I did love her so much!
I'm not looking forward to play the sequels because apparently she barely shows up...

>>114674
>I'm not looking forward to play the sequels
WHAT?
She may not be a main character, but Utawarerumono 2 and 3 are so highly rated and fantastic that you should definitely look forward to them. Oh, to be able to look forward to experiencing it for the first time, you are so lucky!
The characters, the art, the music, the story, the Kuon!

>>114674
Honestly, yeah, I also feel the Uta1 cast is really strong, and that's probably the reason I didn't find 2+3 to be a lot better than 1 as seems to be the common opinion. I would rank them 3 >= 1 > 2.

>>114677
Agreed.

>>114676
I'm gonna give it a try someday, for now all I need is a rest. Uta1 make love the characters, the story and the ambience so hard, then the shameful plot twist and tôka will meet soregashi never again... They probably compensate it very well by your posts, I'm curious about that. The girls look worse, probably a magnificent story, I guess.

I have to strongly disagree with Uta 1's cast being stronger than 2 and 3's. There are certainly great characters, but I found the relationships between them to be a lot simpler than in 2 and 3, along with the story itself. I love the characters, but I didn't necessarily feel like I understood them or was drawn into their world as much as I was with the latter games.

>>102417
I've lost count to how many. Way too embarrassing to list off, I have a weird aversion to recommending anything because it made me cry. It feels way too personal to try and set an expectation for someone else. The staff all share some thought, pouring hours into something they want you to feel, and it resonates - it's the sort of stuff that makes media worth your time. Even better, the senses are all able to be overwhelmed with VNs/games/anime.

> I avoid stuff that's specifically labeled with that 'crying game' label, but maybe I shouldn't.
> For me it's a strange thought to know a game will focus on sadness from the start and I think that people should perhaps not label them at all. What does /qa/ think?
I've avoided all of the key games for this reason. Everything I've seen makes me think they're specifically written to punch you in the gut. Nothing to gain, nothing to learn from the experience, just a way to make you feel attached.

Clannad had its cute moments though.

>>114685
I meant more in terms of charisma I guess, I agree that the 2+3 cast is more fleshed out - they did have twice as much time to develop, after all.

>>114687
Im surprised they've never done NTR for that reason

>>114685
BIG tail

>>114709
retard

Okay, HOLD UP! You guys may remember that I made a thread(s) lamenting pic related entering licensing hell at 99% translation status due to a terribly managed company that went defunct after a guy took the money and ran.
Well... IT GOT A REAL RELEASE!
Who here is up to reading 'together'? By that I mean I'll make a thread and we can talk about it as we read it by ourselves. I still want to finish playing Dungeon Travelers 2-2 first so it will be a couple weeks, but WOW!

https://vndb.org/v22899 is the VN and yes it's ero. It became popular on futaba when it released and I was eagerly waiting its translation. Finally 4 years later it's here.

>>115214
This is a high holy commandment from Jesus Christ himself telling you to please use the improvement patch if you're going to read it.

>>115215
Looking at those notes on vndb, that does seem to be a requirement. Yeeessh.

Was reading a vn with a black side character... I didnt know the "every black guy is named Bob" stereotype was still a thing.

>>115237
Impressive to be racist against the Japanese and foreigners at the same time

>>115237
>>115238
Its not the faces that make japanese hard to tell apart, its that at any time an age group has like two haircuts popular

I recently learned that a couple games I enjoyed are getting English releases, going to do brief writeups on them in case anyone is interested.

Criminal Border

This one was a nice surprise. The basic premise is that our protagonist, your average loner who spends a lot of time on the internet (wow, he's just like me), was making anime MADs when he accidentally develops a digital drug that makes the viewer uncontrollably horny. Sounds like a typical nukige setup, right? Here's the surprising part - despite the ridiculous subject matter, the game keeps a relatively serious tone and stays focused on the story, and we follow the MC as he explores the possible uses of his chance invention, and gets tangled up in some shady dealings involving delinquent gangs, yakuza and prostitution.

