Zalor

It's even more depressing when you compare it to DDLC's numbers. 

Yes, I recommend you to keep on going.
Anyway, as soon as you hear "the best VN ever", you shouldn't be convinced. It's hard to live to those expectations. Let it be you who discovers if it's really the best or not.
Only thing I can tell you, I'm reading Subahibi and I'm enjoying it. I see the game's charm. The best ever? Well, probably not, but close enough. Subahibi has its own merit. Maybe Dies Irae has it too.
Hell, even I myself was skeptical towards Steins;Gate when I was reading through Dr. Nakabachi's conference. It seemed like otaku pandering, and the first contact with Okabe wasn't that smooth. Anyway in S;G you only have to push on a little and when the mysteries keep piling up, the thrill never lets up until the end.

I'm kinda with you on the SoL scenes. It's not that I didn't expect them at all, but due to months of anticipation and elevated expectations from its opening scenes, I felt extremely drained after that initial shift.
But you know, that's kinda my fault for letting my expectations get the better of me; and now that I think about it, I was being way too harsh with my standards. And now that I know what to expect going in, I think I'll be able to put in a little more effort into reading further.

One thing with Dies Irae - and indeed a significant proportion of chuunige in general - is that the antagonists can have a tendency to overwhelm the protagonist's qualities.  Ren has a few good points, but when it comes down to it, he is essentially the ultimate version of the type that 'just wants to return to normal life' and Kasumi is Victim A.  For this reason, I skipped Kasumi's route entirely the first time I played Dies Irae and only reluctantly played it the second time. 
Reinhardt, on the other hand, is a grand character who, for all that he is very obviously evil, is also glorious in his own way.  Mercurius, for all his evil, obviously loves Marie, even if he shows it in a really screwy way.  The fact is, you have to see Kasumi as a symbol rather than a character, when it comes down to it, since her character is a fairly standard osananajimi type. 
Masada generally lavishes his full skills on descriptions of his villains/antagonists' internal qualities, their motivations, their pasts, etc.  He actually seems to prefer the villainous characters over the 'good guys', as is shown in Paradise Lost, where everyone is evil to one degree or another, with the possible exception of Riliel (though this is only in the sense that she isn't malicious, not that she doesn't kill people).  Lyle, the protagonist of Paradise Lost, is about as evil as they get, and most of the characters of Kajiri Kamui are also amoral or have a very strong dark side. 
This can also be seen in Senshinkan, where the protagonist and his closest friends were so much more boring than the antagonists and side-characters (with the possible exception of the main heroine, who has a really wonderfully twisted personality). 
Honestly, I just recommend you play the game through, then think on whether you liked the characters or not, since almost nobody is going to like Ren based on the events of Kasumi's path or the common route (he spends way too much time escaping from reality). 
Edit: Honestly, I've never met anyone who loved Dies Irae based on Ren or Kasumi.  Most people just liked the antagonists and other heroines... or the writing and plot.  I personally am fond of Ren, but, except for his weird hangups (the biggest of which is the one that defines his power), his desires are fairly standard for an early-era chuunige protagonist. 
The main reason you'll almost never see the untranslated readers criticize Dies Irae is because only chuunige-lovers ever play Dies Irae in Japanese.  The game is as well-written as it gets, and the presentation is first-class, with great opposition characters.  I can guarantee you that most of them think of the antagonists and the heroines first when they look back at the game, and Ren is probably an afterthought (except for the coupling with Rusalka, of course, since that was hugely popular).  The sheer difficulty level of Dies Irae in Japanese meant that only people with the level of Japanese knowledge to be able to enjoy the first-class writing ever played the game in the first place, and generally only chuunige readers had that level of understanding.
I have declined to comment on the recent discussions on whether Dies Irae is 'good' or not because, regardless of what I say in that matter, it will end up being disregarded because I am a chuunige-addict and a player of untranslated games. 
One thing that I should probably mention about my initial experience with Dies Irae was that, until I got through Marie's path, I experienced a great deal of frustration with the game and Ren and Kasumi.  I have mentioned this in some of my blog posts, but I personally believe that Victim A type heroines should never be present in chuunige, meaning that, even though I understand her role in the game as a symbol of everyday life/what Ren wants from life, I still loathed Kasumi's presence in the game.  For this reason, I've actually advocated in the past for skipping Kasumi's route entirely, since it doesn't add a whole lot to the story in comparison to Kei's route, which is actually a better intro in a lot of ways (Kei being a better heroine in general).  I had to actually finish Marie's path before I was ready to like Ren as a character, and I liked him even more after Rea's path. 

