Visual Novels -

[SkyeJordan66]

In the past few months, I've been reading/playing VNs for a while now. It's quite interesting for me because of the non linear aspect (very different from the traditional novels) and some of them provides multiple choices (just like real life) and endings.

I'm really new on this genre (as stated before) and played a couple of them (both are 18+). If you have some recommendations for me to play, drop them below.

Personal favs:
1. Freeloading Family (FFCreation) (18+)

Story is based on your relationship between your stepsis (if you're uncomfortable with this, there's a childhood friend option), uour life on college and your relationship between uour retired father. If slice of life is a thing for you, try experience this visual novel.

2. DeLuca Family (HopesGaming) (18+)

Story is based upon your life being trapped on a contract with a well known Mafia family. During your involvement on the underground world, you will learn how to survive in it while discovering the sercet of your parents involvement in the crime family.

 

[SSF2T Old User]

There already exists a General VN Thread

 

[Jolly Copulation]

I've been playing this photo-realistic VN called "real-life". Not only is the dating non-linear, it's downright unpredictable and the sexual scenes are interactive and so immersive you feel like you're right in the story. I recommend it.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

So I want to write my opinions on 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, feel free to rate me MOTI.

The best way I can summarize 13 Sentinels is: "Your scientists writers were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should". This is a game with a grand vision but the execution collapses under how great it is. In the game you play as 13 different characters over multiple time periods where all the events they go through culminates in one final battle. In some ways the game really reminds me of Baldr Sky, both having a lot of shared plot points and sci fi points, including a huge amount of backstory. But while Baldr Sky nails it with the plot, action and player attachment to characters, 13 Sentinels is a mess in all those regards.

I'll start with the gameplay. It is solid, but the game doesn't really give a lot of differences between characters and I found myself repeating a single strategy for every map. Also I wish the game would let me see how the action looks in the real world, but the UI is still pretty good and it feels satisfying to absolutely wreck enemies.

Now for the plot, I can't really explain why it's bad without spoilers, so here is the abridged version: There are way too many characters and plot points, so having any attachment to anyone is hard, which makes the emotional moments of the game fall flat. The plot also constantly jumps back and forth with flashbacks pretty much every chapter, so it's pointlessly confusing. Finally, some of the revelations make no sense or they make the game needlessly convoluted. I'll elaborate in the spoilers (I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum):

Spoiler

The game takes over a setting with time travel, except not really since it is very much locked time travel to specific time deltas, so there are multiple versions of characters from different timelines. This what adds to the confusion since this situation means there can be multiple versions of the same character (which can grow up to four different versions, which is ridiculous).

The plot also doesn't have any "hooks". You learn about the background, but there is nothing that makes you care about the impending final battle. No "traitors", no grand revelation, the idea how to win is more a deus ex machina than something. It's a huge miss, and in general the battles and story are really badly synched.

Since there are 13 characters, you only get around 2-3 hours of story for each character and those stories aren't that interesting both mechanically and in getting you to emphasize with those characters. This makes the build up for some events feel wasted.

My theory about the game was that the writers wanted to have the players play through the campaign over multiple timelines. This would have made the characters and events much more impactful (since those timelines end with the heroes losing and some characters becoming more villainous) and had the plot be more understandable since the player doesn't need to constantly flashback. But either due to the amount of characters or amount of writing required, this wasn't implemented so the whole plot needs to be in a single timelines.

I think the moment that best describes what my problem with the game is when 1/3 into the story the game tells you why everything went to shit in a single 30 second scene and never explains further despite that being the biggest open question.

 

[Marissa Moira]

So I want to write my opinions on 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, feel free to rate me MOTI.

The best way I can summarize 13 Sentinels is: "Your scientists writers were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should". This is a game with a grand vision but the execution collapses under how great it is. In the game you play as 13 different characters over multiple time periods where all the events they go through culminates in one final battle. In some ways the game really reminds me of Baldr Sky, both having a lot of shared plot points and sci fi points, including a huge amount of backstory. But while Baldr Sky nails it with the plot, action and player attachment to characters, 13 Sentinels is a mess in all those regards.

I'll start with the gameplay. It is solid, but the game doesn't really give a lot of differences between characters and I found myself repeating a single strategy for every map. Also I wish the game would let me see how the action looks in the real world, but the UI is still pretty good and it feels satisfying to absolutely wreck enemies.