The art style is pretty divisive, can't say I'm much of a fan but you get used to it.

It's an episodic release in 4 parts, with each one being about 5-10 hours long and focusing on a particular character. Part 1 in English and part 3 in Japanese come out later this month. If you're familiar with 9-nine-, it's the same writer.

Amazing Grace

This one seems be generally considered one of the better VNs in recent years. Sadly I can't give a 100% positive opinion, but I'll get to that later. The game starts with an amnesiac protagonist in an unfamiliar town that seems to be rooted in classical European culture, but he quickly realizes that something seems odd. Not only is the town surrounded by a barrier separating it from the outside world, it's also focused on the arts to an unnatural degree, with the only school being an art school where students are given an environment to learn and practice many kinds of art such as painting, sculpting and film. As a new transfer student he begins to adapt little by little, as he learns more about the town and its inhabitants. (it's in the synopsis, but mild spoilers:) On Christmas day, the town is struck by a fire that is reminiscent of the apocalypse that's said to have destroyed the outside world 101 years ago. The protagonist goes back in time to try to learn what happened and how to prevent it. Yes, it's a time loop game, with various mysteries and reveals and all that good stuff.

(not really spoilers but don't read if you want to go in completely blind:) So my main gripe with this game is the way it's written. I've read other games by this author, Fuyuakane Tom, and they also had this issue but to a lesser degree. The game repeats information way too often and goes out of its way to explain everything in detail. Nothing wrong with making yourself clear, but at the expense of good pacing and a sense of tension...? The feeling I get is that plot twists are a major focal point for him, and he does this to avoid making them feel like asspulls, but still. Rather annoying. Despite this I think the core mystery is pretty fun, and the game has interesting things to say about art and how we engage with it. Also a great game to read during the holiday season.

Hmm, more to add to the backlog. I have mixed feelings about stuff that's set in modern times, double so if its subject matter is a bit dark, so I don't know if Criminal Border is something I would ever try. Amazing Grace sounds right up my alley!
How long is Amazing Grace?

>>115796
>despite the ridiculous subject matter, the game keeps a relatively serious tone and stays focused on the story
Sounds interesting, I like my eroge with a good story behind them to get me hooked. Although just to make sure, it still has ero options right? Would be a shame to have such a premise and not a chance to take advantage of it for some prime H-material.

>>115823
20-30h

>>115829
Yeah, of course. Speaking as someone who tends to skim through H scenes, the ones in Criminal Border were pretty high quality.

Oh yeah, I just remembered. 16bit Sensation had an ad for Criminal Border.

It begins. I am ready to cry bitch tears.

Translation doko

There's a Konosuba VN-like thing out now. Or rather its translation four years later is now on Steam. It seems like there's resource management and you create clothing which triggers scenes? It's a Mages thing so it might not just be licensed shovelware. There's a separate Aqua and a Megumin pout in this preview video, and I see Yunyun! I can't tell from the trailer if it's voiced or not.
(maybe it will be on nyaa soon)

>>119522
The pouts are a big plus but if i understood the translations right, megumin has to wear clothes that make her the opposite of a loli? That doesn't sound good.

I'm surprised this thread is still alive.

I'm reading The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles right now

>>120036
How is that one so far? How does it compare to the older ones? I've read through the original trilogy and the 3DS stuff but haven't touched those newest ones.

