Questions about Katawa Shoujo...

[shogunblade]

I have not done a search post on this, and I just started the game the other day (I'm on day 4 in Act 1, if that means anything to anybody who has played the game), but some questions have come up, questions that I think are unique to me, and maybe some people could help me out with it a little bit.

I have no real background with visual novels (Well, I played a Peach Princess game a few years ago, but that as I understand, is Hentai, not a visual novel), so this is my first, and there are a few questions, about the game and how I feel, that I am curious about:

1) Did/Does the subject matter make you depressed, at least in the very beginning? I don't know if it is just me, but upon your experiencing Arrthymia within the game, the whole hospital thing really made me quite sad. Is this just a game that's hitting heartstrings very well (no pun intended) or is this a common occurrence with players? I cannot think of any game I have played (Movies, certainly) that really make me feel for the protagonist almost immediately, but it left me, including when I went to bed that night (about 40 minutes later), quite sad.
2) Is there a way to experience an even interaction with all the girls, or will one have a shorter playtime unless I go back and click a different option? I kind of like all the girls (Some more than others, and even a few I'd call my Waifu, shockingly), but I'm sitting here, thinking if I make the wrong choice, I'll miss interacting with one girl over the other. I like them all so much, but I want to get an equal amount of time before I sort of settle to one, or am I playing the game with the wrong intent? If so, please correct me so I don't play the game thinking otherwise.
3) One thing that has come to mind with this game is that I'm slowly looking at these girls and feeling more... I guess, accepting of people with physical differences, but something came to mind as I continue playing: If this were a multimillion dollar game (Wishful thinking, I know), could it realistically teach people about those differences more so? As I played the game, I keep picturing some way of seeing a version of Shizune, but with her hands moving (accordingly to the region's Sign Language) in a way, that people could perhaps learn more about sign language, or a way to understand more about Blindness with Lilly? It wouldn't work with all the girls, but it seemed interesting to me.
4) I ended up getting a clash scene (Looked like a clash to me) between Lilly and Shizune, and here I am thinking, "Oh damn... What did I do wrong?" Should I get used to seeing these as the game wears on, or was this a rare instance?
5) Am I too early into the game to guess which of the girls likes me? I think that Rin kind of fancies me, but I cannot tell if she wasn't written as interestingly as all the other girls or her sense of humor makes me think otherwise (Whether Drawn or Real Life, I am kind of blind to sarcasm or tells, I don't read people very well).

I hope being in the gaming Discussion is the right place for this. I'm having a fun time with Katawa Shoujo so far, and it feels like an experience that I'm glad I am having. Hopefully, I can get some answers, and maybe provoke a little conversation about the game, since I'm so late to the party I want to be a part of.

Thank you, Escapist.

 

[Maximum Bert]

Subject matter didnt really depress me actually I found it did the opposite and in parts it was quite touching.

The second act onwards will be heavily weighted with one girl (unless you really mess up and the game will end) if you want to see another route you will have to go back and select different options in act 1 to get the desired act 2 onwards. You cannot give an equal amount of time to each girl after act 1 nor can you be in a relationship with more than one.

Personally I played it normally to start with and then afterwards used a guide on act 1 so I could get onto a different act 2 afterwards (and then played normally again). I actually got all the best endings on my first go so never saw a bad ending as I couldnt be bothered to go back just to get a worse ending than I got already.

As for which girl likes you well all could it just depends how you act towards them or rather what dialogue you select.

Enjoy it anyway I was expecting it to be naff but I actually quite liked it so far its the only visual novel I have managed to get through, not that I try a huge variety.

 

[Nouw]

Don't over think it and just follow your heart dude, that is how you'll get the most emotional gratification out of Katawa Shoujo

 

[Drummodino]

Don't over think it and just follow your heart dude, that is how you'll get the most emotional gratification out of Katawa Shoujo

^^ This.

The game is best experienced going into blind in my opinion. Just do what feels right, there's no way to fail the game. I will say that you do need multiple playthroughs if you want to learn more about each girl.