Now for the plot, I can't really explain why it's bad without spoilers, so here is the abridged version: There are way too many characters and plot points, so having any attachment to anyone is hard, which makes the emotional moments of the game fall flat. The plot also constantly jumps back and forth with flashbacks pretty much every chapter, so it's pointlessly confusing. Finally, some of the revelations make no sense or they make the game needlessly convoluted. I'll elaborate in the spoilers (I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum):

Spoiler

The game takes over a setting with time travel, except not really since it is very much locked time travel to specific time deltas, so there are multiple versions of characters from different timelines. This what adds to the confusion since this situation means there can be multiple versions of the same character (which can grow up to four different versions, which is ridiculous).

The plot also doesn't have any "hooks". You learn about the background, but there is nothing that makes you care about the impending final battle. No "traitors", no grand revelation, the idea how to win is more a deus ex machina than something. It's a huge miss, and in general the battles and story are really badly synched.

Since there are 13 characters, you only get around 2-3 hours of story for each character and those stories aren't that interesting both mechanically and in getting you to emphasize with those characters. This makes the build up for some events feel wasted.

My theory about the game was that the writers wanted to have the players play through the campaign over multiple timelines. This would have made the characters and events much more impactful (since those timelines end with the heroes losing and some characters becoming more villainous) and had the plot be more understandable since the player doesn't need to constantly flashback. But either due to the amount of characters or amount of writing required, this wasn't implemented so the whole plot needs to be in a single timelines.

I think the moment that best describes what my problem with the game is when 1/3 into the story the game tells you why everything went to shit in a single 30 second scene and never explains further despite that being the biggest open question.

You can't get an S-Rank on the highest difficulty though without using Generation 1 Sentinels for maps with ground ones and you need Gen 4 Sentinels to deal with the air based ones.

So it's impossible to have a repeat strategy for every map since it relies on a rock scissors paper system for it's weaknesses.

The blade attack for ground based enemies will wipe the floor with them but has zero effect on air based enemies and can't hit them. The Gens 2 and 3 have a mix of sentry lasers and other support actions but you're going to need to juggle them between missions if you want the score multiplier to get to 30 or over if you want 30 wins in a row and to get enough chips for all the weapon unlocks.

 

[Irrational Exuberance]

I've been playing this photo-realistic VN called "real-life". Not only is the dating non-linear, it's downright unpredictable and the sexual scenes are interactive and so immersive you feel like you're right in the story. I recommend it.

Thanks for pulling your head out of your ass to share this bit of wisdom. Oops, I guess I should have been more subtle with my contempt, like you.

 

[Jolly Copulation]

Thanks for pulling your head out of your ass to share this bit of wisdom. Oops, I guess I should have been more subtle with my contempt, like you.

Joking is hardly contempt, but your reaction makes me think you're MATI. Contempt would be more along the lines of: "Maybe if you were living your best life, you wouldn't need to live vicariously through the adult-child equivalent of weeb picture books." But hey, that's just an example of what contempt would sound like. Don't take it to heart, friend, I'm sure you aren't playing VNs to fill a void in your life.

 

[L50LasPak]

Thread, I'm vaguely interested, are there any visual novels out there that are so good you would recommend them to someone who outright doesn't like Visual Novels? To make a comparison to anime, I'd recommend a show like Cowboy Bebop even to people who don't like anime because the core Sci-Fi elements and world building are so tight, plus it has a good soundtrack. Is there anything like this you've encountered that might have a wider appeal?

So far the only VN I've played is Saya No Uta and much to my dismay there wasn't really a way to turn off the sex scenes. The Lovecraftian horror element was pretty well done though. I also had to bend over backwards to get it running on my system so I'd prefer to only go through that massive pain in the ass again if its a genre I'm interested in like horror or sci-fi.

 

[Safir]

Thread, I'm vaguely interested, are there any visual novels out there that are so good you would recommend them to someone who outright doesn't like Visual Novels?

The original Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. (Of the three games bundled on Steam, the other two are meh to ok. The first one is a masterpiece.)

Hatoful Boyfriend. (You have to like weird shit. It's an absurdist parody -- not a meme game, a raising sim or a dating sim.)

The living national treasure E;R swears by STEINS;GATE.

The House in Fata Morgana is sappy overdramatic sludge, like a cross between a midcentury Bollywood melodrama and a giallo movie. It's also very ugly; all but one screenshots on Steam are splash screens. Most of the time you'll be be looking at heavily filtered stock photos which look like the vomit a hobo expelled after eating a live rat. (PS4 has a port with better art that will supposedly also be on the Switch - no word about a PC version and no fan patch so far.) However, the music is all original and awesome and it's worth playing for the music alone. (Don't buy the live performance video DLC, it's an amateurish record of a meh performance and they don't play any of the best songs.)

 

[Dang Woodchucks!]

