Chocolatemilkgod

Hi Pj900, glad you enjoyed the demo! Our team is still hard at work, so don't worry

What I want to know is if stuff actually happens. I remember watching the anime and stopped b/c my laptop died. I was at the point where either shit hits the fan or it was a fake out by the writers.

 

Is this a cute girls doing cute stuff or does it actually have action later on?

It has action. I actually quite liked the anime, bar a couple of episodes where it loses steam, it just could have been even better I suppose. I'm interested to see what the VN is about, but from what I've heard it's mostly just SoL so... eh. I thought the characters were fun enough in the anime, but I would have wanted more seriousness.

For those interested, there is currently an Angel Beats translation ongoing! A sample of the work (the opening I believe) can be found

Updated March 18th, 2016.

Yay! Thank you for all your hard work

My top four:

1. Little Busters -- Those feel trains. My favourite VN, and it has a FANTASTIC true route... that absolutely destroyed me. Only complaint is a couple of the earlier routes weren't as good, but you have Rin-chan which instantly makes it all worthwhile. Great story and funny SoL. Note that you might want to wait for the perfect TL'n and official release before playing this to get the best experience possible. The perfect version has new routes, content and an entirely new character.

2. Higurashi -- This is actually two parts, Higruashi no koro ni and Higurashi no koro ni Kai. Awesome story with excellent mystery aspects. It's probably the darkest story on the list just in terms of content, but man... so much fun following everything, coming up with your own theories about what's going on etc. Hugely recommended

3. Muv Luv Alternative -- Do you like mechs? Sci-fi? Action? Yes to any of those and you're set. I believe this has been recommeded before here, so I'll just keep this short. Really the only bad thing about this story is you have to slog through Muv Luv Extra and Unlimited to get there. You can read my review here if you want.

4. Ever17 -- This is a pretty hotly contended spot in my head, but I think ever17 just scrapes through. Great sci-fi story with a mind boggling true route that'll keep you really engaged. Another review done by me here if you want more info.

Honorable mentions to Grisaia no Kajitsu (which is officially localised!! (its two sequels are being localised as we speak)), YU-NO (OLD school adventure VN... use this guide to avoid going insane) and Rewrite, my first great VN experience. Oh, and also Katawa Shoujo because it's one of the best EVNs out there and pretty fun (and completely free to download here).

I'm not going to lie, I really had fun with KoiChoco. Let me say that it is far from perfect; Chisato can get on your nerves, one route in particular is especially underwhelming and I feel like they could have gone deeper with a few of the other routes that would have provided a more solid story. That said, for what it is, very fun. If you like SoL with a dash of drama, definitely recommended. Plus the art is a highlight, and its music repertoire (although a little limited) is quite good as well.

If nothing else, just play it for Satsuki Best girl. You could always be a filthy pirate, see if you like it and then buy it if you do later.

For those who haven't seen the Aokana update, apparently the whole 'TL and editing finished' thing was a bit of a fib. They're now aiming for an October release this year... which is pretty disappointing honestly. *Sigh*.

I might get a good VN to read eventually...

Edelweiss is actually one I've wanted to read for a while, so I voted for that. The other two aren't bad, but I hope Edelweiss is the winner .

Huh. I'm surprised I've never heard of this. It looks super nice.

Yeah I know, and that editor is fantastic!

... I'm not biased.

[*]Black Wolves Saga (otome) - 100% translated, 59/65 (90.76%) scripts tlc, on semi-hiatus

 

[*]Ken ga Kimi (otome) - 116/122 (95.08%) scripts translated, 101/122 (88.52%) scripts edited, on semi-hiatus

 

[*]Starry Sky in Summer (otome) - 100% translated and edited, 137/177 (77.40%) through TLC, dropped due to legal issues

Shit that really sucks for the translators. I honestly can't imagine pouring so much effort and love into something for it to get thrown out. Hope something changes for them. Glad to see root double got its kickstarter .

And Aokana.... Soon.

More news; apparently the reason SubaHibi's been delayed for so long is because it's getting an official release. We don't know the details, but it seems like it'll be directly published without a kickstarter and without a bigger publisher. Not hugely happy it's made us have to wait so long, but more official releases are a good thing for the industry in general.

