boukyaku

グリザイアの楽園 (Grisaia no Rakuen) took me longer than anticipated to finish. It's definitely shorter than Kajitsu but it's much longer than Meikyuu. I finished it last night and ended up playing Galaxy Angel a little to clear my head. First off, it's difficult to give a report on this VN since when one talks about a sequel, they have to assume the reader already went through the prequel. In this case, I don't think there's anyone who's gone through Meikyuu so will keep things as simple as possible. When starting you first have three choices, all of which one one is selectable. When completing

I ended up finishing グリザイアの迷宮 (Grisaia no Meikyuu) last night in its raw form. I had to use a dictionary since at least 20% of this game contains technical terms. After playing this "sequel", I firmly believe that Kajitsu is mainly to prepare the readers for whats to come. Here's a little comparison: Kajitsu = MLE Meikyuu = MLU Rakuen = MLA (Maybe I'm wrong with this, no idea what to expect from Rakuen) I am not comparing these two directly, but just pointing out that comparing Meikyuu to Kajitsu is like comparing MLU to MLE. For those who don't know, MLE and MLU is mainly to prepar

I finished reading Grisaia no Kajitsu last night ending with Yumiko route. First let me say that during the common route I developed no particular interests for any of the heroines. None of them hit any of my tastes, that's all. With that, I ended up going through whichever heroine route presented itself to me first, and imo, this is the way people should be arranging the order. Why? Simple, after each route there were a few things mentioned before starting another route that's related to whichever route you finished. Example: after finishing Amane route and before starting Sachi route, Ama

Not exactly, there's still the "true" (aka agave) route which ends up branching into the sequel.

Finished Michiru route last night... Erm, don't know why it's regarded so highly or preferred so much more than say, Amane. In the first half of the route I was almost suspecting that she had some kind of connection to you-know-who from the camping trip but was disappointed again to learn of her history towards the end. I think the writers could've done something great with this one but it ended up being too dull for me. I was kind of looking forward to Yumiko since I'm expecting a story similar to Makina. Too bad it sounds like her route has many flaws... Will probably finish this game tom

For those who love the music in ef, don't just stop with the game OST. Apparently a good portion from the game music is missing from the OST. You can find the rest of it in the anime OST (they're practically the same music). ef / MLA really has good art and character animation, brings everything to life. I'm wondering why newer VNs don't apply the same techniques (like Grisaia no Kajitsu). You would think everyone would've copied and utilized the same engine by now.

Just finished Amane route. I was thinking it was a pretty powerful route during the camping trip but the anti-climactic ending ruined it for me. Oh well, at least a certain silver-haired / red-eyed individual made things very interesting and No idea who will be next, either Sachi or Michiru, whoever comes first. Don't have any particular fondness of any heroine for this one so just takin' them as they appear. Would've really been interesting to have a certain silver-haired / red-eyed individual route but with a different protagonist and a different game ^_^.

Just finished Makina route, can definitely tell it's the most unique route with the most unique heroine. Off to start Amane then.

I also want to see a Julia route. I just think of Cowboy Bebop whenever I see Yuuji and Julia interact for some reason. I mean, come on, look at her character design(physical) and name... -_-

Playing Grisaia since everyone I see just won't STFU about it . Currently on the common route. I can see why Michiru is popular but about the only reason why I am liking her so far is because her voice actress is the same for Kokoro from Majikoi (who is one of my fav in that VN. Apparently my version of the game has voice actresses from the PSP version?). Currently none of the heroines has taken any of my interests so far.

It would be great if people would post these quotes in the original language. Everything I've read is practically something from the translator. We don't know what's been added/omitted etc.

It's something I read from shoutbox(looks at Chocolatemilk), never even knew of Grisaia until recently .

Isn't Grisaia an edited MT? 0.o

It looks like the main protagonist is a subordinate of the Goddess イリアス and is an apprentice angel. His job is to go and help people who are being attacked by monsters while trying to avoid getting raped himself.