 

[BrotherRool]

2) Is there a way to experience an even interaction with all the girls, or will one have a shorter playtime unless I go back and click a different option? I kind of like all the girls (Some more than others, and even a few I'd call my Waifu, shockingly), but I'm sitting here, thinking if I make the wrong choice, I'll miss interacting with one girl over the other. I like them all so much, but I want to get an equal amount of time before I sort of settle to one, or am I playing the game with the wrong intent? If so, please correct me so I don't play the game thinking otherwise.
4) I ended up getting a clash scene (Looked like a clash to me) between Lilly and Shizune, and here I am thinking, "Oh damn... What did I do wrong?" Should I get used to seeing these as the game wears on, or was this a rare instance?

The way the game basically works is that the choices you make in Act 1 will decide which girls storyline you follow (although their are some points where the branching changes) and then that storyline will basically be completely unique to that girl, including all the things that you do. From that point on the choices become about how your relationship with that person works out.

To interact with another girl you basically have to restart the game and make the choices that will go down different routes. (The auto-skip and saves will be helpful here when you start doing that).

My recommendation is, that if there's a girl you're particularly interested in, ask me or someone else what choices you need to get on their route. Or look up a spoiler free FAQ like this one http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/650003-katawa-shoujo/faqs/63632 and make the suggested choices _only as far as act 1_

However if you kind of like everyone, then just carry on as you are. Once act 1 is finished, don't look at the guides whatever the case, it works best if those choices are made from your heart. If you ever make a mistake you can always scroll back through and do something different, making a save before a hard choice isn't a bad idea.

Don't over think it and just follow your heart dude, that is how you'll get the most emotional gratification out of Katawa Shoujo

^^ This.

The game is best experienced going into blind in my opinion. Just do what feels right, there's no way to fail the game. I will say that you do need multiple playthroughs if you want to learn more about each girl.

I almost agree with this but not quite. Some of the choices in Act 1 aren't very transparent and I always feel the game works best if you're following someone's storyline because you like that person, rather than stumbling on it by accident.

The big example is Emi, almost everyone ends up with her the first time through, not because they wanted to but because they wanted to deal with the heart problems, and then you don't quite appreciate her as much.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Well the first thing you do is take Hanako's route then go from there. Hanako is best girl.

Yeah the start was surprisingly impactful. The game in general is really well written.

EDIT: Oh god, do NOT pick "go for it" if you don't want Emi. That scumbag trick...

 

[EyeReaper]

Actually, do not try to spend even time with each girl. dedicate yourself to one, or else you'll get the early undecided ending, in which you

Spoiler

Get drunk and fall off the roof

And no, nothing is wrong with the clash scene, Shizune and Lilly just hate each other. Too bad shizune is best girl and siding against her is treason.

Speaking of Shizune... if you go for her, watch out for her bad ending, It's a tricky one to find. (haha)

 

[Mersadeon]

Ok, so I would also say "go for it blindly", BUT there is some very early locking-in that happens. Wykydtron already mentioned the Emi-lock-in.

This map http://meta.filesmelt.com/downloader.php?file=KatawaShoujoFlowchartv29.png

shows every decision in the game without spoiling much. I advise you think about which storypath you want to go, look at the map to find where the lock-in happens for that path, go for that and then forget the map until your next playthrough.




All the paths are fun, but I actually enjoyed Emi's path a lot - even though I was locked into it very early on (sort of against my plans), it grew on me.
However, if you plan on going for Rin, make sure you can swallow some discussion of the nature of art.

 

[BrotherRool]

I think one of the things I love most about the series is how almost none of the stories really revolve around a person's disability. The stories start off as if they were going to be like that but pretty soon the story is just about the normal things that drive people and affect their lives. Rin is a completely driven artist, Emi always pushes herself to the limit's of everything. Shizune expects herself to be the best in whatever she does. The disability isn't who they are and so the story doesn't really care about their disability much, it's not whats important

Well the first thing you do is take Hanako's route then go from there. Hanako is best girl.

Yeah the start was surprisingly impactful. The game in general is really well written.

EDIT: Oh god, do NOT pick "go for it" if you don't want Emi. That scumbag trick...

Hanako is the best if Hanako is the one that you naturally want to go for because of SPOILERS being totally designed based on why people would make that decision =D I love Hanako's storyline, it even made me really consider how I behave as a person.

