to a large degree. They range from being mildly obnoxious in their issues to outright annoying and might be even riddled with bugs. Needless to say, they should be played in moderation to avoid salt overdose and in most cases, only the most devoted fans are arguably able to look past their flaws. For every imperfect game, you will find at least few similar titles that don't suck as badly.
    Mediocre - Games considered a widely accepted quality norm, stuck at their designated level. Mediocre titles tend to be far simpler in nature and typically offer fair value from a consumer standpoint, but lack in soul and technical aspects, making them cheap in comparison with anything above their tier. They tend to be mostly forgettable and don't leave a long-lasting impression (exceptions happen), but remain enjoyable while they last, giving you something to do for a bunch of cozy afternoons. In overall, they tend to leave players with hunger for more and unfulfilled dreams. Expect whatever being mass-produced at current moment to fall under this group, including majority of moege. At times, I tend to leave them with a tiny +, to indicate devs at least tried.
    Impressive - A game, which elevates itself above norm and skilfully uses tropes, settings and standards along with various medium-related mechanics to create memorable experiences. Those are typically good games by default, albeit not devoid of flaws, often times being a part of their very nature. They still tend to be far from perfect, but you'll love them regardless of those tiny mistakes and bumps, which remain an indicator of hand-crafted approach. Titles as such aren't uncommon, but more than often - they will leave you thirsty for more and that thirst is something, they aren't really capable to quench; after many of those, you will most probably want to delve deeper. They will purposefully tingle your ego, but don't expect them to give you clear answers, nor solutions to problems they create. They are more often about the voyage itself - asking questions and leaving their readers in a state of bewilderment - rather than the end result. Nonetheless, they are almost always a truly enjoyable ride till the very end. This group tends to attract simpler story-heavy games, as well as more ambitious charage titles.
    Outstanding - Very few games reach this sort of artistry, that could be only matched with writers' attention to detail and cleverness in which they build their settings and play with commonly found tropes, much to everyone's surprise and delight of their more hardcore fanbase. In those, the definition of up and down doesn't really exist and any sort of distinctions between what's considered widely accepted moral norms blur to the point of being almost indistinguishable. They rarely give a damn about normalfaggotry conceptions of the perceived genres. Such games will often have great heroes and even greater antagonists - actual people made of flesh and blood, driven by most primal human desires and emotions that will defy physics, bend time and space, obliterate entire armies and cause nations to fall. Such characters often find themselves fighting no less with their enemies, as much as themselves - their flaws, imperfections, inner demons hidden somewhere between the folds of their souls and enjoying to peek outside at times. In those tales, people will die and things get destroyed, with certain fates becoming far worse than a visit to the nearest afterworld. Don't expect your favourite characters getting selective treatment; in realm of outstanding stories, characters considered to be "redeeming" or "favourable" often go through even bigger hell than defeated antagonists - at most if they win - with worst possible cases including moral event horizon induced insanity, gruesome deaths or eternal suffering (preferably all in a never-ending cycle). Those stories will make you laugh, they will make you cry, they are frequently emotionally draining - and boy oh boy - entertaining as hell, provided you're capable to grasp concepts behind their inner workings.
    Considered a desired habitable zone by many aspiring and skilful writers, simply because it allows badassery to exist without hurting immersion in the process.
    Brilliant - Games that ultimately defy laws and conventions of genres they belong to, written by literate geniuses, capable to mould words into whatever the hell they want. Plot no longer functions like in normal space and characters are akin to visitors on a vast plane of  reader's subconsciousness. Those games are typically considered difficult to grasp for most people and with a good reason, because you're expected to deal with creators themselves and whatever personal issues, grudges, hate and passions they throw at you, while you're trying to make sense of everything. They are extremely rare and as such, prone to complete subjectiveness, becoming battlefronts for fan-based warfare. They always attain a cult following and grow endless forests of epileptic trees, which serve as fuel for discussions, that will go on for years - AND YEARS, if not decades after release.
    Masterpiece - This, my ladies and gentlemen - is what any fan could consider a holy grail of eroge... if one would only exist. I doubt I'll ever come across a visual novel as good, to be able to freely - and without doubts - give it such a high rating. It didn't happen yet, perhaps I'm yet to read them, who knows. Most of the really good games I know fall somewhere between outstanding and brilliant, to give an example. This rating is more of a gimmick to keep myself at bay there are no perfect games.
     
    In addition, I use the following special tags as well:
    Highly recommended - Games I consider being capable of showing "how things should be done", both in terms of writing as well as genre standards and rules they operate under. Such works, are - more or less - exemplary and at the same time - provide both content and enjoyment in a way, that's easy to grasp even for novices and people unaccustomed with their tropes or elements.
    Guilty pleasure - You DON'T question why certain games get this tag. Period.
    This is something I typically reserve for titles, that might not really be the best or most worthy of attention or general context (I could quite possibly not play them under most circumstances), but definitely deliver elsewhere. Where the former doesn't apply, they simply have things I have a strong and particular fixation about and approach them in such an excellent way - including fetishes I can't really live without anymore - I'm able to forgive those games any other flaws. I don't really play them because of their depth or plot, I play them for my personal enjoyment on a very carnal level and you might find them of equal interest.
    Wicked - A game that breaks any contrived norms or standards and does it in a fashion, that's definitely worth praising. I use this tag specifically for games that are a cherry on the top amongst the more morally ambiguous titles, often scaling between "cute", "awful" and outright "disgusting". Those games usually throw players into a vortex of extreme emotions, crushing their hopes and uplifting them seconds after, only to cast them into despair once again; The sort of games, that leave you both with sense of a profound disapproval and an almighty grin on your face. TL&DR Games that are literally a blast to plough through, provided you are both physically and emotionally strong enough (lol).
     
    For those of you, who ever wondered how do I rate the games I play, or what's my perception of vns in general this hopefully clears things up, even if a little bit.
  14. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, A few Thoughts on VN Trends   
    Before I go visit my remaining grandparents this weekend (my grandmother on my father's side and grandfather on my mother's side are both in extremely frail condition right now, so we are taking time to show my sister's kid to them), I thought I would give my thoughts on modern VN trends.
    Charage aren't going anywhere
    Though I frequently bash the industry for over-saturating the market with moege/charage/SOL, the fact is that the demand for this type of VN is never going to go away as long as the Japanese eroge VN market exists.  Why?  Because it is the single easiest way to present the formation of relationships of young people into a sexual one.  While the genre isn't that attractive for people in their late teens or early to mid-twenties (incidentally the reason this market is declining), the majority of any older generation is always going to prefer this.  The lesser numbers of young people in Japan compared to my generation and the lower relative amounts of income are the main reasons for the current contraction of the genre.
    Good Writers don't go into VNs anymore
    This is a truth that few of the plotge addicts like me want to admit.  Most of the best writers in the VN industry are getting into middle age or later now (or have already left it), and the new and upcoming writers are mostly up and coming LN writers who have a far looser grasp on how to write/narrate and (more importantly) complete a story.  This doesn't mean they won't evolve their styles to match the new medium eventually, but whenever I've read a VN written by one of these newbies, the plot holes and poor handling of the endings of their games stand out painfully.
    Chuunige are in decline
    I absolutely hate to say this.  However, it needs to be said.  Trends in the last nine years in chuunige have tended to result in far too much side-story exploitation and sequelitis.  There is also a distinct lack of innovation, and when innovation does come, it tends to come with a huge drop in quality in the final product (Sora no Baroque).   Fans of the genre are getting older, and some companies (such as Light) have been putting their games in non-ero form on consoles to try to grasp the hearts of younger VN lovers (this has actually succeeded to an extent), but the fact is that it takes a much longer time for a chuunige company to  make back its investment after a release.  This is exacerbated by economic issues in Japan, and the fact that these companies mostly suck at advertising (like many niche genre companies, they only put it up in places where those already 'in the know' will find them).
    VN Trends are always years behind the rest of Otaku-dom
    VN communities in Japan are insular.  Even moreso than they are in the US.  When rom-com anime vanished for the most part at the end of the last decade, it was replaced with cheap action-fantasy (shallow, weaker stories for the most part, with more emphasis put on 'cool' elements) and moeblob.  The glut of such anime is reaching its peak right now... and that influence is starting to overflow (interpreted through the lens of the hyper-conservative VN community, of course) into our side of things.  That said, this is a trend that is unlikely to take hold, because it requires a modicum of writing skill that doesn't involve dialogue, and most VN writers just don't have that.  Instead, VN companies that have been around for a while have been 'testing the waters' by making games that step out of their usual niches, hoping to diversify to deal with the changing trends.  Light went with going down a much darker path than usual with its most recent game, and Navel actually put up a half-assed plotge last month.  These, along with many other incidences in the last two years, make me wonder just what the market will look like five years from now. 
  15. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Zander for a blog entry, Revised rating system and the eroge food chain or "why certain genres can't attain enlightment"   
    I've been meaning to do this for a longer while now, but various circumstances always prevented me from making it.
    Before we start, let me make this clear. I dislike value-based rating systems, where numbers are supposed to be an estimate on how "good" something is, or how much quality there is to it. In my opinion, those systems are all fair and square but don't really work the way we'd like them to, not to mention a simple number is vague as hell and doesn't really provide anything except a scale between "good", "bad" and "mediocre" in-between. Why is that? Because vns don't work that way, sadly. You can't really rate a visual novel in the same exact manner as a standard Hollywood movie, plastering a number on top of it; it's because vns are insanely diversified works with many unique sub-genres, built with particular audiences in mind. It's a world, where one fan's treasures are another fan's trash, often within the same genre trees. The same can be said about almost every other work medium belonging to japanese pop culture. Discarding this tiny nuance might actually have a pretty detrimental result in terms of ratings, that are either too vague, unfair or way too hedonist, without actually trying to get the gist of what the game actually is and to whom it is addressed. I'd rather want to think of actual ratings as something that helps in deciding how much a game is in line with one's personal interests and how high that goes. Different groups of players have different needs, therefore it's probably easier to explain the whole thing in form of a diagram:

    Don't think of it as "things consuming things", but more as "things supporting other things". Moege aren't particularly worse than high-rated vns, they simply have a completely different target audience, with completely different set of tastes and demands. Obviously, certain genres are more common - because there's a much higher demand for those, but at the same time it means lowering standards to match tastes of a far wider audience, which uniquely leads to genre blandness (this happened to moege and majority of charage already). The games higher on the list in terms of complexity are more streamlined and niche, requiring more refined tastes and greater knowledge in a variety of topics, which leads to them being far less approachable by majority of players. This by default leads to subsequent categorization and further alienation which is one of the major reasons why it's so hard to get into those games and communities that surround them.
    Those tiers are permanent and games belonging to them remain forever bound to their respective positions within the chain. It can't be changed, nor affected in any way, as accessibility by ease of understanding is the sole factor that decides about their fate. This also lead me to believe, that a proper rating system should actually take this into consideration. As much as you play a high-tier chuunige for it's cool story and characters, you play a simple charage not for the plot, but for character interactions and protagonist finally connecting with one of the heroines; you want to see where their relationships will lead to and it's the only actual thing you will care about. It's not really possible to compare both through the same exact value-based rating system.
    Obviously, we could argue about this forever, so without further ado - I present my new rating system, I'll be using onwards for my vn reviews.
     
    Basic ratings go as follows:
    Awful - When things get so bad, you might as well ask yourself what kind of wrong have you committed to end up with such game in your hands. Somehow, you ended up picking it along the way - maybe because it had a cute maid on the cover or a synopsis, which looked particularly interesting; who knows. The point is - the more you play, the less impressed you are and by the time you reach the end, you might be banging your head against the desk in utter disappointment and resentment you ever got yourself into vns. Looks can be deceiving, after all. Avoid whenever possible, since there's probably a thousand things more worth wasting your time on, than crap in p(r)etty disguise.
    Hopefully, I won't ever stumble upon a game, that will prompt me to give it a lower score.
    Imperfect - Games that strive to be good, but fail somewhere along the way - in one or more aspects. Typically a result of many problems piling up on the dev side of things, including lack of proper knowledge, skills, financial aspects, neglect, and/or faggotry. Those titles might (and prolly will) be enjoyable, but often most, the amount of issues outweighs positive aspects, successfully lowering the enjoyment factor to a large degree. They range from being mildly obnoxious in their issues to outright annoying and might be even riddled with bugs. Needless to say, they should be played in moderation to avoid salt overdose and in most cases, only the most devoted fans are arguably able to look past their flaws. For every imperfect game, you will find at least few similar titles that don't suck as badly.
    Mediocre - Games considered a widely accepted quality norm, stuck at their designated level. Mediocre titles tend to be far simpler in nature and typically offer fair value from a consumer standpoint, but lack in soul and technical aspects, making them cheap in comparison with anything above their tier. They tend to be mostly forgettable and don't leave a long-lasting impression (exceptions happen), but remain enjoyable while they last, giving you something to do for a bunch of cozy afternoons. In overall, they tend to leave players with hunger for more and unfulfilled dreams. Expect whatever being mass-produced at current moment to fall under this group, including majority of moege. At times, I tend to leave them with a tiny +, to indicate devs at least tried.
    Impressive - A game, which elevates itself above norm and skilfully uses tropes, settings and standards along with various medium-related mechanics to create memorable experiences. Those are typically good games by default, albeit not devoid of flaws, often times being a part of their very nature. They still tend to be far from perfect, but you'll love them regardless of those tiny mistakes and bumps, which remain an indicator of hand-crafted approach. Titles as such aren't uncommon, but more than often - they will leave you thirsty for more and that thirst is something, they aren't really capable to quench; after many of those, you will most probably want to delve deeper. They will purposefully tingle your ego, but don't expect them to give you clear answers, nor solutions to problems they create. They are more often about the voyage itself - asking questions and leaving their readers in a state of bewilderment - rather than the end result. Nonetheless, they are almost always a truly enjoyable ride till the very end. This group tends to attract simpler story-heavy games, as well as more ambitious charage titles.
    Outstanding - Very few games reach this sort of artistry, that could be only matched with writers' attention to detail and cleverness in which they build their settings and play with commonly found tropes, much to everyone's surprise and delight of their more hardcore fanbase. In those, the definition of up and down doesn't really exist and any sort of distinctions between what's considered widely accepted moral norms blur to the point of being almost indistinguishable. They rarely give a damn about normalfaggotry conceptions of the perceived genres. Such games will often have great heroes and even greater antagonists - actual people made of flesh and blood, driven by most primal human desires and emotions that will defy physics, bend time and space, obliterate entire armies and cause nations to fall. Such characters often find themselves fighting no less with their enemies, as much as themselves - their flaws, imperfections, inner demons hidden somewhere between the folds of their souls and enjoying to peek outside at times. In those tales, people will die and things get destroyed, with certain fates becoming far worse than a visit to the nearest afterworld. Don't expect your favourite characters getting selective treatment; in realm of outstanding stories, characters considered to be "redeeming" or "favourable" often go through even bigger hell than defeated antagonists - at most if they win - with worst possible cases including moral event horizon induced insanity, gruesome deaths or eternal suffering (preferably all in a never-ending cycle). Those stories will make you laugh, they will make you cry, they are frequently emotionally draining - and boy oh boy - entertaining as hell, provided you're capable to grasp concepts behind their inner workings.
    Considered a desired habitable zone by many aspiring and skilful writers, simply because it allows badassery to exist without hurting immersion in the process.
    Brilliant - Games that ultimately defy laws and conventions of genres they belong to, written by literate geniuses, capable to mould words into whatever the hell they want. Plot no longer functions like in normal space and characters are akin to visitors on a vast plane of  reader's subconsciousness. Those games are typically considered difficult to grasp for most people and with a good reason, because you're expected to deal with creators themselves and whatever personal issues, grudges, hate and passions they throw at you, while you're trying to make sense of everything. They are extremely rare and as such, prone to complete subjectiveness, becoming battlefronts for fan-based warfare. They always attain a cult following and grow endless forests of epileptic trees, which serve as fuel for discussions, that will go on for years - AND YEARS, if not decades after release.
    Masterpiece - This, my ladies and gentlemen - is what any fan could consider a holy grail of eroge... if one would only exist. I doubt I'll ever come across a visual novel as good, to be able to freely - and without doubts - give it such a high rating. It didn't happen yet, perhaps I'm yet to read them, who knows. Most of the really good games I know fall somewhere between outstanding and brilliant, to give an example. This rating is more of a gimmick to keep myself at bay there are no perfect games.
     