I have a weird history with Dies Irae. Its a VN I've know about for some 5 years now. It was always lauded as "the best VN you will never read", and the aura in which it got talked about reeked with pretension. Much like Suba Hibi, it was one of those untranslated VNs that couldn't be criticized since only those with Japanese literacy could read it. And for whatever odd reason, the minority of Western VN fans who could read untld VNs seemed to all ubiquitously love it. A couple years ago after having studied Japanese for a bit, I finally cracked Suba Hibi (this was when the translation was in this odd purgatory status), and despite all the skepticism I approached it with, it became one of my favorite VNs. Certainly in my top 3.
I went into Dies Irae with with the optimism I came out of Suba Hibi with. And indeed, the Prologue of Dies Irae alone impressed me very much. I always heard the VN praised for its writing, and the prose was quite gorgeous. Furthermore, the characters it introduced and the conflict all caught my attention. Then we get to the first scene where Shirou and Ren start brawling it out. Upon first appearance I loved Shirou. He had all the chaotic and interesting elements I wanted in a protagonist. But instead we get stuck with Ren. 
I'm a couple of chapters in, and admittedly my biggest issue with the VN is Ren and his school friends (especially Kasumi!). Compared to the Villains the protagonists lack any interesting qualities. The fight scenes I have seen so far have all been very engaging, but they contrast night and day with the dullness of the school scenes. Furthermore, its kind of disorienting reading highly stylized prose for the fights, and then the most generic VN dialogues once we get back to Ren and his school life. My last annoyance with the VN is the adolescent tier philosophizing that goes around. I heard the VN praised for the various philosophies the characters encapsulate, but much of it so far doesn't seem impressive. Although I might just be annoyed because Ren's constant internal monologues and dialogues lamenting the loss of his "regular mundane life" is simply just boring, and repetitive. I'd much rather see more Shirou spouting on about his desire for chaos.
Would you recommend I continue Dies Irae? I do find certain parts of it very fun and engaging (the villains and the fight scenes), but Ren as a protagonist is dragging down the experience so much for me. 

I’ve recently read a few thoughtful discussion threads on the state of the VN market here in the West. Some taking a negative stance, some with a more positive outlook. I thought I’d try to put some numbers on these statements and look at VN ownership on Steam, still the predominant market for PC games, and use that to analyse whether VNs are on their true route or have stumbled into a bad end.

Data collection
I checked just over a million steam profiles to try and get a random sample of gamers. With Steam’s new private-by-default profile settings, only 8% of those users had public game lists, but that still gave us 80k user profiles to work with. I could then compare my sample with the “leaked” owner data and scale up my numbers accordingly to represent Steam as a whole.
Steam is rather haphazard with what gets tagged as a Visual Novel (RPGMaker games like A Bird Story are tagged as VNs), so I’ll only be including games that also have a VNDB entry.

Steam VN releases
So let’s start simple, with a simple plot of how many VNs are being released each month.

 
At first glance things seem rosy for VN fans, there have never been more VNs being released in the West. But let’s break down those results a bit:

Note that these trends are cumulative but NOT stacked. The EVN, JVN, and other VNs trends include only non-free VNs.
Here we can start to see the reason for the differing perspectives on the state of the VN market depending upon whether you read more JVNs or EVNs. While the rate of EVNs releases has steadily increased, the number of new JVNs has remained fairly static since 2016, despite Steam’s lowered release requirements. Steady release rates aren’t definitely bad news, but in general profitable industries want to expand, so the lack of expansion tells you something about the industry. But as someone with a plan-to-read list that grows longer by the day, I’m not complaining if the rate doesn’t increase.
One under-reported development in the VN market is the recent rapid growth of Chinese VNs (listed as other here), who have quietly been doing well in their home markets, but are rarely translated.
So while more VNs might be good for us fans, how does the market look for developers? Let’s have a look at VN sales.