>>120044
I played through them a few years ago. They were pretty fun overall, but I enjoyed the original trilogy + Rise from the Ashes and Investigations 2 more. Otherwise I think they're better than the rest of the series (4, Investigations 1, Professor Layton VS, 5, 6).
Chronicles is a port of the two Dai Gyakuten Saiban / Great Ace Attorney games on the 3DS. The first game was made with a sequel in mind, so it leaves a lot of plot threads hanging, which makes it feel lacking as a standalone game. In contrast, I think even if you stopped at 1 or 2 in the original trilogy you'd be able to feel satisfied.
The games take place in Meiji-era Japan but also in Victoria-era London. The main character is Naruhodou Ryuunosuke, a university student and ancestor of Naruhodou Ryuuichi / Phoenix Wright. シャーロック・ホームズ / Herlock Sholmes and Natsume Souseki also appear as characters. Personally I'm not familiar with Sherlock Holmes, but I think The Great Ace Attorney contains many references to the original stories that were written about him, but the games are still enjoyable even if you don't catch them. Natsume Souseki is caricatured as referring to himself in the first person as "wagahai" due to his famous novel Wagahai wa Neko de Aru.
In some respects they feel like a spiritual successor to the Professor Layton crossover. They share the same director/writer (the guy who also wrote and directed the original trilogy), the same main composer, London as one of the settings, and mob testimony.
The soundtrack is great overall but feels different from the other games except the Layton one because it relies on more period-appropriate instrumentation instead of, say, square waves and electric guitars. The tracks associated with Asougi and Susato blend Japanese and Western elements in an enjoyable way similar to what >>119364 described for Utawarerumono.
Unfortunately the Western releases lack the option to set the text to Japanese while the Japan and Asia releases let you switch between Japanese and English as you please. The first three Japanese DS games were like this too, except that in those games each language gets its own save file, while here you can continue right from where you left off in the other language. Also the port doesn't feel like the definitive edition because it's lacking some of the 3DS DLC, such as a meta skit where the characters in the courtroom talk about buying the DLC, some videos of the developers talking to the camera, and two other neat bonus episodes where you get to play as some characters you don't get to use in the main story. There's also a part that I think originally might've made use of the 3DS's stereoscopic 3D gimmick that had to be re-adjusted here, but that's a minor issue.
Pic related is Iris. She makes some cute pouts.

>>120044
I like it, it's pretty fun. I think it's just as good as the originals. Also they turned Watson in a little girl >>120072

That feelio when almost none of the cute and fluffy VNs/dating sims without s*x are translated. Amagami got a translation recently however: https://nishishitranslations.wordpress.com/ still in (beta) whatever that means though. I intend to play that soon.

I'm going to start the Konosuba 'Clothes of Desire' VN that got a translation a while ago. With season 3 airing this seems like a good time.

43k files. Seems reasonable. It's all voice files. Do they really not have a better way of doing this?

>>123687
It is the simplest way of doing this because you just need to play the sound file when the dialog is displayed.

>>123687
Not unless you want a VN taking the max adorable memory

catpicture just took max adorable memory

I have kind of finished the Konosuba VN! I say "kind of" because it was 1 ending out of something like 10. The ending I got was the Aqua 'regular' ending because her affection meter was the highest, but I don't think it was high enough for the good ending. I assume the good ending is just a minor alteration to the regular ending. I'm impressed with how long the Aqua "ending" was, since it felt like a whole chapter, just without any choices or gameplay elements.
I call it a VN, but there's some shallow gameplay resource/time management and you also pick which characters to hang out with to see their story and increase aforementioned affection meter. You use the resources to craft outfits and some are tied to story progression while others are side stuff just done to see scenes or increase character affinity. I wasn't able to see all the scenes in one playthrough so I'll play again and maybe try to save at points where I can increase affection to choose routes. The resource stuff is honestly tedious, but it's worth dealing with to enjoy the fun VN elements. You already need to play through it multiple times to see everything so the pressure to maximize resource gathering efficiency really isn't there. I guess I should mention that it's extremely easy and simple so if you feel stressed out at time management like Atelier games then you shouldn't be for this.
Being Konosuba, it's very funny and occasionally a little serious and ecchi. If you know Konosuba you know what this will be like.

I liked it a lot!

Today's the 20th anniversary of Clannad!

>>123839
I think that if people count things like Dating Sims as VNs then this should count as much as any as one. How long was it? Might give it a shot if I can spare some time.

>>123840
When I learned that my father liked Clannad, I was really shocked, until I learned that he was referring to the Irish folk band.