    In addition, I use the following special tags as well:
    Highly recommended - Games I consider being capable of showing "how things should be done", both in terms of writing as well as genre standards and rules they operate under. Such works, are - more or less - exemplary and at the same time - provide both content and enjoyment in a way, that's easy to grasp even for novices and people unaccustomed with their tropes or elements.
    Guilty pleasure - You DON'T question why certain games get this tag. Period.
    This is something I typically reserve for titles, that might not really be the best or most worthy of attention or general context (I could quite possibly not play them under most circumstances), but definitely deliver elsewhere. Where the former doesn't apply, they simply have things I have a strong and particular fixation about and approach them in such an excellent way - including fetishes I can't really live without anymore - I'm able to forgive those games any other flaws. I don't really play them because of their depth or plot, I play them for my personal enjoyment on a very carnal level and you might find them of equal interest.
    Wicked - A game that breaks any contrived norms or standards and does it in a fashion, that's definitely worth praising. I use this tag specifically for games that are a cherry on the top amongst the more morally ambiguous titles, often scaling between "cute", "awful" and outright "disgusting". Those games usually throw players into a vortex of extreme emotions, crushing their hopes and uplifting them seconds after, only to cast them into despair once again; The sort of games, that leave you both with sense of a profound disapproval and an almighty grin on your face. TL&DR Games that are literally a blast to plough through, provided you are both physically and emotionally strong enough (lol).
     
    For those of you, who ever wondered how do I rate the games I play, or what's my perception of vns in general this hopefully clears things up, even if a little bit.
  16. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Gibberish for a blog entry, Revised rating system and the eroge food chain or "why certain genres can't attain enlightment"   
    I've been meaning to do this for a longer while now, but various circumstances always prevented me from making it.
    Before we start, let me make this clear. I dislike value-based rating systems, where numbers are supposed to be an estimate on how "good" something is, or how much quality there is to it. In my opinion, those systems are all fair and square but don't really work the way we'd like them to, not to mention a simple number is vague as hell and doesn't really provide anything except a scale between "good", "bad" and "mediocre" in-between. Why is that? Because vns don't work that way, sadly. You can't really rate a visual novel in the same exact manner as a standard Hollywood movie, plastering a number on top of it; it's because vns are insanely diversified works with many unique sub-genres, built with particular audiences in mind. It's a world, where one fan's treasures are another fan's trash, often within the same genre trees. The same can be said about almost every other work medium belonging to japanese pop culture. Discarding this tiny nuance might actually have a pretty detrimental result in terms of ratings, that are either too vague, unfair or way too hedonist, without actually trying to get the gist of what the game actually is and to whom it is addressed. I'd rather want to think of actual ratings as something that helps in deciding how much a game is in line with one's personal interests and how high that goes. Different groups of players have different needs, therefore it's probably easier to explain the whole thing in form of a diagram:

    Don't think of it as "things consuming things", but more as "things supporting other things". Moege aren't particularly worse than high-rated vns, they simply have a completely different target audience, with completely different set of tastes and demands. Obviously, certain genres are more common - because there's a much higher demand for those, but at the same time it means lowering standards to match tastes of a far wider audience, which uniquely leads to genre blandness (this happened to moege and majority of charage already). The games higher on the list in terms of complexity are more streamlined and niche, requiring more refined tastes and greater knowledge in a variety of topics, which leads to them being far less approachable by majority of players. This by default leads to subsequent categorization and further alienation which is one of the major reasons why it's so hard to get into those games and communities that surround them.
    Those tiers are permanent and games belonging to them remain forever bound to their respective positions within the chain. It can't be changed, nor affected in any way, as accessibility by ease of understanding is the sole factor that decides about their fate. This also lead me to believe, that a proper rating system should actually take this into consideration. As much as you play a high-tier chuunige for it's cool story and characters, you play a simple charage not for the plot, but for character interactions and protagonist finally connecting with one of the heroines; you want to see where their relationships will lead to and it's the only actual thing you will care about. It's not really possible to compare both through the same exact value-based rating system.
    Obviously, we could argue about this forever, so without further ado - I present my new rating system, I'll be using onwards for my vn reviews.
     
    Basic ratings go as follows:
    Awful - When things get so bad, you might as well ask yourself what kind of wrong have you committed to end up with such game in your hands. Somehow, you ended up picking it along the way - maybe because it had a cute maid on the cover or a synopsis, which looked particularly interesting; who knows. The point is - the more you play, the less impressed you are and by the time you reach the end, you might be banging your head against the desk in utter disappointment and resentment you ever got yourself into vns. Looks can be deceiving, after all. Avoid whenever possible, since there's probably a thousand things more worth wasting your time on, than crap in p(r)etty disguise.
    Hopefully, I won't ever stumble upon a game, that will prompt me to give it a lower score.
    Imperfect - Games that strive to be good, but fail somewhere along the way - in one or more aspects. Typically a result of many problems piling up on the dev side of things, including lack of proper knowledge, skills, financial aspects, neglect, and/or faggotry. Those titles might (and prolly will) be enjoyable, but often most, the amount of issues outweighs positive aspects, successfully lowering the enjoyment factor to a large degree. They range from being mildly obnoxious in their issues to outright annoying and might be even riddled with bugs. Needless to say, they should be played in moderation to avoid salt overdose and in most cases, only the most devoted fans are arguably able to look past their flaws. For every imperfect game, you will find at least few similar titles that don't suck as badly.
    Mediocre - Games considered a widely accepted quality norm, stuck at their designated level. Mediocre titles tend to be far simpler in nature and typically offer fair value from a consumer standpoint, but lack in soul and technical aspects, making them cheap in comparison with anything above their tier. They tend to be mostly forgettable and don't leave a long-lasting impression (exceptions happen), but remain enjoyable while they last, giving you something to do for a bunch of cozy afternoons. In overall, they tend to leave players with hunger for more and unfulfilled dreams. Expect whatever being mass-produced at current moment to fall under this group, including majority of moege. At times, I tend to leave them with a tiny +, to indicate devs at least tried.
    Impressive - A game, which elevates itself above norm and skilfully uses tropes, settings and standards along with various medium-related mechanics to create memorable experiences. Those are typically good games by default, albeit not devoid of flaws, often times being a part of their very nature. They still tend to be far from perfect, but you'll love them regardless of those tiny mistakes and bumps, which remain an indicator of hand-crafted approach. Titles as such aren't uncommon, but more than often - they will leave you thirsty for more and that thirst is something, they aren't really capable to quench; after many of those, you will most probably want to delve deeper. They will purposefully tingle your ego, but don't expect them to give you clear answers, nor solutions to problems they create. They are more often about the voyage itself - asking questions and leaving their readers in a state of bewilderment - rather than the end result. Nonetheless, they are almost always a truly enjoyable ride till the very end. This group tends to attract simpler story-heavy games, as well as more ambitious charage titles.
    Outstanding - Very few games reach this sort of artistry, that could be only matched with writers' attention to detail and cleverness in which they build their settings and play with commonly found tropes, much to everyone's surprise and delight of their more hardcore fanbase. In those, the definition of up and down doesn't really exist and any sort of distinctions between what's considered widely accepted moral norms blur to the point of being almost indistinguishable. They rarely give a damn about normalfaggotry conceptions of the perceived genres. Such games will often have great heroes and even greater antagonists - actual people made of flesh and blood, driven by most primal human desires and emotions that will defy physics, bend time and space, obliterate entire armies and cause nations to fall. Such characters often find themselves fighting no less with their enemies, as much as themselves - their flaws, imperfections, inner demons hidden somewhere between the folds of their souls and enjoying to peek outside at times. In those tales, people will die and things get destroyed, with certain fates becoming far worse than a visit to the nearest afterworld. Don't expect your favourite characters getting selective treatment; in realm of outstanding stories, characters considered to be "redeeming" or "favourable" often go through even bigger hell than defeated antagonists - at most if they win - with worst possible cases including moral event horizon induced insanity, gruesome deaths or eternal suffering (preferably all in a never-ending cycle). Those stories will make you laugh, they will make you cry, they are frequently emotionally draining - and boy oh boy - entertaining as hell, provided you're capable to grasp concepts behind their inner workings.
    Considered a desired habitable zone by many aspiring and skilful writers, simply because it allows badassery to exist without hurting immersion in the process.
    Brilliant - Games that ultimately defy laws and conventions of genres they belong to, written by literate geniuses, capable to mould words into whatever the hell they want. Plot no longer functions like in normal space and characters are akin to visitors on a vast plane of  reader's subconsciousness. Those games are typically considered difficult to grasp for most people and with a good reason, because you're expected to deal with creators themselves and whatever personal issues, grudges, hate and passions they throw at you, while you're trying to make sense of everything. They are extremely rare and as such, prone to complete subjectiveness, becoming battlefronts for fan-based warfare. They always attain a cult following and grow endless forests of epileptic trees, which serve as fuel for discussions, that will go on for years - AND YEARS, if not decades after release.
    Masterpiece - This, my ladies and gentlemen - is what any fan could consider a holy grail of eroge... if one would only exist. I doubt I'll ever come across a visual novel as good, to be able to freely - and without doubts - give it such a high rating. It didn't happen yet, perhaps I'm yet to read them, who knows. Most of the really good games I know fall somewhere between outstanding and brilliant, to give an example. This rating is more of a gimmick to keep myself at bay there are no perfect games.
     
    In addition, I use the following special tags as well:
    Highly recommended - Games I consider being capable of showing "how things should be done", both in terms of writing as well as genre standards and rules they operate under. Such works, are - more or less - exemplary and at the same time - provide both content and enjoyment in a way, that's easy to grasp even for novices and people unaccustomed with their tropes or elements.
    Guilty pleasure - You DON'T question why certain games get this tag. Period.
    This is something I typically reserve for titles, that might not really be the best or most worthy of attention or general context (I could quite possibly not play them under most circumstances), but definitely deliver elsewhere. Where the former doesn't apply, they simply have things I have a strong and particular fixation about and approach them in such an excellent way - including fetishes I can't really live without anymore - I'm able to forgive those games any other flaws. I don't really play them because of their depth or plot, I play them for my personal enjoyment on a very carnal level and you might find them of equal interest.
    Wicked - A game that breaks any contrived norms or standards and does it in a fashion, that's definitely worth praising. I use this tag specifically for games that are a cherry on the top amongst the more morally ambiguous titles, often scaling between "cute", "awful" and outright "disgusting". Those games usually throw players into a vortex of extreme emotions, crushing their hopes and uplifting them seconds after, only to cast them into despair once again; The sort of games, that leave you both with sense of a profound disapproval and an almighty grin on your face. TL&DR Games that are literally a blast to plough through, provided you are both physically and emotionally strong enough (lol).
     
    For those of you, who ever wondered how do I rate the games I play, or what's my perception of vns in general this hopefully clears things up, even if a little bit.
  17. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Plk_Lesiak for a blog entry, Revised rating system and the eroge food chain or "why certain genres can't attain enlightment"   
    I've been meaning to do this for a longer while now, but various circumstances always prevented me from making it.
    Before we start, let me make this clear. I dislike value-based rating systems, where numbers are supposed to be an estimate on how "good" something is, or how much quality there is to it. In my opinion, those systems are all fair and square but don't really work the way we'd like them to, not to mention a simple number is vague as hell and doesn't really provide anything except a scale between "good", "bad" and "mediocre" in-between. Why is that? Because vns don't work that way, sadly. You can't really rate a visual novel in the same exact manner as a standard Hollywood movie, plastering a number on top of it; it's because vns are insanely diversified works with many unique sub-genres, built with particular audiences in mind. It's a world, where one fan's treasures are another fan's trash, often within the same genre trees. The same can be said about almost every other work medium belonging to japanese pop culture. Discarding this tiny nuance might actually have a pretty detrimental result in terms of ratings, that are either too vague, unfair or way too hedonist, without actually trying to get the gist of what the game actually is and to whom it is addressed. I'd rather want to think of actual ratings as something that helps in deciding how much a game is in line with one's personal interests and how high that goes. Different groups of players have different needs, therefore it's probably easier to explain the whole thing in form of a diagram:

    Don't think of it as "things consuming things", but more as "things supporting other things". Moege aren't particularly worse than high-rated vns, they simply have a completely different target audience, with completely different set of tastes and demands. Obviously, certain genres are more common - because there's a much higher demand for those, but at the same time it means lowering standards to match tastes of a far wider audience, which uniquely leads to genre blandness (this happened to moege and majority of charage already). The games higher on the list in terms of complexity are more streamlined and niche, requiring more refined tastes and greater knowledge in a variety of topics, which leads to them being far less approachable by majority of players. This by default leads to subsequent categorization and further alienation which is one of the major reasons why it's so hard to get into those games and communities that surround them.
    Those tiers are permanent and games belonging to them remain forever bound to their respective positions within the chain. It can't be changed, nor affected in any way, as accessibility by ease of understanding is the sole factor that decides about their fate. This also lead me to believe, that a proper rating system should actually take this into consideration. As much as you play a high-tier chuunige for it's cool story and characters, you play a simple charage not for the plot, but for character interactions and protagonist finally connecting with one of the heroines; you want to see where their relationships will lead to and it's the only actual thing you will care about. It's not really possible to compare both through the same exact value-based rating system.
    Obviously, we could argue about this forever, so without further ado - I present my new rating system, I'll be using onwards for my vn reviews.
     