Note that these trends are cumulative but NOT stacked. All sales are back-dated to the release date of the VN on Steam. Free VNs count sales as the number of users who have logged some playtime in it.
Unfortunately Steam’s API doesn’t list when someone bought a game, so we’ve got to group sales by the release date of the VN. That means there will be a bias towards older releases which have been out longer and so had more time to build up sales.
Here we can see some justification for the doom and gloom perspectives, with more recent VN releases selling significantly less than older ones. With new JVNs in 2017 selling only half what they did in 2016. The EVN downward trend is especially stark given that the number of new releases has been increasing, so that’s less revenue split among even more VNs.
Not all VNs are equal, some are priced higher, so let’s look at total revenue rather than total sales.

Note that this assumes every user pays full price, so this is more the maximum possible revenue than actual revenue.
Here we can see the difference between EVN and JVN markets. While JVNs sell only half as many as EVNs, they earn almost as much revenue due to their higher price. We again see the same dip in more recent revenue though, 2017 was only 46% of 2016′s revenue, and 2018 looks even worse so far.
Remember, this fall in revenue coincidences with an increase in the total number of releases, so to fully comprehend the drop on revenue, let’s look at the average sales per VN.

 
First, we should note that this massively overestimates the average revenue generated as it assumes every user pays full price. I know devs who would sell their soul for 282k per VN. Oh wait, they already did when they signed up for Steam... (just kidding, I do like Steam, but it has issues). The important aspect here isn’t the y-axis total which is unreliable, but the consistent downwards trend.
But it might not be as bleak as it seems, older VNs are more likely to have been in bundles and in Steam sales, so their revenue is likely overestimated compared with more recent releases. So I’d be hesitant to claim that revenue is necessarily dropping, but I think we can confidently claim that revenue isn’t increasing.

VN Reviews
Nostalgia for a past golden age is common everywhere, not least among VN fans. It’s not uncommon to hear that newly released VNs aren’t as good as older ones, but can we get any empirical data on this point? We can get close by looking at the Steam reviews of VNs over time.

Each dot represents the average thumbs up/down ratio for any VNs released that month.
Within the JVN market, we can see some truth to the nostalgia viewpoint. Older releases were more consistently rated higher. But that isn’t to say there aren’t new highly rated JVNs. They still maintain enviously high scores overall.
As for EVNs, while they had consistently scored lower than JVNs, they’re catching up and are now pretty comparable in review ratings of JVNs.
Just for fun, let’s see how the total review count compares between VNs.

The two free-VN spikes are for Emily is Away and DDLC.
As I’m sure anyone familiar with the VN community can tell you, JVN fans are vocal, and it shows in the total reviews VNs get. Despite there being only half as many JVNs as EVNs, they still attract more reviews than EVNs do. This is perhaps because JVNs are typically far longer than EVNs, so might be worth the time of writing a review.
What free-VN fans lack in the wallet, they make up for in their word-count. Although this is massively skewed by two free VNs which compromise 70% of all free-VN reviews: Emily is Away and DDLC. They seem anomalies rather than trends. As shown by the graph when we exclude those two:

*Excluding Emily is Away and DDLC.
Despite the drop in position, free-VNs still out-perform what we’d expect given their lower count of total owners, but that may be because EVN and JVN totals include users who own the VN but have never read it. Whereas the free-VN total only includes those who have logged playtime in that VN, so there’s a larger pool of possible reviewers.

Potential Issues
There are a few sources of uncertainty in the dataset. The selection of users who have set their profiles to public might not be representative of the wider Steam userbase. It probably undercounts more casual fans who are less likely to configure their Steam profile.
We also don’t know when someone purchased a VN, so it’s possible VN sales are increasing, but a lot of that money is going to older releases, especially if they’re in bundles and Steam sales.
In inclusion of VNs in game bundles may be distorting the image of the VN fandom, as it’ll include those who have little interest in the medium and only own a VN by happenstance.
We should also remember that “Steam” is not synonymous with the VN market. There are plenty of competitors in the VN scene, namely Mangagamer and itch.io, who tend to cater to different tastes than Steam does. So we’re only getting a partial picture of the Western VN scene.

