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Started reading Little Busters last week; finally finished a route today (Komari). So far, the game is a fair bit under my expectations, unfortunately. The common route was quite long and boring—pure slice of life, essentially. I was expecting something similar to Rewrite where they toss in some mysterious developments or otherwise once in a while to spice things up, but that was pretty much absent in LB.

Spoiler

Unless, maybe, you count Riki's narcolepsy. I don't know if that even has any significance to the plot later on, though, and it's mostly just lightly touched on during the common route, so it's not enough.

Komari is likely my least favorite character out of the cast so far, so I wasn't expecting her route to be exceptional, and that it was not. Still, I feel like Komari's character actually had little to do with why I didn't enjoy it that much. The storytelling and drama simply weren't handled that well, IMO. First, I don't like how the slice of life abruptly ends once you enter her route, and the way you only see one or two scenes before advancing to the next day. Didn't think I'd ever say this for a VN, but it feels rushed.

Additionally, I kept thinking there was some deeper meaning behind everything. For example, Komari's saying "I wish your eyes could see better" apparently really did mean that she just wished him to be able to find fun/happy things/places? That's lame. Then the drama happened, and again, it felt rushed. All that Riki did was let her rest for a few days, and when that failed, he drew a picture book in 1 day which instantly solved everything... It just didn't seem genuine to me. With how deep her emotional scars seemed, it's weird that Riki was able to get through to her that easily and that she (as far as the story reveals, anyway) didn't have any more relapses after that.

While I never expected to like Komari, I had high hopes for a lot of the other characters. So far, though, they don't seem THAT great... Futaki apparently doesn't even have a route in the normal version of the game, which is a big disappointment. (PE translation isn't released yet? I reckon I'll have to read the Japanese version later, then.) Saigusa is... okay, but she also annoys me quite a bit, which I didn't expect. I do like her mischievous nature, though. Kurugaya and Rin exceeded my expectations slightly, and I really like the latter's mix of being an antisocial and blunt tomboy. Nishizono is about how I expected her to be, and has potential for best girl. Not sure what to think of Kud yet, besides that she is cute.

The music is good, there are several tracks that I really like already. But all of them are action/cheery tracks, and I don't find most of the melancholic ones to be that good. Hopefully the remaining ones I haven't heard yet are better. Also, it actually feels like there are too many tracks... or rather, the game just throws them at you too quickly. I wish they'd instead introduce them more gradually, and reserve some for specific scenes.

Anyway, now to try to get onto Rin's route...

 

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Finished Finished Root Letter, so finally you guys'll be free from my spammings :meguface:

The Princess of Himegamori Forest ending was quite eerie. Moreso than Cursed Letter I'd say, because goddamit Aya. And A Government Plot end was really just ehhh and ends with a meh downer.

What Root Letter does well with these 5 routes/ends though is that they all have quite the unique spin on the same general timeline of events whether it be everything was caused by the supernatural like in Cursed Letter / Princess of Himegamori Forest, or caused by a cover up conspiracy like Government Plot, or just a plain ol' heartwarming reunion between two pen pals like Bond of Marriage

The unfortunate thing though is that all of these routes/ends are basically just 30 minutes of content because the earlier 5 hours of 'common' route is focused on tracking down all of Aya's high school friends and the detective/confrontational gameplay segments... A real shame, because some of the revelations in these routes have quite some oomph and wow power to them, but they never get to leave a meaningful impact on the reader since the story kind of just ends shortly after.


~~
Visuals/aesthetics: 9/10. They made quiet the effort on assets for this VN. Easily over 100 background CGs since theres like 20+ locations each with 3+ sublocations; every character even the nameless passerby ones will have sprites and be voiced, and I like the cutout photograph style. Character Artstyle itself was kind of ehh to me at first but it grew on me.

Music: 6/10. Nothing special. And dammit that title theme is present 99% of the time when you're exploring the city map so it gets stale REALLY quickly. I do like the character confrontation/investigation BGMs though.

Story:

  • Common route: 5/10. Subpar. 5 hours of pure-business-no-fluff as Takayuki monologues to himself where he's going, who he's going to talk to etc etc in his pursuit of Aya, and it's basically you having to prove what you already know to stubborn characters.
  • Routes: 7/10. They all have some interesting moments/revelations/events going on, but are waaay too short. Crossing Paths is a slap to the face, Bond of Marriage is the best everything-works-out-happily-ever-after (and what I'll consider the canon ending plx), Cursed Letter is a wtfmux supernatural horror, Princess of Himegamori Forest is another decent horror, Government Plot is meh conspiracy.