Thread, I'm vaguely interested, are there any visual novels out there that are so good you would recommend them to someone who outright doesn't like Visual Novels? To make a comparison to anime, I'd recommend a show like Cowboy Bebop even to people who don't like anime because the core Sci-Fi elements and world building are so tight, plus it has a good soundtrack. Is there anything like this you've encountered that might have a wider appeal?

So far the only VN I've played is Saya No Uta and much to my dismay there wasn't really a way to turn off the sex scenes. The Lovecraftian horror element was pretty well done though. I also had to bend over backwards to get it running on my system so I'd prefer to only go through that massive pain in the ass again if its a genre I'm interested in like horror or sci-fi.

Corpse Party, especially the first installment Blood Covered is available for PC and PSP (in case you're an emulator guy). In it, you play as a handful of different characters depending on the chapter, to give you a basic rundown, you got:

• "Standard Japanese Nice guy" Satoshi Mochida,
• "Delinquent with a heart of gold" Yoshiki Kishinuma,
• "Stock Bitchy Love interest" Naomi Nakashima,
• "Class President" Ayumi Shinozaki, and
• Satoshi's younger sister, Yuka.

While there are others, these are the more important and recurring playable characters. As you may have gleaned already, it's a Survival Horror with some adventure elements, emphasis on survival; you don't really get ways to defend yourself against what you'll encounter in the game.

There is also the fact that certain choices will net you Wrong Ends, but those are part of the fun and barring a couple, they're pretty obvious at times, so there aren't many chances of getting stuck. I still recommend keeping at least two separate files just to be safe.

The story works best going in blind, and it's easy to get spoiled, but seeing we're in spoopy month,it's the perfect time to check it out!

 

[Vapewizard]

I dunno if the main routes of hatoful boyfriend would really work for someone if they're not familiar with the tropes it makes fun of, though I suppose the alternate storyline does its own thing so in that regard it'd be fine.

Thread, I'm vaguely interested, are there any visual novels out there that are so good you would recommend them to someone who outright doesn't like Visual Novels?

As for recs: the first Zero escape game, 999, is pretty good if you're fine with escape room puzzles. On steam it comes bundled with its sequel, Virtue's last reward, and the collection is called "Zero escape: the nonary games." The only unfortunate part is that the first game was a fine self-contained story on its own but then the sequel needlessly continued the story and turned it into an overly complicated clusterfuck and I heard the third game in the series, Zero time dilemma, is even worse. Though that aside I still really enjoyed 999.

 

[Maurice Caine]

Any of you played Jake Hunter on the Nintendo DS?

 

[DDBCAE CBAADCBE]

Unless Lightning Warrior Raidy counts as a visual novel, and oddly enough I think it may actually qualify for the technical definition, then I've only ever played one. Though I suppose I haven't finished all the routes I can say I've played through most of the Fate Stay Night visual novel and completed the Stay Night and UBW routes. If I had to sum up the experience I'd call it tedious but interesting enough if you want more Fate related content. I've been putting off Heaven's Feel because the other two were such a slog at points and though I really want to see how it plays out I'm still incredibly annoyed with how some of the "choices" are laid out in such a way that the reasonable answer is always a bad end and the one that is clearly a bad decision is always the right one. One of my favorite stupid choices comes up when Saber specifically tells you not to follow her in the fight with Rider with everything having led up to this point having also hinted that such a course of action would be incredibly dangerous and irresponsible. You know, generally a stupid choice to make that would get you insta killed. However this is a Fate Visual Novel so of course it's the right choice... Like that time the right choice was to let Berserker split you in half at the waist, literally separating your body into two halves... and you somehow survive while the other two options lead to getting beheaded. You survive both times but one is bad because Illya captures you in the bad one? What was stopping her from doing that in the good one? Not a damn thing that's what. Lightning Warrior Raidy is a MUCH better visual novel. Perfect 10/10.

 

[Vapewizard]

I'm still incredibly annoyed with how some of the "choices" are laid out in such a way that the reasonable answer is always a bad end and the one that is clearly a bad decision is always the right one.

To be fair, it's an intentional part of the narrative. The 'right' choice isn't supposed to be the logical thing to do cause the thing you're choosing is what is in-character for Shirou, and the 'wrong' option is something that he did consider but that he wouldn't normally do in the end. There's a part in Heaven's feel where the game gives you 3 choices that are exactly the same because Shiro can't even begin to imagine doing something else in that situation.

 

[DDBCAE CBAADCBE]

To be fair, it's intentional. The 'right' choice isn't supposed to be the logical thing to do cause the thing you're choosing is what is in-character for Shirou, and the 'wrong' option is something that he did consider but that he wouldn't normally do in the end. There's a part in Heaven's feel where the game gives you 3 choices that are exactly the same because Shiro can't even begin to imagine doing something else in that situation.

