What are you playing?

[Mago Ivo]

I'm still reading Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, I'm still early in the VN (just finished chapter 11 on the second arc - Watanagashi) and I have a genuine question :
Is Maebara Keiichi such an idiot on purpose? His stupidity is tremendous! I hope that he dies in the most brutal way imaginable.

[Dreamysyu]

21 minutes ago, Mago Ivo said:

I hope that he dies in the most brutal way imaginable.

Oh, don't worry, he will. Multiple times.

[Eclipsed]

You ever been like, well gee, I blitzed through the entire Ace Attorney Trilogy + 3DSilogy and maybe played the spinoffs like Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright 'cuz you just gotta have some more cross examination funzies and wish they would just release another Ace Attorney by now?

Not me

Well there's a VN called Ouka Sabaki / Master Magistrate that should give you your courtroom trial VN fix

Set in 1850's "Bakumatsu Era" Japan, you play as up and coming Magistrate (last) Ooka Shimei, and you got all the classic Ace Attorney inspired elements: a quirky but well meaning cast and an episodic story that goes in Slice of Life -> Case -> Investigation -> Trial format

^Gal on the left is Rimu, your resident discount Ace Attorney's Maya Fey. Classic genki sidekick support to the protagonist.
Broad on the right is Sakura, the classic hardass "Pfft, protagonist is too soft, I could totally do his job 1000x better than him".

The courtroom trials don't really play as bombastically as Ace Attorney's iconic Cross-Examination segments but they're passable. In general everything is slightly not as over the top and there are some good moments to be had. As Magistrate, Shimei is Judge Jury and Executioner; there's no back and forth defense lawyer vs prosecutor going on here.

 

 

...Did I mention Rimu is best girl? I just love it when VNs take the time to have different hair styles for a heroine. Rimu's hair down is to die for LOL

[littleshogun]

On 1/11/2023 at 5:40 AM, Shinyun226 said:

Haven't personally played any Yuzusoft games but from what I do know about them/just looking at their catalog, their games are still a lot closer to Snow than the other stuff Studio Mebius typically would put out ironically enough lol.  The fact that Studio Mebius went from making Kichikuge, to a "pure love" type nakige with Snow is quite a contrast.

Late to reply here.

As for Yuzusoft VN, I can certainly say that it's far lighter than Snow. Although you're certainly right that Yuzusoft VNs did carry over some supernatural element from Snow, and it certainly help that one of Snow composer, Famishin, would be in turn direct several Yuzusoft VNs, with the notable two are Senren Banka and Cafe Stella (Both have shrine maiden heroines), so he may bring over some elements from Snow into modern Yuzusoft VNs.

Speaking of irony, actually not only Studio Mebius that develop dark VN in the past. There's also Jun Maeda (Yes Jun Maeda who would known as KEY prominent figure) did work on Moon, and one of the sexual contents included scat of all contents (And rape as well). Oh yes, Liar-soft as well, which I get the info from Discord and naturally I denied it, only turned out to be true that they have several rape VNs (Well they still have some element of it in their newer VN, although most of the time it's not that bad). The most contrast however we have Saga Planet of all companies did produce the game with dark contents in the past, and yes their past VNs had a lot of rape which obviously contrast with their current library. All in all, it's interesting to take a notice on how several companies VNs in the past are very different with what we got used to the current companies.

Edited January 16 by littleshogun

[Nemesis]

Was reading through Swan Song and Biman5.

SWAN SONG

This seems like a good Christmas story as it starts on Christmas Eve. It has a impactful start with an earthquake destroying the town and our MC, Amako Tsukasa, finding a woman about to die from the disaster. Her last wish being to take care of Aroe, and changing her mind at the last minute to kill Aroe instead. Our MC is too pussy to kill her, so he takes care of her instead. This reminds me of the newborn baby scene in Subahibi and Tsui no Sora Remake with Yukito or Tomosane hesitating whether to kill the newborn baby or to celebrate. It is the duality of cursed life and blessed life.

