General Visual Novel discussion/recommend me some VN's (possible spoilers)

Diddy_King

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So, I've been on a visual novel stint lately. I started reading visual novels about a year and a half ago after I decided I wanted to continue the story of Clannad (ie. read stuff that was left out of the anime). Ever since then I've been reading/playing VN's pretty voraciously. Can't decide what I want to read next, so let's talk about some Visual Novels and maybe I can get some ideas on what to read.

Also, as for recommendations, I'll take any, but tbh I really enjoy romance in my Visual Novels, it's not a deal breaker if it doesn't have it, but I do enjoy it.

Visual novels I've read. (this is not every one I've read, but it's the most memorable of the bunch.)

Clannad - Key

{Most people should already know Clannad (if you're a VN reader or even if you watch anime). The anime was pretty well done, both the English and Japanese versions. But the VN brings even more to the table than the anime did. Take into account that the regular anime is 12 episodes per season. ~24 minutes per episode. Clannad was 2 seasons, so we have roughly 600 minutes of anime. That boils down to roughly 10 hours. The Clannad VN is roughly 30-50 hours, so you get to spend even more time with the stellar characters and learn more about them as people. I'll admit watching the anime, I wasn't really a fan of Nagisa. But after playing the Visual Novel, I can say I really loved her as a character. Also, while the anime did a great job adapting the story to a different medium, there were just things they could not fit due to time constraints. So playing the VN you get quite a few "extras" that didn't make it into the final cut of the Clannad anime. I may be a bit biased, because Clannad was my first VN. But I give it a 9/10}

Little Busters! - Key

{I have not watched the Little Busters! anime yet. TBH I haven't heard the kindest things about it. But the Visual Novel is a pretty stellar experience. Key has a way of tugging at your heartstrings, and you will likely cry at least once for their animes/VNs. LB! is split into 2 parts, the main story, and the afterstory (Refrain). The main story is pretty good, it's mostly comedic, with touches of romance. If I had to grade LB! off of the main story I'd give it a 7 or so. But Refrain is a whole other beast. It keeps the comedy, and to a lesser extent the romance, but it focuses heavily on the true message of LB! Friendship. Taking Refrain into account, I give LB! an 8.5/10.}

Cross Channel

{Ah, Cross Channel. Before I even start, I'll say that this is one of the very few VNs I give a 10/10 to. This game just has so much going for it. The synopsis is pretty straightforward, and really odd at the same time. It's a schooldays type VN, but with a twist. The character's all go a a school for people who can't adapt to society for one reason or another. They are given adaptation quotients, measured in percentages, the higher the percentage, the less likely they are to be able to adapt to regular society. Our main character (Kurosu Taichi) has a mind boggling adaptation quotient of ~90%. I'll say this as well, Kurosu is probably one of my favorite protagonists of all time. His main issue is he sees sexual harassment as a form of love. He's not above flipping a girls skirt, or remarking on what kind of underwear they are wearing. He tries to control this part of himself, playing it off as regular teasing/joking, but he's got a dark side of himself that he can't always quite control. But at the same time he cares for his friends, to the point that he sacrifices literally everything to make them happy. Combine great characters with great character development, and the unexplained fact that literally everyone in the world vanished one day except for the main cast, and you get an experience that's at once heartwarming, surreal, clever, funny and tearjerkingly sad.}

Yume Miru Kisuri: A Drug that Makes you Dream

{This VN falls safely into the Eroge zone. I'll mention this, I don't mind sex/sex scenes in my Visual Novels. But I read them for the story. As long as it doesn't detract from a good story, it's all vanilla in my book. The synopsis of YMK is pretty cool. In most VN's, you have a protagonist who is at once unique, but at the same time has enough leeway for you, the reader, to put yourself in his shoes. The protagonist of YMK bemoans the fact that he feels like he is "colourless". He feels that he has no personality to speak of, he's not unpopular, nor is he hated, but he feels that he adapts to the people around himself, and puts on a false mask, trying to be a "normal" person. That is until he meets the heroines, and slowly gains the "colour" he was missing in his life. The sex can get a bit over the top, but it's an eroge, so you really can't blame it. Overall the game is pretty well done, and has some stellar scenes/routes. I give it an 8/10. }