Conclusion
There’s data here to support both the optimistic and pessimistic commentary. On the positive side, there have never been more VNs being released as there are now. EVNs are improving with higher average ratings and a few have reached mainstream attention.
On the pessimistic side, it seems like there are ever more VNs competing for a fanbase that isn’t significantly growing. While I’d be wary of claiming profits are falling, it seems highly likely they aren’t increasing, and a stagnant market is not a healthy one.
Personally, I think the future is bright. While VNs might not be destined to become blockbuster successes, there is enough of sustainable fanbase to support lots of indie developers, who are the most prone to innovate and write interesting new stories. As a VN fan, I’m excited to see what comes next~
---
I hope you found the article interesting. I had wanted to include a section analysing the Steam users, how many VNs do JVN fans purchase compared to EVN fans etc. But I want to spend a little longer going into more depth on it, so I’ll have a post up next week on that. If you’re interested in more until then, check out my other tumblr analysis posts, look out for updates on my twitter, or give me a yell on Discord (Sunleaf_Willow ／(^ n ^=)＼#1616). Special thanks to /u/8cccc9 for collaborating on the analysis, and Part-time Storier for proof-reading.
I just do these analyses for fun, but if you want to support my work with a tip, I accept small donations at ko-fi.

For future reference, unfortunately you're also going about this all wrong. Without a translator your project is doomed. Find a translator that's interested in a VN first before even announcing a project. They're the rarest commodity in these projects and you almost never get people putting their hand up for something you're interested in; it's the other way around - the translator needs to be interested in something and the group should form around them.

Well, if you have a story focused on a hero, and then add in the presence of deities, then it very likely becomes a hero's journey. And about the hero's legacy, we humans often seek an explanation or purpose in the world, and adding a legacy that provides meaning for the hero's sacrifice/triumph does this.

Yep! I post stuff fron the game from time to time in my twitter account, here you have it: https://twitter.com/BloodDaughters Also I hope you like the rest of the game as much as the aesthetics haha
Aww, thank you, I'm glad you like it that much!! 

I think I was one of those people lol.
This is my most anticipated VN. I'm really glad to hear that the progress is going well.

I'd say it's at least intermediate. The fight scenes can prove especially tricky, so I wouldn't recommend it to a beginner. That being said, if you really want to read it, there is no harm in checking out the trial to gauge whether or not you'd be able to comprehend the rest of the game at your current level.
Akabeisoft is quite annoying, as they block IPs that aren't Japanese from accessing their website, but you can still download the game's trial from sites that sells the game, like Getchu. (Just hit the "体験版DL" button on this site.)

That sounds great, I've talked with a few people in the past months wondering what happened to this project, it's really nice to hear it's back on track. Do you have a Twitter or any other place where you post updates beyond here and Lemmasoft Forums?
Damn, this looks fine too. I guess good aesthetic isn't everything, but the more I see the more exciting this one gets. It can't be a bad sign. :3

Yes! The project is 100% alive. Sorry about the lack of updates, I went through some health problems last year so the development stopped, but I'm back at it now yay! The script is fully translated and edited, the base coding and GUI are done and the ost is being worked on. Right now I'm already implementing the script so I could even release a demo already, a part of the game is playable. That being said, there will be a bit more time of silence until Synergia is closer to its release. Hopefully that will happen soon! Also thank you for the support! As a little extra, check out the main menu: 
 

Hmm, I'd say Ryuu Kishi Bloody Saga fits pretty well in a lot of ways. Most of the points are pretty spot on, honestly. While not all of them play into the "journey" directly, most of what goes on in Roy's mind, and the way he changes through the game very much follows that structure.
It's a pretty underrated game in my opinion. Definitely worth checking out.