With the entire town in a complete mess, Tsukasa meets a bunch of survivors in an abandoned church and takes shelter there with Aroe. While exploring the city wreckage one day he met a Salary Man who lost his entire family, who complains about the pointless life he lived suffering at work everyday for his family. Now that he is freed from those responsibilities, he feels free, but sad at the same time as he lost sight of his goals. He leaves with the line 「君に幸あれ」- "May happiness be with you".

If Scaji is good at explaining and teaching things, Setoguchi is good at showing things in action. You can only see the true nature of human's morality when civilization breaks down and laws stop functioning. This is Lord of the Flies except with Adult society. Each person adapts to the new world differently facing the reality that life has no meaning and can be easily taken away: acceptance, physical suicide, and philosophical suicide. Some people find their own value of life and do their best to survive. Others give up on the value of life and start to harm others and themselves. Others give up on reality and join religious groups for escapism.

The art is rather old, but expressive, and adds a lot to the atmosphere. Music is simple and melancholic.

They talk about what it means to be human, and how Aroe is lacking it due to her mental disability. Her habits are influenced by her disability and not from her own will. Our routines make up as a huge portion of our life. This work conveys that there is no such thing as universal happiness by using Aroe as an example.

It also covers lots of societal topics. How society handles a lot of dirty work such as Justice and punishment, so that normal people don't have to worry about it. But with civilization broken, everyone is forced to handle the topic and make decisions for themselves. People are satisfied living under illusion of safety as long as they don't have to take responsibility for it. One last thing I want to talk about is the title "Swan Song." Even if Swan Song is an illusion, people should try and struggle until their final moments so they can have a beautiful Swan Song ending. I'm not going to go into too much details as the topics covered here are pretty much the same as Black Sheep Town. Overall, it's a very solid read, though not as good as BST.

美少女万華鏡 ー理と迷宮の少女ー

Finally, in the last game of the series. The game starts out with a young girl singing Tooryanse while climbing the stairs filled with Torii, which I'm guessing is Fushimi Inari Shrine.

Sumeragi is a good addition to the cast, a mystery novelist in comparison to our protagonist's occult novelist.

The story itself is average, but the atmosphere is very well done. There are some Jigoku Shoujo reference, which was rather unexpected.

It does have some interesting themes though with the boundary between reality and dreams. It talks about Zhuangzi dreaming he was a butterfly dreaming he was a man and red pill and blue pill. Which is relevant seeing as we have been seeing the life of other people through the Kaleidoscope.

Then, they summarize through what MC found through the Kaleidoscope in the previous games:

Spoiler

1 - 僕がこの場所で捜していたのは屹度、無償の愛……愛する人の為なら自分の命すらも投げ出せるような、そんな愛の記憶を、捜していたんだ……

2 - 僕がこの場所で捜していたのは……決して諦めないあいだ……ドンナニ時間が経ってもその人の事を忘れない……そんな尊い愛なんだ……

3 - 僕がこのばしょで捜していたものは……素直になる事決して自分を偽らない、真実の愛なんだ……

4 - 僕がこの場所で捜したかったもの……其れは、仮令禁止されても貫く愛……背徳的で道ならぬものであっても、其れでも振り返りない、そんな純粋な愛なんだ……

The Biman series has made me more open to trying out some more nukige's once in a while. I'm looking forward to Happoubijin's next work.

Edited January 23 by Nemesis

[Silvz]

On 1/15/2023 at 12:17 PM, Mago Ivo said:

I'm still reading Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, I'm still early in the VN (just finished chapter 11 on the second arc - Watanagashi) and I have a genuine question :
Is Maebara Keiichi such an idiot on purpose? His stupidity is tremendous! I hope that he dies in the most brutal way imaginable.