Osananajimi wa Daitouryou: My Girlfriend is the President

{The synopsis of this game is pretty out there. The idea is that one day an alien was piloting her ship near earth, she lost control and crash landed in Nippon (Japan). She landed on the Diet building, accidentally killing the Nippon government officials. She decides to fix everything, but to do so she has to brainwash the masses, so they won't panic. She institutes a democracy, mistaking the idea that all governments have one, and appoints your childhood friend (Yukino Ohama) as President of Nippon. This game is another one that falls squarely into the eroge zone. Four beautiful girls (your childhood friend, the president of Rusia (Russia), another childhood friend who turned you down in the past and is now the secretary of state and the aforementioned spaceship [in human form] that crashed into the Diet building), a protagonist who also shares the same mindset as Kurosu Taichi from Cross Channel (ie. seeing sexual harassment as a form of love), and various risque occurences between the protagonist and the heroines. With a ridiculous plot, and a game geared toward the eroge market, you'd expect something that isn't terribly well thought out story wise, but you'd be sorely mistaken. The character development in this game is amazing. The characters grow as people, their relationships feel real, and the protagonist get's stars in my book by discarding his playboy attitude once he commits to being with a girl. Add to that the great comedy and stellar supporting cast, you get a hell of a read. 8.5/10.}

Hoshizora no Memoria: Wish Upon a Shooting Star

{Just finished this VN today. The story is pretty interesting, the main character, Kagisaki You, used to play with a girl at the lookout when he was a kid, they used to watch the stars, and she was his only friend. He had to move away because of family issues, but they vowed to meet again one day. Seven years later, he returns to the town, and travels to the lookout, hoping to get a clue. All he has is the girls name, but he knows that if he tries, they'll reunite eventually. Once he gets to the top, he's surprised to find a young girl, who looks exactly like the girl did when she was a child. She says she's a shinigami (grim reaper) who reaps nightmares, and on a subsequent visit, she stabs him with her scythe and he looses the girls name from his memories. The cast in this is great, there are 7 routes, 3 of which are open from the beginning, 2 which open after completing one of the initial 3, and 2 which are what I would assume are the "true ends." All of the heroines are great, and there's a lot going on in the town that isn't initially obvious. They even make callbacks to a myth in town of a guy and girl who had their love reaped, and this myth is slowly revealed as being tied into the protagonist and his story. This game was emotional, and the twists were very well implemented, the only downside are the eroge scenes, let's just say they can be a bit awkward (as one of your heroines is your half sister, and another is the aforementioned shinigami (who as I've stated appears as a gradeschooler.) Still, great story, beautiful visuals, 8.5/10.}

Katawa Shoujo

{This one got a fair bit of attention some months ago, and deservedly so. I assume many people already know about this, but I'll put a bit about it down. This is an English VN (which is not terribly common). The synopsis is the protagonist has a heart defect that causes his heart to fail if he gets too stressed or hit in the chest. He has his first heart attack as a girl is confessing to him at school. After this he ends up being transferred to a school for "special" cases such as himself. This is a story about overcoming ones depression, and seeing the beautiful in life. The protagonist is initially pretty bummed about his circumstances, the girl who confessed to him grew apart from him emotionally, and he's feeling abandoned and alone. He meets several girls, with varying disabilities, and he begins to look past these issues, and see the girls for themselves. This game is pretty emotionally well done, the main issue with it is that the routes were not all written by the same person/group of persons. So some routes are fantastic, and others are noticeably less so. Overall though the routes are all pretty good, and as I said there are 1 or 2 that are noticeably stellar. 8/10.}

Fate/Stay Night

{This is the VN of VN fans. Everyone who has read a visual novel should have at least heard of this game, if not already read it. The synopsis is as follows. The protagonist is an aspiring mage, who only has one talent to speak of. The ability to "strengthen" items. And tbh he's not very good at doing it initially. He get's drawn into the Holy Grail war, and summons a "servant" to fight for him (all completely by accident might I add). Generally the servants are meant to be front line fighters, while getting support from the mage, but the protagonist can't really do much and is at a disadvantage. Still, he vows to fight and put an end to this conflict which is taking lives, because he wants to be a superhero, like his adopted father who saved him from death when he was a child. This game has 3 very different routes, Fate, Unlimited Blade Works, and Heaven's Feel. Each route, while following the same story, are completely different in so many ways. You really feel like you are playing 3 different visual novels going through Fate/Stay Night. Fantastic game, 9/10.}

Tsukihime

{This is a classic. It's a bit dated, the art isn't the best to look at, but the story more than makes up for it. The main character Tohno Shiki, used to live in the Tohno estate, until one day he had an accident, and got sent off to live with a foster family. Several years later he's called back to the house, as his father has just passed away. After living for seven years in a family that was pretty much middle class, he has trouble adapting to the super stuffy/aristocratic family. Add to this his strange ability to see what he calls "lines of death", which is an ability he got after his accident when he was a child, and the various supernatural occurrences that seem to be drawn to him, and you have one hell of a story. Shiki can see "lines of death" which he can cut no matter what. He can use any instrument, even one such as a butter knife, and can cut through anything, even steel, as long as he can see the lines. He feels like this ability (basically being able to see "death" in everything he looks at) would have driven him insane, if not for a kind older girl who gave him a pair of glasses which block the lines from his vision. He tries to live like normally, but as I've mentioned already, strange occurrences just seem to be drawn to him whether he likes it or not. 9/10, may upgrade to a 10/10 in a few years (since they are doing a remake of the game with enhanced graphics)}

These are not all the visual novels I've read, but I've been typing for a good 90 minutes now and it's nearing 7 AM.