    Basic ratings go as follows:
    Awful - When things get so bad, you might as well ask yourself what kind of wrong have you committed to end up with such game in your hands. Somehow, you ended up picking it along the way - maybe because it had a cute maid on the cover or a synopsis, which looked particularly interesting; who knows. The point is - the more you play, the less impressed you are and by the time you reach the end, you might be banging your head against the desk in utter disappointment and resentment you ever got yourself into vns. Looks can be deceiving, after all. Avoid whenever possible, since there's probably a thousand things more worth wasting your time on, than crap in p(r)etty disguise.
    Hopefully, I won't ever stumble upon a game, that will prompt me to give it a lower score.
    Imperfect - Games that strive to be good, but fail somewhere along the way - in one or more aspects. Typically a result of many problems piling up on the dev side of things, including lack of proper knowledge, skills, financial aspects, neglect, and/or faggotry. Those titles might (and prolly will) be enjoyable, but often most, the amount of issues outweighs positive aspects, successfully lowering the enjoyment factor to a large degree. They range from being mildly obnoxious in their issues to outright annoying and might be even riddled with bugs. Needless to say, they should be played in moderation to avoid salt overdose and in most cases, only the most devoted fans are arguably able to look past their flaws. For every imperfect game, you will find at least few similar titles that don't suck as badly.
    Mediocre - Games considered a widely accepted quality norm, stuck at their designated level. Mediocre titles tend to be far simpler in nature and typically offer fair value from a consumer standpoint, but lack in soul and technical aspects, making them cheap in comparison with anything above their tier. They tend to be mostly forgettable and don't leave a long-lasting impression (exceptions happen), but remain enjoyable while they last, giving you something to do for a bunch of cozy afternoons. In overall, they tend to leave players with hunger for more and unfulfilled dreams. Expect whatever being mass-produced at current moment to fall under this group, including majority of moege. At times, I tend to leave them with a tiny +, to indicate devs at least tried.
    Impressive - A game, which elevates itself above norm and skilfully uses tropes, settings and standards along with various medium-related mechanics to create memorable experiences. Those are typically good games by default, albeit not devoid of flaws, often times being a part of their very nature. They still tend to be far from perfect, but you'll love them regardless of those tiny mistakes and bumps, which remain an indicator of hand-crafted approach. Titles as such aren't uncommon, but more than often - they will leave you thirsty for more and that thirst is something, they aren't really capable to quench; after many of those, you will most probably want to delve deeper. They will purposefully tingle your ego, but don't expect them to give you clear answers, nor solutions to problems they create. They are more often about the voyage itself - asking questions and leaving their readers in a state of bewilderment - rather than the end result. Nonetheless, they are almost always a truly enjoyable ride till the very end. This group tends to attract simpler story-heavy games, as well as more ambitious charage titles.
    Outstanding - Very few games reach this sort of artistry, that could be only matched with writers' attention to detail and cleverness in which they build their settings and play with commonly found tropes, much to everyone's surprise and delight of their more hardcore fanbase. In those, the definition of up and down doesn't really exist and any sort of distinctions between what's considered widely accepted moral norms blur to the point of being almost indistinguishable. They rarely give a damn about normalfaggotry conceptions of the perceived genres. Such games will often have great heroes and even greater antagonists - actual people made of flesh and blood, driven by most primal human desires and emotions that will defy physics, bend time and space, obliterate entire armies and cause nations to fall. Such characters often find themselves fighting no less with their enemies, as much as themselves - their flaws, imperfections, inner demons hidden somewhere between the folds of their souls and enjoying to peek outside at times. In those tales, people will die and things get destroyed, with certain fates becoming far worse than a visit to the nearest afterworld. Don't expect your favourite characters getting selective treatment; in realm of outstanding stories, characters considered to be "redeeming" or "favourable" often go through even bigger hell than defeated antagonists - at most if they win - with worst possible cases including moral event horizon induced insanity, gruesome deaths or eternal suffering (preferably all in a never-ending cycle). Those stories will make you laugh, they will make you cry, they are frequently emotionally draining - and boy oh boy - entertaining as hell, provided you're capable to grasp concepts behind their inner workings.
    Considered a desired habitable zone by many aspiring and skilful writers, simply because it allows badassery to exist without hurting immersion in the process.
    Brilliant - Games that ultimately defy laws and conventions of genres they belong to, written by literate geniuses, capable to mould words into whatever the hell they want. Plot no longer functions like in normal space and characters are akin to visitors on a vast plane of  reader's subconsciousness. Those games are typically considered difficult to grasp for most people and with a good reason, because you're expected to deal with creators themselves and whatever personal issues, grudges, hate and passions they throw at you, while you're trying to make sense of everything. They are extremely rare and as such, prone to complete subjectiveness, becoming battlefronts for fan-based warfare. They always attain a cult following and grow endless forests of epileptic trees, which serve as fuel for discussions, that will go on for years - AND YEARS, if not decades after release.
    Masterpiece - This, my ladies and gentlemen - is what any fan could consider a holy grail of eroge... if one would only exist. I doubt I'll ever come across a visual novel as good, to be able to freely - and without doubts - give it such a high rating. It didn't happen yet, perhaps I'm yet to read them, who knows. Most of the really good games I know fall somewhere between outstanding and brilliant, to give an example. This rating is more of a gimmick to keep myself at bay there are no perfect games.
     
    In addition, I use the following special tags as well:
    Highly recommended - Games I consider being capable of showing "how things should be done", both in terms of writing as well as genre standards and rules they operate under. Such works, are - more or less - exemplary and at the same time - provide both content and enjoyment in a way, that's easy to grasp even for novices and people unaccustomed with their tropes or elements.
    Guilty pleasure - You DON'T question why certain games get this tag. Period.
    This is something I typically reserve for titles, that might not really be the best or most worthy of attention or general context (I could quite possibly not play them under most circumstances), but definitely deliver elsewhere. Where the former doesn't apply, they simply have things I have a strong and particular fixation about and approach them in such an excellent way - including fetishes I can't really live without anymore - I'm able to forgive those games any other flaws. I don't really play them because of their depth or plot, I play them for my personal enjoyment on a very carnal level and you might find them of equal interest.
    Wicked - A game that breaks any contrived norms or standards and does it in a fashion, that's definitely worth praising. I use this tag specifically for games that are a cherry on the top amongst the more morally ambiguous titles, often scaling between "cute", "awful" and outright "disgusting". Those games usually throw players into a vortex of extreme emotions, crushing their hopes and uplifting them seconds after, only to cast them into despair once again; The sort of games, that leave you both with sense of a profound disapproval and an almighty grin on your face. TL&DR Games that are literally a blast to plough through, provided you are both physically and emotionally strong enough (lol).
     
    For those of you, who ever wondered how do I rate the games I play, or what's my perception of vns in general this hopefully clears things up, even if a little bit.
  18. Like
    Narcosis got a reaction from Dreamysyu for a blog entry, Revised rating system and the eroge food chain or "why certain genres can't attain enlightment"   
    I've been meaning to do this for a longer while now, but various circumstances always prevented me from making it.
    Before we start, let me make this clear. I dislike value-based rating systems, where numbers are supposed to be an estimate on how "good" something is, or how much quality there is to it. In my opinion, those systems are all fair and square but don't really work the way we'd like them to, not to mention a simple number is vague as hell and doesn't really provide anything except a scale between "good", "bad" and "mediocre" in-between. Why is that? Because vns don't work that way, sadly. You can't really rate a visual novel in the same exact manner as a standard Hollywood movie, plastering a number on top of it; it's because vns are insanely diversified works with many unique sub-genres, built with particular audiences in mind. It's a world, where one fan's treasures are another fan's trash, often within the same genre trees. The same can be said about almost every other work medium belonging to japanese pop culture. Discarding this tiny nuance might actually have a pretty detrimental result in terms of ratings, that are either too vague, unfair or way too hedonist, without actually trying to get the gist of what the game actually is and to whom it is addressed. I'd rather want to think of actual ratings as something that helps in deciding how much a game is in line with one's personal interests and how high that goes. Different groups of players have different needs, therefore it's probably easier to explain the whole thing in form of a diagram:

    Don't think of it as "things consuming things", but more as "things supporting other things". Moege aren't particularly worse than high-rated vns, they simply have a completely different target audience, with completely different set of tastes and demands. Obviously, certain genres are more common - because there's a much higher demand for those, but at the same time it means lowering standards to match tastes of a far wider audience, which uniquely leads to genre blandness (this happened to moege and majority of charage already). The games higher on the list in terms of complexity are more streamlined and niche, requiring more refined tastes and greater knowledge in a variety of topics, which leads to them being far less approachable by majority of players. This by default leads to subsequent categorization and further alienation which is one of the major reasons why it's so hard to get into those games and communities that surround them.
    Those tiers are permanent and games belonging to them remain forever bound to their respective positions within the chain. It can't be changed, nor affected in any way, as accessibility by ease of understanding is the sole factor that decides about their fate. This also lead me to believe, that a proper rating system should actually take this into consideration. As much as you play a high-tier chuunige for it's cool story and characters, you play a simple charage not for the plot, but for character interactions and protagonist finally connecting with one of the heroines; you want to see where their relationships will lead to and it's the only actual thing you will care about. It's not really possible to compare both through the same exact value-based rating system.
    Obviously, we could argue about this forever, so without further ado - I present my new rating system, I'll be using onwards for my vn reviews.
     
    Basic ratings go as follows:
    Awful - When things get so bad, you might as well ask yourself what kind of wrong have you committed to end up with such game in your hands. Somehow, you ended up picking it along the way - maybe because it had a cute maid on the cover or a synopsis, which looked particularly interesting; who knows. The point is - the more you play, the less impressed you are and by the time you reach the end, you might be banging your head against the desk in utter disappointment and resentment you ever got yourself into vns. Looks can be deceiving, after all. Avoid whenever possible, since there's probably a thousand things more worth wasting your time on, than crap in p(r)etty disguise.
    Hopefully, I won't ever stumble upon a game, that will prompt me to give it a lower score.
    Imperfect - Games that strive to be good, but fail somewhere along the way - in one or more aspects. Typically a result of many problems piling up on the dev side of things, including lack of proper knowledge, skills, financial aspects, neglect, and/or faggotry. Those titles might (and prolly will) be enjoyable, but often most, the amount of issues outweighs positive aspects, successfully lowering the enjoyment factor to a large degree. They range from being mildly obnoxious in their issues to outright annoying and might be even riddled with bugs. Needless to say, they should be played in moderation to avoid salt overdose and in most cases, only the most devoted fans are arguably able to look past their flaws. For every imperfect game, you will find at least few similar titles that don't suck as badly.
    Mediocre - Games considered a widely accepted quality norm, stuck at their designated level. Mediocre titles tend to be far simpler in nature and typically offer fair value from a consumer standpoint, but lack in soul and technical aspects, making them cheap in comparison with anything above their tier. They tend to be mostly forgettable and don't leave a long-lasting impression (exceptions happen), but remain enjoyable while they last, giving you something to do for a bunch of cozy afternoons. In overall, they tend to leave players with hunger for more and unfulfilled dreams. Expect whatever being mass-produced at current moment to fall under this group, including majority of moege. At times, I tend to leave them with a tiny +, to indicate devs at least tried.
    Impressive - A game, which elevates itself above norm and skilfully uses tropes, settings and standards along with various medium-related mechanics to create memorable experiences. Those are typically good games by default, albeit not devoid of flaws, often times being a part of their very nature. They still tend to be far from perfect, but you'll love them regardless of those tiny mistakes and bumps, which remain an indicator of hand-crafted approach. Titles as such aren't uncommon, but more than often - they will leave you thirsty for more and that thirst is something, they aren't really capable to quench; after many of those, you will most probably want to delve deeper. They will purposefully tingle your ego, but don't expect them to give you clear answers, nor solutions to problems they create. They are more often about the voyage itself - asking questions and leaving their readers in a state of bewilderment - rather than the end result. Nonetheless, they are almost always a truly enjoyable ride till the very end. This group tends to attract simpler story-heavy games, as well as more ambitious charage titles.
    Outstanding - Very few games reach this sort of artistry, that could be only matched with writers' attention to detail and cleverness in which they build their settings and play with commonly found tropes, much to everyone's surprise and delight of their more hardcore fanbase. In those, the definition of up and down doesn't really exist and any sort of distinctions between what's considered widely accepted moral norms blur to the point of being almost indistinguishable. They rarely give a damn about normalfaggotry conceptions of the perceived genres. Such games will often have great heroes and even greater antagonists - actual people made of flesh and blood, driven by most primal human desires and emotions that will defy physics, bend time and space, obliterate entire armies and cause nations to fall. Such characters often find themselves fighting no less with their enemies, as much as themselves - their flaws, imperfections, inner demons hidden somewhere between the folds of their souls and enjoying to peek outside at times. In those tales, people will die and things get destroyed, with certain fates becoming far worse than a visit to the nearest afterworld. Don't expect your favourite characters getting selective treatment; in realm of outstanding stories, characters considered to be "redeeming" or "favourable" often go through even bigger hell than defeated antagonists - at most if they win - with worst possible cases including moral event horizon induced insanity, gruesome deaths or eternal suffering (preferably all in a never-ending cycle). Those stories will make you laugh, they will make you cry, they are frequently emotionally draining - and boy oh boy - entertaining as hell, provided you're capable to grasp concepts behind their inner workings.
    Considered a desired habitable zone by many aspiring and skilful writers, simply because it allows badassery to exist without hurting immersion in the process.
    Brilliant - Games that ultimately defy laws and conventions of genres they belong to, written by literate geniuses, capable to mould words into whatever the hell they want. Plot no longer functions like in normal space and characters are akin to visitors on a vast plane of  reader's subconsciousness. Those games are typically considered difficult to grasp for most people and with a good reason, because you're expected to deal with creators themselves and whatever personal issues, grudges, hate and passions they throw at you, while you're trying to make sense of everything. They are extremely rare and as such, prone to complete subjectiveness, becoming battlefronts for fan-based warfare. They always attain a cult following and grow endless forests of epileptic trees, which serve as fuel for discussions, that will go on for years - AND YEARS, if not decades after release.
    Masterpiece - This, my ladies and gentlemen - is what any fan could consider a holy grail of eroge... if one would only exist. I doubt I'll ever come across a visual novel as good, to be able to freely - and without doubts - give it such a high rating. It didn't happen yet, perhaps I'm yet to read them, who knows. Most of the really good games I know fall somewhere between outstanding and brilliant, to give an example. This rating is more of a gimmick to keep myself at bay there are no perfect games.
     