I mean, he is a 14-year-old teenager. As a former teacher, I assure you that he is way less idiotic than some real kids can be (Not all of them, of course, but there is always "the one")

 

As of the thread, I'm happy to say that after almost one year reading it, I... dropped White Album 2.

I really don't have too much to say about this one. It is great in everything that it does, but I found two issues: it is too long, to the point that I was loosing interest because I knew that I'd have to read X more hours just to finish the "cheating route". The second issue is also related to its lenght. I almost didn't play any VNs the whole year. 2022 was basically the year that I finished Little Busters for the second time, started reading WA2 and that's it.

As soon as I decided a few weeks ago to drop WA2, I was able to play AI: Somnium Files 2 in just a few days, half of Summer Pockets: Reflection Blue and 70% of 13 Sentinels' story.

Again, I love WA2, its twists, its setting, it as a whole, but I felt that I needed to move on, and probably I'll never complete it, and I'm fine with it.

[adamstan]

Yesterday I finished third chapter of Tsui no Stella so I guess I'm still near the beginning.  (Currently I have time for reading maybe once a week, so I'm progressing rather slowly)

I really wonder, what is it with all those robot girls that makes every one of them grab me by the heart? Planetarian's Yumemi, ATRI, Dal Segno's Ame, ToHeart's Multi, and now Filia - I honestly have no idea

BTW Willem kind of creeps me out - I have strong suspicion that he might turn out to be a villain. But of course it might be just a red herring and playing with reader's impressions and expectations - we'll see

Edited January 20 by adamstan

[Bamf102]

I'm playing Gore Screaming Show. I started this yesterday and I'm having a lot of fun so far. It's a slow build-up to the horror, which I love, and most of the characters are fun to read about. I started with Akane's route and I find her to be really adorable. The music is great overall and I love the voice acting for Gore.

[adamstan]

Yesterday I finished Tsui no Stella (it took me 19 hours)

I don't think I could add much to @Nemesis's review, but I mostly agree with it

I loved it. It was great story about being (or becoming) human and relationships.

Also, as one of the reviewers already pointed out, フィリア's name could be transliterated in two ways - and both are meaningful. One is the "canon" Philia - because that's the greek word for "love" Jude named her after. But it could be also romanized as Filia, which is latin word for "daughter". Nice little touch.

I've read only two Tanaka Romeo's works so far (YMK and Kazoku Keikaku - and both only in English) - but his style is visible in this VN. At the same time, he fit pretty well into the KEY formula Indeed this story was an emotional ride, with many teary moments.

Spoiler

Delilah's death I think that was the fist scene that made me actually cry... At least in this story - unlike Planetarian - Filia survives, and carries on...

8.5/10, definitely recommend I see KEY plans to release official translation this year - I hope it goes smoothly, so more people could enjoy this great story. Since the setting is pretty universal (not explicitly Japanese) - there shouldn't be too many things prone to getting lost in translation.

[Nemesis]

絆きらめく恋いろは

Lots of worldbuilding in the introduction, explaining the history of the world. I like it, worldbuilding is a must for every decent fantasy.

The matches are also interesting and has some actual Kendou terminology built into it such as 先の先 and 後の先. Well, obviously, it doesn't go into as much detail as Hanachirasu with the forms and stances, but still pretty interesting.

So far, outside of Tsubaki, the individual routes are rather average. The tournament brackets change depending on the route which tells me that each route is written by different authors without coordination.

Overall, it's far from being a kamige, but solid game nonetheless.

[Eclipsed]

How the EFF does Witch on the Holy Night on the Switch take up 20GB LOL

Its been like 7 years since I’ve read a TYPE-MOON VN (fate/stay) so we’ll see how it goes~

[Shinyun226]

Finally just 100% completed Snow Portable!

Just gotta say, overall, I really really liked it. it really blew away my expectations.

So, the first thing to address are the Key comparisons. Yes, it absolutely does HEAVILY borrow from Kanon and Air. It uses at least a few Kanon characters tropes (Euuu + Anman instead of Uguu + taiyaki) and straight up rips off Air's overall game structure - that being said, I think it actually handles that formula/structure a lot better than Air does.