 

Overall 7/10. A short, decent story with some passable character detective/confrontational gameplay about some 32year old prick trying to find his long lost high school penpal from 15 years ago which will branch off into some pretty wild but short deviations as to the root of the mystery. Pick it up when it's on sale or something.

PSNQdcY.jpg (960×544)

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Common Route (Chapter One) Impressions:

Spoiler

Since my last post I continued with the prologue for a short while longer. It was at this point that the game threw me for a hell of a loop. I read about someone speculating that the main writer couldn't decide if he wanted to make a traditional Da Capo story or a story about magicians set in London, and I'm inclined to believe this is true. Regardless, this change in setting come chapter one has its virtues.

In the prologue, every girl is in love with you. During chapter one, that is not so. Only the girl you choose to pursue develops feelings for you. This is really good -- congratulations on that. This also lets me pardon their choices in the prologue. Right now, I am imagining each of the girls in present time has a different memory of their time in London, a memory where they ended up with Kiyotaka, which is why they hold feelings for him so easily. Amakase's multiple parallel worlds theory would indicate the possibility. Ricca, the only one who retained semi-clear memories, most apparently shows her feelings. This could also not be the case -- maybe there's only one true timeline (likely where he ended up with Ricca, due to her memories of it) and Kiyotaka's small acts of kindness built him a harem.

Although I am praising chapter one, I will admit that when the setting change occurred, I was fairly ticked off. It felt like I wasted my time with the Prologue for no discernable reason -- after all, all the relationships with the characters reset! Turns out that was exactly what I wanted, though, so I am happy with the choice. That leaves us questioning the purpose of the Prologue in the first place, but I'll be patient and wait until I finish the VN before I get on its case.

There were a couple of missions that required interaction. Truth be told, they were simple, linear affairs, but they created a illusion of free choice and freedom that allowed for greater immersion. I loved that they did that. Reminds me of older Rance games where I had the option of 'search'ing mundane object or people, 'talk'ing with them, 'look'ing at them or moving around. Great for messing around.

Kiyotaka himself brought a few mysteries. He possessed a greater than usual magical ability, which was exciting to see. I kept waiting for a moment where he might make use of it -- and whilst said moment did come, his magical ability remains a secret from others -- I'm hoping her might reveal his powers during a route. He also appears to have a mission, in all likelihood to attempt to find a way to dispel a curse from Himeno or his family.

The Free Time for this chapter had a wider range of selection than the prologue, and I think one can go as far as using up their three slots just meeting random, non-romanceable people. Remind me to do that in one of my runs. Once again, giving us choice is nice, though it can also leave one a bit lost.

The 'student council elections' is a plotpoint I always like. Anything related to the student council, really. Liked it in Koichoco, liked it in Katawa Shoujo, liked it in Ikikoi, and liked it in Fortune Arterial. Enlisting Suginami's help, somebody who goes to every length to appear less reasonable than he is, made for some funny scenes. I really like how he's in every Da Capo, does not have a surname, and does not have an explanation behind his many mysteries.

Speaking of characters, a couple new ones showed up. Ian, a mage from a noble family -- complete narcissist, you know the archetype -- coupled with Rurika, a maid who does not seem to respect him much and makes fun of him at every possible opportunity. Truth be told, her true goal seems to be to witness interesting and fun developments, as opposed to educating or helping her master.

Tomoe is a character I find compelling. She's is lazier than she would have others think and I'm fairly sure she'll resort to violence to get things her way. She's an archetype, but precisely because she is an archetype, we can tell how her personality is from the few short interactions with her

Holmes and Watson also showed up, because why the hell would they not be present in London? Whilst I have little interest in Edward Watson, rumbustious little Mary Holmes is an engaging character. One of the main things I'm trying to understand is whether or not she really is as smart as she claims. Everything indicates she is, but she's had few chances to shine.

We also met Shiki in the flesh -- oops, maybe she doesn't have flesh? -- and she makes it a point to insult her master at any time that is convenient. They actually built an captivating dynamic between these two, because as hostile as she appears, Shiki seems to care for Edogawa more than a simple glance would have you believe.

And so, the 'deduction segment' between Holmes and Watson and Edogawa and Shiki was truly riveting to watch. It seems both Holmes and Edogawa may be smart, but in slightly different ways. Edogawa completely lacks knowledge; a necessary component to make deductions. Thankfully, Shiki is more cultured than Edogawa, enabling him to make the necessary deductions where information is available. Holmes, on the other hand, and rather faithfully to what little I've read of the original stories, easily goes off on a wild theories and needs to be grounded by Watson. When they both present their conclusions, Edogawa's makes sense, but is limited, whilst Holmes' is more daring and far-fetched. One of my favourite scenes thus far.