    In addition, I use the following special tags as well:
    Highly recommended - Games I consider being capable of showing "how things should be done", both in terms of writing as well as genre standards and rules they operate under. Such works, are - more or less - exemplary and at the same time - provide both content and enjoyment in a way, that's easy to grasp even for novices and people unaccustomed with their tropes or elements.
    Guilty pleasure - You DON'T question why certain games get this tag. Period.
    This is something I typically reserve for titles, that might not really be the best or most worthy of attention or general context (I could quite possibly not play them under most circumstances), but definitely deliver elsewhere. Where the former doesn't apply, they simply have things I have a strong and particular fixation about and approach them in such an excellent way - including fetishes I can't really live without anymore - I'm able to forgive those games any other flaws. I don't really play them because of their depth or plot, I play them for my personal enjoyment on a very carnal level and you might find them of equal interest.
    Wicked - A game that breaks any contrived norms or standards and does it in a fashion, that's definitely worth praising. I use this tag specifically for games that are a cherry on the top amongst the more morally ambiguous titles, often scaling between "cute", "awful" and outright "disgusting". Those games usually throw players into a vortex of extreme emotions, crushing their hopes and uplifting them seconds after, only to cast them into despair once again; The sort of games, that leave you both with sense of a profound disapproval and an almighty grin on your face. TL&DR Games that are literally a blast to plough through, provided you are both physically and emotionally strong enough (lol).
     
    For those of you, who ever wondered how do I rate the games I play, or what's my perception of vns in general this hopefully clears things up, even if a little bit.
  19. Like
    Narcosis reacted to MayoeruHitori for a blog entry, The Heart of Chuuni   
    The Heart of Chuuni

    My previous blog posts were about analyzing common definitions and attitudes toward the word "chuuni" and the chuuni genre. I was establishing a baseline. But now it's time to delve into the essence.
     
    Background
    Most VN fans have heard an "explanation" of the chuuni genre before.
    "It's stuff like Dies irae"
    "It's hotblooded and over-the-top action"
    "It's about detailed settings with cool characters"
    "It's edgy shit"
    "It's a story with characters who act chuunibyou, except nobody tsukkomi's them"
    "It's people with heterochromia or special powers and victim complexes"
    "It's shounen for adults"
    Whatever you may have heard, there's one thing I'm sure about: it's vague. Most people zero in on a specific element of chuuni that holds their attention or that they like about it, and say, "This is chuuni!"
    In truth, though, chuuni is a broad genre that encompasses many literary mediums, many sources of appeal, many tropes, and many cases where the trope is hard to describe. People are expected to experience a lot of chuuni works, and experience a lot of references to "chuuni" within other Japanese works, and thus by cultural osmosis, form an abstract concept of what is "chuuni".
    But do we really have to settle for that? Can't we precisely say what exactly is and isn't "chuuni", at least in spirit? I believe we can.
    Let's throw out popular perceptions and attitudes, along with all the baggage associated with the word "chuunibyou" that formed the basis of the word chuuni. Let's move beyond the cultural background that has been established in my previous post, discard all preconceptions, and finally... approach the true heart of chuuni.
     

    .
    The Path to Chuuni
    What follow are largely my own informed inferences. They lack evidence, because there's no easy way to prove a cultural trend. If anyone has an alternative theory, they're free to present it in the comments or their own blog post.
    Early manga was expected to conform to the "common sense" of society. Or rather, there was little market for contrarian works.
    Works that targeted the youth often centered around "heroes" who were expected to help maintain the peace of society, living according virtues such as kindness and mercy, and achieved success and peer recognition as a result. Works that targeted adults, on the other hand, might be more cynical, but they still revolved around adult protagonists who had conformed to society.
    For a parallel outside Japan, look to Western comic book heroes like Superman, who stood tall amid the Comics Code Authority regulations. In fact, the style of early manga was significantly inspired by its Western counterpart.
    But society doesn't stay the same forever. Decades passed, and people's sensibilities changed along with their attitudes.
    ...No one can possibly trace chuuni to its origin point, because there is no such thing. Throughout history, there have always been isolated elements within works of literature that speak to our chuuni hearts. Like, for a fairly "recent" example, everything about the style of Hiei from Yuu Yuu Hakusho. If there is an origin of chuuni as a genre, it occurred when those elements fused together. But what degree of fusion is necessary to birth a "genre"? The only point by which it's absolutely certain a "genre" had come into existence was the advent of Fate/stay night.
     

     
    What We Desired
    So, what is chuuni?
    Chuuni is completely pointless from a practical standpoint; it just sounds cool. Chuuni-style nicknames, throwing in random German, or donning a scarf or a cape.
    Chuuni doesn't serve to create a conflict, or add necessary depth in ways typical of fantasy stories. Rather, it serves to emphasize the special coolness of the lead character. Having a "unique infection", wrestling with madness, experiencing an "awakening", or possessing memories of a past life.
    Chuuni depicts the "alternate truths" that contradict what others think and feel. A morality that is not subordinated. Killing to survive, references to the food chain, massacre as self-expression, or a rebellion against the natural order of a hypocritical "God".
    Chuuni reveals the "hidden truths" about society that have scarred the people within it. Conspiracies, cover-ups, or human experimentation.
    At the heart, chuuni is a celebration of the virtue of "chuuni" characters--and the chuuni fans who recognize them--as the true heroes of this world, in touch with a reality the masses can't conceive of, capable of facing harsh truths and shouldering emotional burdens that typical, mundane people would be overwhelmed by--because those people lack character, lack mental strength, and are emotionally weak, capable only of clinging to the foolish perceptions, beliefs, and morals espoused by society. I believe that everything that chuuni has become started from that.
    Young people in society often experience alienation, or some kind of frustration with their inability to perfectly conform. Such people are often tempted by a certain wild idea, and think like this:
    "I feel like shit because no one sees the world the same way as me. But even after I've let myself stew in this rotten emotion, I still can't make myself be just like everyone else... What if everyone else is actually deluded, and I'm correct? In that case, my perception is superior to others, and I'm aware of truths they aren't, AND I had the boldness to stick with my beliefs instead of delude myself and conform like the rest of them. Aren't I quite awesome?"
    People who feel like this, even if it's just a slight inclination rather than full-blown chuunibyou, tend to admire and seek out characters and stories with a chuuni spirit.
    When Fate/stay night came out, it was like a bomb went off. Fate hit just the right note with its moral complexity, the mystique of the rich world it depicted, a lawless secret world of the supernatural, ordinary people depicted as clueless sacrificial sheep, a male lead whose evolution is a condemnation of traditional moralistic leads, and so on. People with an inclination toward chuuni tropes flocked to it in droves, plus everyone else, because Fate/stay night was just that good.
    That said, in the present day, what we (especially VN fans) call "chuuni" often refers more to famous tropes from chuuni works, and what those tropes have evolved into, and doesn't necessarily seek as its audience the sort of person I just described. But it's worth keeping in mind the origin of this genre.
     

     
    More Human than Humans
    I'll close with this wonderful piece of prose that truly captures the essence of chuuni.
    They, who wandered and pursued that formless “humanness,”
    who couldn’t see any significance in their existence outside of battle,
    who, because of their hearts becoming akin to blades, didn’t know how to grasp any hands extended to them,
    who never had anyone understand their beauty, and had no choice but to seclude themselves among each other,
    who had no choice but to estrange themselves with fake smiles when with other people so they could maintain themselves,
    who couldn’t pride themselves in anything but destruction,
    who therefore were particularly cynical and were born with inhumane powers, and therefore were continuously called monsters, were, more than anyone and anything else, human.
    -- Excerpt from "Psyren: Another Call 2" by Iwashiro Toshiaki, translated by himetsuri
     

     
    I'm not entirely satisfied with this post, so I may revise it later.
     
  20. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, Experimental Book Post: The Under Jurisdiction Series   
    First, I should note that this is a series that is right up the alley of people like Dergonu... it were a VN.  This series, Under Jurisdiction by Susan R Matthews, mostly follows Andrej Koscuisko, a Drakonij Prince and would-be (though not by his own will) Inquisitor. 
    Setting
    The Under Jurisdiction series is based in a sci-fi future where humanity, at some point, diversified so greatly that sub-specification has occurred (though most aren't quite separate species entirely.  In this future, humanity (such as it is) is ruled by the judiciary, in the form of the Bench.  All humans are subject to the law as proclaimed by the judicial forces, and punishments are mostly corporal... horribly so in some cases. 
    In this setting, torture is not only allowed, it is actually carried out by licensed medical professionals trained to inflict the maximum amount of pain to gain confessions of crimes (regardless of how heavy the evidence is), and, where it is justified, to torture them to death in the most horrible of fashions.  This legal use of torture as a deterrent to criminals has led to a gradual decay in the morale of the planets ruled by the Judges on the Bench, and rebellions have begun to occur on a regular basis by the time the protagonist, Andrej, takes his first steps into the world of the Fleet.
    Andrej Koscuisko
    Andrej is an extremely complex man... a man raised in a noble family of oligarchs who believe intensely and with absolute conviction in the duties of noblesse oblige and the duties to those under a lord's protection.  He is also a young medical professional, a genius surgeon and chemist with a the kind of skill in actual surgical procedures that is seen so rarely as to be unheard of.  He understands the human body (all races) to a degree that is often terrifying, and this is part of what becomes his plague... for when he begins his training, he discovers that, to his horror, the process of Inquisition brings out an intense, sick hunger to inflict pain upon and dominate the subjects that come under his hands.  Coupled with his natural understanding of the body and human psychology, he comes out of his training as the most horrifyingly skilled Inquisitor in Bench history, an artist of pain eternally on the verge of madness due to the conflicting imperatives within him.  He is only held back from the edge of the cliff by the efforts of his Bond Involuntaries, former criminals implanted with behavioral governors that force them to absolute obedience, so they can serve as his aides, and they are thus under his protection.  Their care for him, for his sanity, for his health, and for his honor, is all that keeps the sadistic madness at bay as it fights with his honor and inherent compassion...
    The Story
    The story follows Andrej from his training as an Inquisitor and first encounter with a Bond Involuntary, to his first duty as a Fleet Inquisitor and beyond... His fight with madness as he tries to glean mercy and justice from the horrors he is forced to perform on others, his fight to keep his honor, to protect his Bond Involuntaries from others who would use them poorly, and his fight with his own, culturally-ingrained sense of filial duty are intense to read.  For all the foreignness of his culture, Andrej's journeys through life leave behind an impact far out of proportion for the actual deeds he performs. 
    Unfortunately, if you have a weak stomach, I can't recommend this story at all.  The galaxy Under Jurisdiction is one of the most horrifying dystopian sci-fi systems I've ever seen... all the worse when you realize that it all began out of a desire for justice and fair play in a universe where human racism has, if anything, gotten worse thousands of years after leaving Earth.
  21. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, Random VNs: Otomimi Infinity   
    Why did I pick this game to play?  Because, when I went into Shugaten, I was actually wanting a bit of charage goodness.  So, it seriously pissed me off when I got a mindless loli moege.  As a result, I decided to pull out one of my favorite fetish games, Otomimi Infinity. 
    Otomimi Infinity is based on island in a world where beast-people and humans live side by side (it isn't mentioned often enough to reinforce this, but the beast-people were originally artificial creations).  On the island, prejudice against the beast-people has gotten so bad that a right-wing politician has managed to get a segregation law passed.  The protagonist, Segawa Yamato, is a beast-girl loving guy (in the sexual sense, and not limited to their humanoid forms, lol) who gets seriously pissed off at the new law.  After a series of events, he ends up working for Otomimi Transport, a company that basically takes care of shipping packages all over the island and from the mainland.  This company is all beast-girls, except for him... (so naturally, he is in heaven)
    There are a lot of laughs in this game... in particular the pirate group led by Sango (a side-character shark-girl) and Dr. Forest (real name: Hakumi), a mad scientist who keeps trying to use her high-tech AI android to steal bbq meat from Otomimi Transport's trucks (and failing miserably) stand out as absolutely hilarious.  Not to mention the company's 'mascot', Akuta (which uses the kanji for 'garbage'), a do-M AI implanted in a fat squirrel stuffed animal who can't resist making perverted statements.
    I was also surprised in retrospect at how seriously the game handles the elements of prejudice... and the negative elements of Japan's society that show through.  The position of the beast-people is pretty weak, mostly because the average beast-person isn't that good at thinking before acting (those that are are the exception, rather than the rule).  Humans call them 'worthless burdens on society' (it bears an eerie resemblance to the attitude of the US right-wingers to immigrants) and it was apparently really easy to get the segregation law passed.  Also, falling in love with a beast-person and vise-versa is considered perverted, lol.
    Anyway, as well as jokes there are some good feels in here... as well as some really good endings (considering that this was written by the same guy who wrote Shikigami, Shiden, and Pretty X Cation 2, that is actually pretty surprising).  For some reason, fetish games sometimes have stories a lot more interesting than the average VN, lol.
    The game's heroines are:
    Chachako- A clumsy and airheaded dog-girl who somehow always manages to land on her feet, anyway.
    Tetora- A tiger-girl who is a scientific genius but categorically incapable of admitting when she doesn't know something or is wrong... or when she is lost (she has no sense of direction).
    Kon- A fox-girl whose first love in life is teasing others and getting her way through fast talk.  She is highly intelligent and has a solid grasp of people in general.
    Hanemi- A bunny-girl who gets lonely ridiculously easy... and is a speed-demon whenever she gets behind the wheel or control stick of any vehicle whatsoever (thankfully, she is also a genius at using them).
    Chizuru- The protagonist's older sister... who has an insane, obsessive brother complex that extends to waiting half-naked in his bed and stalking him whenever she isn't running the family corporation.
    Mayoi- A cat-girl and the game's 'true' heroine.  She is a lazy gamer who hates working, has a foul mouth, and who only really cares about the people working at Otomimi Transport. 
    Overall, this is a VN for people who love their mimikko.  My first fetish was neko-girls and my second was kitsune, so naturally this game fits me well.  It also has a good, well-told story with a fun set of characters even if you ignore the heroines.
  22. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Asonn for a blog entry, Cringe, Cooking and flimsy filming with Asonn.   
    Today, I made the most famous Karaage (から揚げ). I do make this often and today I thought why not start a blog with this delicious content.
    Spoiler: I didn't let my chicken rest enough so it had some excess potato starch on it... but the heck with it.
    Preparation: 
    Sake Corn/Potato Starch sugar Ginger (just a bit! we will only use the sweet juices) Soy Sauce Chicken ( cut them a bit larger than your normal bites, as it has a lot of fiber so it will shrink when frying)  

    Secret frying process: 
    Fry them 3 times. For best results go with 2 min on 190C, then let them rest for 1 minute. fry them again on 190C this time for 1 min, rest 30 sec. and then once again 1 minute on 190C.
    I couldn't be bothered this time, probably also the reason why I have still corn on my finished product. It still tasty af tho. 