If this thread get's any kind of traffic, I'll gladly update later, feel free to post recommendations/mini reviews of your own, please add spoiler tags for anyone who hasn't read them/may want to read them in the future.
 

Smertnik

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Well, there's Ever17 which seems to be rather popular and generally well regarded. I found it pretty boring and obnoxious, though. Other than that you seem to have read everything I could recommend as far as the romance genre goes.
 

DasDestroyer

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Ever17 and Stiens;Gate are certainly a must, Key's Kanon is pretty good and their latest VN Rewrite is pretty damn awesome, albeit very different from what they normally make. Muv-Luv Alternative has an amazing presentation, although you need to read the first Muv-Luv to get the story, which is also really good. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni starts off as an amazing thriller VN, and as you learn more about what is going on, it becomes more of a puzzle, where you try to put the pieces together and figure out what the hell is happening. Saya no Uta is a short lovecraftian horror. Speaking of short, True Remembrance and Planetarian are short but really good. Finally, G-Senjou no Maou and Sharin no Kuni, which are made by the same developer whose name eludes me, have a somewhat unique story structure, and are both all-around well made VNs.
Don't worry, I'm not just listing all of the VNs I've read :p [sub]only 80% of them[/sub]
Edit: I might update this post with reviews once I'm on my pc, because there's no way I'm going to type so much on my tablet.
 

StormShaun

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Hmm, nice collection. Though I found Little Busters better then Clannad. :p
For suggestions I will put these down for ya.

Kira Kira - A VN about love, sweat and rock n roll!
So the music is damn good.
It's funny.
I also liked the comedy.
And it is some what dramatic. :O


You should also try out Overdrive's (The guys who made it) other VNs.

Like Deardrops and Edelweiss. (Deardrops is like another KiraKira but still awesome and Edelweiss is about alchemy.)
BOT AWESOME!

Kanon, the first VN by Key. (Guys who made Clannad en etc) So you know what to expect. T_T

Muv Luv (And Muv Luv Alternative) - There are three parts to the Muv Luv collection, Muv Luv which is the first part which is about the usual school drama and etc. Muv Luv Unlimited which involves giant robots and spoiler spoiler. And the Muv Luv Alternative which is the meat of the series.

G-Senjou no Maou - It is a serious drama/thriller with a good sense of classical music. It has a dark theme too.
Still, really good!

Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo - I think it's made by the people who did the VN above me, but it's pretty different even though it feels the same.

Other then that, I think you got all my other recommendations.
 

saintdane05

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Obviously, there is the entire Ace Attourney series, and the ones mentioned, but I also recommend the Monster Girl Quest novels. THey are smut (Genuine smut, like, porn to the max), but smut with a good message and something to say. I should warn you, though, that the majority of the sex scenes are also rape scenes. Female on male rape scenes. There is also a bit of the occasional Vore, but none of it is gory.

Plus, it has a great sense of humor, and a varied monster design.
<spoiler=Lots of pics. May be NSFW>



 

Lovely Mixture

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I never know what to think when I see VN discussions outside the normal channels.
You'll get rage, fanboyism, fangirlism, austere behavior, hatred of anime, love of anime, nitpicking, pretentiousness, and other unsettling words


And I am very well aware of my glass house here, I find myself behaving elitist despite my hardest to try not do so.

90% of the time, the love the first VN that you play, you'll love it to death, once you've garnered a couple titles under you....You'll start to realize that the ones you loved were not really that good.

Case in point. I used to be a HUGE Type-Moon fan a couple years, and now I just cringe whenever I see people praising Fate/stay night as a godly visual novel (and I mean no offense to you in particular Diddy_King). Same with things by KEY, because Maeda has been rehashing his archtypes to death, and once you've seen them once you've seen them all and the "OH SO SAD" things get old.


The visual novels that I've played AND have stayed positive in my memory:

Saya no Uta (as mentioned by DasDestroyer) as well as Kikokugai, both by Urobuchi. Urobuchi's work is a mix of action cliches, sexual fetish gimmicks, all while having a nice setting. The former elements turn people off of Urobuchi and I understand that, I think he creates an interesting dark and compelling atmosphere with his writing, and that's why I enjoy it.