Sakura showed up. The character introduction on Sakura by MangaGamer spoiled me a bit on what she's doing here, but oh, well. I'm sure that, in typical Da Capo fashion, they'll still find a way to pull out of their behinds some insane nonsense to reveal during the 'true' route.

If I had any complaints it would be how little magic there actually is. No flashy stuff, you know? When magic does appear it does little more than compensate for the technological gap between eras.
 

I've also just started Sara's route and, uh, this is sweet. Like, goodness. <33333

Proper respect to the game for having all the development up to the confession occur during the common route. The route therefore starts with them already in a relationship, sort of.
This is, without a doubt, my preferred way to have a title of this kind structured.

 

Now then, I think this route may decide everything. Da Capo II had a common route I liked more, and also included some solid (and some malleable) routes. I want to see if Da Capo III surpasses it.

Edit: Forgot to add that I have teeny weeny problem with the art. They decided to draw lips on the female characters, something I just don't like.

 

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So, Fata Morgana, again. I finished the fifth and started the sixth chapter and... it's great. I don't really read as many VNs as a lot of people on the forum, so it probably doesn't mean much, but I think it's the best VN I read... in a year, at least. There still are some minor problems that bug me, and maybe I'll properly write about them after I finish the game. But those problems are minor enough, so, I don't know, there still is a possibility that I decide to give it a 10/10 in the end.

A bit of story spoilers.

Spoiler

I must say, I liked the version of Michel in the fifth chapter much more than the version of him in the fourth chapter. Originally he seemed just an empty shell for progressing the story, but now he became a character I actually care for. Giselle is also an interesting character, though, I must say, her worldview is a bit too modern for a person born almost a thousand years ago. Overall, I have pretty little to comment the story of this chapter. It develops the characters and the relationship between them well, and the level of foreshadowing about Michel's... intimate problems and possible connections to the White-Haired Girl make the read engaging. The chapter is great, and relatable enough. I even teared up a little in the end, though those things are pretty rare for me.:vinty: In the end, i guess, the knight who killed Michel was his brother? And he was the person who sent the paintings? At least, it seems so from Michel's reaction. Well, I'm pretty sure this is going to be answered soon enough.

The sixth chapter started excellently. I feel like it might become my favorite chapter in the whole story, if the future chapter won't be even better. So, we a going for Higurashi-style answer arcs, huh? And the witch got more or less properly introduced, and we finally learn some of her motivations. I must say, I didn't expect revenge to be her motive. I don't know, maybe it's a good idea to return to earlier chapters right now and try to look for tiny hints in them, though i doubt I'll be able to do that at this point.

And, finally, the last scene I got to. The White-Haired Girl got to the mansion for the first time, and we finally learn her name. At this point, I wasn't really surprised, since it was exactly the name I expected. I'm still not sure how to interpret it though. All the hints seem to imply that she is the same person as Michel. On the other hand, it doesn't explain why her character is so different from his, and why the painting said that the tragedies in chapters 1-3 are not his, so I try to stay open-minded at this point.

That's all I guess.

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@Mr Poltroon Maybe they actually want to make London but decided to do Hatsunejima first as the demo because the business strategy. You know, for attracting Da Capo older fan which surely expect another Hatsunejima as the setting instead of London. Just my speculation here though, so it might be wrong. Oh, and I think if I may strictly speaking the first side story would be what I called true prologue for London arc, because it was quite long and more importantly telling us the story of how they knew each other. It also reveal some interesting thing like

Spoiler

actually there's one people who knew that Kiyotaka was Category 4 mage. Namely the person was Ricca Greenwood. Yes, Ricca knew that Kiyotaka powerful mage. But it's still secret to most of the casts though.

So I would suggest that you better read first side story whether you had the chance. Just saying.

PS - I finished Suzuno route and therefore I finished my Flyable Heart playthrough (Duh). I'll comment about Suzuno route later here.

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Guys, guys, you know all that shilling that bats and others did for Fata Morgana that annoyed the shit out of all casuals, mainstreamers, hipsters, and elitists alike?