Katawa Shoujo really is amazing. I think after Hanako I liked Emi's best and then Lilly (although the way Hanako seems like a different person when you do Lilly's annoyed me). Then Rin had so much going on, and it was kind of dark and unsatisfying, but I think it was meant to be and it was really gut-wrenching.

Shizune is the only storyline I didn't really get.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Having played a few visual novels now(Katawa Shoujo being my first), I have to say that this is a fairly straightforward VN in general. With the exception of Rin's arc, you should be able to move forward by favoring one girl above the others, then trying not to make too much of ass of yourself. Not every choice is obvious, but in the end you'll get funneled into one of two endings for each girl. Or you can be wishy-washy in Act I and get that other ending.

Try not to think too hard about it; you can always go back and play again since Katawa Shoujo is a pretty short game. It's not like, for example, Steins;Gate, where the choices are so many and nebulous that you likely won't get past the first character's ending without a guide(seriously, I have no idea why half of the choices I make in that game have any effect at all). Just do what you want, and see how it turns out.

Oh, and about feeling depressed... It's not the beginning of the game that you should worry about on that score... wait until you get further in... It's a pretty intense and interesting experience. Typically referred to in the VN community as "the feels." Not every VN goes that route, but a lot of them do.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Don't over think it and just follow your heart dude

Your arrhythmic heart that is.

I didn't like the "game" (visual novel?) very much. I just did a Ctrl+F for "game" and there're 30 uses so I'm guessing people consider this a game. I wonder where the gameplay went though?

It's really a visual choose-your-own-adventure where you're given a selection of women to choose from to have a romantic relationship. They're all somehow impaired - the blind, the mute, the legless, the armless and burn victim by my count. Each falls into the shy or quirky category. As the story moves on they become "shy but" or "quirky but" characters so they're given a sense of depth. This reminds me of a fun little bit in a Hong Sang Soo's Book chon bang hyang, where a character lets in a secret for looking introspective as fuck: "Tell a person he's one way on the outside, but the opposite in the inside". You're tough on the inside, but sweet in the inside. And so on.

If you don't mind Mary Sue stories this is essentially "choose your own fanfic" between yourself and the character of your choice. The writing is nothing special so I guess that's it for the novel part of visual novel.

Regarding your questions, if you're worried about your path you can always use a guide and savescum. I think Act I is where the character determines his path.

 

[Scars Unseen]

Don't over think it and just follow your heart dude

Your arrhythmic heart that is.

I didn't like the "game" (visual novel?) very much. I just did a Ctrl+F for "game" and there're 30 uses so I'm guessing people consider this a game. I wonder where the gameplay went though?

It's really a visual choose-your-own-adventure where you're given a selection of women to choose from to have a romantic relationship. They're all somehow impaired - the blind, the mute, the legless, the armless and burn victim by my count. Each falls into the shy or quirky category. As the story moves on they become "shy but" or "quirky but" characters so they're given a sense of depth. This reminds me of a fun little bit in a Hong Sang Soo's Book chon bang hyang, where a character lets in a secret for looking introspective as fuck: "Tell a person he's one way on the outside, but the opposite in the inside". You're tough on the inside, but sweet in the inside. And so on.

If you don't mind Mary Sue stories this is essentially "choose your own fanfic" between yourself and the character of your choice. The writing is nothing special so I guess that's it for the novel part of visual novel.

Regarding your questions, if you're worried about your path you can always use a guide and savescum. I think Act I is where the character determines his path.

Yeah, with a few exceptions, visual novels aren't games in my estimation. Rather, I'd say that they sit somewhere on a venn diagram where manga, light novels, and sometimes anime or audiobooks overlap. Some are incredibly simple, and some of them are practically opaque, but they are all about the story with varying degrees of interaction.

A few examples that I think stand out for varying reasons(this is not a best of list):

Grisaia no Kajitsu - this one is notable for two reasons. First, it's incredibly simple(even more so than Katawa Shoujo). You pretty much only have two choices per route to make, so everything is about the story and dialogue. Fortunately, the other thing that makes this one stand out is that the dialogue is spectacularly written. The humor is legitimately funny and well paced, while the serious parts manage to have proper impact without bringing you down enough to forget that this VN is - mostly - a comedy. The only truly bad parts are the H-scenes, but I have yet to see a VN where I didn't hate those, so maybe I'm just not the right audience for that sort of thing...