I definitely ended up getting the option of turning Rance into that but chose to end the route. I've only finished the True route and attained 90/106 CG scenes. I used the walkthrough on gamefaqs then got a few more when I started cheating in the end . I haven't touched the other heroine routes. It's time to stop when you start feeling like the gameplay gets really repetitive. If there was an option to auto-battle everything except boss battles and when important characters show up as the enemy, then I would still play. And yes, many priceless moments in that game. Maybe someone should t

Sex sells . Anyway, h-scenes just makes the game more realistic to me even though the scenes themselves are usually horribly written/translated. It signifies to me that a certain level has been reached in the plot even if the scene itself adds nothing to the plot. It's the act itself that's significant to me. On another note, I just finished Sengoku Rance a couple of day ago. Funny game, an OK gameplay, and interesting characters. If you're looking for a game that will fill up a lot of your time, this is it. I ended up cheating in the end to get through the game cause it would take too m

Currently playing Sengoku Rance and if you thought Koihime Musou had a large harem, you were wrong.

I actually had quite a low expectation for this VN when I first started it. Actually, it's this VN that got me back into these types of games in the first place. I think the last VN I played before MGQ was Private Nurse or something like that a while back. I don't know what it was but something about MGQ immersed me quite deeply, or maybe it was just my first VN in a long time. Kind of similar to eating a hamburger after being stranded on a deserted island for 10 years . Yes, old news and expect Rogue to finish the translation by the end of the year or after. His translations are quite good

I read the summary of Umineko on vndb and it just sounds like a copy of one of those stories where a bunch of family members gather in an isolated mansion for inheritance issues and "stuff" starts happening. Tell me if I'm wrong. I mean, really, read the story summary. How many mystery novels were made on that basis? -_- On another note, the artwork I saw on vndb was a major, major turn off. Actually it's the main reason why I don't even try this game. Was this improved upon using the UmiTweak patch? I saw some comparison pictures of the same scene with and without the patch and it looks mu

Right, I forgot about the "true" route. *sigh* Will go with that once I regain my patience with this game.

Time to report in. Majikoi -> Very funny VN, unique characters, enjoyable half-assed story. I see a part of myself in every male character in class 2-F. I do not know whether I should laugh or cry at this fact . I found Yukie and Chris route the funniest. Utawarerumono -> Wow, probably one of the best protagonists I've seen in any VN. Classic character personalities, good music, fun and simple gameplay with a great story. Majikoi S -> Sadly I found myself disappointed with Majikoi heroine routes (I only tried Yukie and Chris). They mostly consisted of h-scenes with a small cl

The elements you mentioned here used to compare VNs would only be valid for similar VNs. Something that is relative to eachother. I could see one comparing Hoshizora, ef - a tale of the two, and other similar drama VNs using this value based system but I simply can't see it when there are no similarities between the VNs. Similarly based VNs would be Sengoku Rance vs Utawarerumono (or Kamidori Alchemy Meister vs Koihime Musou etc), or MLA vs FS/N, and the list goes on. I would definitely start comparing the details of the aforementioned VNs to see which would be better than the other. But this

That's a pretty shallow comparison. I'm talking about the depth and context of a game. You can't say either game is better than the other because they try to accomplish completely different things. Hoshizora is obviously another drama eroge while Majikoi is just one big fat JOKE. Everything about Makijoi is a joke, you can't take anything in that game seriously. It's meant to be a comedy eroge to which it accomplishes very well. Even the forced drama is in itself one big fat joke. That's why I'm saying you can't compare the two. Neither is better than the other, they're just different.

You can't compare Majikoi and Hoshizora. They are both completely different games.

Nocturnal Illusion "All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream." - Edgar Allan Poe, "A Dream within a Dream" "The reward of pain is experience." -Aeschylus "Love and hatred are the same thing. The former is just aggressive and the latter is passive." - Hans Gustav Adolf Gross, "Criminal Psychology" "Pain is a great teacher for human beings. The soul grows under the breath of pain." - Wolfram von Eschenbach "To be human is to have the freedom to control one's fate." - Karl Marx, "Economic and Philosophic" "Without the desire to live, there is no