    Tip: use Japanese 7 spice mix (七味唐辛子) on your mayo. 
     
    Here is a video of me actually making it. unedited. (I didn't film the whole frying process as I couldn't be bothered...)
    Enjoy the Cringe : )
  23. Like
    Narcosis reacted to Clephas for a blog entry, Random VN: Vermilion Bind of Blood   
    This is my fourth time replaying the Light VN, Vermilion Bind of Blood, and to my startlement, I realized that my only commentary on this is is in my ancient VN of the Month Thread on the forums.  So... of course I cannot leave my beloved public ignorant of this game (though I've made a habit of recommending it to everyone, like Evolimit).
    Vermilion was the first chuunige made by Light's second team, and it was my first experience of the team's work.  It is also probably that team's single most balanced VN, and it is the only one I call a kamige, albeit with a few reservations. 
    The protagonist of this story is one Kashima Toshirou (who is referred to in the Western fashion as Toshirou Kashima throughout the whole game).  He is a former samurai from the era just before the opening up of Japan by Perry's black ships who became a vampire.  Now he is a gloomy man who serves as a watcher for the vampiric community of the fictional American city of Foggy Bottom.  Toshirou is something of an anomaly amongst vampires in general... and most seem to hate him instinctively (there is good reason for this, though few ever know it).  He considers all vampires merely to be an extension of humans, denying the vampire legend that most believe in, and he has nothing but contempt for those who allow themselves to drown in their power and the arrogance born from it.
    This game has four heroines.  They are:
    Anne Portman- The first heroine.  You are forced to play her route first (probably because nobody would want to go after her if given a choice).  Unlike the other heroines, who are more or less easy with their lives as vampires, Anne is a timid, kind-hearted girl who is fundamentally unsuited to being a vampire.  Her role in this game is quite similar to that of Kasumi in Dies Irae (more as a contrast in the form of a 'normal person' than as a real heroine).  While her character is less than inspiring (that she is a heroine is the only flaw I see in this game), her path is actually quite good, though less so than the others in this game.  I did and do find the ending worthy of mention, because it is... pleasant in a sad sort of way.  It is also surprisingly uplifting, coming back without being tainted by my dislike for the presence of a Victim A heroine in a chuunige VN.
    Sherryl McGregor- The victor of the heroine polls twice in a row, Sherryl is Toshirou's long-standing partner in both work and the home.  Their relationship is a 'don't ask, don't tell' one where they don't talk about their pasts.  It is an easygoing relationship, but it is fairly obvious that Sherryl fell for him decades ago.  If I were to compare Sherryl to a translated VN heroine, it would be the adult Cal Devens from Phantom of Inferno, albeit with a century and a half of experience under her belt.  Sherryl was born in Victorian England, and her experiences in the slums there shaped her base personality.  She bluffs, she fights, and she has a temper... but underneath it all, she is as soft as a fuzzy teddy bear when it comes to Toshirou.  She is also a talented singer, a skill she shows off at Casanova, the bar near the office.  Her path is the most revealing of Toshirou's past (in fact, that is its structural purpose, though that doesn't interfere with its quality), and it is a fun ride...  Her ending is actually pretty hilarious as well as touching, because it is probably the only path in the game where Toshirou manages to move on to some extent (Toshirou is very very stuck in his ways).  Sherryl also grows a great deal as a character in this path (as a matter of course) and it is a pleasure to watch.
    Nina Orlok- The Principal (political leader of a Diaspora, which is the name given to vampiric communities) of the Western US Diaspora, a young woman forced into a position far beyond her personal power by her powerful blood father's will after his death.  She sees her duty as the only way to repay her father's trust in her, and she constantly struggles with the gap between what she wants to be and who she actually is.  That said, she is actually a quite capable political leader (a given, since she isn't dead or imprisoned, despite being a youngling in a position that would normally only be allowed to an ancient vampire), with a core of strength hidden under the girl struggling desperately to fulfill her father's hopes.  I sincerely enjoy her path, each time, because her growth as a character is inspiring, especially once she gets past her father complex.  Toshirou in her path is probably the most samurai-like (in the classic sense), and the battle that closes out this path is the third-best in the VN (behind two of the fights in the Grand Route).
    Ariya Takajou- The Jaeger (vampire hunter) White Pile's successor, who has come to Foggy Bottom specifically to hunt Toshirou Kashima.  Driven by her desire to prove herself and a latent fear born from her experiences as a child (her family killed before her eyes by vampires), she endured training that would make a Marine recruit run away screaming to obtain the ability to almost match the physical abilities of a vampire (it is something close to inner qigong).   She despises all vampires and sees them as inhuman monsters, but her meeting with Toshirou fills her with a personal hatred, as his obvious (to her) difference from other vampires drives her to obsess over him.  Ariya's personality (on the surface) is very... twisted.  She is probably the single most sharp-tongued heroine I've ever encountered (she makes Kagome from Comyu seem pleasant), quite naturally using insults in a tactical fashion to get vampires to lose their heads and simply because she doesn't like people.  In her own path, she also develops a rather... twisted sort of love for Toshirou (and it is love, mixed with hate, gratitude, and intense sado-masochistic lust).  I always rofl at the way she changes in this path, and the ending... is actually really really cool. 
    Grand Route- The Grand Route of this game focuses on fighting the antagonist who was the root cause of the conflicts in the VN, as well as dealing with the origins of vampires in general.  In this path, Toshirou finds himself facing his past and looking into the future in a way he doesn't in the other paths.  This path also has two of the best fights in the game, including the final face-off between the antagonist and Toshirou himself.  This path also gives a really significant insight into the mind of a side-character whom I loved... Klaus, the previous White Pile.  The ending of this path is bittersweet and faintly sad (as is common in a lot of chuunige true endings), but it also gives you a sense of completeness, closing out the VN nicely.
    Side-characters worthy of mention
    Isaac- Isaac is the bartender at Casanova and plays a key role in all the paths.  He is Toshirou's one true friend, and his personality is a cross between a hedge philosopher and a boy who never gave up his dream (and never will).  His (oddly troubling) life advice frames a lot of the game's key internal conflicts, and his influence can be felt throughout every part of the game, to some degree.
    Klaus- The previous White Pile, an elderly Jaeger who fights with a gigantic stake (think a log from a log cabin with its edges carved into a spike-like tip and you get the picture).  He is a warrior to the core, a man who hates vampires absolutely and has made a living sacrifice of his life to cleanse as many of them from the world as possible.  In contrast, his unstinting love for humanity, including its flaws, is awe-inspiring in its strength, and he has an absolute faith in humanity's potential to rise above its own filth.  He saved and raised Ariya to be his successor, and she is perhaps the only chink in his armor other than his personal hate (he normally sees vampires not as individuals but as harmful insects to be crushed) for Toshirou.  He loves her deeply, in a fatherly fashion, and it is his love that is perhaps Ariya's greatest salvation, though it is also her second greatest weakness.
     
