Decay

Discovered them just now, I think it's pretty good.

I find that it's very often when someone thinks they know what an artist truly intends, and how their art is "meant to be," that they are way off. This goes for a lot of the censorship conversations that have been making the rounds, lately. Please try to avoid getting into the mindset of "They're ruining the original vision, this isn't how it's meant to be!" because you REALLY don't know. You do not have a better idea of how something is meant to be than the original creators.

This is only a valid complaint if the individual parts cost more than most VNs of their length and production value. We don't know yet what the pricing will look like.

I have this same problem, although not quite as severe. As far as VNs go, Duel Savior is one of these, where I got halfway through the final route (of seven) and stopped. More recently, there's Kara no Shoujo 2 where I've gotten all the ends but the true end. I keep telling myself I'll go back to it but I just never end up doing so... I never consciously think "I don't want this to end," I always come up with some other reason for stopping. But I've heard a number of people are like this and the common psychological explanation given is a subconscious aversion to endings, with people like me afraid of being "finished" with something and never having a reason to go back. I do finish most VNs I start, however. Normal video games, on the other hand... I can't remember the last one I've beaten. I literally can't. I've started preferring games that don't have an end, maybe because of this. Even my beloved MGS5... Maybe some day... Going back closer to the original topic, I've never stopped a VN because I just liked a heroine too much. I HAVE stopped reading a VN because I hated the other heroines, though. Like Canvas 2.

I hope you meant to say Xbox One just there.

This doesn't fit your request exactly, but I/O does bear some similarities. Most notably, there's an MMO that some people practically live in. And it's translated!

Nah, they're just characters. I could never get that attached to them.

Oh, yes, Grisaia. I thought I looked and saw that it wasn't on sale but I must not have been seeing it correctly or something.

Then they'd have to make the whole game at once. They'd have to wait much longer, possibly years longer, to start selling it and making money off of it, and we'd have to wait much longer, possibly years longer, to actually buy and play it!

Why would they, though? Why would they doubt it in the first place? The only reason why someone would do further investigation is if there's reason to doubt. But people who aren't plugged into the community wouldn't have the knowledge necessary to doubt it. And even then, you say that they should do these things, but did YOU? No. You just sat back, spread your own misinformation, and let everyone else do the investigation for you. That's a weird kind of double standard you're imposing on the regular steam users.

Some good, cheap VNs this sale: Romanesque for $16.24 - A fun, simple raising sim/VN hybrid. It's pretty long and has a LOT of variation for multiple playthroughs. The story is super laid back, generally speaking. Clannad for $25 - It's Clannad, and it's $25. Amnesia Memories for $4.49 - A pretty lengthy, apparently very good otome game. Rooke likes it a lot. It's dirt cheap, too! Fault Milestone One and Two for $3.74 and $7.49 - Pretty decent medieval fantasy adventures for super cheap. The Fruit of Grisaia for $19.99 - Easily one of the best VNs ever officially released, and the best VN on this whole list, for just twenty bucks. I doubt there's many of you who aren't already aware of this, though. eden* for $8 - Fairly decent romance/tragedy. Cho Dengeki Stryker All Ages for $12.24 - Pretty fun shounen action story. The action is pretty ridiculous and over-the-top, and sometimes it gets a little generic, but it's still good, mindless fun. I liked it a fair amount. I promise you that you will not miss the ero content, it's very short, infrequent, bad, and totally shoehorned in. Tokyo Babel for $27.99 - I've been trying to keep to games that have a significant discount but Tokyo Babel is my favorite VN in quite a while and $28 is a steal for it, in my opinion. Higurashi Ch.1 and 2 for $9.09 - Although it's still practically just the opening of this ridiculously long story, Higurashi is a very good VN about the powers of friendship and all that with elements of horror and mystery.

That's still a few weeks away. I'll probably do the same I did as this thread, make one when it's a few days out.