I think some arguments can be made about whether or not Air's main route is better when analyzed on its own, BUT Air as a whole is undeniably kind of lopsided.  It's 1 big route, with 2 minor routes that might as well not be there (Minagi route is actually amazing though, but I digress). Snow does a lot of what Air does ie:

Spoiler

: the Main heroine route ends rather inconclusively > you unlock a 'backstory route' (Summer/Legend) > then you eventually unlock the main heroines 'true' route

, but unlike Air the other routes in SNOW actually contribute to the overall narrative. (Also I could actually understand what was all going on in Snow, unlike Air lol).

 

Anyways, brief/disjointed thoughts on individual routes:

Sumino

Spoiler

Hearbreaking but anti-climactic. Different story and conflict, but functionally the same as Misuzu's initial route in Air and as a result doesn't stand on it's own - it's just a leadup to the rest of the game. 

Legend

Spoiler

Really enjoyable.  Drags a lot less than its Air equivalent, Summer. Also, unlike Summer, its important for all of the main heroines. 

Asahi

Spoiler

It's the Makoto route, no two ways about it. Yes the backstory is different, yes it's a rabbit instead of a fox, yes she likes boneless ham instead of nikuman, and yes it's got a happier conclusion but... it's still pretty much just Makoto's route(+なのだ)

Shigure

Spoiler

The bigfoot gags are funny at first, but they go on and on for like an in-game week so it's a bit much. But then after that it does get pretty entertaining. The time slip stuff is dumb, but a lot of fun. Kanata's reactions in these scenes are probably the most entertaining stuff in the whole game.

Ouka

Spoiler

The final route in the original version of the game, and what doubles as Sumino's "true end". Really an amazing route overall. If nothing else, this route alone makes Snow a real classic.

My only problem is it's never explained why Sumino doesn't loses her memory even though she definitely does hook up with Kanata this time around. From a gameplay perspective, I suppose the logic is you undid everythinig in Shigure's route and that broke the curse, and this carriers over when you start Ouka's route but... if that had actually happened from a story perspective, then Ouka wouldn't even exist in the first place.

Also, despite basically giving Sumino and Asahi combined 'true ends' in this route, Shigure is basically 100% absent which is a bit disappointing.

Meiko

Spoiler

Bonus/port exclusive route 1. Despite being one the clearly most popular characters in the game, kind of an underwhelming route. I mean it wasn't bad, but it was very unremarkable compared to the rest of the game + a pretty nonsense resolution imo. They spend all this time making it seem like Meiko's sportadic temporary rapid aging was going to be the big conflict but instead her "death" is just her fading away (while she still looks young) 

Meiko's overall narrative is one of the most interesting parts of the game as a whole, and this route does actually add a bunch of pretty important details,  but it kind of gets weighed down by other nonesense which is kind of a shame.

Seishiro does get to show that he's clearly the best heroine over the course of this route though. 10/10

 Nazo no Shouojo

Spoiler

(Shaman route)

Spoiler

Bonus route 2 and the reason to maybe choose PSP over PS2. Actually really good. VERY tonally different from the other routes (horror-esque), but at the same time an excellent to Ouka's route. 

Unfortunately the "best" ending is locked behind some real cryptic nonsense. Basically you have to beat the route, then go back and find a new dialogue option with Meiko, then replay the end of Legend to find another new scene, then replay the ending of the route again. How would anyone find this without referencing guides is beyond me. I mean I guess you'd know to replay the route itself when you see you're missing 2 CGs but... who would think to replay Legend?

And then after all that, I think the 'standard' ending is the better one imo. Shaman being reborn as Kanata and Sumino's 2nd child just feels like the better ending overall for me.

Bonus: Shigure actually gets to do something in this route. add 10 points

So to come back to this question:

On 1/11/2023 at 3:08 AM, adamstan said:

 The question is - is that new route worth it? 

