Zalor

Gaming, anime, history, linguistics, and, of course, linguistic history. I love competitive gaming, like "Startcraft" and CoD, as well as RPGs like "Earthbound" and "Persona". My favourite historical topics are early 20th century Europe and the history of the English language.

I've noticed that over the past couple of weeks there have been more threads created that either advertise new western made VNs, or threads that are scouting for people to participate in making a VN. In the past I've noticed that threads like these were not as common, however recently they've gotten far more in number. (Which is great!) But a big problem I see is that most of the time these threads get quickly forgotten. I found a number of these threads (which I will link to later) and only one of them is on the first page of threads in the Visual Novel Talk forum. This is bad. Fuwa's goal is to make Visual Novels more popular in the west, and garnishing the support for new western developed VNs is a must. While a fair amount of us (including myself) discovered VNs because we were already interested in other Japanese related things (anime and Japanese video games) I also know a lot of people in this community had Katawa Shoujo to thank as their first VN. Katawa Shoujo, a western produced VN. People can complain that most western VNs are inferior to Japanese ones, but the best way to popularize VNs in the west is through western VNs. Unlike most visual novels, several semi-popular Youtube channels gave Katawa Shoujo exposure in someway or another. The reason Katawa Shoujo was getting this exposure by westerners was because it is western. Now I am fully aware that most western VNs don't compare to Katawa Shoujo, but my point is that western VNs provide western exposure to the medium that is often too difficult for a Japanese VN to accomplish (no matter how good it is). 
 
One of the main problems with forcing those who want to provide exposure for a VN project to post their thread on Visual Novel Talk is that often the VN they are promoting is still being developed, and there may not even be a demo released. Meaning they start the thread not with the intention to discuss the VN, but to promote it. This contradicts the reason most people go on Visual Novel Talk (to talk about the music, story, characters, and art of VNs they have already read). Thus the topics that promote a VN quickly sink into obscurity. In fact in my archiving of relatively recent threads that promote VNs there were a few interesting ones I missed entirely simply because I was away from my computer for a few days on a short vacation. It saddens me the most when one of the threads I read (https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5359-sunrider-part-1-was-just-publically-released/) was started by a guy who works on the development team of the VN he was promoting and how that topic lasted for only 8 days. The person saw Fuwa as a potential source for receiving exposure for his VN and we as a community (including myself although I did play the demo) disappointed him. Fuwanovel should be a place where VN developers can advertise their VNs without their threads being forgotten in mere days. Also, to further illustrate why Visual Novel Talk is not a good forum for those who want to promote VNs, the discussion of the VN the guy was promoting turned into a critique of the VNs writing. The guy wasn't even a writer for the VN! But can you blame people for critiquing a VN when that's the reason that people go to Visual Novel Talk? No you can't. The problem was that the OP simply wanted to promote the VN, not discuss it. There was a conflict of interests. Those reading the thread wanted to talk about the VN, meanwhile the creator of the thread just wanted to promote his VN.  A VN Development Promotion forum would be the ideal place for these posts. For one, the purpose of visiting such a forum would be to see what new VNs are being developed. Two, since these topics aren't as common as most Visual Novel Talk topics, they would be able to last longer on the first page results (which would lead to more exposure).     
 
Here are links to the threads I found promoting VNs within the first three pages of history on VN Discussion: 
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5359-sunrider-part-1-was-just-publically-released/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5580-maze-the-visual-novel-development/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/4039-kendo-crush-kickstarter/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/4543-the-lucid9-project-a-new-amateur-vn-project/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5214-fault-milestone-one-kickstarter/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5511-helping-a-friend-ehem-with-his-vn-endeavors/
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/2957-violet-hill-community-based-visual-novel-project/
 
(this last link links to the one topic that actually managed to stay on the front page and has 6 pages of replies, however most topics promoting a VN aren't this lucky). 

Welcome! I can tell from your list that you've got a fair amount of VNs under your belt already. If you liked Clannad I would recommend Kanon (KEY's first VN and my personal favorite from KEY). And if you like stories with darker themes I highly recommend Swan Song. 

I love anime, in fact for me anime is my main hobby. (I read VNs when I'm not watching anime. ) I don't really like following new stuff but I love watching older stuff, especially anime from the 90's.
 
