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Chronopolis

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Everything posted by Chronopolis

  1. When my head is full of the last VN I read, I find it helps to write all my thoughts down. Once I've written it down, I feel its easier to put it aside, I think because I know I've recorded it somewhere, and also the processing of writing stuff down helps to sort out jumbled feelings. If the VN was long enough, I usually find it satisfying enough remembering the journey that happened. If I'm really home-sick after finishing a VN, I might rewatch parts of it, to kind of ease off it. In rare cases I felt like I was thinking TOO much about the series. But it was not that hard to gradually get back to the normal life. If I finish a great route and have trouble playing the others cause I get stuck, I'll usually put the VN on hold. I don't think you can enjoy a story or route for what it is when you're mainly thinking about a different one. One of the worst things is when the VN is great, but its too short and leaves you craving more.
  2. High school wasn't especially fun or meaningful for me so nope. Though I imagine if you had good times in high school it might make you reminisce.
  3. You're probably better off just looking up a cg set of it online. The art is nice, but the gameplay is infamously terrible.
  4. Nice review! I'm a fan of VN's with a cosy atmosphere. I didn't notice you have links to English reviews. Pretty handy, also if you've played the game and want to see a western opinion.
  5. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCZBRocN7AN1N9Ypvgql7lg Doujin game of the Year. Highly reccomend if you are interested in seeing doujins vns of all sorts of genres. I would definitely go play some of those titles, if only I had more spare time.
  6. Never been so hyped by an OP. I love how every single shot shows an element of the show. The main trio are exceptional, and the OP gets that across. Norman: A kind soul, but an unbounded mastermind. Ray: The brains, who despite being tsun and almost crazy, seems to act as the voice of reality among the three. Emma: Idealistic, loving, and true to a fault. Carrying the weight of a reckless dream, she withstands being ground into dust by way of her indomitable will and the help of those around her.
  7. G-senjou no Maou I like to hate on this VN because it's a little bit plot holed, but it is a strong mix of thriller and emotion, the main route is quite the ride, and something about the ending. It was nice reading your comments on your VNDB list. I mostly play untranslated games, so it's hard for me to pick... you've played many of the quality, intriguing games with a translation. Since you've read quite a few experimental works, perhaps SeaBed? It is a sort of unique work, is a lot about the mundane living and coming to terms with the past. It seems to be have been cherished by many who have read it.
  8. https://vndb.org/v10680/ Luna from Tsuki ni Yorisou Otome no Sahou comes to mind. Isn't translated though. She's also dominant in the H-scene if you pick the right choices.
  9. Ah, right, you must be running through VN's pretty quickly to be able to review so many. Thanks for the kind words. It's a different kind of reading, called intensive reading (where you study text closely and dissect it). The majority of one's reading can and should be extensive reading, which is just reading tons and not worrying about understanding everything.
  10. Daitoshokan no Hitsujikai cause Pooltron keeps spamming screenshots from it, and it looks hilarious. But Katawa Shoujo is a good read. It's on the shorter side and the routes are varied and pretty interesting.
  11. Hi fellas, Chronopolis here. I want to rollout to you guys this new videos series I'm testing: The VN Guided Tour Project. The idea is that I'll do a read-through of VN prologues, reading aloud the unvoiced text, and explaining the vocab and grammar. Reading VN's is very difficult when you first start out. One of the challenges, is that there are a lot of expressions and grammar patterns (out-of-my-ass number, like 33%-40%) which aren't covered by JLPT, but which show up commonly in novels. You can find a lot of grammar guides on the web, so I want to offer something which is dead focused on reading Visual Novels. This series is for people who have down some reading in Japanese, but who still maybe struggle on tackling different titles. If you've haven't or have just started reading VN's in Japanese, it might be difficult to follow, but you could try anyways. I explain almost all of it. So far, I've recorded two videos. Thoughts on this format, anyone? I'd especially like to hear your feedback if you are someone who might use this series. Edit: Started adding some grammar notes for the lessons. Edit 2: Link to the full folder. I'm going to add some longer guides for JP grammars that need full explanations. Not going to cover everything, just a few select topics. So far there is just one super-guide on conditionals.
  12. There's the new VR VN's like Project Lux and Spicy Tails (upcoming).
  13. No, I've never reread a VN fully. I just revisit my favourite parts. A lot of the description in a VN that helps immerse you in your first play, becomes extra baggage when you go to play the VN again. If the VN is pretty concise in this aspect then you can still play it again. Another way is by waiting many years before replaying the VN. After 4 years, I noticed my impression changes quite a bit (Current impression is different from how I pictured from memories.) Basically, I think you reread stuff to check details, or if the work is layered enough so that your impressions will differ and justify a second playthrough.
  14. This is because it's difficult to write a good, active MC. Just look at english fanfiction, and you can see the opposite but similiar problem. Tons of active, edgy, but poorly characterized protagonists.
  15. Susoi Ginka no Istoria Giniro Konota Yori Kanata Made Sakura Mori Dreamers (people dont't call this an utsuge, but man is the mood gloomy. There's no comedy in it.) I haven't read, but well known: Naricissu Kana Imouto Boku ga Tenshi ni Natta Wake https://vndb.org/g693?fil=tagspoil-0.tag_inc-693;m=0;o=d;s=rating;p=1
  16. I think overall the voice acting level is significantly higher on average in JP subs, however there are some great english performances. Growing up used to watching a language's dub certainly makes it easier to watch. If you listen to something enough, you just recognize it as "that", without judging it. And that familiarity is a positive reaction, usually. When we complain that EN cutesy voices sound bad, there is some level of bias. Since we're used to JP cutesy voices, and we hear English people talk all the time, but Japanese people not so much. My usual gripe is that their delivery isn't expressive enough and they don't have the breadth to emphasize all these different situations. Besides those, I guess the most common culprit for a bad dub is a bad script. A good English performance really needs a good English script -- not the accuracy of the TL so much, but whether those lines can be naturally acted out in the scene. Unnatural English sounds REALLY bad. Lastly, the Japanese have mastered the art of doing KAWAII voices. There are so many variations, and they still manage to come across clear even when talking fast or using shrill tones. The japanese language might actually help here -- there are so many ways to customize a character's speaking patterns (old-fashioned, personal quirks, etc.). It probably can be done in English too, but that level of adaptation/script-writing is rare, I imagine. There is also little need to make someone sound peculiar, when simply doing a good VA will serve the purpose. Curious what people think about a dub like Sunako from Shiki.
