Why do people keep calling this a "visual novel"?

[Mr J]

While looking for VN recommendations, I keep hearing this series brought up on the lists.
Granted, I haven't played many visual novels, but having played this back on my Wii, I always got more of a "detective/investigator" feel. The courtroom scenes especially add in it's own flair to the point that I think a series like this ought to have it's own genre.

[Blue_Glasses]

a visual novel is a text based game that is interactive.
it is essentially a novel with visuals.

yes, ace attorney is probably the visual novel with the most in-depth gameplay (danganronpa doesn't count, as it is just mostly minigames), but simply "visual novel" is the best way o describe the series for now

[🜍Medjed🜂]

its a visual novel, its telling a story with 2D characters, its text based and interactiv so its the best way to describe it

[Fronzel]

Visual novel is a form while "detective/investigator" is a genre...it's a detective/investigator visual novel.

[miptop]

People call it a visual novel because it is a visual novel.

Just because it's interactive or innovative, doesn't make it less so.

[Artur Ditu]

I never understood. It's basically an adventure game, you have an inventory of items and use them to forward the story just like in most point and click adventure games. It's obviously not a visual novel

[Mr J]

Originally posted by Artur Ditu:

I never understood. It's basically an adventure game, you have an inventory of items and use them to forward the story just like in most point and click adventure games. It's obviously not a visual novel

Thank you! Not to mention all the parts in the court. It's NOTHING like what you'd find in the typical visual novel.

[TwillionKILLION]

Originally posted by Mr J:

Originally posted by Artur Ditu:

I never understood. It's basically an adventure game, you have an inventory of items and use them to forward the story just like in most point and click adventure games. It's obviously not a visual novel

Thank you! Not to mention all the parts in the court. It's NOTHING like what you'd find in the typical visual novel.

The inventory is very static. You cannot progress the game without finding all the items that you speak of, and there is isn't much you can do with them. The most accurate thing to say would be that It is an Adventure Visual novel. Honestly it is kind of both genre's

[Hotel Security]

It's definitely a visual novel, albeit a bit more "active" than the typical one. Despite the interaction, A LARGE majority of your time with this game is still spent just reading dialogue and plot so it still fits in the visual novel category for me.

An adventure game is almost entirely exploring and puzzles with some dialogue tossed in. Not the same to me but there are hybrids of these genres as well.

[Kavi]

Not being rude but you're overthinking. If we bothered with such tiny details we would have way too many labels for any game that would be slightly different in terms of identity. It would make things tedious in terms of tags for the shop. General labels are also a way to discover new things slightly different but based on the same kind of game or experience people would play or look for.

I consider it as a visual novel, it tells a story with static images and is text based, it has an interactive part where you have to think but most of the game has the codes you'd find in a visual novel (even a skip dialogue option or a reload mid game and save options whenever you want), I don't see what the problem is. Generally speaking it really is a visual novel.

[chococake2024]

i think its fine to call it VN since there is sooo much talking and is novel length and also the presentation but you can call it adventure/mystery too since thats what the gameplay is :))

[diced]

tbf one of the first visual novels was a detective game with point and click gameplay and was based on american point and click adventure games

[Hotel Security]

>Not being rude but you're overthinking. If we bothered with such tiny details we would have way too many labels for any game that would be slightly different in terms of identity.

We sadly already do. Labels like "Soulslike," "RPG," "Metroidvania," and "open world" have ten different meanings now and get slapped onto tons of games that aren't these genres.

That's why I'm fine with this just being called a visual novel. Let's keep it simple.

[Ranch]

Because you cant really do anything wrong, its basically you following a script, like a visual novel. There is a clear story, and even when finding evidence and going into court youare sort of given the answers. Its interactive, and it is cool but it sort of loses its appeal to me and just turns into id rather watch someone play than play myself.

[Blue_Glasses]

Originally posted by Ranch:

Because you cant really do anything wrong, its basically you following a script, like a visual novel. There is a clear story, and even when finding evidence and going into court youare sort of given the answers. Its interactive, and it is cool but it sort of loses its appeal to me and just turns into id rather watch someone play than play myself.

but you can do wrong though, and get a game over. doesn't make it any less of a visual novel. + side dialogues that are funny when you do stuffs like present certain things to people, or press certain statements, they don't add to the story, but they're there to break the monotony of going through a linear adventure

[Dieter]

This thread was quite old before the recent post, so we're locking it to prevent confusion.