Maji de Watashi ni Koishinasai is probably the best visual novel I think I've played, it is action-comedy, romance, drama, martial arts. And if anyone had tried to sell it to me with those words I would I have shot them down in an instant. Majikoi works well to me because instead of using the characters as merely archtypes, I get the feeling that they are actually characters populating a world, whenever they are on screen they set their own "aura."
The romance is hit or miss, but the character interactions are so fun that I don't mind it. It has ero, but you never find yourself waiting for it, because the actual plots are more engaging.


The works of ZIGZAG [http://vndb.org/p31] have a very cool indie appeal, though they do tend to get a bit wordy.

I'll mention more when I can.

EDIT:

MGQ, Steins;Gate are all nice titles as well. Also Shikkoku no Sharnoth.
 

Diddy_King

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x-Tomfoolery-x said:
Do you have a PSP? If so, I'd recommend this.
http://metalgear.wikia.com/wiki/Metal_Gear_Solid:_Digital_Graphic_Novel

Also 999 for the DS is pretty decent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/999:_Nine_Hours,_Nine_Persons,_Nine_Doors
I have read 999 and Virtue's last Reward. Speaking of PSP Visual Novels, there is one being translated right now. It's called Danganronpa and it looks pretty good. As for MTGS, I have never been a fan of the series, so I don't know if it'd interest me.

VNDB link: http://vndb.org/v7014

{Special high school students throughout Japan are transferred to Kibougamine Academy because they excel above all other students in a certain way. The protagonist, Naegi Makoto (excels in Luck) arrives on the first day of class only to fall unconscious after he steps through the gates. When he wakes up, he meets up with 14 other students who went through the same experience, and they find that all possible exits have been sealed shut.

The 15 are then informed by Monokuma, a black and white robot bear who appears to be behind the whole affair, that they are playing a game and the only way for them to leave the school is to "graduate". To do so, they must kill another student and get away with it. A trial will be held after a corpse is found, and if the culprit is found guilty, they will be executed and the game will continue. If they are found innocent, they will graduate and be able to leave, while the rest of the cast gets executed in their place...
}

Edit: Forgot to mention it's at like ~85% complete, so may be seeing this pretty soon.
 

Diddy_King

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ShinyCharizard said:
Kira Kira and Tomoyo After are pretty good.
Read both, I enjoyed KiraKira, give it an 8/10. I do plan on reading more from Mangagamer, such as Edelweiss. I have already read Da Capo as well, I give it an 8.5/10. Eventually I'll read the rest of the series of that, but I don't like to jump from one VN to another of the same universe immediately after. Tomoyo, I don't know how to rank this, it's good but
{So damned depressing. I guess it's just like Key to make you cry your eyes out, but it feels crappy that there's really no GOOD ending for it.}
I guess I'd say 7/10.
 

Diddy_King

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Smertnik said:
Well, there's Ever17 which seems to be rather popular and generally well regarded. I found it pretty boring and obnoxious, though. Other than that you seem to have read everything I could recommend as far as the romance genre goes.
Thinking of Ever17 next. A friend of mine who kind of got me into this whole genre recommended it, and Tsukihime as his first 2 recommendations. Like I said I loved Tsukihime, but I had trouble getting into it, finished the Arcueid route and then kind of put it down for the longest time, once I picked it back up I couldn't put it down. As for Ever17, I've started it 2-3 times, but every time I couldn't get far before I got bored, though eventually I'm going to knuckle down and get through it because I have heard good things mostly.
 

Diddy_King

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DasDestroyer said:
Ever17 and Stiens;Gate are certainly a must, Key's Kanon is pretty good and their latest VN Rewrite is pretty damn awesome, albeit very different from what they normally make. Muv-Luv Alternative has an amazing presentation, although you need to read the first Muv-Luv to get the story, which is also really good. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni starts off as an amazing thriller VN, and as you learn more about what is going on, it becomes more of a puzzle, where you try to put the pieces together and figure out what the hell is happening. Saya no Uta is a short lovecraftian horror. Speaking of short, True Remembrance and Planetarian are short but really good. Finally, G-Senjou no Maou and Sharin no Kuni, which are made by the same developer whose name eludes me, have a somewhat unique story structure, and are both all-around well made VNs.
Don't worry, I'm not just listing all of the VNs I've read :p [sub]only 80% of them[/sub]
Edit: I might update this post with reviews once I'm on my pc, because there's no way I'm going to type so much on my tablet.
I do plan on reading Steins;Gate, it's on my list. But the thing stopping me is Chaos;Head. I have watched Steins;Gate, and loved the anime. But I want to read Chaos;Head first, and the Protagonist of Chaos;Head is just so insufferable to me. That's another one I have as a possible next, so maybe if I can just look past that protagonist (the story seems great at least).
 