I'm gonna say yes, I really enjoyed the Nazo no Shoujo route.

I'm probably gonna want to replay the game on PS2 someday to get the full voice experience for the rest of the game but... I do think this bonus route makes double-dipping worth it.

[littleshogun]

On 1/29/2023 at 10:26 AM, Eclipsed said:

How the EFF does Witch on the Holy Night on the Switch take up 20GB LOL

Well at least it's not as big as game dump file on PC in which it took up to 31 GB HDD lol. Also yes, I manage to play it in my laptop despite that I several time claim that I didn't own Switch and Mahoyo still didn't have translated PC version (Which I still hope that someday it'll be available), and surprisingly it run quite well on my low spec laptop. Admittedly though there are some very heavy slowdown in the animated effect, which I can see the reason why because my laptop spec is too low compared to the requirement to run Ryujinx emulator. Well have fun playing Mahoyo there.

Edited February 1 by littleshogun

[Ariurotl]

Read Bokuten about a month ago, the first VN in years for me. Sadly, it wasn't great and I can totally see why it near-bankrupted Overdrive. Gave it a generous 6/10.

[littleshogun]

Considering that Bokuten best sales is only at 19th rank on Getchu sales before not appearing anymore along with on how Overdrive need to use crowdfund to make Musicus, it might make sense that Bokuten almost make Overdrive bankrupt to a degree, although I won't be so sure if the cause might be because of the story (Which to say give justification toward Tomoe extremely pessimist view in love whilst we supposedly see on how he see more positive view in love) or not.

PS - I know that the author (Or maybe Overdrive) may not want the reader to see that the moral of Bokuten is 'Love can only bring suffering', but unfortunately with on how the setting work one can interpret that the author want to convey his pessimist view towards love.

Edited February 2 by littleshogun

[Ariurotl]

I don't have the foggiest idea whether utsuge just generally sell worse than most (especially when made by a company that was never exactly among the top names) but to me it's not that it's an utsuge (I love me some depressing VNs) but more that it's not a particularly good one. The "true" route is the only one that's more or less good (even if it is exceedingly contrived), the rest vary from just about okay to plain bad.

I haven't the energy or the enthusiasm to get into a review mode but at points it felt like it was written by an alien who has only a very faint idea of human psychology.

But hey, at least I was pleasantly surprised when it had

Spoiler

a full chapter about a gay character and it wasn't stereotypical, wasn't played for laughs and didn't even end up in him getting converted to heterosexuality somehow and hooking up with the crossdressing girl. I kinda expect those things from a non-BL VN by now.

And the worst points of it were

Spoiler

the entirety of Yuri's route where NOBODY behaved like any human being would behave at several points;
Naruko's "good" end which is just, come on, sure there's magic in this world but how just forgetting about each other's existence is going to work at all when you have all those friends in common and LITERALLY LIVE NEXT DOOR?;
and the bold decision to regurgitate the already stale "idols/musicians can't have BFs/GFs" plot TWICE.

 

[Nemesis]

Finished Mekuiro and tried Fate/Empire of Dirt.

絆きらめく恋いろは

Tsubaki > Saya=Shion > Shia

I actually like Trenka better as more Tsubaki, and the writers seem to be better at writing linear story compared to route structure that builds up. My issue is that they really don't connect the individual routes well compared to some of the better written VN's. The routes just feel like it's written separately without caring about the entire structure.

Fate/Empire of Dirt

Pretty terrible doujin game outside of the art. The prose is shit and far from Nasu quality, and the lore is warped to fit the shitty writing.

Gameplay itself is pretty much just a shittier version of FGO.

This is just really bad Fate fanfiction, and dropped it halfway through. I couldn't stand the terrible prose anymore. I regret being baited by the art.

[Nemesis]

I've been reading Kurai Heya and Oretsuba Prologue and Afterstory.

