Ever17 is probably my favorite of all, it was the first one I played with this thing of "play all routes to unlock the true one". Its a pity I don't remember her name but the black hair heroine was lovely: long black hair, beautiful design with modest clothes, a tough yet later tender personality and the same voice actress as Raider from Fate; I can still remember those moments towards the end giving you hints about who she is, why shes here, and the goosebumps of excitement as you realize the answers. The AI heroine, which is just another "human" because she has/will have all the emotions and the AI attribute is just an excuse for chatting about philosophical themes, like what is love, what is existence, etc which makes in this particular case an interesting and enjoyable route, presenting also the most epic part of the game, a battle of wits/debate with herself(or more accurately: her pure logical part of her system which see these emotions as a threat to all aboard).
Never7 surprised me because I started it with 0 hint of anything, I didn't even read the description of the game, I just read the romance tag, male protagonist, it had a good rating and the classic art seemed nice. So I was playing the game thinking it was just a romance story with some mystery in between , nothing more; and when I thought I reached the end of the route with the heroine I chose... wow! what is going on?! That took me by surprise and I like what they did. I think you don't need to play all the routes, but I did it anyways because all the girls were nice EXCEPT one of them that was boring and so uninteresting to me but sadly her route has all the answers so it is mandatory to play her part if you want to understand the story completely.
(I have yet to play Remember11).
White album2 is the only game that made me feel a lot of emotions, I was excited, upset, It fkn made me shed tears , fury!, what a roller coaster, so much that at the end of the single route I did I said I'm not playing this game after some years pass.
I think this is a well known VN, mostly because is the king of love triangles and this is ironic to say from me because I didn't chose any of these two girls lol. Of course the game forces you to play into this triangle the first half of the game but eventually you end highschool and start university in the second half where you meet the rest of the heroines from where I chose my favorite. And what a drama, she will endure and reserve for herself a lot of problems caused by falling in love with the mc, cold treatment by her best friend, classmates, I think even teachers because she started to lose grades (she was a top student) but she keeps being with the mc, pretending that nothing happens, forcing her smile until, of course, she explodes. Fortunately it has a very satisfying ending and, unlike with any of the previous vns I've played, it left me thinking of her for the rest of the day, like missing her? I don't know, this vn is scary.
Ao no Kanata is an sport and romance vn; you will be the coach of these girls(you are some kind of an ex-star of this sport) and eventually become the personal coach of your chosen heroine.
The sport is based in race with a form of pvp. The player can fly through the sky thanks of special shoes. The matches are always 1 vs 1 and take place in a big delimited square area in the sky where both players start at same corner. In order to win you must have at the end of the time limit more points than your opponent, you aquire these points by either: touching a corner of the square or by touching the back of your opponent and this is where the pvp factors enters. There is a lot of talking about the "science" behind everything, the strategies, the playstyle such as speed focusing players that only go for the corners avoiding contact with the opponent or the fighters which keeps close distance with the adversary searching for fights since the touch in the back can destabilize the opponent in mid air allowing you to keeping him in a loop and winning consecutives points quickly.
The matches are thrilling, unexpected movements, pirouettes, comebacks; all this accompanied with fantastic art, nice little animations in the right moments and what is for me the best bgm of all the vns I talk here.
The romance is not less to the sport part of the vn, there is a rivalry (tho is kind of one sided) between two of them that underlines a classic topic: the gifted(which is crazy, in the same vn this girl who never even put on those special shoes and didn't know anything about the game became a pro) vs the hard worker. I picked the black hair girl, which develops a jealousy inside her toward the other girl and a feeling of being stuck in term of progress, sense of inferiority and a lost of motivation, thats where the mc plays a mayor rol in helping her. There is a plot twist in the story between these two that I didn't expect but it was nice. It has a satisfying ending underlying good sportmanship, friendship above rivalry and ,of course, love.
Ao no Kanata EXTRA2
This is a fandisc meant as the continuation of the black hairs girl route, there is another one EXTRA1 but that's for the blonde one(I have yet to play it). I'm gonna say just one thing about this: surprisingly is even better than the original work.
Full metal daemon: Muramasa. Mech samurais, lots of blood and violence, outstanding art and bgm, epic fights with nice animations, a lot of data to read, so much that it can become annoying sometimes, there is also a lot of philosophical talking about war, peace; and in the route I did(blue hair girl) a story about a common goal born from each one of them past, that coincidentally is marked for both by death, suffering and some resentment. But despise this and the fact that they form feelings for each other this common goal will go little by little separating into two visions and end up totally breaking when a secret from the mc is brought to light. This will underline a fight between the idealism of her vs a rare mixture from the mc: some realism, some pessimist and, in my opinion, a lot of brain damage bullshit. Apart from all this there is an exterior threat, a mysterious white mech that bring destruction and sings a song that makes, all humans in a certain radius around it go crazy, killing and ,if I remember correctly, sometimes eating each other.
There is one problem with this vn: there is, as far as I remember, at least 4 infuriating rape scenes, seriously, nothing happens to the heroines but to the side female characters that the vn makes you know, talk, help, sympathize, making sure to mark very well the attributes of innocence, honor, bravery, and will before all of them being raped in the most humiliating way by the most disgusting people, you will not only be furious for the rape in itself by even more for all the build up, the ambience, the people and how 2 of them end up dead and 1 mutilated, mind broken and soulless.
Taking all that part aside, it has a satisfying ending? Kind of, I mean its not happy but a satisfying death happened although later Its like I defeated something but I ended up becoming the same as that because using it its the best way to achieve my own goal. I think there is too much gray zones in this vn, nonetheless for the major part of this vn I enjoyed it.
Spirit hunter volume 1/Death Mark.
This a terror vn with some pieces of investigation work. You will be this unknown guy who coincidentally at the beginning of the game suffers from amnesia so we don't know who he is, the only thing that we do know is that he has a strange mark in his arm. He well arrive at a mansion and be greeted by a sophisticated doll. Throughout the game new people bearing the same mark as you have will be coming to the mansion seeking for help, each one of them is associated with a ghost that you must give (in the best case scenario) a peaceful pass to the other life, you can approach this in a more forceful way by "killing" them but it has consequences and depending on the outcome the character you take with you will live or die, permanently.
You will learn the stories of these ghost like this: first before the mission you are given the rumors in an urban-legend-like way, later you go to the place told in the stories and search for clues, this is where you will learn about some things about the past that will help you in gain knowledge of how to defeat the spirit and also how to help it; now this thing about helping it can get confusing and sometimes it's just impossible without a guide but I think it's a thing about the translation because I saw some japanese gameplays and they really knew what to do, not to mention that there is in some instances of multiple choice where the game trows at you a play of words riddle that I think it's very difficult if not impossible to translate with the same purpose and functionality. Anyway, once you are done with the spirit you will get the full story of the ghost, its past and the circunstamces that lead it to suffer such fate. You do this for all the characters finish the game and get an addional chapter that gives one last story and a proper ending. The stories are cool, the music too tho it can get a little repetitive but there are some catchy tracks, the big strength I think its the art style. One thing that bothered me was the little, but very forceful and out of nowhere, fan service CGs; even sometimes from female corpses, totally unnnecesary.