>>123864
Oops, I didn't see this post until now. It's not long, but hard to accurately gauge because of the resource thing. I tried to min-max before realizing that seeing everything in one or even three playthoughs was impossible. Probably like 5-8 hours if you don't do a bunch of experimentation and a host of save files at different points like I did. I imagine it will be hard to resist making a whole bunch of costumes even if it's not necessary, though, and for that you'll spend time messing around with gathering.
Sadly you can't just share a saved file for all the stuff either because the event gallery is only for the costumes and not all the other scenes.
The dating-like parts kind of run into the same problem as the Sword Art games- the story is already established so you know in your mind all of this is "fake". It's nice to hang out with Wiz in a first-person perspective, but I know that this is superfluous fluff that exists outside canon.

Anyway, I entered this thread again because I'm going to try reading Nekokawa ( https://vndb.org/v1320 ) after I saw a random /v/ thread mention it, but I'm having issues since it's old and certainly not meant for a modern OS with multiple monitor setup. I think I have Japanese locale installed, but I haven't done it since I reinstalled. The story is translated, but the error popup menu definitely is not.
I wonder if I can even use a controller for it without doing some awkward keyboard emulation which I again haven't set up since reinstalling windows a couple years ago.
I'll have to try again later after I get some sleep.

I decided to try out Steam's controller stuff and it seems like I don't need to use JoytoKey any more, which is great because the two heavily conflict with each other if you use a Switch controller.
Something interesting I noticed is that this "Mouse Region" thing here for joypad lets you move the cursor around the screen as if you were aiming a gun in one of those console shooter games. Move it slightly left and the mouse moves to slightly left of center, move it all the way to the top and right and it moves to the top right of the screen!
Using the controller buttons is good for stuff like the Enter or Escape keys, but some of these older games do rely on mouse movement sometimes to navigate menus so this is pretty nice.
I decided it's time to read ToHeart 2 and then I'll play the Dungeon Travelers game with them in a few months since it was finally translated over a decade later and was put on Steam unlike the other Dungeon Travelers games.

>>126482
It isn't my favorite controller ever but I've found PS4 controller to be a pretty good all-around PC gamepad. The touch screen is really helpful for when you need a mouse. I re-programmed the PCB in my joystick to emulate the PS4 touchpad. So now I can hold down the start button on it and navigate with the mouse pointer using the joystick itself.

https://www.brookaccessory.com/detail/06960737/

I've found these PCBs to be really good for PC support on *nix and they're easy to work with. If you get one with the headers you don't even have to solder. I'd like to get a large shell and build a custom gamepad out of one of them. They're just small enough that they could fit in something comfortable.

You can force it to identify as dinput, xinput, switch/Wii controller and about 4 different other things. It works with both PC and every console since the Xbox 360 era. Steam support is really good.

Steam keeps taking over more of my gaming stuff. At first I really didn't want to rely on it for controller support. But it simplified configuration of all my fighting games when we're using more than one controller. So I've defaulted to it now for most stuff. I haven't used joy2key for anything in a long while.

I was surprised to see Atri survive voting in the seasonal stream, so now I must read it before the anime really gets anywhere!
It's quite interesting to see the options in a modern VN. It has some option to send information to external TTS software for unvoiced lines? Huh. Japanese TTS might be better (Zundamon, etc) but this still seems like a major immersion breaker to me.

>>131544
zundamon narration??? i think that could be fun

>>131544
I'm also surprised to see that you can choose to display multiple languages at the same time. Good for language learners, I suppose. (For those 3 people on the planet learning Japanese for VNs). My assumption is that this was a feature made for the international release as there's also Chinese, but in theory I guess it could help Japanese people learn English if they wanted to for some reason. (I think those people would be playing FPS'd or something)

>>131549
Yeah, the reason Zundamon was originally brought up on kissu back in early 2022 was because it was a TTS voice used in some Japanese streams. >>90430
Sadly it's too difficult to use it in English, but you can use that thread if you want to try it.