Well, I just finished the First Door of Fata Morgana and now it's my turn to shill I mean comment on what I think of it so far :Chocola:

~~
Alright, so Fata Morgana's premise seems to be you are this nameless amnesiac prick who wakes up in some place Rose Manor or whatever and this creepy ass maid is all "Welcome back Master! Wait, you lost your memory? Well shit, let's go time travel into various events of the past and you'll surely remember who you are and everything about this manor and its history"

And so I'm guessing the narrative will be an episodic flow with each Chapter / Door focusing on a specific time and the horrific events that occurred at the manor, and so we start off with the First Door of 1604 

And it starts off FKING SLOW. Goddammit who the fk are these sibling brats Mell and Nellie; Oh gawd, Nellie's this stereotypical spoiled little girl who loves her brother waaay too much in that kind of way -.-;;; The duo hail from the high nobility Rhodes family and spend their childhood years innocently playing princess and prince and reaffirming their devotion to each other.

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And I'll still be the same age when I quit this VN right now, because goddamn this girl.

Cue the timeskip and now the duo's in their teenage years, Mell is a mellow 17 year old who is uncertain what to do with his life, and Nellie's 14 and still her clingy princess self much to her brother's dismay. There will be an apparent disjoint in the sibling relationship as Mell does indeed deeply love his sister Nellie, just not in that way, but he doesn't realize that her love towards him does swing that way and so he obliviously continues being her one and only prince. Wtf did I just say, idk.

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Hrrrmmmm, you know what? You're right. Dearest Nellie, I apologize for my reluctance. We shall return to my quarters immediately, and make lov- NOT


~~
I was snoring bubbles at this point, scoffing and wondering how anyone and everyone who called this VN a masterpiece was just high off of "Ermahgawd this shit is something new, something different, look at the weird art, listen to all the various vocals in the BGM, simply fantastic this VN is!!@#"

But then they introduce the White Haired Girl and that's when things really start picking up. It's really nothing special or groundbreaking or anything, but her introduction was simply the defining moment in which this VN was able to give me three hard slaps to finally hook line and sinker me.

It's probably the way the scene was set up- very atmospheric and mysterious- Mell is walking around the manor in the middle of the night due to plot related insomnia when he stumbles upon one of the maid's chambers and decides to peer inside:

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Ooooh, she's hawt- Oh wait i mean she doesn't see me- she doesn't see me- she doesn't see me she doesn't see m-

kMHdlZM.jpg (590×444)

OH SHIT...!!!!


Turns out the White Haired Girl is a new maid for the Rhodes household, and of course Mell would love-at-first-sight-this gal, which would naturally eventually lead to conflicts with his little princess Nellie. The conflict is written VERY WELL imo, with some pretty decent WTF-worthy moments as to the origins of the White Haired Girl and the motivations and actions of characters friend and foe alike. I was talking alot of smack about Nellie but in the end I really liked her character :devil:. Mell himself grows from an awkward, uncertain shy dude to quite the romantic, assertive stud too :vanilla:

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D'AWWWWWW DAT'S MY BOI MELL!@#

~~

So Fata Morgana's an 8/10 for me so far. Art is weird, but it's an okay weird. Music is appreciated. No voices, goddamit. Story started off slow, since it had to set up its characters and setting but once shit goes down it gets pretty interesting. I have high hopes that the other episodes and characters will be up to par quality and add to the overarching mystery and eventually end the whole thing with a big bang. 

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Wonder if any of you Fata readers, would agree that chapter

Spoiler

2

is definitelly the worst one. Most boring, with not so much emotions in it. Every other chapter is from 'freaking great' to 'ultra awesome', but that one... not so much.

 

11eyes. Rant incoming.
I really liked it. Cliched slice of life, but with great 'moments/scenes' of really creepy, horor-esque atmosphere (red night!), with really grounded depressed protagonist, who is not and 'edgy teen angster' at the same time.

Buuuut.
there is a 'comedy duo': unfunny perverted friend, and his childhood "friend", tsundere piece of shit.
I fucking hate "characters" like her. :< Why is she here. She ruins every single one scene she's in.

She's abusive with words and behaviour at every moment, but here is the newest little example:
She took games from her "friend" and brutally destroyed them, just because he took them to school [they were not even on school grounds], and then when he was crying at what he is going to do now, those wasn't only his, but whole club possesions, she angrily replied "ITS NOT MY FAULT, you should not have bring those to school and show them in my presence".
This is really my pet peeve when somebody physical possesion is destroyed with maliceness by other character.
I hate tsunderes. Really fucking hate. And I hate those filthy scumbags, eroge writters, than never, not once, wrote a male character, who would stood up to terryfyingly abusive behaviour of tsundere princesses. And I'm not talking about fair punch in the face, which I would be delighted to see, no - they never even get angry. That's the reason I dropped Clannad [this + airheadness of whole 'nottsundere' rest of the cast]. And if situation will not get better, this will be a reason I'll drop 11eyes as well... Which is a shame, because setting is really interesting, music is great, technically is great, system is neat, characters, while cliched, are at least explained [f.e. why protag is hanging out with his stupid as a shoe childhood-animal-like-friend is clearly revealed and I have no problems with that here [which is a rarity, I never 'buy' relations like that in other VNs] and I don't know anything about story yet.
I want to enjoy it. But no. Tsundere. :<