Diddy_King

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DasDestroyer said:
Ever17 and Stiens;Gate are certainly a must, Key's Kanon is pretty good and their latest VN Rewrite is pretty damn awesome, albeit very different from what they normally make. Muv-Luv Alternative has an amazing presentation, although you need to read the first Muv-Luv to get the story, which is also really good. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni starts off as an amazing thriller VN, and as you learn more about what is going on, it becomes more of a puzzle, where you try to put the pieces together and figure out what the hell is happening. Saya no Uta is a short lovecraftian horror. Speaking of short, True Remembrance and Planetarian are short but really good. Finally, G-Senjou no Maou and Sharin no Kuni, which are made by the same developer whose name eludes me, have a somewhat unique story structure, and are both all-around well made VNs.
Don't worry, I'm not just listing all of the VNs I've read :p [sub]only 80% of them[/sub]
Edit: I might update this post with reviews once I'm on my pc, because there's no way I'm going to type so much on my tablet.
I watched Kanon (Anime) and my VN friend says the VN doesn't really bring anything to the table that the Anime didn't (except for awkward sex scenes). Eventually I do plan on giving it a shot, but it's not high up their on my list. I played Rewrite, got through the common routes and very much enjoyed it, but I kind of burned myself out on it. I think the main reason I burned myself out on it is I did the Lucia route as like my second playthrough, and it was too good. I tend to be pretty good at saving the better routes for last, but this time I did it early and the other routes were just falling a bit flat compared to hers IMO. Chihaya's was pretty good though
{Even if it is just Unlimited Blade Works, rewritten (see what I did there :p).}
Previously mentioned VN friend finished it and loved it though, so I'll have to get back into it and wrap it up eventually. I have heard Muv-Luv Alternative is great, but I've heard that Muv-Luv is a bit of a chore, don't remember where I heard this though, so may see about downloading that, since I've heard Alternative is pretty high up there on the rankings. As for Higurashi, it's another one that gets very high marks everywhere, but that art man. I'm not sure I can get past it. I'm a bit of an art snob, maybe it's since I started with Clannad and Key has such beautiful art (IMO). A friend of mine mentioned a patch for the game that used the PS2 version sprites though, so I may look into it if I can find said patch. Saya no Uta is another game near the top of my list. I've heard great things about it, and the fact that it's written by the same guy who wrote Fate/Zero and Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica, make me pretty interested.

I have read G-Senjou, fantastic visual novel, 9/10. Interesting approach to the Visual Novel structure, and great story. Lots of intrigue, mystery, twists and even a fair bit of romance. Also great art and music (since they use a lot of classical stuff, since that's the protagonists favorite music). The end had me in tears and smiling at the same time. Also any story that
{Turns a villain that you just despise into your favorite character is gold in my book (if you've read it I'm talking about Azai Gonzou.}
Loved it.

As for Sharin no Kuni, that is like the #1 recommended VN by my VN friend, but for some reason I just can't get any drive to read it. He's been hassling me forever to read it, and while it looks pretty interesting, I just don't terribly feel like it. I'll read it eventually, but it's less so from his recommendations, and more from the fact that Akebesoft2 (the guys behind G-senjou) are also behind it.
 

Diddy_King

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StormShaun said:
Hmm, nice collection. Though I found Little Busters better then Clannad. :p
For suggestions I will put these down for ya.

Kira Kira - A VN about love, sweat and rock n roll!
So the music is damn good.
It's funny.
I also liked the comedy.
And it is some what dramatic. :O


You should also try out Overdrive's (The guys who made it) other VNs.

Like Deardrops and Edelweiss. (Deardrops is like another KiraKira but still awesome and Edelweiss is about alchemy.)
BOT AWESOME!

Kanon, the first VN by Key. (Guys who made Clannad en etc) So you know what to expect. T_T

Muv Luv (And Muv Luv Alternative) - There are three parts to the Muv Luv collection, Muv Luv which is the first part which is about the usual school drama and etc. Muv Luv Unlimited which involves giant robots and spoiler spoiler. And the Muv Luv Alternative which is the meat of the series.

G-Senjou no Maou - It is a serious drama/thriller with a good sense of classical music. It has a dark theme too.
Still, really good!

Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo - I think it's made by the people who did the VN above me, but it's pretty different even though it feels the same.