  24. Like
    Narcosis reacted to kivandopulus for a blog entry, Updated   
    Finished updating old posts. Nothing really interesting is added, so added games comments are very scarce. Main changes are mostly about descriptions for games that did not have one, over 500 new descriptions. Some review/opening/image links changed. Finally, I can move on now. This is the early draft of changes, stopped updating it midway. 
    VN of the Month December 2005 - Aekanaru Sekai no Owari ni
    https://vndb.org/v22685 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 8
    https://vndb.org/v23599 - The Noroi no Game
    https://vndb.org/v27013 - Sugar Sugar Rune: Koi mo Oshare mo Pick-Up!
    https://vndb.org/v22900 - Mousou Nikki: Joshikousei Hen
    https://vndb.org/v26016 - Chained Valkyria -Akashiya no Kyouen-
    https://vndb.org/v23124 - Hyouka no Gen'ya
    https://vndb.org/v24462 - Kidou Shounen
    VN of the Month November 2005 - Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo
    https://vndb.org/v23460 - Mirugeki 3 Bishoujo Maki Naisho no Taiken
    VN of the Month October 2005 - Ayakashi
    https://vndb.org/v23462 - Mirugeki 2 Papa tte Yobitai no
    https://vndb.org/v24385 - Qu Beifang
    VN of the Month September 2005 - Gunjou no Sora o Koete
    https://vndb.org/v24864 - Gokujou Seitokai
    https://vndb.org/v23903 - Fushigi no Umi no Nadia ~Inherit the Blue Water~
    VN of the Month August 2005 - Saihate no Ima
    https://vndb.org/v24778 - Final Approach Final fandisk
    https://vndb.org/v25938 - Gakuen Tengoku
    VN of the Month July 2005 - Swan Song
    https://vndb.org/v25128 - Still More
    VN of the Month June 2005 - Ayakashibito
    VN of the Month May 2005 - Princess Witches
    https://vndb.org/v26583 - ETERNITY-The Joker to a Dark Side-
    https://vndb.org/v24625 - Counter-Strike NEO -White Memories-
    https://vndb.org/v26058 - Majo no Yuigon
    https://vndb.org/v25355 - School Navigation!
    VN of the Month April 2005 - Sanarara
    https://vndb.org/v22864 - Akane
    https://vndb.org/v22047 - Kochou Yuukaku
    https://vndb.org/v23463 - Mirugeki 1: Imouto -Boku to Asumi no Himitsu Taiken-
    https://vndb.org/v23773 - Rondo ~Punyupuri Joshikouhen~
    VN of the Month March 2005 - Parfait ~Chocolat Second Brew~
    https://vndb.org/v26743 - Iris ~Kimi ga Ita Toki~
    https://vndb.org/v23499 - Love Love Fight
    https://vndb.org/v23148 - Kochira Memetsuki Onsenkyou
    VN of the Month February 2005 - Steel
    https://vndb.org/v25146 - The Kanshikikan
    https://vndb.org/v25118 - Tsuki wa Kirisaku ~Tantei Sagara Kyouichirou~
    https://vndb.org/v26915 - Gakuen Prince ~Fandisc~
    VN of the Month January 2005 - Tenshi no Nichou Kenjuu -Angelos Armas-
    https://vndb.org/v26265 - Rou ~Kedakaku Gouman na Dansei Fushin Onna ga Seidorei ni Ochiru made~
    https://vndb.org/v23774 - Punyupuri SP - Yamiyo no Miko Shokushu ni Otsu
    VN of the Month December 2004 - To Heart 2
    https://vndb.org/v22681 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 7
    https://vndb.org/v25848 - Erumani 2
    VN of the Month November 2004 - Planetarian ~Chiisana Hoshi no Yume~
    https://vndb.org/v24350 - Reason of Detective
    https://vndb.org/v24330 - The Suiri  ~Soshite Dare mo Inakunatta~
    https://vndb.org/v24539 - Seikon ~Boku to Meido to Kyouki no Yakata~
    https://vndb.org/v24485 - Phantomphobia ~Ikai~
    https://vndb.org/v25122 - Tenkuu Danzai Skelter Heaven
    https://vndb.org/v26885 - Manabe yo Otome!
    VN of the Month October 2004 - Akai Ito
    https://vndb.org/v23610 - Ryoujoku Jiken File -File. 1 Renzoku Fujo Shissou Jiken-
    https://vndb.org/v24844 - A to 1
    VN of the Month September 2004 - Abandoner - The Severed Dreams
    VN of the Month August 2004 - Sorauta
    https://vndb.org/v24387 - It's So Flogging Molly
    https://vndb.org/v26317 - Sankaku Matsuri Vol.1
    https://vndb.org/v25159 - Destino
    https://vndb.org/v24303 - Harukeki Kawa no Nagare ni Nosete
    https://vndb.org/v26071 - Tsuki no Furu Yoru
    VN of the Month July 2004 - Dear My Friend
    VN of the Month June 2004 - 3days ~Michiteyuku Toki no Kanata de~
    https://vndb.org/v25629 - Yokubou no Ori
    https://vndb.org/v23364 - Gyakuten Ryoujoku Angel Online
    VN of the Month May 2004 - Carnival
    VN of the Month April 2004 - Realize
    https://vndb.org/v23327 - Tanetsuke Choukyou II
    VN of the Month March 2004 - Remember11 -The Age of Infinity-
    https://vndb.org/v24318 - Yomigaeri ~Refrain~
    VN of the Month February 2004 - Forest
    https://vndb.org/v25310 - The Legend of the Deep -Episode4-
    https://vndb.org/v22297 - Nurse Witch Komugi-chan Magikarte
    https://vndb.org/v26280 - Inran Mahjong ~Nugasare Modaeru Maid-tachi~
    VN of the Month January 2004 - Paradise Lost
    https://vndb.org/v25266 - Stellvia: Uchuu no Stellvia
    https://vndb.org/v26884 - Heian Onshijo Koi Emaki
    https://vndb.org/v25215 - Shoujo Taimashi Misato ~Ingoku no Fukushuusha~
    VN of the Month December 2003 - Saya no Uta
    https://vndb.org/v22680 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 6
    https://vndb.org/v24319 - The Saiban ~Shinmai Shihoukan Momota Tsukasa no 10 no Saiban File~
    https://vndb.org/v24401 - END OF THE WORLD
    https://vndb.org/v24460 - Hotel Bloody Doll Fandisc -2003-
    https://vndb.org/v22821 - Futari no Kon'yakusha
    VN of the Month November 2003 - Kurenai
    https://vndb.org/v23483 - Princess Riesz
    VN of the Month October 2003 - Lovers ~Koi ni Ochitara...
    https://vndb.org/v25252 - The Musume♥ Ikusei Simulation ~Otousan to Issho~
    https://vndb.org/v24459 - Hotel Bloody Doll
    https://vndb.org/v24326 - Otoko no Tame no Bible The Yuujou Adventure -Hotaru Soul-
    VN of the Month - September 2003 - Cross†Channel
    https://vndb.org/v26604 - Shoujo Yoshitsuneden
    VN of the Month August 2003 - Natsuyume Yawa
    https://vndb.org/v24370 - Tondeke! Nayama Seed
    https://vndb.org/v25210 - Officer's ~Onna Sousakan-tachi no Ingoku~
    https://vndb.org/v22101 - Sweet Apricot
    https://vndb.org/v23001 - Sayurin no Tantei na Hibi
    https://vndb.org/v22449 - Natsu Shoujo Summer Disc
    https://vndb.org/v24386 - Shuumatsu ni Yosete
    VN of the Month July 2003 - Komorebi ni Yureru Tamashii no Koe
    https://vndb.org/v26194 - Tristia Dokidoki Operation
    VN of the Month June 2003 - Sayonara
    https://vndb.org/v23925 - Ore-sama Teacher ~Fukushuu Kyoushi no Web Counseling~
    VN of the Month May 2003 - Ashita Deatta Shoujo
    https://vndb.org/v25628 - Imouto no Onani
    VN of the Month April 2003 - Zanmataisei Demonbane
    https://vndb.org/v22295 - Zero One
    VN of the Month March 2003 - Interlude
    https://vndb.org/v24300 - Akaku Kagayaku Yuki
    https://vndb.org/v23841 - Vampire Yui ~Sen'ya-shou~
    VN of the Month February 2003 - Routes
    https://vndb.org/v24162 - Otogi Story Tenshi no Shippo
    VN of the Month January 2003 - Moekan
    https://vndb.org/v22679 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 5
    https://vndb.org/v25214 - Mahou Shoujo Ai ~Mahou Senshi e no Chinkonka~
    https://vndb.org/v24877 - Fukuramikake Returns
    https://vndb.org/v23352 - Bijutsu Kyoushi Ryouko
    VN of the Month December 2002 - Popotan
    https://vndb.org/v23852 - Getchu Ya★Getchu!!
    https://vndb.org/v24358 - The Suiri ~Aratanaru 20 no Jikenbo~
    https://vndb.org/v22429 - Romancing Kanon ~Eien no Shoujo Densetsu~
    https://vndb.org/v24302 - Free Flower
    https://vndb.org/v25158 - Bois Hoshikuzu to Tetsukuzu no Niwa
    VN of the Month November 2002 - Baldr Force
    https://vndb.org/v24706 - Dr. Rin ni Kiitemite! ~Koi no Happy Four Season~
    VN of the Month October 2002 - Rocket no Natsu
    VN of the Month September 2002 - Masaru: Ashita no Yukinojou 2
    https://vndb.org/v24897 - Sold Out Frontier ~Reifu-tachi no Kihin Shakou Ressha~
    https://vndb.org/v23858 - Chobits for Game Boy Advance -Atashi dake no Hito-
    https://vndb.org/v24713 - Izumi Jiken File
    VN of the Month August 2002 - Ever17 -The Out of Infinity-
    https://vndb.org/v23355 - Clover ~Shiawase no Layout~
    https://vndb.org/v24361 - Suiren
    https://vndb.org/v25152 - Bois ~Kikaijikake no Mori~
    https://vndb.org/v25212 - DarknessSuppressor ~Onna Taimashi-tachi no Inbu~
    https://vndb.org/v24745 - Himekishi Monogatari -Princess Blue-
    https://vndb.org/v25455 - Gekka Chou no Yakata
    VN of the Month July 2002 - Viper-RSR
    https://vndb.org/v24398 - Moon Fox Legend: Little Fox
    VN of the Month June 2002 - Kanade
    https://vndb.org/v24335 - Metal Wolf
    VN of the Month May 2002 - Akane Maniax
    https://vndb.org/v25213 - Iroiro ~Ingoku no Yakata~
    VN of the Month April 2002 - D.U.O. ~Song for All~
    VN of the Month March 2002 - Kikokugai - The Cyber Slayer
    https://vndb.org/v22678 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 4
    https://vndb.org/v23847 - Tokimeki Nya no☆Getchu!
    VN of the Month February 2002 - Kusarihime ~Euthanasia~
    https://vndb.org/v24704 - Dr. Rin ni Kiitemite! ~Koi no Rin Feng-Shui~
    VN of the Month January 2002 - Princess Knights
    VN of the Month December 2001 - Izumo
    https://vndb.org/v26659 - Sister Princess ~Pure Stories~
    https://vndb.org/v24724 - Hermina to Culus ~Lillie no Atelier Mou Hitotsu no Monogatari~
    https://vndb.org/v24301 - Pray to Snow
    https://vndb.org/v27131 - Water Dragon Knight ~Anata to no Yakusoku~
    https://vndb.org/v27135 - Yozakura no Utage
    https://vndb.org/v24546 - Koukou Kyoushi ~Memories of Summer~
    https://vndb.org/v27128 - Claire Hikari no Densetsu Meisou no Hanged Man
    https://vndb.org/v27081 - Karen
    VN of the Month November 2001 - Nijuubako
    https://vndb.org/v23361 - Para Para 2
    VN of the Month October 2001 - Jisatsu no Tame no 101 no Houhou
    VN of the Month September 2001 - Eve: The Fatal Attraction
    VN of the Month August 2001 - Kimi ga Nozomu Eien
    https://vndb.org/v25906 - TameGirl
    https://vndb.org/v25454 - Totsugeki Uchuu Senkan Masrao
    VN of the Month July 2001 - Cosmos no Sora ni
    https://vndb.org/v27142 - Chinpu Kitan
    VN of the Month June 2001 - No Reality
    https://vndb.org/v26011 - KID Mix Section Character Collection
    VN of the Month May 2001 - Sapphism no Gensou
    https://vndb.org/v25901 - TameBoy
    https://vndb.org/v22099 - Weakness Hero Torauman
    VN of the April 2001 - Mizuiro
    https://vndb.org/v22983 - Bishoujo Ren'ai Mahjong Series 2nd: Shiritsu Houou Gakuen: 2-nen Junjou-gumi
    https://vndb.org/v22832 - Angel Present
    https://vndb.org/v24324 - The Suiri ~IT Tantei: 18 no Jikenbo~
    VN of the Month March 2001 - Silent Hill: Play Novel
    https://vndb.org/v25243 - Mix Party 2ND
    https://vndb.org/v22677 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 3
    https://vndb.org/v23760 - Taiho Shichauzo
    VN of the Month February 2001 - Tasogare
    https://vndb.org/v22427 - Kara: Suzuna Hen
    VN of the Month January 2001 - Vampirdzhija Vjedogonia
    https://vndb.org/v23945 - Love Hina Party
    VN of the Month December 2000 - Never7 -The End of Infinity-
    https://vndb.org/v22257 - DiGiCharat Akiba Touitsu
    https://vndb.org/v22536 - Air Carrot e Youkoso!!
    https://vndb.org/v27093 - Ruriruri ADV
    VN of the Month November 2000 - Nijuuei
    https://vndb.org/v22982 - Bishoujo Ren'ai Mahjong Series 2nd: Shiritsu Houou Gakuen: 1-nen Jun'ai-gumi
    VN of the Month October 2000 - Baldr Bullet
    https://vndb.org/v25763 - Nurunuru Shiru Jigoku 6 Insui No Ningyo
    VN of the Month September 2000 - Gensou Suikogaiden Vol. 1: Harmonia no Kenshi
    https://vndb.org/v27269 - Arc Side Gaiden 2: Mahou to Yuujou
    VN of the Month August 2000 - Tsukihime
    https://vndb.org/v23944 - Love Hina Pocket
    https://vndb.org/v22135 - Remel
    https://vndb.org/v27161 - Akikaze no Love Songs
    https://vndb.org/v26606 - Yuukyuu Kumikyoku All Star Project
    https://vndb.org/v27114 - Ceramic Heart
    VN of the Month July 2000 - Shoin, Aruiwa Ushinawareta Yume no Monogatari
    https://vndb.org/v24325 - The Sound Novel
    https://vndb.org/v25153 - Douboku
    https://vndb.org/v22443 - Yokoshima
    https://vndb.org/v27095 - Tomoyo Venture Episode2
    https://vndb.org/v26468 - Baroque Syndrome
    https://vndb.org/v23943 - Sakura Taisen GB-geki - Hanagumi Nyuutai!
    VN of the Month June 2000 - Age Maniax ~Isumi Yon Shimai Saigo no Hi~
    https://vndb.org/v22323 - Bibou Vintage 2000
    https://vndb.org/v22642 - Saint Shirobara Gakuen Petit☆MAHJONG
    VN of the Month May 2000 - Purepure
    VN of the Month April 2000 - Gyousatsu♥Shinsengumi Hitokiri Bishoujo Adventure
    https://vndb.org/v22056 - Believe ~Shitsuyoku no Tenshi-tachi~
    https://vndb.org/v8376 - Great Hunting
    VN of the Month March 2000 - Eve Zero    
    https://vndb.org/v23360 - Para Para
    https://vndb.org/v22676 - Power Pro Kun Pocket 2
    https://vndb.org/v26268 - Meitantei Conan: Kigantou Hihou Densetsu
    VN of the Month February 2000 - Phantom of Inferno    
    https://vndb.org/v22981 - Bishoujo Ren'ai Mahjong Series: Karan Koron Gakuen: Pure Love Hen
    https://vndb.org/v22418 - Uzumaki ~Denshi Kaiki Hen~
    https://vndb.org/v26267 - Meitantei Conan: Karakuri Jiin Satsujin Jiken
    VN of the Month January 2000 - Lien ~Owaranai Kimi no Uta~
    VN of the Month December 1999 - Elemental Arts
    https://vndb.org/v22978 - Bishoujo Ren'ai Mahjong Series: Karan Koron Gakuen: Dokidoki Hen
    https://vndb.org/v22980 - Bishoujo Ren'ai Mahjong Series: Karan Koron Gakuen: Mune Kyun Hen
    https://vndb.org/v27113 - Kokoro no Tobira
    https://vndb.org/v27129 - Conve ~Houkago no Sugoshikata~
    https://vndb.org/v24989 - Hirosue Sougou Byouin
    https://vndb.org/v27126 - Himitsu Sentai Burning Bunny
    https://vndb.org/v27116 - Sentimental Memorial
    https://vndb.org/v27115 - Sessou no Yoru
    https://vndb.org/v27084 - Prime Sexual
    https://vndb.org/v27088 - To Heart CR
    https://vndb.org/v24959 - second anopheles 1
    https://vndb.org/v27125 - Aurora Hime Higyaku no Makyou
    https://vndb.org/v27124 - Heart no Clover
    https://vndb.org/v27082 - Furukizu
    https://vndb.org/v27121 - Natsu o Shizuka ni
    https://vndb.org/v27123 - Chikan wa Yamete
    VN of the Month November 1999 - Parts
    https://vndb.org/v27120 - Rescue Disk
    https://vndb.org/v25992 - Purupuru Magic
    VN of the Month October 1999 - Silver Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v22350 - Furiman Bibou Hen
    https://vndb.org/v26904 - Harlem Beat: You're the One
    VN of the Month September 1999 - Kazeoto, Chirin
    https://vndb.org/v27094 - Tomoyo Venture Episode1
    https://vndb.org/v25229 - BOYS BE... 2nd Season
    VN of the Month August 1999 - Tsui no Sora
    https://vndb.org/v26327 - Maria 2: Jutai Kokuchi no Nazo