Aside form the Otaku stuff I love anthropology and political theory. I've spent hours arguing with my friends about Marxism. One of them happens to be a Libertarian who loves capitalism and we always get in debates. However we're still good friends regardless of our opposing views (If you couldn't tell I usually argue pro-Marx, but sometimes I criticize him depending on the nature of the discussion). I also often use anthropology to buttress my arguments.
 
 
 
I did Tae Kwon Do for quite a while (6 years). However my academics got really rigorous and in order to keep up with school I had to quit. ;(   

Like Ceris mentioned you can press PrintScreen on your keyboard, then open Paint (or any other image editing software) and press CTRL + V.
 
Have fun! 

I used to do Brazilian jiu-jitsu, but not as of recently. As a result of that, I exercise regularly, because that's always a good thing.
 
Also video games and anime and stuff. -_-

My hobby is anime.
I love it ! because it contains animation XD

please tell me fuwanovel is joking
 
https://forums.fuwanovel.net/index.php?/topic/5681-tell-me-japan-is-joking/
 
is this another loli thread? 

Delete all these except Swan Song! Swan Song is probably one of the best English translated VNs there are. Clephas is just biased since he has a pet-peeve against multiple perspective story telling (which Swan Song does).

A few months ago, I figured that I knew enough about visual novels to post a Beginner's Guide to Visual Novels onto Talk Amongst Yourselves (Kotaku's user community) because I didn't really see a guide to the genre that was up to snuff. I've been working on it ever since, tweaking it to improve it and make it better, and now I'm currently working on a video version of it, which is in the process of editing. I figured, since i'm now on Fuwanovel and I think there would be a few people who would appreciate it, I'd go and post it here. I'm no pro to VN's in comparison to alot of people here and it's not perfect, so if you have any constructive criticism, please comment about it below. 

                                                                                                                                                                                             


What exactly is a Visual Novel? Why should I care, and why do you care about them? The Visual Novel Genre is a confusing genre, especially if you have no idea what it's about. I'm here to try to help. This is is my Beginner's Guide to one of my favorite genres in gaming, Visual Novels.
 
Before we actually get started, there is one thing I need to clarify; i'm talking about Visual Novels as a genre, not about dating sims. NOT ALL VISUAL NOVELS ARE DATING SIMS. Dating sims are a Sub-Genre of Visual novels, if that. A lot of them aren't even VN's. Get it? Ok, good. Let's move on.

What is a Visual Novel?

A visual novel is Genre of video games (Personally, I like to think of it as an interactive storytelling medium, as there isn't really much gameplay), that's similar to choose your own adventure books and adventure games. As the name implies, Visual novels are text heavy, but they usually have music, voice acting and stills of characters to help you get absorbed into the story. The biggest gameplay aspect of a Visual novel is choices; The player has to decide what the protagonist does in the form of options. The options can lead you to different story plotlines called routes, or they could just lead you to a bad end and you'll have to try again. Visual novels without choices are usually referred to as Sound Novels or Kinetic Novels.


Why should I care?

 
Visual novels are a very flexible genre, storytelling wise. Visual novels have very little restrictions, story wise, as they can go on and have a ton of exposition without making a book HUGE, they have the flexibility of multiple routes, they don't have to comply with arbitrary rules set by TV companies and using the genre to mess with you. The Fate Stay Night Visual novel is a good example of this, as it's 50+ hours, had 3 separate routes, and having Shirou as a narrator can skew your viewpoint. The flexibility leads to many visual novels to have amazing stories. Because of the excellent stories from this genre, many popular visual novels get anime adaptations. Some of the most well known adaptations are Clannad, Fate Stay Night, Steins;Gate, and Higurashi. Some of you may be asking, why would I play Visual Novels if I could watch the anime? There are many parts of the visual novels that do not get adapted, and sometimes the adaptation is kinda bad. Also, there are some great visual novels that have not been adapted, like Phoenix Wright, G-Senjou no Maou, 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, and Tsukihime that I'd recommend you check out.

What is it like to play a Visual Novel?

