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Seems interesting, but it might be prudent to add some kind of measure by which to decide if the game is say 5/10 or 10/10 Experience is important but when rating something, especially for others to see and use, it's important to know WHY something is rated poorly or not. You see a lot of review sites with a score system that just doesn't work, many users will blatantly rate a product 10/10 simply because the experience was great. I'd personally suggest simply giving the game a score point based on the quality/appearance of certain factors. Something like this; Overall 0/10 Experience 0/4 Style 0/2 Visual 0/2 Audio 0/2 Again, experience is still important, this is the bit where a product can be so much more than the sum of its parts and shouldn't be neglected, but based on experience alone I'd give Muv-Luv a 10/10 which simply isn't helpful. Many stories are also done in such a way that you'd need to plow through a bad start which redeems itself towards the end (Muv-Luv for one, and even things like Sengoku Rance require you to pierce a certain initial assessment to get to the juicy filling) Maybe this is mostly a difference in opinion, but I find statistics a rather useless piece of information, they are so easily misinterpreted and abused without the all important context, which should not be neglected. Another thing I need to point out is that quantity and quality are competitive concepts, this essentially means that a quality product will only work for a small quantity of people, and vice-versa. At least so much so that it is utterly impossible to say "many people have used it, so there must be something good about it" I've been on twitch chat long enough to know there is absolutely nothing good about many people doing the same thing, people tend to flock towards specific things. Lastly, consider the differences in Genre's, there is a bit of a breach between people who read VN's for things like SSSS and people who want to read things like Clannad, having them use the same measure of scoring while pursuing a completely different set of interests is only going to dilute the final result. If anything this top list as you have phrased it now will indicate what the tastes and interests of the people that participated in creating it are, which can be nice, but I get the impression that isn't what you are striving for. Apologies if I seem overly negative or dismissive, but I do like the sound of this idea and I'd like to see it done successfully, feel free to ignore my opinions if you disagree with them.

Well it's a tricky subject, in most good stories I want the hero/heroine to win. When that includes them having sex at any point it just feels voyeuristic which can disturb immersion. I tend to just skip straight through these scenes. Rape is different, as I see it as an ordeal the character needs to overcome, and I'm interested in how they go about that. Game-over rape in many games is different again, as it's done at the end with no chance of the character winning anymore. I guess what I'm trying to get to is "Where do erotic scenes really fit in storytelling" which might be a bit of a heavy topic for this thread, which I don't want to derail too much.

While not really "finished" I completed the translated part of MGQ3 last night, and the story has yet to disappoint me. It's also still one of the few games where I wish they left out about 80% of the erotic content, both due to it's.... horrific(?) nature and the fact that I'm mostly just pining for a pure Alice + Luka combination, they get along so well after all. I especially think the interactions with all the past characters is done really well I was also pleasantly surprised at how good the quality of the translation is, especially considering how fast it's been progressing. Is it just me, or do VN's with good/great story generally have bad erotic elements that only take away from the experience most of the time.

I wasn't trying to make an exact comparison in terms of quality, but rather a difference in elements (extra being a goofy story, alternative being a very serious story) I have actually read that review, and I guess the best comparison in terms of quality/elements I can come up with from my limited experience would in fact be a comparison to dual savior (having liked it quite a bit for what it was) That said, I'll reserve actual judgement (as opposed to initial assessment) for when I have actually tried the game. I certainly don't expect a bad product at all, but rather I was hoping for a serious story as opposed to the degree of comedy which this seems to exhibit.

Things like dual savior have a cartoonish style, but not exactly "chibi", the key difference to me would be the size of the heads/eyes and them being actually bigger than the bodies themselves. I don't really mind a cartoonish style at all, and after some further research this seems to be a mostly comedy oriented story so it might actually be more fitting. I guess the issue is mostly the disparity between my expectations and reality, what with the title and the combat system resembling Eien No Aselia I was expecting a somewhat serious story along the same vein. In the end, this looks more like a muv-luv extra than a muv-luv alternative, and I'm doubtful if that's going to turn out to be a good thing.

