What's your opinion on the "Visual Novels" on Steam?

[Thelime]

I would discuss this on the discussion forums of one of the individual "games", but the weaboos do nothing but defend their precious garbage anyway.

Let me start by saying, from what I have seen these VN's have gotten progressively worse as they go along. I don't own any as I'm not into them (and porn is free, I'd rather go watch it than buy it on Steam.) One of my friend's was talking about one over a year ago, and explained how it had loads of choices, multiple endings, etc. That didn't seem that bad. One of the newest ones to hit Steam is called "Happy Campers". This has got to be one of the the biggest money grab attempts I've ever seen on Steam. It's not even remotely Japanese as far as I can tell. It's made by one guy. It might be, who knows. But I don't believe that the people playing it are. This "story" has also got to be the worst I've ever heard of, read reviews and read the forums. It's pretty much just panty shots and big boobs galore.

I actually did post in their forums a couple times, having "heated discussions" with people, but the developer (if you can call him that) removed most of my comments, and has been banning critics left and right.

I really want to know... What is the ACTUAL point of buying this? The weaboos will say for the story, or to support the creator, but that's utter BS... An early age children's book has more story than some of these.

So what is your guys' opinion on these? The first few I've seen didn't look all that bad... But now almost every one of them has a link to an 18+ patch pinned right on their forum, proving my point further that these are not for story. I don't believe porn belongs on Steam, but hey, that's me.

[Kartoffelsuppe]

I have a hard time taking you serious OP with that post history in Happy Campers. Weaboo doesn't mean what you think it means. If you really think that people who enjoy cartoon porn need to get their priorities straight, whatever that means, then I don't know what to tell you.

[Thelime]

Początkowo opublikowane przez lolibus:

I have a hard time taking you serious OP with that post history in Happy Campers. Weaboo doesn't mean what you think it means. If you really think that people who enjoy cartoon porn need to get their priorities straight, whatever that means, then I don't know what to tell you.

I don't need you to take me seriously. I don't see why I should take you seriously either when you're sporting "loli" in your username, and for the record, weaboo is slang. It is not a real word, so there isn't an "official" definition, but nice try.

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

More accurately, there are multiple meanings of "weeaboo" (or "weaboo") in use.

Hey, didn't I write up a telescoping "definition" of that term a little while back? I wonder if it was in this thread.

[Slimurgical (Stormy)]

IMHO I literally couldn't care less aobut any visual Novel. Yeah, I get it, as an artist, I get that it's fantastic as they give artists a crapload of work, but development-wise, for hte most part they're easy as hell to produce. Case and frigging point: Every Sakura Visual Novel in existence.

Not only that, but there's no true interactivity there. Absolutely none. Like what... you can choose multiple paths that lead to different endings? Cool, congrats, still not actual interactivity.

It's not any better than the average Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Book, where every second choice basically leads to death or the end of the story, infact it's better, but at the same time...

Visual Novels are just that. Visual Novels, not games. IMHO, I'm only on Steam for Games, and I really cannot BEGIN to care about them. I wanna play something where I can atleast TRY to play in a way the devs didn't originally intend, or go outside of the common strategy area and try something totally new from everyone else.

Also, I guarantee you that nobody, absolutely nobody will ever genuinely rack up over 100 hours in a Visual Novel, and then keep playing it for far longer still.

Their lifespan is as short as their stories, which won't be too long because A. Either you work on it for YEARS, or B. you do it for a few months and it's basically movie-length, only there's just reading and looking at pretty visuals, no acting, no voice work, nadda to really immerse you when you gotta progress it just by clicking a thing.

Regular Novels and comic books have more to them than any Visual Novel for the simple fact that I can read those without needing to buy it online and access my computer for it.

IMHO, if you're going to make a Visual Novel, just go the extra mile and make it paperback at the very least or try to make it more gamey and immersive.

Otherwise, there's literally no actual point to it is there? How can you ever be immersed when, sure some have auto-progress options, but if they then lack voice acting, the viewer can miss out on dialogue since every reads at a certain pace, but if it's not paced correctly, it's just annoying.

Immersion is important if something is going to be an escape from reality to ultimately entertain.

Enjoying a story as a viewer only goes so far, which is far less distance than well-done immersion will ever do.

[Radene]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Jello Pone Tids:

Also, I guarantee you that nobody, absolutely nobody will ever genuinely rack up over 100 hours in a Visual Novel, and then keep playing it for far longer still.

I did just that with Steins;Gate.

Maybe wait until I ask you to speak for me before you include me in your "absolutely".

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

Also on that same quote:

Początkowo opublikowane przez Jello Pone Tids:

Also, I guarantee you that nobody, absolutely nobody will ever genuinely rack up over 100 hours in a Visual Novel, and then keep playing it for far longer still.

I can't speak for anyone else, but for me, amount of time spent in game does not correlate directly to game quality. The games I've spent the most time on are very much not the same as the games I've enjoyed the most. I don't hate the ones I spend a lot of time on, but I also wouldn't consider them my all-time faves.

In fact, one of my all-time faves has three playable characters and I've only played one, yet it's still one of my all-time faves. Because that one playthrough was just that great.