 
How exactly do Visual Novels play? It's like watching a really long anime, or reading a book that's kinda animated. It's easiest to describe as a mix between a book and an anime. On average, they are usually much longer than the anime counterparts, which give them time to flesh out the characters and the world. Usually, Visual Novels have branching routes, where stories have some similarities (known as a common route), but overall could be considered their own stories (ex: Heaven's feel in Fate/Stay Night). In any Visual Novel, usually you have to go on a path and stick with it. When you stray away from the route you are in, you'll probably run into what's known as a BAD END, where  something horrible or pointless happens. Also, i'll insert the OBLIGITORY EROGE WARNING here; Many Visual Novels are Eroges, meaning they have NSFW content. Many have censorship patches, or none of this content at all, but if type of content is not up your alley, be prepared.

 

How would I get my hands on a Visual Novel?
 
The fact that Visual Novels are not popular in the west means that most of them are kinda hard to get over here. Many companies do not translate and make english versions, so you are pretty much have to rely on fan translations. If you know that the game has an official US release, I'd go and support the publisher, but if it's not, the best place to find a visual novel is at Fuwanovel. It's important to note that many Visual Novels do not find their way outside of Japan, which can be depressing if you found game or series really like.

Terms used in Visual Novel talk:
 
Visual novel - This is an umbrella term used in the west to designate a type of game which is particularly story-focused, or containing novel-like narration in its writing. In Japan, such games are generally referred to as "love adventure games" (恋愛ADV/AVG), or novel game (ノベルゲーム noberu gēmu, in short: NVL).
 
Routes - The name that refers to a story line in visual novels. Non-linear branching story lines are a common trend in visual novels, and these branching story lines are routes.
 
Kinetic Novel - Kinetic novels are visual novels without choices, so all you do is read.
 
Sound Novel - Sound novels is a trademark from Chunsoft. The term is the original word referring to novel type games.However "Visual Novels" became prevalent due to other companies using it in order to avoid the company's trademark.
 
This term later was known because of Higurashi, which used it because the sound was more important than the actual visuals, so they called it sound novels. 07th Expansion's sound novels are essentially kinetic novels with a focus on sound to create an atmosphere.
 
Dating Sim - Technically, this term refers to simulation games focused on dating. However, this term is frequently used by English speakers to describe any romance-driven game, regardless of game mechanics used.
 
Chuuni - An umbrella term for games that have melodramatic characters, and they are typically focused on the protagonist.  
 
Nakige - A game that produces emotional catharisis (touching your heart, making you cry, etc), with a good ending. Think of games like Clannad.
 
Utsuge - games that are made with the intent of making you depressed, kinda like how nakige is to make you cry.
 
Moege - A VN where the focus is on Moe (not even going to try defining moe....)
 
Charage - Sub-genre of Moege where the focus is on character development 
 
Eroge - An eroge (エロゲー or エロゲ erogē); a portmanteau of erotic game: (エロチックゲーム erochikku gēmu)) or Ero-ga is a video game that features erotic content. AKA Hentai Game. This is a blanket term for any game that includes NSFW content.
 
Nukige - A sub-genre of Visual Novels which focus on the erotic content.
 
Harem - A trope characterized by a protagonist surrounded by three or more members of the opposing sex who are usually love interests. Harem usually refers to a male protagonist with female love interests, while stuff with females with male love interests are referred to as reverse harem. Occurs in manga and anime as well.
 
Bishōjo game - This term designates any game involving a male lead dating pretty anime girls. The word "bishōjo" literally means "pretty young girl". "Girl game" and "gal game" are also used to describe this sub-genre.  Not really used here in the west.
 
Otome game - This term designates any romantic game involving a female lead dating pretty anime boys.... so the exact opposite. Translated literally, Otome game means "maiden game". They are also referred to as a "reverse harem". 
 
Boy's Love game - This term designates any game involving a male lead dating pretty anime boys in a homosexual relationship. "BL game" and "Yaoi" are terms also used to describe these games. This sub-genre is primarily geared toward a female audience.
 
If I missed any terms please post a comment below and i'll update this post, or check out Fuwanovel's document of Lexicon​ that should have pretty much anything I missed.
 


Recommendations
A beginner's guide really wouldn't be that great of a guide without some recommendations, right? well, I have quite a bit of recommendations broken into sub-genres, so click on the ones you are interested in, or just watch them all. I'll be giving out one main recommendation per sub genre, with extra recommendations if you liked the main recommendations.
 
If there's anything you think that's missing, that's probably because I haven't played them yet, or I didn't care for them too much. If these aren't enough for you, check out Kaguya's list of 50 translated VNs you should read before you die.
 