School Days - Okay, I'll be up front and say that I don't really like this VN. The characters are mostly unlikeable, and the main character in particular is an indecisive prick(though he doesn't come off too bad through his mannerisms, there are a lot of dialogue trees that leave me wanting to choose option C: don't be a dick). I also prefer at least some humor in my VNs, and this one has absolutely none. But I put School Days on this list for a reason, and that's because it has the absolutely best dispersion of choices of any of the VNs I've played. Your choices can alter the story in a lot of ways, and come up often enough to constantly make me feel like I'm having an effect on the story without being so frequent and nebulous that I feel that I have to look a a guide all the time. Also, this one feels less like an interactive manga and more like an interactive anime(lots of animated scenes in this one, including most of the dialogue).

Steins;Gate - Now this is probably my favorite VN so far, with the best plotted story, the best dialogue(though not quite as funny as Grisaia no Kajitsu), and my favorite art style. It's a pretty amazing sci-fi story that makes excellent use of foreshadowing(there are quite a few moments where ended up thinking "crap, I should have seen that coming"). However, the reason this VN makes my list is because it has the absolute worst way of making choices that I've seen yet. All of the choices you make in this game are made by interacting with your phone(mostly by replying to text messages), and the choices are so nebulous and come so often, that the first time I played through the game, I hadn't even realized I had made any story relevant choices at all until I had already reached one of the endings. A serious case of Guide Dang It [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/GuideDangIt], and it really says something about the VN's other qualities that Steins;Gate is still my favorite despite that.

One thing that those VNs have in common that Katawa Shoujo does not is that they are all voice acted(in Japanese, naturally). This really does add a lot in keeping you attached to the characters and engaged in the story(unless you're the sort that can't stand subbed anime, in which case I guess it wouldn't...).

 

[BrotherRool]

It's really a visual choose-your-own-adventure where you're given a selection of women to choose from to have a romantic relationship. They're all somehow impaired - the blind, the mute, the legless, the armless and burn victim by my count. Each falls into the shy or quirky category. As the story moves on they become "shy but" or "quirky but" characters so they're given a sense of depth. This reminds me of a fun little bit in a Hong Sang Soo's Book chon bang hyang, where a character lets in a secret for looking introspective as fuck: "Tell a person he's one way on the outside, but the opposite in the inside". You're tough on the inside, but sweet in the inside. And so on.

If you don't mind Mary Sue stories this is essentially "choose your own fanfic" between yourself and the character of your choice. The writing is nothing special so I guess that's it for the novel part of visual novel.

I think you're judging it in too broad a stroke, due to the way it was made KS fractures in style drastically with each branch. It's hard to make a general point about the writing for example, when each part was written by a different person.

I bring it up for example because "Each falls into the shy or quirky category. As the story moves on they become "shy but" or "quirky but" characters so they're given a sense of depth...If you don't mind Mary Sue stories this is essentially "choose your own fanfic" between yourself and the character of your choice." is pretty much set up as

Spoiler

the trap for the reader to fall into in Hanako's arc. They expect you to fall for her for no reason other than she's cutely shy and all those lingering expectations of how a story 'should' go in those circumstances. And then the story smacks the people down hard for thinking like that

.


I'm ambivalent to whether it's a game or not. It's a super boring question because I've never sat on a chair and suddenly found it to be uncomfortable because someone told me it's a stool. But I would agree that KS is much more on the novel side of the spectrum, and is frankly at it's best if you don't expect to interact with it any more than picking the storyline to go down. Except that that choice is an important part of the work, if it were non-interactive it would be very much inferior because the lessons and emotions it tries to give over are meant to come with the experience you build interacting with it. There's a big difference between reading about a person who let their frustration get the better of them and pushing someone who should have been respected in their decisions and being the person who says that. Even if it's only a tiny action of the course of a long story

 

[[REDACTED]]

Spoiler: Personal thoughts on Katawa Shoujo. Nothing too major will be spoiled, but don't read this if you want to go into the game blind.