暗い部屋

My first impression is it is very Setoguchi work: a rather dark and hopeless start.

For the most part, it has similar themes to Swan Song: it's a story about despair and how people deal with it. But compared to Swan Song, it's much more of a charage. It follows our two protagonist: 日野清太郎 and 押川悠衣子。 「楽しいことが、全然ないんだもの」

It starts with the concept of death. It narrates in detail how a corpse rot and flies lay eggs on the body with maggots eventually coming out, and how a once beautiful person gets turned into rotting piece of meat.

Then our MC 清太郎 explores a new world after being locked inside the house 24/7 for health reasons. He was adopted by her aunt and her family. Oh wow, the aunt is a control freak and a terrible person. She forcefully adopted him, and when she learned about the gas mask, she wants to chase him out now.

But in the midst of that despair, he gets along with his cousin, 悠衣子 and 英, and lives a somewhat normal life for a while. It really goes in detail to be what it's like to be under an abusive family, and how abuse is not really just physical abuse. 「毎日、明日が怖いの」

It also gets into the story of their twin mothers 寿子 and 耀子.寿子 wanted to be an artist, while 耀子 wanted to be a housewife. Both of their dreams have come true, but they were both unhappy with their life.

Overall, it's another solid story from Setoguchi which is probably better as a novel rather than a VN.

俺たちに翼はない ～Prelude～

I wasn't originally planning on reading this, but since I got it along with the AfterStory I might as well.

Reading this is rather nostalgic, and Ou Jackson's prose is fun and upbeat. But story-wise nothing much happened, so I don't know what else to talk about. There is just some added introduction to Haneda's heroines.

[Larxe1]

Tenshi no Inai 12-Gatsu

Decided to come back to reading VN's again and chose this depressing classic. Fits perfectly to the type of VN's I love reading. A storyline that is grounded in reality, with characters written well with their own flaws and problems.

This visual novel puts the characters flaws and problems as the main story. It is a character-driven work and there are possibly no good people here aside from Toko (I didn't do her route but she seems the nicest out of all of the characters.

The start of the plot begins with Toko offering herself to the MC. It was some form of transactional sex with Toko getting permission from the MC to escape her own hell to his place.

The MC is unique, in the sense that many asshole main characters are written to have a heart of gold hidden under all that attitude, but the MC is kind of an asshole 80% of the time. I actually found this refreshing as it is rare to see a genuine asshole as a main character, and seeing him uncharacteristically act nice in some scenes was fun to read. 

I only read Shinobu's route, and Shinobu is Toko's best friend that seems to be overly protective of Toko. The start of her route is on par with the theme of the novel, very depressing and there's a sense of despair on every scene.  Shinobu's traumas are on full display, and the MC isn't some magical main character from romcom's who manage to cure the traumas of his heroines. The MC is as fucked up as she is and their relationship is equally bad. They aren't lovers in their route, neither sex friends or friends either. Their relationship is something unique to the two of them that came about from their own unique circumstances, and their relationship makes them feel safe from the demons that haunt them.

As I read from the other reviews, I agree with their sentiments that usually the endings aren't very satisfying. You don't fully find out what happened with the MC and why he's such as asshole, you don't know what happened in the past for Shinobu to become so broken. She shows clues of what her possible traumas are. They aren't fully explored, heck they aren't even mentioned again later on. Just writing about it frustrates me as I was actually invested to know more but the game is really short.

The game ends on a weirdly hopeful and depressing note. The game ends without really solving any of their problems, but their strange and warped relationship comforts them. The game ends with the feeling of that their problems may never really be solved. It doesn't matter to them, they didn't enter into their relationship with the goal of being exactly happy or having their partner solve their traumas for them. The traumas and problems that they carry aren't solvable, as solving them doesn't really matter. They just want to atone for their sins or run from their traumas. Self-harm and depression and sometimes suicide is a topic that heavily plays into the story which is a rare topic for visual novels to actually dive deeply into. Usually in some other VN's they get better but with Tenshi no Inai, they just learn to live with it.