Sci-Fi 
 
This is the same Sci-Fi you know and love, Science fiction; but the Japanese usage may skew more twords fiction than science.  This is my favorite sub-genre of Visual Novels, I haven't played one of these I disliked.
 
999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors (DS,iOS)
 

 
 
 
Why this rocks: This game has an amazing atmosphere, great writing, and it keeps you engaged with an interesting premise. This series has an atmosphere that is unmatched by any other game, and it's a must play.
 
If you like this one, play Ever 17, Remember 11, Never 7, Zero Escape Virtue's Last Reward (3DS, Vita), Steins;Gate, Chaos; Head


Romances
 
Romances are all about relationships, dating included. This includes the sub-genres of Nakige, Utsuge, Dating Sims and many others.
 
Clannad

 
 
Why this rocks: All of the feelz ;-;. It's pretty much like the anime, but there are a few routes that are in the game that go further or are totally missing from the anime. If you don't know anything about clannad, it's a great story with excellent characters, excellent writing, and is just amazing overall. This game really impacts you with a great message, great charecters, and it floods you with feelz.
  If you like this one, play Anything made by Key: Kanon, Rewrite, Little Busters, Planetarian, Katawa Shoujo, and the fantastic White Album 2 (no English translation yet, but it's going to be great when it comes out. Check out the anime).

 
Horror
 
Horror is… well horror! These are games made to make you afraid. Pretty self explanatory.
 
Higurashi - When They Cry
 

 
 
 
Why This Rocks: It's a horror mystery. it has some of the most interesting scenes in any series ever, and is unlike anything you'll ever see. Personally, I haven't played the game so I can't speak personally about it, but I did love the anime.
 
If you like this one, play Umineko, Corpse Party (PSP), Saya no Uta (on a totally different lvl of messed up tho....), Kara no Shoujo

Mystery
 
G-Senjou no Maou

 
Why this rocks: I like to call this the Death Note of Visual Novels. If you want to learn more about this, check out my review Here.
 
If you like this one, play Sharin no Kuni, Any Akabeisoft2 game, Higurashi, Hotel Dusk, Last Window
Action
 
Fate/ Stay Night
 

 
 
Why this rocks: This, along with Clannad are pretty much flagships of Visual Novels. Fate Stay Night has a very well written plot If you want to learn more about this, check out my review here.
If you like this one, play Tsukihime, Fate/hollow Ataraxia, everything Type-Moon... and Muv-Luv.

 
Phoenix Wright
 

 
 
 
 Why this rocks: Some people may debate that these are actually visual novels, but personally, I think they are. If you've made it this far without knowing what Phoenix Wright is, i'm disappointed in you. You play as the defense attorney Phoenix Wright, and it's quite fun.
 
If you like this one, play the rest of the Ace Attorney series, It's spiritual Successor, Ghost Trick (DS, iOS), Danganronpa, Hotel Dusk
 
Weird Visual Novels
Visual Novels usually come from Japan. You kinda have to expect stuff like this. I've never played a lot of these, but from what I've read about them, I'm very curious.
 
Go! Go! Nippon! My First Trip to Japan- This one's about an okaku going to Japan. It has an interesting concept, but it's really not worth your money…. can finish in one sitting.

Hatoful Boyfriend - YOU ARE TRYING TO DATE PIGEONS. AND GUESS WHAT? IT'S COMING TO THE STATES.


Osananajimi wa Daitouryou: My Girlfriend is the President - This one is self explanatory. I'm very curious.
School Days - A game that defies expectations with the most assholish protagonist ever.

Edit: Thanks to our friend Richard Eisenbeis, I'd seen some pretty weird VN's as of late. Interested in dating Sushi or slabs of meat? Well, NOW YOU CAN!

That's about it for the basics of Visual Novels. If you see anything missing, post it in the comments and I'll update this post.

First of all, there is a (?) on the title because I have no fucking idea of what to call this, I used that name but it doesn't actually suit the project at all.
 