That would be fine if it were consistent, but it’s not.

 

[Safir]

I dunno if the main routes of hatoful boyfriend would really work for someone if they're not familiar with the tropes it makes fun of, though I suppose the alternate storyline does its own thing so in that regard it'd be fine.

This is why I recommended it: it was my first VN and I didn't play any before because I was familiar with the tropes through cultural osmosis and stayed away. It's not strictly for fans, and at the same time it's not a mean-spirited "haha look at those nerds weebs" thing.

 

[wtfNeedSignUp]

You can't get an S-Rank on the highest difficulty though without using Generation 1 Sentinels for maps with ground ones and you need Gen 4 Sentinels to deal with the air based ones.

So it's impossible to have a repeat strategy for every map since it relies on a rock scissors paper system for it's weaknesses.

The blade attack for ground based enemies will wipe the floor with them but has zero effect on air based enemies and can't hit them. The Gens 2 and 3 have a mix of sentry lasers and other support actions but you're going to need to juggle them between missions if you want the score multiplier to get to 30 or over if you want 30 wins in a row and to get enough chips for all the weapon unlocks.

I played on normal so I won't be surprised if harder difficulties need actual strategy, but it's still a fuck up on the devs to have the normal difficulty be too easy. What I did was use the first gens to kill the big baddies (emp if necessary), a second gen to spam turrets, third gen for missile rain/large missile and fourth gen for mop-up/interceptors (or kill big baddies if I had the kick chick). How I divided it doesn't really matter since I never got hurt or went through more than a minute. In general I took extra first gens or fourth gens since they are better responders when I don't know what's next.

 

[John Titor]

Thread, I'm vaguely interested, are there any visual novels out there that are so good you would recommend them to someone who outright doesn't like Visual Novels? To make a comparison to anime, I'd recommend a show like Cowboy Bebop even to people who don't like anime because the core Sci-Fi elements and world building are so tight, plus it has a good soundtrack. Is there anything like this you've encountered that might have a wider appeal?

So far the only VN I've played is Saya No Uta and much to my dismay there wasn't really a way to turn off the sex scenes. The Lovecraftian horror element was pretty well done though. I also had to bend over backwards to get it running on my system so I'd prefer to only go through that massive pain in the ass again if its a genre I'm interested in like horror or sci-fi.

I will always swear by Zero Escape and steins;gate. Though as someone else said, first ZE game was a fantastic standalone until the second game complicated things but it's still good. Third game was the contentious one.

As for horror, I might recommend Higurashi or Umineko but I think they are acquired tastes. Umineko's soundtrack are absolue bangers though.

 

[Marissa Moira]

I played on normal so I won't be surprised if harder difficulties need actual strategy, but it's still a fuck up on the devs to have the normal difficulty be too easy. What I did was use the first gens to kill the big baddies (emp if necessary), a second gen to spam turrets, third gen for missile rain/large missile and fourth gen for mop-up/interceptors (or kill big baddies if I had the kick chick). How I divided it doesn't really matter since I never got hurt or went through more than a minute. In general I took extra first gens or fourth gens since they are better responders when I don't know what's next.

Did you do the bonus objectives? They tend to want specific team make ups or to have limited members. You need them to unlock the last mystery files but I don't think they play a part in getting the s-rank.

I had most of my team members with +50 into the stat boosts, but I don't think you can get 4 rounds out of a single party member the most I've been able to get was 3. I figure you need at least 200 points into a single upgrade stat. Everyone wound up being in the high 30's on average by the end of the game. The point multiplier I raised to winning 50 games in a row and coupled that with the terminal upgrade that boosts that by x15 within the target area that you put down. When you unlock all the mystery files all mystery points get converted into chips and those chips at the end of the round are also affected by your multiplier. A few times I dumped millions of chips into an upgrade stat because I already unlocked and upgraded all the weapons possible.

 

[Str8Bustah]

Now for the plot, I can't really explain why it's bad without spoilers, so here is the abridged version: There are way too many characters and plot points, so having any attachment to anyone is hard, which makes the emotional moments of the game fall flat. The plot also constantly jumps back and forth with flashbacks pretty much every chapter, so it's pointlessly confusing. Finally, some of the revelations make no sense or they make the game needlessly convoluted. I'll elaborate in the spoilers (I'll try to keep spoilers to a minimum)

odd, I think the game has one of the best stories I've ever seen done in a game for the same reasons that you think it's garbage. Maybe this is one of those 'clashing tastes' situations I've heard so much about.