It is hard to recommend this VN to others as the story is not for everyone but for those who like this kind of stories, it is hella good. 

[Fujoneko]

It's been so long since I've updated this thread LOL

I don't remember where I've left off, but this last month I've played Project: Eden's Garden, Lewd Idol Project Vol. 1, LIP! Lewd Idol Project Vol. 1 - Hot Springs and Beach Episodes, LIP! Lewd Idol Project Vol. 2, and finally, Mikoto Nikki!

All of these got reviews for Fuwa - you can check them out here! Well, one of them will release today and the other is still getting edited lel

—————————————————————————————

Ok, current reads!

I'm currently reading Steins;Gate and will probably finish it around the beginning of April I'm reading it for the VN reading club I host!

Other than that, I'm also going to re-read Mix Ore as part of my "Covering CHARON" series! I started with Mikoto Nikki and that is already done, so next on the list is Mix Ore

[Shinyun226]

Just finished White ~Setsunasa no Kakera~ recently.

 

This was NekoNeko Soft's debut game and, although I did enjoy it overall, most of the routes were definitely a bit underwhelming/unpolished. The biggest problem being that the actual routes are way too short (and some of the characters get introduced pretty late in the common route)

That being said, it was a pretty solid effort considering it was their first original/commercial game + 2 of the routes (Hadzuki and Chinami) were actually REALLY good imo.

It's very clear the developers were inspired by early Key games (or rather early games by the Key staff, since One was published by Tactics game), particularly One ~Kagayaku Kisetsu he~ and, although not all routes accomplish this, White is clearly meant to be a Nakige in that vein. 

(+ there's some pretty clear One references sprinkled throughout)

"And, that scene where the [main character] just disappears while blind senpai is holding ice cream"

Spoiler

Clear reference to Misaki's ending in One for those who don't know

Anyways, some brief thoughts on each route.

Izumi

Spoiler

The 'main' heroine, and the protagonists, Kenichi's childhood friend. Despite being the main girl though, she has a pretty underwhelming route. Basically she finds out her little sister Megumi likes Kenichi > so she tries to get them together, but Ken predictably realizes he actually loves Izumi at the end. Megumi's bad end does actually add some interesting extra characterization but... it's all very undeveloped and the conflict is a lot of nothing (also it happens way too fast).

Her route still feels like the longest since the common route is pretty much all here one way or another.

Mikana

Spoiler

Glasses girl who likes manga and tokusatsu. She's an interesting character but her route also lacks a real conflict. Basically Kenichi is playing a prank on Izumi by putting an Ero manga in her locker > Mikana sees him, so he lies and says it's a love letter > so Mikana thinks he likes someone...

Madoka

Spoiler

Violent blonde twintails Tsundere with kansai-ben. Template for a great character, but has a route that really drags on. Like Izumi, you can meet her really early on and thus she gets a lot of scenes from the get go and, as a result, her route feels REALLY long. Her route starts to make things feel closer to an actual nakige, but it's all a bit underwhelming. Definitely one of the more memorable characters, albeit with a rather unmemorable story.

Hadzuki

Spoiler

Ok, now we're getting into actual nakige material. Long story short, Hadzuki feels like she's responsible for the deaths of her older sister and mother. We also learn that Kenichi had a little sister who died (very One-esque), albeit it doesn't get expanded upon much in this route (his little sister is also briefly namedropped in the Megumi badend in Izumi's route, with no explanation).

Chinami

Spoiler

The primary reason to play the game imo. Pretty damn depressing - little girl who's parents abandoned her and is collecting seashells so she can wish for her parents to return. Oh and also her adoptive father is sexually abusing her.... 

In the end, Kenichi and Izumi decide to "adopt" her, so it feels a bit like Ouka's route in Snow in that the heroine of the route isn't a romantic target + it kind of serves as a true end for the main heroine (Izumi). 