Other then that, I think you got all my other recommendations.
Already mentioned that I did KiraKira, but I do agree the music was great. Romance, Punk and friendship, a great read all around 8/10. Also the whole scene where
{to be more punk they start cursing in their everyday lives is brilliant. Especially when the prim and proper girl has the tea party with the nuns and says "This is some F***ing good tea" and the nun nearly has a heart attack :p.}

I have Edelweiss and Deardrops, I loaded both up last night, but didn't get far. I know my next VN will be pretty soon, but I literally finished 2 this week, so I guess I was feeling kind of burnt out last night (and also wasn't sure what one I wanted to pursue) so instead I decided to talk about VNs with people.

And yes, G-senjou and Sharin no Kuni were made by Akebesoft2, the only other VN they have that's translated is A Profile http://vndb.org/v1894 which is another one I was looking at.

Speaking of games being un-translated, I really wish there were some more games translated by Alcot (the people behind My Girlfriend is the President). I was looking at their stuff on VNDB and there are some cool looking stories, and I just really enjoyed Osadai, something about their lighthearted approach just struck me as a breath of fresh air and had me grinning the entire time I played.
 

DEAD34345

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Weird. I hated Nagisa with a passion when I went through the VN, but she grew on me when I finally saw the anime.

Anyway, I haven't read all that many Visual Novels (yet), so the only ones I can really recommend outside of what you've already read are G-Senjou no Maou and Muv-Luv: Alternate. Both are amazing experiences, but they have major downsides too:

G-Senjou No Maou has pretty much everything you'd want from a Visual Novel; story, soundtrack, great characters, but it all falls apart if you play any route other than the main one.

Muv-Luv: Alternate is a 50 hour long world dimension-spanning epic war story that completely blew me away the first time I went through it, but it pretty much requires sitting through its mediocre-at-best predecessor to get to it. (Also the name alone almost makes it embarrassing to recommend... "Muv-Luv"? Who the hell thought that up? )

I've actually been looking for another VN to read myself, and your tastes seem pretty similar to mine, so I guess I'll finally give Cross-Channel another shot. The protagonist put me off last time, but I only played about 15 minutes or so, so hopefully he'll turn out to be better than I thought.
 

NeutralDrow

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Obligatory post and open invitation to all into our resident <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/Visual-Novels>Visual Novels usergroup.

Honestly, I'm surprised I'm the first one here...

Diddy_King said:
So, I've been on a visual novel stint lately. I started reading visual novels about a year and a half ago after I decided I wanted to continue the story of Clannad (ie. read stuff that was left out of the anime). Ever since then I've been reading/playing VN's pretty voraciously. Can't decide what I want to read next, so let's talk about some Visual Novels and maybe I can get some ideas on what to read.

Also, as for recommendations, I'll take any, but tbh I really enjoy romance in my Visual Novels, it's not a deal breaker if it doesn't have it, but I do enjoy it.
Well, you already have four of my major recommendations (Tsukihime, Fate/Stay Night, YMK, and Katawa Shoujo), so I have fewer recommendations than I might normally. On the other hand, since our tastes seem to match...

<url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.308335-Neutral-Drow-reviews-Symphonic-Rain>Symphonic Rain is very good. That's almost all I can say about it...other than pointing out that it also has a rhythm game.

You might be interested in <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.163769-Neutral-Drow-reviews-Kanon>Kanon if you liked Clannad. I haven't played the latter, so I can't really compare them, but Kanon is one of my big three favorites (along with Tsukihime and Yume Miru Kusuri), and the comparison opinion I seem to hear the most is that Clannad has the better story and side characters, but Kanon has better heroines.

While I had a...mixed opinion of it, you might give <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.237875-Neutral-Drow-reviews-Crescendo>Crescendo a try. I had problems with it, but I can see why it's a fairly popular title.

<url=www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.252998-Neutral-Drow-reviews-Princess-Waltz>Princess Waltz is a bit light on the romance, and is pretty expensive compared to other VNs, but I'll throw it out there. I liked the characters, and it's quite pretty.

You played Tsukihime. Have you played <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.139628-TYPE-MOON-reviews-Kagetsu-Tohya>Kagetsu Tohya, yet?

Obligatory <url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.206764-Neutral-Drow-reviews-Kana-Little-Sister>Kana: Little Sister recommendation. I'd almost consider it required reading, though it's also a hard game to recommend, in a way.

I haven't finished them, just yet, but I'm having a lot of fun with Family Project and Snow Sakura. They're both really funny; the latter I'd describe as a romantic comedy with major, major emphasis on the comedy. And the former has Norio Wakamoto.