When recommended a novel, people usually look for it's synopsis, screenshots and maybe some reviews, that's where some problems arise. Reviews at best 8/10 contain spoilers usually without warning and in the middle of the text, some might not mind but there are those who don't enjoy being heavily spoiled. This project seeks something different, it's not a review, I'd say it's closer to being an analysis of the general game, I honestly don't know how to exactly put it into words. The basic idea is to get a VN and give an unbiased "analysis" of it, not saying if it's good or not, leaving that for the reader to decide if it'll be worth a shot.
 
I'll leave here the one I did as an example, I guess it'll be easier to understand the objective of this after reading it. Keep in mind that the images might get out of place since it'll be in a spoiler to avoid using too much space.
 


      Voice Acting
  The voice acting was professional and the cast matched well the personalities of each character.       H-Scenes
  Grisaia's H-Scenes have a good quality and can to some extent be considered relevant to the plot and/or as an extension of the relationship. Some of them insert comic dialogues and sometimes they might be a little too lengthy       Art
 
      OST
  I’ll leave here two of them to demonstrate:   For dramatic scenes – Want to Smile…   For retarded scenes – Colorful Seeds       Game system
  The game system is pretty good and is open to customization in possibly every needed part. The saves are limited but there is a reasonable amount of slots so it’s hard to believe they won't be enough, either way once you finish the first route you’ll gain access to the Scene Gallery so you can overwrite older files if needed. Since the game is really long it's interesting to mention that the game offers a scene skip/skip to next choice option.
 
The analysis would be all in the same thread since having one for each would be unnecessary. I'd appreciate everyone's thoughts about this, things like ways you believe it could be improved or reasons why you disapprove of it.

As Rooke is my witness, there are forums changes coming this/next week. Most of these changes are already set in stone. There will be new forums/subforums. As I explained in the 2nd chat with Ren on his podcast -- these organizational changes are necessary for me to clean house and get us moving. I won't be asking for referendum on the changes, though suggestions after we see how it works will of course be taken seriously.
 
 
Zalor -- some of what you're talking about will be built into the new system. Never fear.
 
Let's talk about forums changes after they're all rolled out next week.

The best choice to allow necroing could be divided into three categories.
One and most importantly - If it is actual news. For example, a new anime was announced. Few days later, more information was released. Within those periods no one posted on the thread so obviously this would be subjectively marked as important. Obviously, post links to your sources.

Second and Third categories would be similar to the thread being pushed back or ignored/not noticed by others. One option is if the thread gets pushed back to the second page then the person can kick it back up. Or/and the person must wait a period of 2 or 3 days if they want to bump the thread back up to the first page.

Fuwanovel promotes the growth of VNs in the Western market. Working with OELVNs is yet another way of doing it. This is just a way to group them together for better visibility, while removing them from the main VN forum for those who think they clutter that forum up (or just dont care about OELVNs)

Its fine the way it is. 

For those of you who haven't had the chance to check out the podcast episodes as of late, take a look at the new series Tay and I have been working on recently in an effort to improve the community and listen to you, the people of Fuwanovel. The 2 episodes posted below are the beginning of the series - a preview into what we hope will be the format for many future episodes going forward. Being very similar to an "ask me anything" thread, Tay will do his very best to answer the many questions the community has in an effort to connect with the many members here on the site.
 
Fuwanovel is on the verge of change, and this is in my opinion a great leap forward, so feel free to tune in by clicking any of the links below, and we hope this helps answer many people's questions.
 
Man Behind the Curtain - Episode 2: Fuwanovel Unification and Concerns
 
And here is the 1st episode in case you happened to miss it:
 
Man Behind the Curtain - Episode 1: Fuwanovel Towards the Future
 
Thanks for listening!
 

I think it's pretty much obvious that a story is what makes or breaks a visual novel. Pretty graphics, or your favorite seiyuu can only get you so far. Without a good compelling story with interesting plot and characters it's probably safe to say you're not going to keep reading it to the end. At least not all the routes.
 
So it all falls on the writers to keep the reader interested in their VNs. Unfortunately the writing craft is easy to understand but hard to master and combine that with the fact that each reader has their own individual tastes in the kind of stories they like to read, the pressure on the write gets quite heavy.
 
Share what are some writers that you dislike, hate, have a certain pet peeve with or just plain don't like his or her stories. This is not a place to cuss and hate a particular writer so please keep the discussion fair and intelligent. No flame/hate wars.
 
Also, please avoid spoilers.
 