Isn't the combat basically like Eien No Aselia? The graphic style is a bit off-putting though, I can only call it "kiddy" (vndb seems to call it SD - super deformed) which kind of takes any possible seriousness out of the fights. That essentially sets up some red flags about the story (it's hard to see something as threatening when it looks as such, instead of say a threatening dragon you get puff the magic dragon), which I dearly hope are false. It also seems to feature dungeon crawling, which hopefully isn't going to be another random-encounter grindfest. What it boils down to is that without a very good demo (good in the sense that it properly shows the games strengths and weaknesses) this game has too many potential negative points to be a purchase on release for me :|

See this is the part where I'm having difficulty; apathetic/proactive -> pick one The original reason for not continuing with the story was his obvious apathy, yet he was supposedly of a profession that requires you to be proactive. The dis-junction between who he was and what he did was already established early on, they couldn't even finish one chapter without glaringly contradicting the supposed apathy of the main character yet they cling to it as if to make the character interesting that way. Thanks for the answers, I'll steer clear Also I'm not quite sure I'm interpreting that last bit correctly, it seems you're suggesting I'd like reading about retarded main characters? I fail to understand what even gave you that idea.

So question; would you recommend this game to someone who cannot stand the typical passive protagonist? I remember picking this up a long time ago and stopped right at the start where the protagonist got the case and went something like: "I wanted to ask her more, but she was already walking away" At that time I basically just dropped it going: "If you want to ask her more, and you absolutely should as you don't know half the things she should have told you for you to take the case, fucking stop her from walking away and ask the damn questions RIGHT. NOW." But of course our typical passive protagonist just watches... making me follow up: "See here's how it's done, I don't want to put up with this weak-ass bullshit so I'm not going to, starting RIGHT. NOW. *uninstall game*" I suppose my question essentially becomes; Does this type of thing occur more often in the story or is it just a one-time thing that I should just get over and continue?

Well, the kind of vibes I got from the "main plot" there was that both characters essentially bitched out, I simply cannot stand a story or even a situation where the characters don't even bother trying to work towards a resolution and just accept their fate and be miserable about it. I had looked up some minor spoilers on the following routes to see if they were worth reading. I'm the kind of reader that doesn't care much about things being spoiled, a good story isn't carried by some revelation at the ending, a good story is good throughout and it's more important how they get to the end than what the end really is. That said, what I had read about the last routes wasn't all-together appealing, but if I've misinterpreted something there I'm more than ready to be corrected.

Honestly, while the first reply is somewhat abominable, there is a hint of truth here, while asking for a recommendation is fine you won't really know what suits your tastes until you've sampled the product, since we're talking about VN's here a few CG's and a synopsis don't really cut it for a sample, especially when you take translation quality into accord (like with the aforementioned "if my heart had wings") I'd personally recommend Demonbane if only for Dr. West, though it is otherwise still an enjoyable read, the scene's/cg's aren't amazing and the music, while fitting, isn't amazing save for a few exceptions. Main reason why you might want to try before you buy is that it's a rather quirky affair which you either enjoy or you don't, with little room for middle ground.

What confuses me about the picture is that "shogun" doesn't really enter the stage until after Nanami loses her hand, seems more like a sort of "perfect world" image added in as a bonus for finishing the game?

Yea was already fixing it, this is what happens when you're messing with html all day and then come read a forum before going to sleep.

Well, I can't say I fully recommend ef - a fairy tale of the two mainly because I never finished it due to all the drama feeling rather... pointless, while not bad in a romantic sense I personally prefer strong-willed characters. I simply could not keep reading after that one route where The kind of story I'd like and recommend are stories where: there's a problem -> work towards a solution. Rather than: there's a problem, let's talk about our feelings and be miserable about it. Probably why I figured LB was so much better than clannad

Well Mylen is probably the best character by far, having high movement, damage and survivability. High movement is especially important in kamidori, give her teleport item and destroy everything.