Also this is the place where Kenichi's dead little sister actually becomes (kind of) relevant, since apparently Chinami looks like her.

Then there's the bad end where... Kenichi turns into a scum bag and legit r*pes her. Very uncomfortable scene to read through (though it had to be done because... gotta 100% that CG gallery lol).

Much like some of the other routes, every happens very fast though. Chinami is introduced really late in the game so her scene count is pretty low.

The other "fun" thing about this game was getting it to work right. Installing it and getting it to run + using DXWnd's Winmm.dll to play the music without the disc wasn't a big deal but... for whatever reason it loading the character sprites REALLY slow, so there was like a 3 second delay every time an expression changed.

Did a little research and found out this was a common issue with older nScripter games that use CD-DA audio, so I ended up grabbing a newer version of the nscr.exe and learned how to manually modify/create a new Dat file to go with it so... now I know how to do that if I ever play another nScripter game that uses CD-DA audio.

But anyways yeah, good game overall. I'm looking to play more of NekoNeko Soft's library (and by extension Team Nana's games) eventually. Already bought their second title GinIro, which is apparently a pretty legendary Utsuge, so I'll probably get to that some time this year.

[adamstan]

15 hours ago, Shinyun226 said:

I'm looking to play more of NekoNeko Soft's library

If we're at it, I strongly recommend Amber Quartz (it was made by NekoNeko Soft's offspring - Cotton Soft).

[Shinyun226]

5 hours ago, adamstan said:

If we're at it, I strongly recommend Amber Quartz (it was made by NekoNeko Soft's offspring - Cotton Soft).

Cool! I'll have to check out it eventually (endless backlog, so it'll probably be a while though lol).

Browsing through Cotton Soft's other games and at least a few of them look interesting + MANYO music on at least some of them, so I'm interested even if just for that.

[Nemesis]

俺たちに翼はない AfterStory

I feel that a lot of the big events in Takashi and Shuusuke route was covered in the main game's epilogues. But I don't remember how much of it was covered, so hard for me to compare on what's been added.

Takashi- Even if we don't have wings alone, together, we can fly everywhere. In this case, I think wings here represent freedom, hope, and future. Or in other words, the willpower to live and the courage to face tomorrow.

「ほうら、私たちにも翼くらいはあるんだぞう」

「大好きなひとと一緒なら、私どこまでも飛んでいきますか」

Shuusuke route - the dialogue feels off or just lacking in the first few scenes of the games. I'm guessing that was written by the subwriter. Then it goes to back to standard Ou Jackson quality again after the H-scene.

Spoiler

We get some tension between Shuusuke and Asuka, who realized her feelings for Takashi too late.

Hayato route - We get back to our hardboiled protagonist enjoying the city night life and our weird heroine Naru.

Spoiler

Hayato gets involved in some Yakuza incident, and we got some cool action scenes including Karuo.

Spoiler

Youji route - We get to see Youji interacting with everyone else now that the others have become one aspect of his personality and became more well rounded. This is really where Jackson's prose shines with Youji's speech pattern becoming a combination of the other four with one of them being more pronounced depending on who he's talking to. At the same time, we see aspects of other character's personality that they don't usually show. We get to see them with a different mask.

Other than that, there are a couple short stories.

ランス4 －教団の遺産－

With the new patch released, I figured now is the time to continue with Rance and play 4.

The mechanics are pretty shit with it being a Tactics RPG without any of the features that make it tactical such as terrain. Mechanics are still exactly the same as basic RPG, except they annoy you with having to walk your characters every turn. Without the patch, this probably would've been rage inducing to me. With the patch, it's somewhat tolerable with a walkthrough.

Story-wise, it's decent. Well, it's at least better than Rance 2, but not as good as Rance 3.

[chasekilleen]

Replaying Kajiri Kamui Kagura （神咒神威神楽）

Spoiler