Looseboy
Credited - A Profile, Sharin no Kuni, G-Senjou no Maou
 
Authored some of the most adored visual novels by western fans in history. You'll probably die before you finish counting on how many top 10 lists G-Senojou climbs to No.1. Both SnK and G-Senjou quickly became the must visual novels to read for any vn fan. There is no counting how much these two are praised.
 
But this is where my problem with Looseboy comes into surface. It's kind of hard to explain but basically I can't stand his style. Every scene overstays its welcome, every dialogue feels like he's trying to buy time to make the story longer. It takes too long to get to the point. I know, visual novels are long, and they take a long time to set things up, I'm not a newbie to visual novels but Looseboy just rubs me the wrong way.
 
It's too bad really because he can write some great characters and G-Senjoy has an awesome cast. It's just that he is in desperate need of an editor. I could not finish SnK and G-Senjou and I played them almost to the end, but I could not finish them. Maybe some day I'll give them another chance but I never want to reading anything else by this guy.
 
 
Hiroyuki Kanno
Credited - Desire, Eve: Burst Error, Yu-No, Exodus Guilty
 
The late Kanno is one of the most beloved and respected visual novel writers in Japan to date. Each of his stories has some kind interesting and unique approach to storytelling, philosophy and religious overtones. At a time where most visual novels where nothing more than a fapping material Kanno wrote VNs that have a strong focus on a story.
 
The thing is that coming up with great ideas and actually writing a good story with those ideas are entirely different things. Writing craft is not easy to master no matter how creative you are. That is the main problem with Kanno, awesome ideas plagued by problems.
 
Desire's main selling point was that it had two protagonists that you can choose and play the story for that character's perspective. After finishing that you can choose the other character and play the story from his perspective. But Desire never uses this idea to the best of it's abilities, it never really takes advantage of it. So you end up with two stories that cross very little with each other that they might as well have been different stories entirely. What's more Desire wants to be a sci-fi story but since it had to also be hentai we end up with an unlikeable protagonist who throughout the story gets to sleep with every woman he meets. There is basically no sci-fi story here, its' just you wandering about and having fun times. Once in a while the story will stop to give some characters some depth or to make the story more interesting but in the end it's just a waste of time. There are a few surprises if you finish both stories but I'll leave that to those who are interested in playing this vn.
 
Eve: Burst Error quickly became one of C's Ware's best selling visual novels of all time. Its main selling point is that you play the story from two perspectives but unlike Desire where you just choose and side and read the story from that character's perspective, this time to finish the game you have to change between the two characters all the time. So you're seeing the story from two perspectives at the same time. You gotta admit this is an awesome idea! Kanno has a very carefully plotted mystery story here and this time both characters influence each others progress. This creates an interesting dynamic and give a great chance to tell a thrilling story. To some extend it is a good story but just like Desire it's plagued with the usual abrupt dialogue scenes that sometimes don't connect from one scene to another. The other problem and it's not really the writers fault is the horrible game design. You are expected to make the same choices over and over without any kind of hint of what you are supposed to do next or if what you're doing has any kind of result on advancing in the game.
 
Unfortunately Eve: Burst Error was such a hit that in desperate attempt to stay afloat C's Ware started churning more and more sequels for the Sega Saturn and the PSX and none of them were any good (according to what I hear.) Eve: Burst Error was also remade a few times including with fresh new graphical style and probably new script. There was the pc and ps2 remake (with pc having h-scenes) and another remake with another change in the graphical style for the PSP. Interesting fact, the last game in the series (not remake) was written by none other than Kotarou Uchikoshi, the man behind the Zero Escape series and the scenario writer on the infinity series. I also need to mention that due to some technical problems I was never able to finish Eve: Burst Error so this is not a review of the game.
 
Exodus Guilty had another great idea. This time you are playing three characters through three different ages spanning a 1000 years of history between the ages. There are three chapters, past, present and future. One of the themes of this game is history and religion, how things change with times and how some things don't. It's a fascinating idea for a storytelling. One example is in the past chapter there is a puzzle you need to solve but if you go into the present and visit the same place and since the puzzle has been already solved a 1000 years ago you see the solution, then you go back to the past and solve the puzzle. How awesome is that? Well it happens maybe once through the story. And the story is nothing interesting either. Again Kanno just doesn't know what to do with his ideas and how to write interesting scenarios. The past chapter starts very interestingly with a story about a man rebelling against the gods but quickly turns into a typical jrpg story and a really cliche one at that, complete with the 4 elements and making friends on the way to adventure. The present chapter is just plain not interesting about some young guy who is a treasure hunter and he has the swag so certain women love him and others just want him. The future chapter... that's it I stopped playing this game at this point, it's basically a post apocalyptic wasteland and I had better things to do than keep reading this.
 