First of all I want to point out Doki didn't translate shit. They were gifted the translations by another group who didn't have the time to finish the EX/ME versions.

 

They then sat and sat on it not doing shit in the way of translations. I have no idea if they decided to compensate the original translators for their work but considering the way they've treated the rest of us sitting on their work for years not doing anything before finally shafting us doing an all ages 'perfect' release that was essentially already translated I wouldn't be surprised if they got taken as well.

 

This is another reason why DOKI stuff is shit and why no one bothers with their releases anymore.

As far as I'm aware, the people who did the translation before (fluffy I believe) essentially joined doki translations. So in reality the people who actually translated the original LB game (and now the PE) are getting paid for their hard work... I don't see the problem.

so i am guessing LB perfect edition will not have h scenes like ecstasy. darn i am not a huge fan of all ages novels. though thats not because of no h scenes. i just thnk in a choice of the same game with or without h scenes i would rather have them in. other thatt that glad to see progress on these projects.

yup, if its an all age novel no problem but playing an all age when an 18+ exists it just seems wrong.

Have fun with Kanon H scenes

Might explain why Doki has dragged it out so long. Either that or it's unrelated and they just gives zero f's.

It was only just released that this happened. They've been talking with Visual Arts for a while, but they wanted to keep it a secret, presumably until everything was finalised and the script was closer to being finished. I have no idea what the time frame will be because they talk about cleaning up their original translation on top of doing the work for the perfect edition.

Little Busters will get an official release Little Busters! - TLWiki

 

EDIT: Tomoyo After as well https://www.facebook.com/VisualArtsUSA/posts/1507390016245822

I'm glad they're getting the chance to translate the perfect edition... I'm annoyed by the fact the TL'n will take several months to a year most likely.

I'm still waiting for Doki to translate Little Busters ME/EX. When they were given the project there was like 5K of text left. It's taken them 3 yrs to translate it and they haven't even edited or proofread it yet.

 

To bad the group didn't give it to a different group or just post their scripts to Fuwnovel or something. I guarantee you if they did it would have already been done already.

The group that TL'ed the original game, fluffy, joined doki, so it's not like they left or anything. But yeah, it has been pretty slow unfortunately. The last update we had was a couple of months ago. That said, however, I don't think there's a whole lot more to edit now, and I believe the TL has been finished for some time. Moreover, the TL quality is going to be much higher than could have ever been achieved if it was just posted on fuwa or something. So although I hate waiting... it's probably better this way.

At least that's what I tell myself...

Huh, I didn't know if we were ever going to get a continuation of that TL project. Well, good luck to the project member(s)! Looking forward to this one

Oh, and Lilium x Triangle English patch was also released... so yay?

The guys over at Alternative Projects had a few announcements including:

- TL of Muv Luv Total Eclipse at 25%

- TL of Kimi ga Nozomu Eien

- TL of Haruko Maniax

- TL of a few other bits a bobs such as Ayu Mayu Alternative, Aspriation and the Schwarzesmarken LN!

Personally I'm most excited for kiminozo, but I hadn't expected quite so much stuff!

For Grisaia fans: Idol Magical Girl Chiru Chiru Michiru part 1 and part 2 were released on steam. No idea what the TL is like (since apparently it was rushed out the door). I'll wait to hear about the TL quality (and possibly wait for Koestl to go through it), but I hope it's at least a decent TL.

Just finished Majikoi S. All in all I'm fairly mixed. Although the "true", Tsubame's and, to some degree Mon's, routes were reasonably well done, the rest was a bit naff honestly. The after routes were basically 50% H-scenes, with the other 50% being pretty contrived or uninteresting bits and bobs. I guess I shouldn't have expected more from that part, but anyway... I had fun playing it though (especially Koyuki's part, although I wish more attention was paid for hers and the main characters interactions). One thing I was really impressed with was their use of anime/video segments; I think this had more of those than in any other VN I've read to date. The art is nice as well as having some good music, so no problems there.

Conclusion: Lots of meh "story" bits mixed in with some genuinely good Majikoi fun. Needed to have more of the latter and less of the former, but oh well.