I'll admit watching the anime, I wasn't really a fan of Nagisa. But after playing the Visual Novel, I can say I really loved her as a character.
Oh! That sounds promising. I haven't played Clannad, yet. Well...finally got it installed, at least, but I have a few games to finish first; my backlog is huge (playing Da Capo now). I have heard complaints about her even from people who share my tastes, but since those seem to be anime-centered, I might have a better reaction than I thought.

Okay, so I've heard more complaints than that, but none of the other ones seemed to match my personal tastes, so it's one of the few I take seriously. Besides, I loved Kanon.
 

Arcane Azmadi

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I'd second any recommendation for Ever 17. Yeah, you have to play through all 4 routes to get the true ending (2 for each character, so at least you're not playing the same story 4 times) and there are plot holes you can drive a bus through if you're determined enough but it's worth it because the shocking twists in the "true" route are INCREDIBLE. I was blown away by the revelations in that final story, it justified the entire game.

Phantom is also a good game, but it's impossible to get a good version. The DVD Play version Hirameki released in the US (Phantom of Inferno) is a disgrace (DVD Play itself was just a flawed concept) and is clunky, crude and poorly translated, while the vastly superior PC version (Phantom ~Integration~) has no english version and I don't believe anyone has made a patch for it. Regardless, it's a fantastic story; yes, Phantom of Inferno is awkward to play, but it IS worth it. Take my word for it. If you can read Japanese, play Phantom ~Integration~. If you can't, play Phantom of Inferno. Totally unique. How many visual novels have YOU played where you play as a brainwashed teenage master assassin for the mob?

Hourglass of Summer is also something I'd tentatively recommend just for the Kaho route. It's also a stupid DVD Play like Phantom (if anything, it's even worse with the DVD coding being HORRIFICALLY bad) and to be completely honest I never found the interest to actually finish it- I played the Tomomi route after beating the Kaho route and was disappointed to find that her personal story was actually WORSE than the one she had integrated into the Kaho route, so I never continued. But the Kaho route is just SO good that I'd recommend finding it and playing it just for that alone.

saintdane05 said:
Obviously, there is the entire Ace Attourney series, and the ones mentioned, but I also recommend the Monster Girl Quest novels. THey are smut (Genuine smut, like, porn to the max), but smut with a good message and something to say. I should warn you, though, that the majority of the sex scenes are also rape scenes. Female on male rape scenes. There is also a bit of the occasional Vore, but none of it is gory.

Plus, it has a great sense of humor, and a varied monster design.
<spoiler=Lots of pics. May be NSFW>


Yeah, Monster Girl Quest is pretty good. Dunno why, but it FEELS better than it should; its story, while interesting, is honestly rather trite and cliche and its combat gameplay (it has pretentions of being an ero-JRPG) is pretty damn poor. But I love it anyway and found it quite addictive. Yes, partly because I have a colossal hard-on for monstergirl porn, but also because the characters are also really likeable. Alice is a great character, even if her (first) "big plot twist" is so obvious that you'll guess it the INSTANT you see her (her second one is actually pretty unexpected and hits rather hard). I'm hoping that in the upcoming chapter 3 Luka will FINALLY get over his stupid neuroses and just admit that he loves her. Honestly, the "no, I can't, she's a monster" schtick is getting REALLY old by this stage...
Lovely Mixture said:
Case in point. I used to be a HUGE Type-Moon fan a couple years, and now I just cringe whenever I see people praising Fate/stay night as a godly visual novel (and I mean no offense to you in particular Diddy_King).
Hmm. Well I don't know what standards you're judging visual novels by, because Fate/stay night IS still the greatest visual novel of all time. Seriously, the production standards of that thing are through the roof! 99.999% of visual novels are still just scrolling text, still character image, different still character image, occasional CG, maybe 2 or 3 movies per game. Fate animated those still images (not literally animation) to create actual ACTION scenes with them, giving a real sense of action, motion and intensity. The prologue action scene between Lancer and Archer shows this off incredibly well. The game is also REALLY long, with 3 completely different routes through that each COMPLETELY change the shape of the story- things you thought you knew are turned on their heads, characters who live in one route die in another, entirely new plot threads appear out of nowhere. Fate just does this better than ANY other visual novel I've ever played. It's staggering.
 

Diddy_King

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Lovely Mixture said:
I never know what to think when I see VN discussions outside the normal channels.
You'll get rage, fanboyism, fangirlism, austere behavior, hatred of anime, love of anime, nitpicking, pretentiousness, and other unsettling words


And I am very well aware of my glass house here, I find myself behaving elitist despite my hardest to try not do so.

90% of the time, the love the first VN that you play, you'll love it to death, once you've garnered a couple titles under you....You'll start to realize that the ones you loved were not really that good.