That holds true for me as well most of the time, but when you call your story sci-fi you're going to need to be sure to not forget the "sci" part and make it all fiction. For that particular scenario the inconsistency between the penal system and the people involved in it were too jarring to ignore, it's not so much that it wasn't realistic enough, it was the fact that it was inconsistent. This is probably my own head messing it up for me, but knowing what I do I simply cannot ignore a system that puts would need to put ridiculous ammounts of resources in rehabilitating criminals which then... I'll just stop, it's for the best... Suffice to say when a semi-realistic story suddenly features flying pigs, I can handle it, but when the moon crashes down on earth and everyone keeps going like nothing happened, that's when it becomes too jarring to ignore (unless there's an actual plot relevant reason for that)

I don't mind telling them, honestly, everyone I know has read/is reading Game of Thrones, which has just as much sex as the average non-nukige (is that the right term?) eroge. Sex scenes are nothing new, most literature and other media has tons of sex in it. Dutch literature actually has a book which can only be described as a nukige (almost all sex scenes with little to no story in between) called "turks fruit" I do actually discuss most of the VN's I read with the people I know, and I don't hide the fact that there is sex in it (not that I make a point to mention it either, though)

The thing is, he just walked in there knowing his life was the one they were after, not his partner's (and if it was, his partner would never survive it anyway, since he was already at their mercy) The fact that he went there alone, knowing there was no way he could save his partner (again, he knew they had captured his partner because they wanted either him or them both dead and would have been well aware there was no way they would let his parner walk away alive), especially without backup, just signaled that he had given up on survival and walked right into his death. He never checked the location of the perpetrator and just took a stroll through the hospital. The more I think about it, the more it just seems like he threw in the towel and let himself be killed, there was no way he wouldn't know that he was the target and his partner would never survive the ordeal, maybe the inevitable death of his partner is what made him too give up and resign to his death.

Going to get contraversial here and say I didn't particularly like any of the characters, mostly because almost all of them can't seem to get enough of MC dick. Yuella seems to be one of the few reserved ones, but she is so utterly lacking in common sense and so devoted to some code of servitude that she too is dislikable, any character that can't/won't act on their own wishes/desires is an unlikable one in my book. I did like one of the extra characters you get to meet on a second playthrough (can't remember the name, some warrior chick with a spear? I think) because even though her dispositon is very amicable she doesn't just drop everything she was doing up to the point of meeting the MC and swarm his workshop, she kept going on her business which sold her as an actual character with a solid personality and her own circumstances. Medodi started off as a likable character but later she turned too dependant on the MC and too exaggeratedly shy, too bad. The succubus and grim reaper were not too bad I guess, at least they had a reason to want MC dick.

The sad part is that the journey was so much better than the end... the end meant the amazing journey was over ;_; I know there are a lot of extra bits to it now, but I'm afraid, knowing how hard it would be for something to get this good.

My main issue with it was that throughout the story the detective was remarkably perceptive of fine details and was essentially "on the ball" throughout. The way he dealt with the events leading to his death were just out of character for him, as if he knew he was going to die and had resigned himself to it. He knew he was being lured there and that they wanted him out of the picture, he was aware of the risks, yet walked right into one of the most obvious traps you could think of, gone was the competence and savvy he had shown before. It's not his death overall that irritated me, it was the way his character was killed off, it didn't do the character justice. My point about the "staring contest" is that the pacing of it all was so slow, it felt too much like the villain monologuing and counting his chickens before they hatched in a too cliche and silly fashion. The villain was well aware as to what he was up against yet gets defeated in a downright silly fashion. Then again, considering the clueless and inept nature of the main character that was really the best they could do, which was why it was even more frustrating that they killed off the only competent character. The "insanity" of the main villain also ruined much for me stories tend to do this sometimes where a competent and insidious villain metaphorically throws off his mask and goes "tadaaaa, I was actually bat-shit insane all along! whahahahahahaaaaah!" Is it really so hard to come up with reasonable motivation for a competent villain?

To me, my all time favorite VN has got to be Muv-Luv, the entire trilogy. Muv-Luv Extra (the intro) was what I was expecting at the time, an over the top silly romance comedy, not great but not bad either. Muv-Luv Unlimited (the training montage) was a bit of a curve-ball, the disjunction between it and Extra made it interesting and while a lot of the "silly" from extra was still tangibly present it set the tone for the finale. Muv-Luv Alternative (the finale) Holy shit this one is not only a great story by it's own right, but puts the events of the previous stories in a unique perspective, making the events in Alternative have even more impact, we go from a happy-go-lucky protagonist in a fluffy and fun environment to what can only be described as the training montage into finally the end of the world. The type of stories I like best is where extreme suffering is overcome by strength and resillience, and Muv-Luv delivers that in a way that does so many things right. One of the greatest things about Muv-Luv is not just the story though, to me Muv-Luv defined the VN genre due to it's amazing soundtrack, ambiance and overall atmosphere that a mere book could never acomplish. The events in the story had impact and the characters were surprisingly human. All the fine details are great as well, how Alternative even incorporates the "routes" from the previous games into its core story, and how many events were hinted at in the previous stories. I acknowledge full well that it is far from perfect, but the sheer impact of the atmosphere and the intricate detail in the storytelling made this the best VN I have read to date.