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Checking in for my obligatory boring post. :pyaa: 

I'll start with something at least some people might care about - I've started re-reading Fate/stay night, this time in Japanese, on my Vita. What this means is that I'm finally getting to experience the original writing and all the perks of Realta Nua... at the expense of the sea life encyclopedia h-scenes, oh no! :marie: I've never seen the replacement scenes, so they better at least not be absolute shit, if they are taking the pinnacle of comedy that were the original h-scenes away from me - though no matter what they do, I have my worries about HF already. Please don't be shit. D:

Anyway, the re-read is going well so far. Nasu's writing is fun as always. In Fate especially, it is extremely noticeable when he decides to flip his chuuni switch - as soon as these "Prelude" battle scene come in and the narrative switches into third person, Nasu throws away his baby Japanese and goes hardcore into his (often) archaic vocabulary. It's such a stark difference that you immediately notice it from scene to scene, with not only the entire lexicon different, but the structure too. Now I don't remember the English translation much since I read it years ago, but I think they did a reasonably good job within the limitations of English - some people might want you to believe that "Omg Nasu's writing is the most unique untranslateable thing ever!1!1!!", but really, all it amounts to are some subtleties that might not work with other languages, and within the context of Japanese itself it's not some amazing mastercraft either; it's just good writing.

As for the story, I am about halfway through the Fate route. I should probably put it out there that I never was a Saber fan, and this re-read only reaffirms that sentiment. I'm pleasantly surprised that even after all these years (and with all the Fate knowledge now giving me a different context), my impression is still pretty much the same - that is, the Fate route feeling like some cruel experiment, in which you are forced to watch two hypocrites argue until your sanity crumbles into dust and you're left with nothing but bottomless despair. Though perhaps contrary to my first read-through, I don't feel like criticising the work for this at all, as it is clearly intentional with Nasu pursuing the theme of contradictions and heroism - still, it doesn't make the characters any more likeable.... that is to say, mainly Saber. How can people not like Shirou but adore Saber? They're both pretty much the exact same character, only Shirou has many more redeeming qualities, if only in his prerequisites for character development in the different routes.

I would also like to comment on the port itself. I might've freaked out on this forum some years back when I tried the Vita demo for the first time, screaming about how for some reason the protagonists weren't voiced and that the OST was shit and what not - well, frankly, that's what happens when you're a dumb idiot like me and don't give something a proper chance. :pyaa: The MCs are voiced - the VN just goes out of its way to disable their voices by default when you start the prologue and when you start the real game. I guess my weird recent habit of scourging the menus before starting a VN has finally paid off, haha. The new OST can also be switched for the old one in the settings - but weirdly enough, I prefer the remade OST now. It just feels like a more competent rendition of the original tracks - with some rare exceptions, that is. The VN also is widescreen now - but all this really means is that you get to scroll the screen up and down as you see fit - or just turn it back to 4:3 if you're a crazy person. There also is a flowchart, which got me really excited at first, but while the flowchart paints itself as you go on, it doesn't really let you jump around in it - maybe they just want you to finish one route first?

Which brings me to the last point - the bad ends! I love the bad ends in this VN! Not only are they elaborate and often go for much longer than you'd expect, they're often presented in ways where you aren't even sure if you are on a bad end or not until you see the game over screen. Best of all, some of the bad ends are flag-based, instead of simple choices - and these are the best ones, for sure. This is just the part that makes me wish the flowchart was more, well, interactive, but again, maybe that is a thing that gets enabled later.

I wanted to talk about more VNs, but looking at this wall of text... I will probably just leave it for some other time. (;´・ω・)

Edited by Vokoca
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Having finished Sara's route, here are my thoughts on it.

Spoiler

Bloody hell, I loved it.

It was sweet, and nice, and fun. And the choice of drama was also good. Adapting to Kiyotaka's good natured self was a great plotpoint. Joining together to help Sara was also great. Frankly, I just liked it all.

A bunch of CGs. I'm rather glad this game doesn't skimp on those. What it does save up on is voice acting side characters. Which is kind of weird, kind of understandable -- the rest of the games seem to lean towards the high budget side of the scale.