Case in point. I used to be a HUGE Type-Moon fan a couple years, and now I just cringe whenever I see people praising Fate/stay night as a godly visual novel (and I mean no offense to you in particular Diddy_King). Same with things by KEY, because Maeda has been rehashing his archtypes to death, and once you've seen them once you've seen them all and the "OH SO SAD" things get old.


The visual novels that I've played AND have stayed positive in my memory:

Saya no Uta (as mentioned by DasDestroyer) as well as Kikokugai, both by Urobuchi. Urobuchi's work is a mix of action cliches, sexual fetish gimmicks, all while having a nice setting. The former elements turn people off of Urobuchi and I understand that, I think he creates an interesting dark and compelling atmosphere with his writing, and that's why I enjoy it.

Maji de Watashi ni Koishinasai is probably the best visual novel I think I've played, it is action-comedy, romance, drama, martial arts. And if anyone had tried to sell it to me with those words I would I have shot them down in an instant. Majikoi works well to me because instead of using the characters as merely archtypes, I get the feeling that they are actually characters populating a world, whenever they are on screen they set their own "aura."
The romance is hit or miss, but the character interactions are so fun that I don't mind it. It has ero, but you never find yourself waiting for it, because the actual plots are more engaging.


The works of ZIGZAG [http://vndb.org/p31] have a very cool indie appeal, though they do tend to get a bit wordy.

I'll mention more when I can.
I do wholly agree that you have rose colored glasses for your first Visual Novel experience. While I don't think that Clannad (my first VN) is the best ever, I do find I have a predisposition towards Schooldays/romance visual novels. And I do also agree about Keys tendency to reuse the same idea over and over.
{Comas, ghost girls, superpowers or supernatural powers of one form or another, idiot friend who is actually a super-bro, etc.}
But I can't say I dislike it at all.

As for what you mentioned about Fate/Stay, it's good, but it's not the best either. A fair bit of the points it gets from me are from the unique story and setting.
{I will readily admit that the Fate route and the Heaven's Fell route (to a lesser extent) weren't terribly great. Fate was just a bit meh, and Heaven's Feel's heroine was Sakura, who is just a wholly dis likeable character. UBW was great though, and I went into it disliking Rin, but falling in love with her at the end. I've mentioned before, but when a VN (or another experience) changes how I feel about a character it get's points from me.}

Majikoi is not finished yet right? I've been keeping an eye on http://vntls.tindabox.net/ and it's still showing as incomplete, I assume there is a partial patch out? It looks great, but I'm not sure about playing something that isn't fully translated. Another one I'm interested in is Grisaia no Kajitsu (http://vntls.tindabox.net/project/grisaia-no-kajitsu/) but it is also not fully translated, even though it does have a demo out.

And don't mind offending me when you talk about what you like and dislike. I don't get offended by anything, and I agree that people enjoy different things. It's all good, as long as we agree on the inherent strength of the genre in particular :p.
 

Diddy_King

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Lunncal said:
Weird. I hated Nagisa with a passion when I went through the VN, but she grew on me when I finally saw the anime.

Anyway, I haven't read all that many Visual Novels (yet), so the only ones I can really recommend outside of what you've already read are G-Senjou no Maou and Muv-Luv: Alternate. Both are amazing experiences, but they have major downsides too:

G-Senjou No Maou has pretty much everything you'd want from a Visual Novel; story, soundtrack, great characters, but it all falls apart if you play any route other than the main one.

Muv-Luv: Alternate is a 50 hour long world dimension-spanning epic war story that completely blew me away the first time I went through it, but it pretty much requires sitting through its mediocre-at-best predecessor to get to it. (Also the name alone almost makes it embarrassing to recommend... "Muv-Luv"? Who the hell thought that up? )

I've actually been looking for another VN to read myself, and your tastes seem pretty similar to mine, so I guess I'll finally give Cross-Channel another shot. The protagonist put me off last time, but I only played about 15 minutes or so, so hopefully he'll turn out to be better than I thought.
I have a friend who I got into Visual Novels. I recommended a bunch to him, got him to read Tsukihime, Tomoyo After, Little Busters!, etc. I recommended Cross Channel to him and he also couldn't get into it because of the protagonist. I don't see how that's possible, he's got such an interesting mind and way to see the world that he feels vastly different from other VN protagonists. Also when he
{takes off his shirt in the first scene and says "My nipples collaborated with the wind." I knew we'd get along well :p.}

But in all seriousness, Cross Channel is fantastic. If you haven't read any spoilers on it, I highly recommend not even looking at the snynopsis, and just reading through it. I knew a couple of minor things about the plot and even though I knew them I still got goosebumps so many times from that game.