Which route?

[MindfulOcean]

I know nothing about Clannad other than it is famous and at least some of it is sad. If I were to read one route to see what I thought of Clannad, which one would you recommend? As a bonus question, how long are the routes compared to something like Shuffle!, and how much of each route is shared in common (and can therefore be skipped on subsequent read throughs).

Thanks!

[DPM JaMaN]

I'd say that the true route really shines, but to get to it you will be forced to complete all other routes first. It's hard to tell which of those basic routes is better, personally I really enjoyed Fuko's route and Kotomi's. Never played Shuffle so I can't compare these 2 novels, but for your first playthrough you will probably spend 20-30 hours or so(there are few exceptions) others are more like 10, since you can skip a lot of events you've already seen. It's kinda complicated to describe on how much of each route is shared in common, it depends on a route and the amount of already completed routes. An the last one - I highly suggest you to use a walkthrough located in guides section, or from any other source, since it's a 100+ hours vn with some pretty tricky shenanigans to complete it))

[Mr. Manual]

I agree completely with the above. The only difference: The Steam guide I used says to do the baseball route first, since it introduces you to a lot of the characters. I agree with that. It introduces you to all of the heroines and support characters (except Kotomi and Yukine. I think you run into them only once), so you can have an idea what they're like, except Nagisa and the Furukawas. To get a good understanding of them, it's best to do Fuko's or Nagisa's routes. She's also the canon/true route.

Also, it might sound like a stretch when you hear people say this game will break your heart, but it's NOT a stretch.

[Corban]

The common routes for the main heroines end in the 28th of April, but for that time you are already heading to one route or to a bad end.
People say that the baseball route is a good start since it has almost every character on it, in the Steam version I started with Yukine's route because I find it boring and is one of the shortest (along with Misae's one).

Once you clear the baseball route the best order is Misae --> Tomoyo --> Yukine --> Ryou --> Kyou --> Kappei --> Mei --> Kotomi --> Fuko --> Toshio --> Nagisa --> After Story
Keep in mind that Ryou is actually a bad end for Kyou, Misae is mandatory to be done before Tomoyo since you get her light in Tomoyo's route if you cleared her route before.