For instance... the animations when Kiyotaka was overcoming Nate's trial. Wow. I never thought the VN would go that far. I'd actually consider it a waste, but I can't help but appreciate the effort.

It's really weird that they do not draw Kiyotaka's face more often than not. There's no reason for this! If you're going to draw it on occasion, then sodding heck, do it for all of the CGs! Like, one of the best CG's was without doubt the one where he proposed in front of Sara's family. With his face in it.

In theory I'd have more intricate thoughts, but since I'm overwhelmed by the sweetness of it all, I don't really recall any minor details to elaborate on.

In short, fantastic route. I could ask no more from a romance title.

Charles' will be next, followed by Aoi's, Ricca's and Himeno's.

 

Edit: In regards to the comparison between Da Capo II and III, 2 seems to, in traditional Da Capo fashion, rely on some supernatural twist to build the route around, a twist which will cause problems but may be overcome. 3 appears to, at least in the route I've seen, be more generic, but generally sweeter. No big twist anywhere. Just as good or better than 2, though.

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6 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

11eyes. Rant incoming.
I really liked it. Cliched slice of life, but with great 'moments/scenes' of really creepy, horor-esque atmosphere (red night!), with really grounded depressed protagonist, who is not and 'edgy teen angster' at the same time.

Buuuut.
there is a 'comedy duo': unfunny perverted friend, and his childhood "friend", tsundere piece of shit.
I fucking hate "characters" like her. :< Why is she here. She ruins every single one scene she's in.

She's abusive with words and behaviour at every moment, but here is the newest little example:
She took games from her "friend" and brutally destroyed them, just because he took them to school [they were not even on school grounds], and then when he was crying at what he is going to do now, those wasn't only his, but whole club possesions, she angrily replied "ITS NOT MY FAULT, you should not have bring those to school and show them in my presence".
This is really my pet peeve when somebody physical possesion is destroyed with maliceness by other character.
I hate tsunderes. Really fucking hate. And I hate those filthy scumbags, eroge writters, than never, not once, wrote a male character, who would stood up to terryfyingly abusive behaviour of tsundere princesses. And I'm not talking about fair punch in the face, which I would be delighted to see, no - they never even get angry. That's the reason I dropped Clannad [this + airheadness of whole 'nottsundere' rest of the cast]. And if situation will not get better, this will be a reason I'll drop 11eyes as well... Which is a shame, because setting is really interesting, music is great, technically is great, system is neat, characters, while cliched, are at least explained [f.e. why protag is hanging out with his stupid as a shoe childhood-animal-like-friend is clearly revealed and I have no problems with that here [which is a rarity, I never 'buy' relations like that in other VNs] and I don't know anything about story yet.
I want to enjoy it. But no. Tsundere. :<

Some good news for you: the idiot comedy duo basically vanishes about 1/4 of the way through (probably pretty shortly after where you are, if you already saw the game-chucking scene). They're just there to make the early part of the story less empty, before the whole main cast gets put together.

...I'll hold myself back from saying anything further about the game, since I've already made my views clear. :sachi:

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Well, I just read your review and from the start I know I don't trust any word you're saying, cause you found Comyu enjoyable. :P ...and I actually disagree the strongest about the protagonists. I like him very much. Well, maybe little more at the beginning when he was really brooding, but I never stopped liking him.
Disagree about the routes as well - I really like this system, but I'm a fan of linear storytelling, so I'm a little biased.
What else? Glad to hear that 'comedic duo' is getting shuffled - I'm around 12-14h in and they almost disappeared, which is great.
Also - unexpectedly I'm really liking Yukiko. :D She annoyed the hell out of me on her first scene, but then..while not changing herself not one bit, she quckly grew herself on me. Somehow. :P 

And for a not so good things: I want more story! Too much of SoL right now, I want some meat. But the 'gang' is assembled, everything should move on right now. I hope. 

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11 hours ago, Vorathiel said:

Buuuut.
there is a 'comedy duo': unfunny perverted friend, and his childhood "friend", tsundere piece of shit.
I fucking hate "characters" like her. :< Why is she here. She ruins every single one scene she's in.

That's less of a problem of the tsundere arche type and more of a problem that she's just plain rude and impolite and lacks even the most basic manners. She's tsuntsun at most. I tend to like tsunderes, but not even I can stand her. And to be perfectly honest, it's quite a while since I saw the last time a good written tsundere. I think too many writers mistake tsundere with a plain bitch for some reason. Good written tsunderes are far too pride to lower themselves to such crude behavior. Instead, they make you think that you are the blunt barbarian. :P 

Unfortunately, the other characters aren't much better. Tadashi is the dai baka of idiot friends and Yuka's submissive clingyness drives me up the wall. So far only only Misuzu and Kukuri are bearable and I can also live with the protagonist if he isn't just in emo mode.