    https://vndb.org/v26378 - Magical Kanan - Magical Fantasy Box
    VN of the Month July 1999 - Mamatoto ~a record of war~
    https://vndb.org/v27176 - Inagawa Junji: Kyoufu no Yashiki
    VN of the Month June 1999 - Kanon
    https://vndb.org/v26661 - Ren'ai Kouza Real Age
    https://vndb.org/v27584 - Soreike Majokko Serika
    VN of the Month May 1999 - Comic party
    https://vndb.org/v25789 - Seikon ~Inbou Uzumaku Byoutou de Tadareta Soukanzu~
    VN of the Month April 1999 - Lipstick Adv.EX
    https://vndb.org/v22675 - Power Pro Kun Pocket
    https://vndb.org/v26769 - Boy x Boy ~Shiritsu Kouryou Gakuin Seishinryou~
    VN of the Month March 1999 - Captain Love
    https://vndb.org/v23526 - Sougaku Toshi Osaka
    https://vndb.org/v24005 - Yakusoku no Kizuna
    https://vndb.org/v27162 - Sanjuusou
    VN of the Month February 1999 - Campus ~Sakura no Mau Naka de~
    https://vndb.org/v26560 - Den'ei Shoujo Virtual Girl Lun
    https://vndb.org/v27079 - Aiiro no Kankei
    https://vndb.org/v26566 - Kouyasai
    VN of the Month January 1999 - Ikusa Megami
    VN of the Month December 1998 - Kuon no Kizuna
    https://vndb.org/v27109 - Densetsu no Ato de LoveLove no Shou
    https://vndb.org/v26314 - Pureprime -pianissimo-
    https://vndb.org/v27089 - Black Album
    https://vndb.org/v27087 - Roots
    VN of the Month November 1998 - Exodus Guilty
    https://vndb.org/v23855 - Neko na Kankei
    https://vndb.org/v26018 - Abunai Hyakkaten
    VN of the Month October 1998 - Psyclone
    https://vndb.org/v25330 - Efficus: Kono Omoi o Kimi ni...
    https://vndb.org/v26913 - Sakura Tsuushin
    https://vndb.org/v22058 - Kuroi Hamon
    VN of the Month September 1998 - With You ~Mitsumete Itai~
    https://vndb.org/v24393 - Kaze no Oka Kouen nite
    https://vndb.org/v26131 - Dennou Meikyuu Gensou Bouken Yuugi Yurika
    https://vndb.org/v26559 - Ren'ai Kouhosei Starlight Scramble
    VN of the Month August 1998 - Shiokaze no Memory
    https://vndb.org/v25415 - Full House ~Joyuu Monogatari~
    VN of the Month July 1998 - luv wave
    https://vndb.org/v24062 - 17 Sai ~My Dear Angel~
    VN of the Month June 1998 - One ~Kagayaku Kisetsu e~
    VN of the Month May 1998 - Diabolique
    https://vndb.org/v27080 - Kusairo no Hitomi
    VN of the Month April 1998 - Love Escalator
    https://vndb.org/v24063 - Find Love 2: The Prologue
    https://vndb.org/v27122 - Maou to Iu Ikikata
    VN of the Month March 1998 - EVE: The Lost One
    https://vndb.org/v26068 - Eberouge 2
    VN of the Month February 1998 - Doukoku Soshite...
    https://vndb.org/v25110 - Tour Party: Sotsugyou Ryokou ni Ikou
    https://vndb.org/v26605 - Yuukyuu Gensoukyouku 2nd Album
    VN of the Month January 1998 - Machi
    https://vndb.org/v26103 - Datenshi no Sumika
    https://vndb.org/v24635 - Mix Candy 3
    https://vndb.org/v26102 - Amandine
    VN of the Month December 1997 - Universal Nuts
    https://vndb.org/v26326 - Maria: Kimitachi ga Umareta Wake
    https://vndb.org/v27083 - Gensuishou
    VN of the Month November 1997 - Moon.
    https://vndb.org/v10382 - Toriko 2
    VN of the Month October 1997 - Sweepers!
    https://vndb.org/v22868 - Dear Princess
    VN of the Month September 1997 - Comic Road
    https://vndb.org/v23479 - Eberouge Special ~Koi to Mahou no Gakuen Seikatsu~
    VN of the Month August 1997 - Kaeru nyo Panyon
    https://vndb.org/v26576 - Koi no Summer Fantasy in Miyazaki Seagaia
    VN of the Month July 1997 - Tokimeki Memorial Drama Series Vol. 1: Nijiiro no Seishun
    https://vndb.org/v23769 - My Dream ~On Air ga Matenakute~
    VN of the Month June 1997 - Zoku Hatsukoi Monogatari ~Shuugaku Ryokou~
    https://vndb.org/v26130 - Kakutou Cosplay Ojanko
    https://vndb.org/v26511 - Ami ~Shoushin no Tenshi~
    https://vndb.org/v26929 - Digital Ange ~Dennou Tenshi SS~
    VN of the Month May 1997 - To Heart
    https://vndb.org/v27573 - Kojiin ~Kyouki no Ketsuzoku~
    VN of the Month April 1997 - Canaan ~Yakusoku no Chi~
    https://vndb.org/v26711 - Critical Blow
    VN of the Month March 1997 - Ruriiro no Yuki
    https://vndb.org/v26565 - Ayakashi Ninden Kunoichiban
    https://vndb.org/v24298 - Stand by Say you!
    https://vndb.org/v24007 - BOYS BE...
    VN of the Month February 1997 - Yatsu no Na wa Diamond
    VN of the Month January 1997 - Rookies
    VN of the Month December 1996 - Kono Yo no Hate de Koi o Utau Shoujo YU-NO
    https://vndb.org/v24366 - Alice In Cyberland Yamiyo No Madoushi
    https://vndb.org/v23457 - M ~Kimi o Tsutaete~
    https://vndb.org/v26381 - Ars Amatoria
    https://vndb.org/v27402 - Instant Clarity
    https://vndb.org/v27570 - Minako no Suiyoubi
    VN of the Month Noveber 1996 - Mashou no Kao
    https://vndb.org/v26522 - Jun'ai Monogatari - Shuugaku Ryokou no Yoru
    https://vndb.org/v8979 - Muppet Box
    VN of the Month October 1996 - Bounty Hunter Rudy
    https://vndb.org/v23481 - Eternal Melody
    https://vndb.org/v23324 - Heroine Dream
    https://vndb.org/v14583 - Toriko
    https://vndb.org/v14512 - Katei Kyoushi
    https://vndb.org/v15162 - Ikumoto
    https://vndb.org/v21972 - G no Kyokuhoku
    https://vndb.org/v27401 - Hokenshitsu no Akuma
    VN of the Month September 1996 - Sakura Taisen
    VN of the Month August 1996 - Be-Yond ~Kurodaishou ni Mirareteru~
    VN of the Month July 1996 - Kizuato
    VN of the Month June 1996 - Es no Houteishiki
    https://vndb.org/v26521 - Moderate Party
    VN of the Month May 1996 - Rouge no Densetsu
    https://vndb.org/v26325 - Hanafuda Graffiti Koikoi Monogatari
    VN of the Month April 1996 - Harlem Blade ~The Greatest of All Time.~
    VN of the Month March 1996 - Mujintou Monogatari 3 - A.D. 1999 Tokyo
    VN of the Month February 1996 - DIES IRAE
    VN of the Month January 1996 - Ryuuki Denshou Dragoon
    VN of the Month December 1995 - Lilith
    https://vndb.org/v20887 - Doki Doki Pretty League EX
    https://vndb.org/v25169 - Shikimi
    https://vndb.org/v25074 - Rinn-chan no Tensei Hakusho ~Meido no Miyagebanashi~
    https://vndb.org/v25101 - Momoiro Sankaku ~Riko & Hikaru Hen~
    https://vndb.org/v27010 - Hotaru
    https://vndb.org/v27022 - Asuka Ayako-chan to Hokenshitsu
    https://vndb.org/v27406 - Tantei Imasato Misa Jikenbo Tanpenshuu: Romance wa Shiroku Kiken na Kaori
    VN of the Month November 1995 - Eve: Burst Error
    VN of the Month October 1995 - Trouble Chaser Dai 4 Wa - Saishuukai
    VN of the Month September 1995 - Mime
    VN of the Month August 1995 - Isaku
    https://vndb.org/v23921 - Shin Youjuu Kyoushitsu Ecstasy Adventure
    VN of the Month July 1995 - Kuro no Danshou: The Literary Fragment
    https://vndb.org/v9004 - Perfect Blue
    VN of the Month June 1995 - True Love ~Jun'ai Monogatari~
    https://vndb.org/v9139 - Trouble Chaser Dai 3 Wa - 2 Do Aru Trouble 3 Do Aru
    VN of the Month May 1995 - Koihime
    https://vndb.org/v27160 - Nana Eiyuu Monogatari
    https://vndb.org/v18299 - S.A. 3
    VN of the Month April 1995 - Mugen Yasoukyoku
    VN of the Month March 1995 - Cybernoid Alpha
    VN of the Month February 1995 - Doki Doki Pretty League Dai 3 Wa - Minami no Umi no Kai no Maki
    https://vndb.org/v10902 - Poison ~6 Nin no Majo~
    VN of the Month January 1995 - Doki Doki Vacation ~Kirameku Kisetsu no Naka de~
    VN of the Month December 1994 - Xenon ~Mugen no Shitai~
    https://vndb.org/v25076 - Rinshitsu no Chikubi
    https://vndb.org/v27158 - Para PARA Paradise
    https://vndb.org/v24488 - Bomber Quest
    https://vndb.org/v24991 - Dennou Mahjong Tsuushin Tacet
    VN of the Month November 1994 - File: Kokubou Soushou Jouhoukyoku Jouhou Rouei Taisakubu Josei Jinmonin
    VN of the Month October 1994 - Gao Gao! 3rd ~Wild Force~
    https://vndb.org/v24450 - Jikuu Sousakan Pretty Angel Misty Flash
    VN of the Month September 1994 - Ai Shimai ~Futari no Kajitsu~
    VN of the Month August 1994 - Shinsetsu Ooedo Tantei Kamiya Ukyou
    VN of the Month July 1994 - DESIRE - Haitoku no Rasen
    VN of the Month June 1994 - Necronomicon
    https://vndb.org/v24990 - Adirate
    VN of the month May 1994 - Tokimeki Memorial
    VN of the Month April 1994 - AmbivalenZ -Niritsu Haihan-
    https://vndb.org/v24448 - Cherry Bomb: Chou-ojou-sama Sayaka-chan Nanpa Daisakusen
    VN of the Month March 1994 - Mirage 2 - Torry x Neat x Roan no Daibouken
    VN of the Month February 1994 - Dragon Knight 4
    VN of the Month January 1994 - Fuzoroi no Lemon
    https://vndb.org/v8652 - Bell's Avenue 2
    VN of the Month December 1993 - Demon City
    https://vndb.org/v25109 - LEX Kyonyuu Monogatari
    https://vndb.org/v25104 - Gegera no Joshikou Indoka Keikaku! Part 1
    https://vndb.org/v25077 - Anna Midaller's
    https://vndb.org/v27404 - Tantei Imasato Misa Jikenbo: Itoshiki Onna yo, Satsui no Bishou o
    https://vndb.org/v27405 - Tantei Imasato Misa Jikenbo: Sonzai Shinai Futatsume no Shinjitsu
    VN of the Month November 1993 - Ooedo Tantei Kamiya Ukyou Vol. 2
    VN of the Month October 1993 - Nooch 2 Remy no Gyakushuu
    VN of the Month September 1993 - Youjuu Senki -A.D. 2048-
    VN of the Month August 1993 - Houma Hunter Lime Dai 03 Wa
    VN of the Month July 1993 - Bunretsu Shugoshin Twinkle Star
    VN of the Month June 1993 - Can Can Bunny Extra
    VN of the Month May 1993 - Nova
    https://vndb.org/v18297 - S.A.
    VN of the Month April 1993 - Quintia Road 2
    https://vndb.org/v25075 - Mahou no Shougakusei Clit-chan
    VN of the Month March 1993 - Marine Philt
    VN of the Month February 1993 - Cosmology of Kyoto
    VN of the Month January 1993 - Mamono Hunter Youko: Tooki Yobigoe
    https://vndb.org/v23902 - Fushigi no Umi no Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water
    VN of the Month December 1992 - Koroshi no Dress 3
    https://vndb.org/v25088 - Beyond the Wall of Stars
    VN of the Month November 1992 - Dracula Hakushaku
    VN of the Month October 1992 - Ginga Ojou-sama Densetsu Yuna
    VN of the Month September 1992 - My Eyes!
    VN of the Month August 1992 - Kiss
    VN of the Month July 1992 - Phobos
    VN of the Month June 1992 - De-Ja 2
    VN of the Month May 1992 - Kurutta Kajitsu
    VN of the Month April 1992 - The 4th Unit - Wyatt
    VN of the Month March 1992 - Sotsugyou Shashin / Miki
    VN of the Month February 1992 - Joker II
    https://vndb.org/v23259 - Abunai Bunkasai Zen'ya
    VN of the Month January 1992 - Himitsu no Hanazono
    VN of the Month December 1991 - Gidyy
    https://vndb.org/v27021 - Mana
    https://vndb.org/v25129 - Momotarou Gaiden Momoko-chan Fight
    VN of the Month November 1991 - Psychic Detective Series Vol. 5: Nightmare
    VN of the Month October 1991 - Rance III - Leazas Kanraku
    VN of the Month September 1991 - Cosmic Psycho
    VN of the Month August 1991 - Kimi Dake ni Ai o..
    VN of the Month July 1991 - Nike
    VN of the Month June 1991 - ELLE
    https://vndb.org/v23235 - Crystal Chaser: Tenkuu no Mashoukyuu
    VN of the Month May 1991 - Ginsei Senshin Guynarock
    VN of the Month April 1991 - Psychic Detective Series Vol. 4: Orgel
    https://vndb.org/v26292 - Imadoki Junjou Monogatari
    https://vndb.org/v27006 - Sadistic Gamers Part 5 Burusera Play
    VN of the Month March 1991 - Jesus II
    https://vndb.org/v27000 - Watashi o Golf ni Tsuretette
    VN of the Month February 1991 - Akagawa Jirou no Yuurei Ressha
    https://vndb.org/v27035 - SAP Tokushu Koudou Keisatsu File:M661-51
    VN of the Month January 1991 - Dragon Eyes
    VN of the Year 1990 - De-Ja
    https://vndb.org/v27004 - Sadistic Gamers Part 2 Otanjoubi Play
    https://vndb.org/v27008 - Nenriki Momoiro Yuugi
    https://vndb.org/v24736 - Mitsubachi Gakuen
    https://vndb.org/v27145 - Yamamura Misa Suspense: Kyoto Zaitech Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v27002 - Sadistic Gamers Part 4 Rumi no Climb Play
    https://vndb.org/v27009 - Angel Commander 2 Gaiden
    https://vndb.org/v27007 - Sadistic Gamers Part 1 Shinjinkyouikuteki Play
    https://vndb.org/v27003 - Sadistic Gamers Part 3 Telephone Play
    https://vndb.org/v27011 - Suijaku Sakusen 2 Moeyo Dragon
    VN of the Year 1989 - Imitation wa Aisenai
    https://vndb.org/v9383 - Hero Syndrome
    https://vndb.org/v22078 - Nishimura Kyoutarou Mystery: Blue Train Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v27144 - Yamamura Misa Suspense: Kyoto Hana no Misshitsu Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v26992 - Tenboudai
    https://vndb.org/v23495 - TM Network: Live in Power Bowl
    https://vndb.org/v27005 - Sadistic Gamers Part 1 Kateikyoushi Play
    https://vndb.org/v25543 - SD Toki no Kagi
    VN of the Year 1988 - Lipstick. ADV
    https://vndb.org/v26991 - Fushigi no Kabe
    VN of the Year 1987 - Hiatari Ryoukou!
    https://vndb.org/v9450 - Anjela
    https://vndb.org/v26978 - Las Vegas
    https://vndb.org/v25149 - Yamamura Misa Suspense: Kyouto Ryuu no Tera Satsujin Jiken
    VN of the Year 1986 - Gall Force - Eternal Story
    https://vndb.org/v26979 - Mahoutsukai no Deshi
    https://vndb.org/v27639 - Shoumakyou no Densetsu
    VN of the Year 1985 - Shiro to Kuro no Densetsu ~Hyakki Hen~
    https://vndb.org/v26956 - Saiyuuki
    https://vndb.org/v26954 - Juggler Stone
    https://vndb.org/v26959 - Asteka
    https://vndb.org/v26957 - Time Zone
    https://vndb.org/v26958 - The Count
    https://vndb.org/v26997 - Doukeshi Satsujin Jiken
    VN of the Year 1984 - Hokkaido Rensa Satsujin: Ohotsk ni Kiyu
    https://vndb.org/v26994 - Kuronekosou Souzoku Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v26983 - Chouhou Buin
    https://vndb.org/v26984 - Ginga o Sukue
    https://vndb.org/v26985 - Mission Impossible
    https://vndb.org/v26982 - Emmy
    https://vndb.org/v26980 - Ningyo no Namida
    https://vndb.org/v26955 - Southern Cross
    VN of the Year 1983 - Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v26975 - Dasshutsu! Shi no Aokigahara
    https://vndb.org/v26965 - Date Adventure
    https://vndb.org/v26970 - Mission Asteroid
    https://vndb.org/v26967 - Genma Taisen
    https://vndb.org/v26968 - Happy Bushman
    https://vndb.org/v26974 - Icarus
    https://vndb.org/v26996 - Kagiana Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v26963 - Ninja Adventure
    https://vndb.org/v26964 - Puzzle Adventure
    https://vndb.org/v26966 - Seiko no Adventure
    https://vndb.org/v26969 - Mystery House
    https://vndb.org/v26973 - Wizard and the Princess
    https://vndb.org/v26975 - Dasshutsu! Shi no Aokigahara
    https://vndb.org/v26977 - Nehan no Mori
    https://vndb.org/v26971 - Orly Kuukou Satsujin Jiken
    https://vndb.org/v26976 - Wonder House
  25. Thanks
    Narcosis got a reaction from kivandopulus for a blog entry, Yougen Tennyo   
    Warning: This review isn't necessarily safe for work, but all the nsfw content remains hidden within the spoiler tags. Read at your own discretion.