I really enjoyed Katawa Shoujo. It wasn't perfect (the prose in general felt like it really could have used a better editor) but the characters were well-written, it got across its point without feeling too heavy-handed about, and it was just plain sweet. The sex scenes were also handled pretty well (with the exception of Hanako's route, Jesus fucking Christ), and made sense for the story and the characters involved. Mind you, I've only played three routes (Emi, Rin, and Hanako). Lily just doesn't interest me as a character, and I've heard that Shizune's route is godawful.

Rin's route[footnote]The Captcha says "basket case". Heh.[/footnote] was my personal favourite. It managed to be both a very moving and accurate portrayal of both physical and mental disability. I really appreciated that the writers allowed Rin to act like a complete tool at certain points. It would have been easy to write her stunted social skills as nothing more than another endearing quirk, but they didn't. Instead, her flaws are portrayed realistically, and add quite a bit of depth to her character. It's never explicitly stated what she suffers from, but speaking as someone with Asperger's[footnote]And yes, it's diagnosed, hold yer horses.[/footnote] I can say that she's the most accurate portrayal of someone on the autism spectrum I've ever seen in a work of fiction.

Emi's route was pretty good. Not nearly as interesting as Rin's, but it was well-written and fun. It got some good drama in there without being as overbearingly angsty as Rin's route could sometimes be, leaving lots of room for light-hearted humour[footnote]One word: "Anal".[/footnote]. I especially loved Hisao's speech about how "even knights need to help each other out". You can tell they gave a lot of thought into the kind of message they were sending. Emi's route is also the only one where Hisao isn't an asshole, so that's a big plus.

As for Hanako's route, well... I appreciate the moral of the story, but I don't feel like I got to see enough of Hanako as a person. If we had gotten some sort of epilogue after the good ending, it might have been great. As it is, it feels like we're ditching the story right when things are getting a little less fucked up between the two of them. It's unsatisfying. And seriously, that fucking sex scene. Good god.

This is the first (and so far only) VN I've ever played. All in all, it was a damn good introduction to the genre.

As for the whole "Is it a game" issue, my thoughts on the matter can best be summed up with this Extra Credits video.

Edit: @LoopStricken, why do I get the feeling don't want to see the un-cropped version of your avatar?

 

[Loop Stricken]

*Snip*

1) I'm paranoid about my heart so, yeah, pretty much worked immediately.

2) Nope. You choose a path, everyone else's screentime lessens. You know, like in real life.

3) Maybe, but that's massively dependent on whether or not it would actually SELL as a triple-A release. I find this unlikely, but then, I do not dare to hope. It has forsaken these lands.

4) It's pretty much the only one in the game that I can recall, at least.

5) Mild spoilers;

Spoiler

It's a Visual Novel, they ALL like you.

6) Hanako is best pony.

 

[Loop Stricken]

I think after Hanako I liked Emi's best and then Lilly (although the way Hanako seems like a different person when you do Lilly's annoyed me)

Shizune is the only storyline I didn't really get.

Well, that's 'cos she is. You as the player aren't interacting with Hanako as much as you do in her own storyline, so of course she's going to act differently.

Also, mild not-really-story-related spoilers for Shizune's arc:

Spoiler

Apparently the person in charge of writing her story really hated Shizune

 

[Loop Stricken]

*Snip*

1) I'm paranoid about my heart so, yeah, pretty much worked immediately.

2) Nope. You choose a path, everyone else's screentime lessens. You know, like in real life.

3) Maybe, but that's massively dependent on whether or not it would actually SELL as a triple-A release. I find this unlikely, but then, I do not dare to hope. It has forsaken these lands.

4) It's pretty much the only one in the game that I can recall, at least.

5) Mild spoilers;

Spoiler

It's a Visual Novel, they ALL like you.

6) Hanako is best pony.

is it me or is hanako like fluttershy off mlp i mean there both really shy

They're both shy. The similarities really do end there though.
[sub][sub]For a start, Fluttershy isn't best pony.[/sub][/sub]

 

[Scars Unseen]

Also, mild not-really-story-related spoilers for Shizune's arc:

Spoiler

Apparently the person in charge of writing her story really hated Shizune

That... actually makes a lot of sense. Especially when it comes to the bad ending...