But I'm also hoping that the cringeworthy slice of life scenes stop and the story gets some more meat. The red night sequences were quite interesting - that's the way to go.

Edited by ChaosRaven
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Finished The Labyrinth of Grisaia's fandiscs.

This is good stuff. Fandiscs exist that feel extra. These fandiscs instead feel complementary. They feel like they belong in the main game. I feel like they could have easily been added into it and make Labyrinth even better.

They reveal more details about Yuuji's time with Asako and they add some needed action into the middle-latter half of Labyrinth. Afterglow contains interesting extra information. Melody details a part I wanted to read but was merely glossed over in Labyrinth. I can't praise them enough. These are both great additions to the main story in Labyrinth of Grisaia.

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22 hours ago, Kawasumi said:

>not an edgy teen angster

hahaha, are we reading the same vn!? 

Yup. Probably. Protag in 11e was, at the beginning,

Spoiler

just a hollow shell, he didn't see any point in doing anything, didn't want to do anything, he was simply lifeless.

He wasn't 'hurrdurr, nobody likes me, why is everything against me, whole world is cesspool and I'm the biggest piece of shit of it all', etc. Far from that.

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56 minutes ago, Deniz said:

I want to start to Root Double.So there is a true ending.I love playing first time blind without walkthrough.Is other endings worth reading?

Well, you must reach all of other ending first (Route A end and route B end to unlock C route) in order to reach D route. But I think it would be nice for completion, although the only happy ending was true ending though iirc. Hope it'll be help, and if it isn't clear just ask me again here.

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On 29.01.2017 at 1:24 AM, Dreamysyu said:

How dare you, Fata Morgana!.. How dare you giving me hints, that my craziest idea might be correct!:notlikemiya:

So, in the end, even my craziest idea turned out to be not crazy enough.:wahaha:

Spoiler

When I first wrote this post, I started to notice the hints that Michel might have female body, at least partially, and I thought that the White-Haired Girl might turn out to be the same person as him. But later, as I noted in my last post, I noticed that it didn't add up with some other things, so I became very cautious about that idea. But it never occurred to me that he could have such a body, and yet not to be the White-Haired Girl! Damn, it was such a clever red herring... Bravo!

I just started the final door, by the way. And at this point I feel like I finally understand all the praise this VN gets. Characters are great, their interactions are even better. The overall plot and structure are great, and the mood, especially in the 6th and 7th chapters, is insane! Historical inaccuracies are, actually, noticeable sometimes, but I don't really care about them at this point, because this VN is certainly not about making the historical setting realistic as possible. Well, they even avoided directly mentioning countries' names, even though some of them are very guessable, and some others can be guessed after a bit of surfing on Wikipedia.

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Finished Charles' route in Da Capo III.

Spoiler

Ah, good to know we're back to Da Capo. Supernatural magic, I missed you.

I cried considerably. In that sense, this route had some really good high points. I suppose Da Capo is at home using supernatural BS to create big twists and heartfelt scenes.
Unlike Sara's, which I consistently liked, Charles' had a few moments I didn't like much.
I'd say the moments I least liked were the moments where Ricca appeared to already know everything and whatnot. I mean, she just fixes everything when she appears, and what she doesn't fix it's because she doesn't want to. This latter part is what bugs me most.

Still full of <3's, still. Very sweet, very nice. It would appear that this is what this game specialises in. I imagine it'll be more or less the same with all the girls, with them depending and loving you a lot. Some of the sweeter romances I've read, which is strange, because this game makes it look easy.

This one spent some more time with the 'getting into a relationship' bit, which isn't necessarily bad, I quite liked it as well.

Moving on to Aoi's.

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9 hours ago, Mr Poltroon said:

Moving on to Aoi's.

For correction there, you could only access Aoi's route after finished all of other four routes. But I guess it made sense if you referring Himeno. Just telling here.

Oh, by the way I decided to play some Kamidori and once again Id decided to enter Yuela's route later.

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6 hours ago, littleshogun said:

For correction there, you could only access Aoi's route after finished all of other four routes. But I guess it made sense if you referring Himeno. Just telling here.

Whaaaaat.

Ah, well, I suppose it makes sense. Best female for last and such. She doesn't seem to have any straightforward prompts, so I guess that'd be why.
Hmm... Interesting, then. I will change my order around and do Himeno's first.