    Title: 妖幻天女 (The Bewitching Celestial Maiden)
    Developer: Scoop
    Release: 2001/01/25
    Genre: Fantasy
    Rating: AO/18+
    Trailer:
    After way too many vns in our existence all the plots slowly run together into one and character development stops being important. It is when we want to take a break and get our hands on something extra crispy - as long as it allows us to indulge in the deepest of desires, there's no place for needless banter. We are merely simple beings with simple needs... and being a simple guy, I couldn't neglect a game, one of my friends recommended me long ago. "Play this japanese erogi", he said. "You will reach true happiness.", he said. At that point I barely knew moon runes, so I couldn't care less. Now when things changed, I accidentally stumbled upon this magnificent piece of software, while browsing through more forgotten corners of the japanese net. Was it worth it?
    If you're interested, please continue.
     
    Story

    It's common for sons of well-established leaders to be mostly useless, good-for-nothing gallants. Raziel isn't an exception.
    Prince Raziel is the successor to the demon throne, but his interests vary wildly from whatever his father keeps in stock, not to mention actual marriage. When his soon-to-be fiancée turns out to be an angel - a mortal enemy of the demon kind - Raziel takes a liking for the girl and decides to make her his bride, much to Demon King's disapproval. After a heated argument, king promises to approve of their relationship, but only if Raziel manages to bring her back to the demon realm. Clueless on how to begin, prince Raziel joins forces with his ever profit-hungry childhood friend Rosetta and together they embark on a fantastic journey through mystical realms, full of glorious dickings and endless hopes for treasure troves ready to be taken.

    In this realm, your future half is revealed through divination, the rest does not seem to matter that much.
    In order to reach the heavens above, our duo has to traverse through 魔界 ("Hell" for you, uneducated peasants) and obtain four elemental stones, which will allow them to open a magical portal leading to the mortal plane. From there onwards, they will have to pass through the Machine Country and Country of the Beasts, before they reach entrance to heavens. A seemingly simple task, if not for the fact the stones are being kept away within four great towers and each of them is supposedly protected by a powerful guardian. Obviously, the stones themselves contain tremendous powers that allow it's bearer to control the elemental energies and as such, shouldn't ever fall into anyone's hands, especially demon.

    What a cutie. I'm obviously talking about Rosette.
    No one really knows what lies beyond the mortal gates, but they're confident to push onwards. Such is their fate.
    TL&DR version: It's a game about a demon prince, boning any females that stand on his way to achieve true happiness. Also, snakes. Lots of 'em.
     
    Gameplay

    Thanks for stating the obvious, Rosette.
    Yougen Tennyo is a classic eroge, deeply rooted within the galgame realm of late 80's and early 90's. Game itself is divided into two parts - the usual story mode, presented in ADV fashion and a Qix-esque mini game, where your take control of our dark-winged protagonist trying to slash through maps compromised of tiles, avoiding and fighting against a variety of opponents. The capricious all-female guardians force him into a game of wits and wagers to prove his worthiness on being the next owner of the stones... and perhaps something else.
    As you slowly progress through the game, you quickly find out the damn stones are as relevant as Raziel's fidelity. While each failure results in a classic "game over" screen, after which the game restarts, actual victories net you - the player - not only story progression, but the main reward - h-scenes, in which our protagonist has his way with the defeated ladies (sometimes likewise). And boy, oh boy - if you enjoy stories, where protagonists are either rogues or straight out bastards, while females constantly switch from prideful to poor, oppressed beings into lust-filled demons demanding your se- I mean, your unyielding attention - you'll love every minute of it. It's not a mystery to behold our dear ladies are of supernatural origin and being forever bound to a single place with no one to accompany them, they grew both very lonely and bored over the passing centuries. Surely - they might be ill-tempered and/or cautious (PMS, perhaps), but it's in your task to soften them up and judging from devs, the best possible way to do so is by being rough. Push onwards, traveller. Open all the gates!
    The whole story is divided into seven arcs, not counting prologue and epilogue. There are four different towers and three realms our heroes will have to pass in order to reach ending. Each of the areas is a home to one of the game's heroines.
    The Earth Tower, inhabited by our shy nymph Raka (guarding the Earth Stone) Kingdom of Winds, home to the capricious sylph Sherra (guarding the Wind Stone) Tower of the Flames, guarded by the tsun fire sprite, Narsemi (guarding the Fire Stone) Rainy Kingdom, home to the tempting undine, Arga (guarding the Water Stone) Machine Country (human world), managed by the automaton Queen, Lia Country of the Beasts, supervised by proud centauress, Eija. Finally, the Heavenly Realm, where Raziel's fated bride - Oferina - resides. As a reader, you will spend most of the time following Raziel and Rosetta from place to place and engage in battles with it's guardians; either chasing after the more timid gals, or confronting the powerful vixens directly, ultimately falling into their playful clutches. It's worthy to note despite game's initial simplicity, girls themselves prove to be pleasantly developed, both in terms of personalities and the less, but not less important bits (when it applied). Each of the encounters is different and has something else in stock - there's a nut for every bolt, as they say. Not all of them run away scared or remain hostile to the protagonist. Some - in fact - welcome him as a pleasant surprise in their realms, offering to exchange their stones (wew) for a friendly game of cat and mouse. Those games - often being contests of strength, wits and spirit - ultimately turn to time, where they slowly get to know each other and sadly - the only time where we can learn something more about them. Fans of Rance series might find themselves at home, as most of the events in the story are described in an ultimately comedic fashion, rather than being serious and you can't deny that Raziel - even for being a villainous sort of a protagonist - isn't inherently bad, or evil as his only ultimate goal is to find a way to heavens and meet with his fated fiancée. In other words, you quickly let certain things go past the radar, even when most of the acts committed by Raziel could easily be described as nothing else but forcey fun time.
    Things get more hectic in the end, when you finally reach the Celestial Kingdom, that turns out to be less celestial, than you thought at first. A rather tiny, but surprising plot twist occurs, where you confront an unexpected guest and have to rescue Oferina from a fate far worse than death... I'd rather omit the details to avoid potential spoiling, but the whole final confrontation left me as much distressed and angry, as hilariously grinning for the remaining portion of the game.

    And they all lived happily ever after... or did they?
    I found the whole concept of the game symbolic at times. Embarking from the depths of the netherworld, collecting elements that form the basis of universe, passing through the human realm, reaching the kingdom representing nature itself (one that will always remain above humanity) and finally reaching heavens, representing self-understanding all create a somewhat mystic feeling. Each of the realms seems to be a self-sufficient, closed-off state - more of a dream, where our heroines reside, mostly alone, if not counting their faithful servitors. The lack of humans within their own world is thought-provoking and you start to wonder, what happened. Did we lost ourselves in our never-ending pursuit of perfection or perhaps the mechanical puppets themselves are what remained of our own kind? In contrast to this, the Country of the Beasts seems like a bliss, akin to ancient descriptions of Promised Land, or Eden. We see all the animals in the backgrounds - both herbivores and carnivores - living in perfect harmony. A place of eternal happiness and ultimately something we cannot return to. The Celestial world above seems very cold and empty, with ancient ruins older than the universe itself. It reflects in Oferina's eyes - distant, melancholic and filled with solitude.
    All those states form what could be seemingly described as our own consciousness. Quite artsy, to be honest.

    This is what happens, when you allow greedy lolis to do as they please.
    In overall, I found the whole story to be pleasant and really enjoyable, if not a bit repetitive. Despite being plain and very much straightforward, the entire voyage got me hooked until the very end. For that I have to thank the game's heroines and Rosetta's constant antics.
     
    Minigame

    Though the developers consider Yougen Tennyo a mix between ADV and Qix, the mini-game portion itself feels closer to Bomberman, rather than similar puzzle/arcade titles.
    The mechanics are very simple. Your primary task is to clear each stage from all the tiles scattered on the floor. There's a timer running, so you have to hurry up, because when it reaches zero it's instant game over.
    Raziel moves across the tiles, leaving a flaming trail behind him which can be used to close them in simple geometric patterns. When you succeed, all tiles contained inside turn into elemental bullets and shoot in a direction our character was last facing. Those can be used to damage and kill the servitors sent by the guardians to hinder our progress. Killed enemies will sometimes leave power-ups. Those are divided into few different types - offensive, defensive and utility, ranging from instant bombs and bonus lives to additional time or stop it for a while, prevent opponents from spawning on the map or summon Rosette's lovely pet companion - Grimarkin (actually, it's a female as well... hopefully) - to either destroy tiles or launch attacks at the opponents. Again, despite it's simplicity, the mini game turned out to be a lot more engaging than I expected. It's feels very balanced and provides constant challenge, while not being an overly frustrating addition. If you will play straight from the beginning and have some skill with arcade games, you shouldn't have any problems in reaching the end, considering how generous stages can be at times, raining you with constant stream of 1-UP's.
    You're also gifted with Rosetta's presence in the bottom-left window, cheerfully commenting on your achievements and mishaps, because all we need is more sarcasm.

    My only note is that the game could still use a bit more variety in map design and puzzle elements. If not for the slight changes in terrain graphics and opponents, you could be as well playing the same exact thing, over and over again.
    The whole game is divided into 7 different worlds and each of them contains four stages. The first one is considered more or less an introduction. The second one adds more opponents. Sub-bosses appear in third stage. Those are usually powerful beings and each of them comes with a fairly different set of skills, requiring different approach to clean stages. They can be killed, but attempting to do so can be quite tricky, considering their toughness.
    In the final stage, you will confront the guardian heroines themselves. Similar to sub-bosses, ladies have different skills and attacks, becoming progressively more dangerous and difficult to beat as the game progresses. Personally, I found Eija to be the most challenging opponent, truly worthy of her character. Heroines can be defeated as well, but they are one of the toughest opponents existing, requiring a lot of effort. Regadless, as your main task is to clear all the tiles, beating them is not required, but purely optional.

    Regarding boss fights, it's worth to remember about Rosetta's treasure hunting requests, if you want to earn her gratitude. As to why, I will leave it for players to deduce themselves
     
    Art & Music
    There is "music" in this game.
    Jokes, aside - it's all simple FM-midi tunes. Those might have been good around thirty years ago, but not anymore. Regardless, they are fitting and create a good background noise for all the action.

    Queen Eija is a lovely lady, but the bottom part seems incompatible.
    What really does shine, though is the art. For a game of it's time, Yougen Tennyo managed to reach a peculiar mix between simplicity and utmost artistry. The majority of art, including character concepts was done by Minoru Murao (of Knights, Last Exile, Burst Angel and 707R fame, amongst other works), remaining nothing less than gorgeous. It's obvious Minoru was heavily inspired by Arabian Nights (visible in character designs and setting) and Art Nouveau with it's flowery patterns, thick outlines, minimal shading, subtly drawn faces and beautiful anatomy. All of this is a true feast for eyes to look upon. The unique mix between erotica and high art - the subtle embrace of delicate female beauty portrayed against the flowery plains, contrasting with the primal joviality of our dark-winged demon protagonist turned out to be a really tasteful and unique approach for a visual novel of this kind.

    It's a shame the game is so old and as such, former hardware limitations prevented higher resolution graphics.
     
    Ero

    Because our protagonist is a an awful, awful person.
    The cherry on the top.
    If you're a fan of 100% consensual vanilla H, stay the hell away from this game, as some of the scenes might end in complete disgust to all things japanese, possibly combined with police knocking on your doors.
    If otherwise, this - my friend - will be one of the most memorable experiences in your life, you might feel ashamed of but won't ever regret.
    Not only you get beautiful gals, as they pant and tussle in ecstasy, there's a lot more in store for all the fans of dirty erotica. Our protagonist is a shape shifting dweller of the netherworld himself, capable to turn into a gigantic snake and command a whole flock of scale-covered familiars, ready to pursue his every single order. He is not afraid to use them to the fullest potential (don't click that link at work, seriously). The game offers a wide variety of heroines with different personalities, sexual experience and level of kinkiness, which results in a lot of funny situations (mostly for us, less for them), not to mention preceding sexual innuendos and dirty talking. As an seemingly inconspicuous but powerful apex predator - demonic avatar of lust and depravity - you will slowly drive your unsuspecting victims into a corner, devoid them of their dignity and work them up to new heights of carnal pleasure, they never experienced before.
    Even tentacles in this game come as one of the most beautiful I've ever came across and quite cuddly in their own way
    If you ever thought how females felt during the age of myth, play this game. Being forcefully taken against your own will is just the very beginning of a never-ending circle of perversion, our ancestors excelled at. Not only we loved to imagine how things are done within the celestial realm, but the cleverness behind the sex acts themselves could only equal to cunning tactics, our demigod brethren (and possibly sisters) employed to seduce their targets. Bulls, swans, sneks, golden rain, fog, treasure chests, spiders, mirrors, more sneks, wine, eagles, even more sneks, larks, mysterious objects(?) were all just a tip of an iceberg floating within a sea of wriggling snakes.
    This game just loves snakes. I won't be surprised you too might start to like them afterwards.
     
    Technicalities
    I can't forget to mention how hard Yougen Tennyo is to obtain nowadays (if you're a collector) and how even more difficult is to make it run on any modern PC at all. Since the game is basically a self-extracting software CD from circa 2001, it does not recognize modern display standards. I had to hack the executable in order to make it work on a 16:9 screen, although it did manage to open properly on another machine running Windows 7 on a 5:4 monitor, in 1280x1024 resolution. I suspect a windows hooker, such as DxWnd might be able to run it as well. If you own the original CD, an optical drive is surely required.
     
    End thoughts
    If you're a fan of oldschool eroge, looking for something nice and not overly long nor difficult to play, this game - despite it's complete obscurity - is a true gem in the rough and shouldn't be omitted.
     
    Pros:
    Gorgeous, highly stylized art Six different heroines standing on your path, plus Rosetta and your would-be fiancée Despite the themes, story is mostly light and comedic, akin to Rance games Plenty of well drawn and varied h-cgs with pretty, fairy-like gals You get to bang a haughty centauress 👌 Rosetta is cute af and she gets her screen time as well (provided you know what to do) You get cucked Cons:
    No catgirls (sub-boss in the penultimate map doesn't count) The story can be considered shallow and characters could include more depth The mini-game could use more variety in terms of mechanics The game is a pain in the ass to run on modern systems, unless you own a retro pc Lack of possibility to save, skip and fast-forward the text the old style censorship with it's invisible weenies and huge mosaics gets really annoying at times If resident lolis weren't enough, Narsemi's arc might be an actual deal breaker for a lot of people (YMMV) You get cucked
×
×
  • Create New...