  17. Reading the choices can be a moderate spoiler, and it also gives away the structure of the VN. I prefer to pick the choices myself, until I get stuck at all. If it's a super clusterf**k of choices I'll end up breaking out the walkthrough pretty soon, no loss there.
  18. Maybe you could try translating a free game novel. There are some (very) short ones which are interesting. There might be technical challenges, but it's a lot more satisfying to finish something then do 3k line long prologue. https://freegame-mugen.jp/adventure/game_1266.html
  19. Happy endings are usually a straightforward, following plot resolved and internal issues overcome. I dont like bittersweet or bad endings just for the sake of, but as a consequence of plot/theme, they can be the most interesting.
  20. Quartett. The presentation and style of moe is closer to manga than other VN's, so if you came from anime/manga you might enjoy it.
  21. Soft utsuge is a vn which is full of sad feelings: loss, grieving, or regret. There is comfort, but unlike in a nakige, the negative events and resulting strife are a primary part of the story. Hard utsuge is when the circumstances throughout the VN (not just the ending) are crushing and it seems like there is no hope. At least thats how I distingush them.
  22. Ah, that's an interesting point. Even a sci-fi setting can be accessible, if the concepts are familiar. When I first read it, the technology related 熟語 and verbs bogged me down for a while. It doesn't get any harder, though.
  23. Komorebi no Nostalgica -- This game is actually on the hard side I would say. There's lots of setting and discussion about technology, including fictional terms. A lot of detail and random trivia, since the author is an intellectual. Only things that might make this easier is that there is no complex significant plot, and the drama is not complicated either. For those unfamiliar Clephas, maybe you could explain the classification between hard and soft utsuge?
  24. Yeah, like a living world where certain parts of the setting seem to be moving their own way. I can only think of one story I've read which fits that bill. Even in a story with much smaller world-building I think a setting and it's characters needs to be something the protagonist wanders through and bumps into, not something they finish like an RPG dungeon. I enjoy stories focused on a cast of characters because they tend to naturally fulfill this criteria. Perhaps having primarily consumed VN's and JP media, I'm not that picky about behind-the-scenes logic and minor plot inconsistencies, but when a story breaks its own rules... that just weakens it.
  25. On my journey to try and write a complete story, I found it incredibly satisfying creating my story's universe. Mostly characters, relevant parties, and cause and effect. So after a few months of creating, I end up with a decent amount of details and a fair chunk of my story plot filled in. But I haven't written a story. In fact, I haven't even completed a single scene in it's entirety. Strange. These "details", feel so integral to the story. I feel like I'm creating the story. And yet when I google "how to writing", everything is dead focused on the scene: making the perfect scene, the build-up of scenes, scene dialogue, etc. It seems like our focuses are different. Anyways, without going into how modern writing is too presentation focused, let me lay out these two contrasting features which constitute a story. A World The world of a story is its own characters, and their thoughts, interactions, histories, and details. And a timeline of events with explanation of cause and effect. To me as a writer, a world is already the story. Creating the locations, characters, and happenings. Just like how facts and forensic evidence can tell a story, the existence of this separate world, it's characters and events makes it a story to me. Telling a Story However, there is another huge element in stories. That is, how we convey them. When we talk about a good writer, we often applaud their gripping text, captivating storylines. A good part of that is the art of presentation. The first implication of presentation is that of selection. Not every fact and character's thought reaches the reader's eyes, and certainly not every cause and effect is layed out. A story consists of a series of scenes which convey the journey, and also bring the reader through the build-up and through the climax of the story. Beyond that, a story has description, which helps the reader to imagine the scene and put them there. A scene can have a mood, which immerses the player. It's possible to like a scene just for it's mood. Note this mood is a very subjective thing which is both conveyed and imagined. A mood might also might suggest something about the character's lines of thoughts, or it might connect to the punch line of the scene. A narrator can use different tones, which achieve similar effect to a mood. For example, the ironic tone in the narration of the post apocalyptic world SukaSuka encourages us to grin painfully as we hear about curious history and the downfall of foolish parties, deserving and tragic alike. A caustic tone in another post-apocalyptic story could be emphasizing to the reader that human lives matters little here. Of course, the writer could offer up these ideas directly, but a tone or mood simply hints at them. Mostly what these things contribute to is to bestow an experience to the player. This is a subjective experience which is distinct from the world that the author created. Before you think I'm saying "objective rulz", I note that it is possible for a story's universe to have certain emotions or ideas that permeate through it, which the author was trying to convey in the first place. I guess this is why they talk about stories often having an over-arching message. I personally am not a big fan of stories having a primary message, though that it is definitely something which can be done. However, even without having a message, stories usually end up effectively talking about something. This is because they inspire us to think about the phenomena/conflict that they depict. In closing, my fellow VN readers, I leave you with this. Think about a story you've read or are writing. Does the world exist for the sake of the telling, or does the telling exist on behalf of conveying the world?
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