In conclusion, Kanno deserves all the greatest respects and respect he gets and maybe I'm just not the person for whom his stories are written for. It's not doubt that he influenced quite a few well known Japanes visual novels. The Multi-Sight Adventure system was used in one of the most popular visual novels in Japan Machi which has influenced in some way Remember11 (if you go by some people who say this is what the main man behind the Infinity series says) although Remember11 uses the Desire's technique than E:BE's system.
 
So share what's your pet peeves with some writers, or which ones you just can't stand.

As usual Clannad is getting more love than Kanon. Well I'm here to vote for Kanon, which was the first (and possibly the only) anime that actually got me to physically tear up. What's more Kanon got me to cry twice.  Major spoilers for Kanon up ahead:
 

I did a tally of the most recent 50 or so threads, and:


Interpretation: In the last week (=first two pages of threads), there have only been 7-9 s seperate VNs for where there has been discussion about the content of the game. I'm sure the fuwanovel community is playing many many more games then that.
 
Many VN's have few enough players so that people are playing them months apart. Heck, VN's in general take long enough that you can finish weeks apart even if you start around the same time. Basically, if what you are playing isn't translated and at least somewhat popular, you're pretty out of luck. There are too few people at one time to support a specific VN thread.
Here's what I'm proposing:
 
Everyone put down a list of the VN's they are open to discussing. It could be most of the VN's you've played recently, or just a few. Then when you or someone else finishes a VN and are looking for someone else to talk about it with , you can search the VN title in this thread and try PM'ing that person.
 
You can edit and keep your list updated as you read more VN's, or if you don't want to get PM's anymore.
 
To start off, here's my list.
Midori no Umi
Aiyoku no Eustia
Houkago no Futekikakusha
Gin'iro
 
 
 

Everyone wants to own a word, because owning it gives them power. Racism is a powerful word because it gives people the power of a victim no matter who uses it. Notice no matter who uses the word, the other side will always try to take it away from them.

HEY ZALOR HOW ABOUT "THAT SCENE". VALFLAME.


 

As usual Clannad is getting more love than Kanon. Well I'm here to vote for Kanon, which was the first (and possibly the only) anime that actually got me to physically tear up. What's more Kanon got me to cry twice.  Major spoilers for Kanon up ahead:
 

Actually just to be a bit of a technical asshole knights do still exist. Anyone with "Sir" in front of their name has been knighted. From my understanding knighthoods are no longer hereditary, but if you are an English citizen and you accomplish something great you can receive a knighthood. For example Paul McCartney got knighted and his proper name ever since was Sir James Paul McCartney. Sorry I'm just obsessed with hierarchical structures and had to say this.
 
On to the actual topic: I have had some really awful conversations with some radical feminists in my school and I learned two things from those conversations. 1) To avoid the topic as much as possible, and 2) Their crazy. Almost everything is seemingly sexist. -.-
My actual views on Chivalry is that I think its good. I generally act courteously and I think people appreciate it sometimes. In fact since most people don't give a shit, it actually helps me stand out a tad bit.  
 
Also, 
Please explain.

Actually just to be a bit of a technical asshole knights do still exist. Anyone with "Sir" in front of their name has been knighted. From my understanding knighthoods are no longer hereditary, but if you are an English citizen and you accomplish something great you can receive a knighthood. For example Paul McCartney got knighted and his proper name ever since was Sir James Paul McCartney. Sorry I'm just obsessed with hierarchical structures and had to say this.
 
On to the actual topic: I have had some really awful conversations with some radical feminists in my school and I learned two things from those conversations. 1) To avoid the topic as much as possible, and 2) Their crazy. Almost everything is seemingly sexist. -.-
My actual views on Chivalry is that I think its good. I generally act courteously and I think people appreciate it sometimes. In fact since most people don't give a shit, it actually helps me stand out a tad bit.  
 
Also, 
Please explain.