Interestingly, it looks like Sekai is branching out a wee bit and is doing its first manga release.

EDIT:

They also announced an official KS and steam release for Root Double.

Hiya, welcome to the forums. I realise that your questions have mostly been answered, but I thought I'd throw my opinion into the mix as well.

As far as Hoshizora goes, it's an all right borderline 'moege', ie a VN that doesn't have a whole lot of substance. It took me a whole year to read that one, and I wasn't hugely impressed by some areas of it. That said, I really liked the sisters' routes (Komomo and Kosame); I thought theirs were a bit more special and fun. Asuho's route was okay. As for the rest... it sort of ranged from being a bit meh to flipping annoying (I'm looking at you Aoi). So, summation: Hoshizora has some really good fun bits here and there, but it requires you to slog through potentially iffy bits. Conclusion: I'd still read it, but it's more the type of VN you can read on the side less seriously than something else (like an anime or TV show where you watch an every day or two); as I said, I'd at least try to read the sisters' routes at some point. As far as length, it's probably nearer the 30 hour mark than the 50 hour mark, but it's still not a short read. Oh, before I forget, try turning Chinami's voice off in the options menu. You'd be surprised at how much it improves your quality of life (my ears stopped bleeding for one).

Yeah, I've checked it before asking, but I've asked to check other sources. So, it seems vndb.org is kinda "main" site of all VN's things?

vndb.org is the main database. It's a list of most of, if not all VNs there are and is a pretty good place to get a general idea about a title and to see whether or not it has an english patch. However, it's definitely not the best place to go if you want current news. For that, I'd recommend our forum which, if you look under our news section, is updated every Sunday about the status of current official (mainly sekai project, manga gamer and JAST translations) and unofficial (fan) translations. You could also use something like the fuwa VNTL-Moon if you want an aggregator to read about every bit of news (FYI, if you didn't know, fuwanovel is sort of the 'other' VN fan translation site... it's a different atmosphere, but most people there are cool... obviously we're better though).

As for recommendations, there are several I can give depending on what exactly you want.

Sharin no Kuni - Its story/route structure is very similar to G-Senjou no Maou as it was produced by the same company, however I'd say it's less polarising. I know this has been recommended before, but I suppose I'm just throwing in my support for this one. A little silly in places, but generally pretty fun and not too long at 20-ish hours. This has eroge in it.

Little Busters EX - I put this here because you mentioned it in your first poast. LB is possibly my favourite VN... so I'm a little subjective. Still, I'd highly recommend the VN with a few things to keep in mind. Firstly, I'd wait a little bit for the deluxe version called Ectasy (EX) to be translated before reading. This adds three new routes (a LOT) as well as modifying and improving the current routes. It also adds a completely new character to the game. I have no idea when the translation'll be done, however, so we might be waiting a while... (an update was posted not too long ago, but who knows when exactly it'd be out). The other thing to keep in mind is that it's long; whilst I'd say it's totally worth it and the majority is reasonably paced, some people might disagree. Also really long VNs can be poor choices for a reader who's only read one or two VNs before. The last thing to keep in mind is that there is a lot of slice of life stuff. KEY, the developer, has a formula which goes something like:

Fun happy intro > Slice of Life ballocks in common route > More serious in the character routes > True (final) route > Reader cries

Now I really like the slice of life stuff done by KEY; I think it's fun and easy going, and I also appreciate the stark contrast there is between the common route and the character and true route (the latter mostly). But... yeah. Point I'm trying to get across is that the length and slice of life stuff can be a little polarising for some people. Still, wait to read the complete version if you can (whenever that'll be...). The complete version has eroge in it, but seriously that's not the reason you play a KEY game.

Ever17 - As said, this is a pretty great mystery VN. You can read my spoiler-free review here. That explains my thoughts more than I can here (just don't hit the spoiler boxes if you don't want to spoil bits of the story, obviously). Another one of my favourites, and a reasonable (again, 20-25ish hour (?) length).

There are a whole load of other VNs I can recommend, but I'll just stick with these three for now (these were recommended by other people or referenced by you... I just wanted to put down my opinion on them). If you want more ideas just let me or someone else here know.