I have a tendency to do single playthroughs and then put games down, but correspondingly, I also tend to play games with a definite endpoint to their stories, as opposed to sandbox games that are open-ended with regards to their gameplay experiences. So a single playthrough -- or, in the case of a visual novel, a single readthrough -- that's intensely enjoyable, can be far, far more fulfilling than a many, many playthroughs of a game that's mildly enjoyable and a good time-waster but not hugely fulfilling.

[Paratech2008]

I dunno, I've spent 100 hours in Stardew Valley and even though its repetitive, I like it. I've done 70 hours on Story of Seasons for my 3DS, 60 for New Super Mario Bros 2.

Some games that are technically short are very fun to play over and over again.

I'm not into multiplayer, but I've seen people play the Call of Duty games hundreds or over a thousand hours and some people do that with World of Warcraft. To each their own.

I don't play Visual Novels a lot, I don't mod them into Hentai. I don't stop anyone from doing either. I do play them occasionally, and enjoy PG adult humor.

[Winged One]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Jello Pone Tids:

Their lifespan is as short as their stories, which won't be too long because A. Either you work on it for YEARS, or B. you do it for a few months and it's basically movie-length, only there's just reading and looking at pretty visuals, no acting, no voice work, nadda to really immerse you when you gotta progress it just by clicking a thing.

actually, a good chunk are voiced (in Japanese mind you), and several VN's actually have a surprising amount of length to them (I have heard some of them have an estimated completion time of 60+ hours, granted I can't confirm that myself)..


there is nothing inherently wrong with not liking VN's (or any other genre for that matter), but it doesn't hurt to be somewhat aware of the genre when stating your dislike of it..

[Paratech2008]

Its no different than overgeneralizing about anime. A few rotten apples make the whole lot look bad.

In fact in the US that's how anything the media wants to portray as negative is handled. Pull out extremes and portray them as normal. Talk shows do that as well.

[Tsal Vlaxitov]

I mentioned that Steam needs to put the cartoon sex games in their own category in a more general thread about a week ago. I got a salty knee jerk response by pretty much all the same characters heckling the OP here, with a moderator closing that thread shortly afterwards.

I'm not even saying that Steam gets rid of it, but at least put that garbage somewhere where I don't have to see it if I want to use Steam and give those who do want to see it the option to. A video rental store in the 90's knew well enough to put the degenerate movies in the back, why can't Steam do the same thing today with degenerate cartoon sex games?

[Quint the Alligator Snapper]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Paratech2008:

Its no different than overgeneralizing about anime. A few rotten apples make the whole lot look bad.

In fact in the US that's how anything the media wants to portray as negative is handled. Pull out extremes and portray them as normal. Talk shows do that as well.

You're describing how a darn lot of people do things. Heck, it applies to those people who like flaming the "media" so much.

Początkowo opublikowane przez Tsal Vlaxitov:

I mentioned that Steam needs to put the cartoon sex games in their own category in a more general thread about a week ago. I got a salty knee jerk response by pretty much all the same characters heckling the OP here, with a moderator closing that thread shortly afterwards.

I'm not even saying that Steam gets rid of it, but at least put that garbage somewhere where I don't have to see it if I want to use Steam and give those who do want to see it the option to. A video rental store in the 90's knew well enough to put the degenerate movies in the back, why can't Steam do the same thing today with degenerate cartoon sex games?

Początkowo opublikowane przez Tsal Vlaxitov:

I mentioned that Steam needs to put the cartoon sex games in their own category in a more general thread about a week ago. I got a salty knee jerk response by pretty much all the same characters heckling the OP here, with a moderator closing that thread shortly afterwards.

I'm not even saying that Steam gets rid of it, but at least put that garbage somewhere where I don't have to see it if I want to use Steam and give those who do want to see it the option to. A video rental store in the 90's knew well enough to put the degenerate movies in the back, why can't Steam do the same thing today with degenerate cartoon sex games?

You can edit your store preferences to not show things tagged with "Sexual Content" or "Nudity". There's a similar and separate setting for "Violent" and "Gory", too.

[100% lob juice]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Tsal Vlaxitov:

I mentioned that Steam needs to put the cartoon sex games in their own category in a more general thread about a week ago. I got a salty knee jerk response by pretty much all the same characters heckling the OP here, with a moderator closing that thread shortly afterwards.

I'm not even saying that Steam gets rid of it, but at least put that garbage somewhere where I don't have to see it if I want to use Steam and give those who do want to see it the option to. A video rental store in the 90's knew well enough to put the degenerate movies in the back, why can't Steam do the same thing today with degenerate cartoon sex games?

You sound quite salty yourself.

[Nadia]

I realy don't get what the big problem is, there is different kind of games on steam that some people like and others dislike, and the good thing is, no one have to care about it, because no one is forced the buy or play the games he dislikes.

[Tux]

I dont think novels belong in gaming however, I consider many of the most popular titles out there to be nothing more than interactive novels so clearly my opinion doesnt matter much

[Winged One]

Początkowo opublikowane przez Tux:

I dont think novels belong in gaming however, I consider many of the most popular titles out there to be nothing more than interactive novels so clearly my opinion doesnt matter much

where do you draw the line however? the same thing can be said about Tell Tale games, or several of the PC games from the late 1980s..


exactly what does a software have to contain for it to qualify as a "game"?