What VNs have you noticed can be broken down into the structure of the Hero's Journey? If so, which elements of the Hero's journey are most present? I don't think most follow the structure exactly, but I'm willing to bet that a decent amount of story based VNs follow the structure loosely. Particularly Chuunige. 
I would argue in a very roundabout way Suba Hibi follows the general structure. There is a call to adventure (going down the rabbit hole). Delving into the unknown. A road of trails
And the achievement of the freedom to live （幸福に生きよ！）

Hi, folks.
I used to be a bg artist for an anime outsource company, now I just want to do some freelance jobs 
I would like to draw bg on some VN's projects.
Here's my old stuff I did in for the company : https://www.flickr.com/gp/75976495@N06/0Zm21g
Correct me if I'm wrong, honestly I do not know where to post this. 
PRICING
Depend on the resolution, complex and detailed.

- Normal Backgrounds (1920x1080) : $60 - $80 usd
- Detailed Backgrounds (1920x1080) : $100 - $120 usd

This price is only for Visual novel background.

PAYMENT
I currently only accept Paypal payments. And please, you'll pay the Paypal fee.

My process is :
- Normally, you can give me some reference image like sketchs, real pictures, some info about the color style you want, the more details the shorter time 'til work done.
- When I finish , I'll send you a small sample for you check. If everything is ok, I'll send you full pic(png,jpg...) upon you payment for me.



CONDITION
I reserve the right to use it for my portfolio or post it on social media.

If you are interested my artwork, contact me through: 
- Email [email protected]. 
- Discord : Shiki#3061

Looking forward working with you guy.

Point and click adventure is not really VNs, but whatever. The question is interesting nonetheless and could be interesting for VN creators as well in case they want to make a heavily branching plot.
Sadly I'm not sure I can come up with a simple solution. The best thing I can think for getting an overview of something this complex would be a database. Think something like VNDB. You can enter a VN and in that VN you can get a list of characters. You can then enter a character and get a list of VNs where that character is mentioned. You should build up something similar with quests and characters. Perhaps add a third entity for items, allowing specific items to be used in multiple quests. Build the game, have notes for each quest and character and once quests are well defined, you will have the ability to look up a quest and see all the interesting points in that quest, possibly with notes about order. You can also look up a character and get a list of quests that characters should take part in, which is the first step in planning a dialogue tree.
Another interesting point is that you should plan dialogue trees rather than dialogues. It seems you have different text depending on event flags. You should know the branching layout, possibly make notes about what topics to touch in each branch and then the last step is to fill out the details of each branch.
The most important issue with designing is to only try to accomplish one thing at a time. Do not try to design quest, dialogue tree and dialogue in the same step because you will end up focusing on one of those and sacrifice the other two and you will end up with two or three of those three parts being messed up.
I can't really answer the question of which software to use. I wrote that it is supposed to do, but I can't think of anything, which delivers such a functionality and telling you to code something from scratch is likely not a useful approach either.

Wow, thank you for such a well thought, insightful comment. I really appreciate that the new trailer had such a good effect on your opinion. I hope you will enjoy future info, trailers, the demo and of course the final game as well!

The sad truth is, where porn or fanservice aren't involved, those games aren't popular either. VNs are mostly about reading and no one really reads nowadays, especially gamers; the reading rates have been constantly dropping across the world. When you compare the sales numbers of popular games like Nekopara and story-driven, plot-heavy all-ages titles you will see they barely sell at all; no matter how good they are and how well praised they get by critics, Steam curators and gaming websites, they won't ever be able to fight with those. It's another reason why we get so little of them and what gets translated nowadays are typically light charage and moege instead.
VNs are destined to remain a niche and interesting vns will always be a niche within a niche. It's because the population those games were once directed at is actually declining and new generation that's ought to replace it remains completely different.

That's funny, the old look is exactly why I do want to read it.

That's funny, the old look is exactly why I do want to read it.

I can only think about this 2 games right now: (with a mother as main heroine with normal tits and yet not a pure nukige)
 
https://vndb.org/v4824
https://vndb.org/v7653
 
if you have issues "buying"  them let me know 

This topic is so depressing, lol.