For someone into sociology as much as I am, the unbelievability of the events in the latter part of the story ruined it for me, I was able to gloss over the brutal murder of the other candidate at the very start (for being a few seconds/minutes late, wtf?) but the utter disjunction between a penal system focussed on rehabilitation and the people involved being stupidly cruel (disney villain cruelty, completely out of place in the setting itself) just made it too silly. The obligation to not exist? I couldn't believe that silly shit if I tried, even if it did make the MC's narrating fitting.

I figured with this type of thread spoilers were a given, I mention the title of each vn specifically so you can avoid reading about that one if you haven't read it before. Yes, I'm aware I could treat everyone that reads this thread as a retard and pander them, or I could just treat people like mature adults that they're supposed to be in reading here and have them think, and avoid content they don't want, by themselves. Apologies if thats a problem, do let me know if you still want me to add spoiler tags afterall.

Surprised I didn't see mention of Sharin no kuni, it starts out rather well and then takes a massive downhill slide toward the second half and doesn't stop sliding, some of the endings even completely ignore the events of the final chapters. School days was an interesting concept (at least what people told me it was, a deconstruction of the harem genre, was interesting) What I (we) got was pretty much a regular harem story with the characters suffering from extreme personality disorders at best, a main character that has no depth to him at all (seriously, what does he do other than act like a complete jackass? No hobbies and no motivation toward anything/anybody, what is he trying to acomplish?) and constantly changes his mind about everything. He wants his girlfriend to put out and threatens to break up (even suggests taking some time apart) when she doesn't and when she actually does he loses all interest in it and starts fantasizing about a different girl. The best part is that it's never really explained why all those girls like him in the first place (particularly jarring when one of the girls has a freaking mental breakdown because the guy she helped hook up with someone else is now out of her reach.... yeah...) Chaos;Head is also an obvious candidate here, the story actually starts off slowly and poorly, but gets going very well with the introduction of the detective character (best character in the story imo) who is, unlike the MC, actually competent, motivated and to some extent aware of what's going on. Lo and behold, toward the ending they kill him off like an incompetent chump (the events leading to his death are ridiculous) and the story ends with apparently all the girls being/had been tortured into having ESP superpowers and the MC inexplicably gaining them as well, right on time for the final showdown which ends up being nothing more than the ESP equivalent of a staring contest. I'd have loved if Chaos;Head actually spent more time following the detective and him having an actual leading role in the ending, the detective is the only character with somewhat of a clue as to what's going on and seems to be the only character who is actually doing something and getting somewhere. Dissapointing to say the least. As for DearDrops, honestly the premise was the only exciting bit (violin is my favorite instrument) which gets shot immediately due to the violin MC picking up a guitar for 90% of the story, turning it into another bland as fuck rockband with all the same KiraKira bullshit stuck to it. Cheers to when the MC finally does pick his violin up again toward the end of the Riho route but too little too late. Another one I haven't seen mentioned would be Soul Link, I was excited for this one because it was one of the few stories I'd found where the MC is actually very competent at what he does (I had recently ragequit ever17 because I can't stand clueless MC's) But lo and behold, it was a fucking bait and switch where the competent MC gets killed off halfway through the story and it switches to a clueless incompetent (but ultimately miraculously successful) MC. God. Damnit Soul-Link. I suppose Hoshizora no Memoria should also be mentioned, but the main problem for that one is that the best girl is one of the first (Komomo or w/e the twin was called) and the girls just get progressively more loli/retarded and there isn't really an overarching story that ties all the stories together (they bring up a lot of stuff in the twin's routes which is never really mentioned or heard of after that)