Also, valve does actually have some sort of internal approval process even with greenlight. That's how that Ona Ken thing was denied, if you remember that. They also check for copyright infringement and that kind of thing. It's not purely "anything goes." Edit: As for actual content curation, yeah, Valve had that and it was extremely unkind to all Japanese games, not just VNs.

Okay, so, PARANOIA is an old Half Life mod from 2009 or so. On April 16 on Greenlight, this was put up: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:KHYq9NRpn94J:https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/%3Fid%3D666547216+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us It was put onto greenlight by "PARANOIA Team." If you look at their profile, it's the leaf one. This pretty much confirms it. Fake.

I don't remember saying it was common practice, but yeah, you're right. I guess I wouldn't be terribly surprised.

It's the same page. It was taken down and then brought back up by Valve. edit: apparently this is the second or third time? Ehh... I don't know what the hell's going on anymore, don't care either.

This was taken down, but now it's back. The fact that it's back means it's actually real... right? But the fact that they take screenshots and the description from VNDB is, well... I don't know what to think of this.

The prologue's disjointed writing is due to the circumstances of how Gethel has trapped Sorami. Her entire world was in flux, at that point. The writing reflected that. Once they make it to Pandora, things become much more consistent and "normal." There are some issues related to what you were complaining about, like how the game will switch from action to comedy and back from time to time, but generally speaking the format for each route is slice-of-life character building and training -> first combat encounter -> celebration and another brief SoL sequence, w/ maybe more training -> action action action action. The balance and pacing can feel a little off at times, but I wouldn't necessarily qualify it as a "mess."

It was actually written by a trio of writers, although I don't know who was responsible for what. Have you played Secret Game 2nd Stage? The same group went on to do that (with Nakazawa directing again), so I wonder if there was any improvement.

For the first spoiler, yeah, they even said as much in the game. It "makes sense," but it's still a hilariously stupid term. So is Beyond Communication, for that matter. And literally every other bit of fictional english terminology. I don't hate it, though, I find it comical how bad Japan is at naming things in English, and their continued insistence at doing so anyways. As for the second spoiler: Oh. Hmm. Eh. I wasn't particularly impressed with that, but that could have easily been affected by the translation.

Right, right. Root Double is full of some of the most absurd english terminology imaginable. Got some mixed up. edit: Shimuzu Ai isn't in RD according to VNDB.

Those two routes are basically the first 2/3rds of the story. If your viewers actually expect a complete story experience, they will not get that if you stop at the end of route B.

I didn't dig into the minutiae of their situation because explaining EVERYTHING could take ages, but in the game world they developed a drug called AD ("Alone Despair," thanks Japan) to counteract radiation poisoning. They actually have limited supplies of the drug and much of the first scenario is spent with them trying to locate and secure more of it. But there's definitely some suspension of your disbelief required in some aspects.

The honorifics thing doesn't come up too often. Most characters are on a first-name basis and it all sounds normal. It's usually just random background characters at the school and stuff like that. Oh, the teacher refers to her students as Mr. and Ms. as well, which feels weird. Still doesn't happen all that often. About your second question, well, sometimes? A lot of the stuff kind of gets glossed over until they directly address it. Sometimes this actually works out, like some of the stuff going on in Rokumei City feels a bit creepy and unnerving, at least to me. But often times you'll see the characters go "I SEE NO PROBLEMS HERE!" until suddenly it's "OH WOW ACTUALLY IT IS BAD AND NOT GOOD!" with all of the nuance of an 8th grade sociology essay.

Hi. Just in time for the game's release. http://reviews.fuwanovel.net/2016/04/27/root-double-before-crime-after-days-xtend-edition/ I couldn't find a decent promo image in English. I have no idea what that's saying but hey, whatever. I give this game 3/5 stars. While I think it's a bit overhyped and overrated, it still has some good stuff going for it and some of you people who are huge zero escape and infinity fans might like it anyways.