On "main heroine" route psychology

[onorub]

One thing i noticed is that while some VNs have main/cover heroine routes with the assumption that they are gonna be played first (Rewrite and original MajiKoi are what comes up off the top of my head), a lot of people in the VN community seem to prefer doing the main heroine route last.

With that in mind, i ask: when it comes to main heroine routes on VNs with no enforced route order, is it smarter on the writer's part to put the least amount of plot reveals (assuming it's gonna be played first) or the most amount of plot reveals (assuming it's gonna be played last)?

[Clephas]

Newbies tend to play the heroine they like the most (often the main heroine, since they are often written to attract the reader's interest) first.  Vets almost always play the main/central/true heroine last.  

From a maker's perspective, they want the readers to play through all the paths, so locking the main/true heroine path makes perfect sense.  From a reader's perspective, a locked path means anticipation of what might be revealed.  

[MDruidd]

well if not unlockable route i did the bonus or side characters first, then go to main heroin. OFC ill put the cutest personality in the last. If i do the main for first when there sideheroin ill maybe skip the main heroin to cuz lazy to go the same plot's

[Volt]

On 5.5.2020 at 2:51 AM, onorub said:

With that in mind, i ask: when it comes to main heroine routes on VNs with no enforced route order, is it smarter on the writer's part to put the least amount of plot reveals (assuming it's gonna be played first) or the most amount of plot reveals (assuming it's gonna be played last)?

For a VN with no enforced route order I'm in favor of putting in either an equal amount of plot reveals for every heroine or the most of plot reveals for the main heroine, because the main heroine route would end up feeling less significant when you add the least amount of plot reveals.

Though, I am generally in favor of enforcing a certain play order, especially the type where you need to play a certain amount of side routes before going into the main route. One of my favorite VNs does this pretty well in my opinion. It's an otome game though, Collar x Malice. The game has 5 love interests out of which you can only pick 3 in the beginning. Once you finished one playthrough the 4th one becomes available (because vital plot points are revealed in his route) and once you finished all other routes you can finally unlock the main hero/true route where the main mystery will be revealed.

For very story-driven VNs I guess it's easier for the writer to lock certain routes, because you don't have to keep in mind all the details along with a mixed playthrough of routes (it's difficult to keep track of everything that way and for everything to still make sense with a complicated story) and instead slowly build up suspense by adding layer upon layer with each route you finish and unlocking the next one. Just like Clephas pointed out, it builds up anticipation for the reader - with the downside being that it needs to be better than the side routes or the reader will be let down.

[SweetMonia]

I think there are two good scenarios. One is to make it impossible to play the routes that reveals the most of the plot without playing the other routes first. The other good choice is to make all the routes equal. In case of rewrite, I played Kotori's route after Chihaya, so I enjoyed it less than in case I played it first, which disappointed me a bit.