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Finished the Fate route in F/sn. I don't have much to add since my last post about it - maybe except for the chuuni parts being really enjoyable. Each fight has some sort of a twist to it that it gets to explain, which is what makes chuuni interesting in the first place. Each time I see a well written chuuni fight, I just think back to Senshinkan and that very unfortunate last part of the VN.... what was Masada thinking? The fights up to that point were great for the most part, but past a certain point he ran out of things to explain and the fight scenes became an absolute snorefest. Gahh, I really do hope Dies Irae doesn't have that problem.

Anyway, back to Fate. The Realta Nua replacements for the h-scenes kind of go both ways - the first h-scene before the Berserker fight gets replaced with a scene that's actually way better than the original, if only because of the weird amount of production value that went into it alone - but at the same time it kind of felt like they were stepping around the fact that this still somehow was a h-scene in some weird way anyway. It gets especially obvious with the second one, where the scene might just as well have ended with "THEY FUCKED AFTER THIS, BTW!" and it wouldn't have made any difference.

In the end, if nothing else, the Fate route has some good chuuni in it, and it's also a nice introduction to the story. What isn't so nice though is the flowchart - it does get unlocked in the Extra menu after you clear Fate for the first time.... but it only lets you replay isolated scenes. Who the hell thought that was a good idea? This is probably the stupidest decission I've ever seen in VN design, and it makes me question why the flowchart even is there in the first place save for a mere structure visualisation you can't do anything with anyway. Just... why. After so many re-releases you'd think they would get at least that right... but I guess they just took the PS2 port and slapped a (in retrospect even lazier) widescreen modifier on it. At least Higurashi with it's plethora of re-releases had something unique for each one, from new sprites, OSTs, OPs, entire game systems, to different plot structure and even story arcs - but what does the Vita Fate port have? Three new OPs that were just outsourced to ufotable anyway? For fuck's sake, at least milk your cow properly, Type-Moon, this is embarrassing.

On a side note, I found it funny how beating the Fate route presents you with a white screen that says "Try again from the night of the 3rd day." In English. Now I can understand the chapter titles be in English, but why the hell was a hint that tells you how to progress in a language a lot of the readers don't probably even speak properly? Why...? Why Nasu, why? I hope a bunch of people got stuck because of it, at least that'd make it pretty hilarious.

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Finished the main ending of Fata Morgana yesterday.

Spoiler

I can't really describe how angry I was of those three idiots when the truth behind Morgana's curse was revealed! So, an innocent girl all of them cared about was tortured to death because they were basically afraid of each other. And Jacopo was the biggest fool of them all. Seriously, out of the context this whole scenario would feel pretty comedic, but it's just too sad to be that.

And then I reached the ending. I'm always afraid of endings in stories I enjoyed, because not all writers know how to write them well, and they are often disappointing. But this ending, I believe, was done pretty well. I personally was more or less satisfied, and didn't feel like anything was off. And in the end I was disappointed only because the ending actually came. It's not fair! It clearly wasn't enough! I want more! Aghh! :reeee:

More seriously though, I definitely didn't have enough of Morgana and, maybe, 11th century Jacopo. So, I think, that's what Requiem for Innocence is about, right? I'm pretty hyped for it now, though let's be real, it's just too short to bring any real satisfaction.

In the end, this VN clearly exceeded my expectations. I expected a 6-7/10 VN when I purchased it, but in the end it became much more than that. I already praised it a lot, and I don't want to repeat my praises again. I just want to say, that this VN really shines through it's characters and their interactions, and if it weren't for that, all its other merits would be for naught. As for the flaws... Well, in the end, the only thing that really bothered me and remained valid to the end was that I often felt that the VN didn't try to maintain historical accuracy that much. I don't really know what to think of it, since history isn't really what this VN is about. On the other hand, I always thought that if you write about events that happened in the past of the world, clearly based of the real one, and not some generic fantasy world, you should try to make it as realistic as possible. Though I certainly don't know history that well, and maybe I'm finding flaws where there are none.

In the end, I'm quite torn about how to rate this VN. It doesn't feel like it reached 10/10. On the other hand, I clearly enjoyed it more than some VNs I gave 9/10 to. So, for now I'll leave it at 9.5. I'll let this thought sink for a bit, and then decide either to move it down, together with some other VNs, or leave it at that level. Or, I don't know, maybe after so thought I start liking it even more, and then I'll move it up.

Well, next I'm going to read some bad ends I missed, and then move to something else. I wanted to try Himawari after I finish it, but right now I'm probably going to hate whatever VN I try next, so maybe it's a good idea to stay away from VNs for a while.

Edited by Dreamysyu
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