GameFAQs Top 10: Top 10 Best Characters From Visual Novels

[Oddball]

Putting something that isn't a video game up against real video games designed as such is going to hurt it.

What makes it not a video game?

No interactivity. All we do is turn the page, every action taken is Hisao's action. Sure we can choose to read multiple outcomes when Hisao is considering something but in the end there is nothing we do that influences things. Also there is no gameplay since there are no tests of skill or strategy.

Every action taken is Hisao's action? That's like saying there's no action in Mario Bros because the plumber is the one jumping on mushrooms and not the player.

Yes. There is interaction. You choose Hisao's actions at various points which leads you to another choice later on. These choices lead you to either the good endings or the bad endings ("You win!" or "Game Over!")

The game play itself does have certain skill and strategy. The skill rests in how well you can read and predict the characters reactions to your choices based on the knowledge you have of them. No decision is in a vacuum. For each choice you're given, you have to think about what you know based on the characters, themes, and setting, and choose what you feel will be the most positive reaction. It's a far close to puzzle game or adventure game play than than the typical jump on the turtle or shoot the zombie interaction, but that doesn't mean you aren't using certain skills to get your good ending.

Tic-Tac-Toe is a game. There's hardly anyone in the world that would contest that, and it has far less choices available to the player. (Whether it's a good game or not is another matter entirely.)

[Guest Poster]

So is engaging in a coin flip game, although it's an extremely basic game. Telling the guy flipping whether it's gonna be heads or tails or telling the operator of a shell game under which shell the ball is doesn't involve major activity other than picking the right choice. They're still games.

[Pyramid Head]

Every action taken is Hisao's action? That's like saying there's no action in Mario Bros because the plumber is the one jumping on mushrooms and not the player.

Yes. There is interaction. You choose Hisao's actions at various points which leads you to another choice later on. These choices lead you to either the good endings or the bad endings ("You win!" or "Game Over!")

The game play itself does have certain skill and strategy. The skill rests in how well you can read and predict the characters reactions to your choices based on the knowledge you have of them. No decision is in a vacuum. For each choice you're given, you have to think about what you know based on the characters, themes, and setting, and choose what you feel will be the most positive reaction. It's a far close to puzzle game or adventure game play than than the typical jump on the turtle or shoot the zombie interaction, but that doesn't mean you aren't using certain skills to get your good ending.

Tic-Tac-Toe is a game. There's hardly anyone in the world that would contest that, and it has far less choices available to the player. (Whether it's a good game or not is another matter entirely.)

Without your direct, precisely timed input Mario will jump onto the mushroom and crush it to death. However what you're describing in Katawa Shoujo doesn't really work. A puzzle? Skills? No. You can't do anything different, it's always turning the page of a story and occasionally selecting which section of the story is canon out of multiple possibilities. Katawa Shoujo does absolutely nothing that couldn't be accomplished by placing a CD player next to a comic book. And it works best that way, trying to involve a player and get said player to project onto Hisao wouldn't work since Hisao ultimately makes his own decisions. You can choose to read a story where Hisao sticks with the art club or leaves it, but in the end we're still reading a story where a fucking idiot encourages Rin to go into professional art under the guidance of a greedy bastard and someone who is quite clearly unreliable and who never encourages her to leave even though she's breaking down. Since it's never our actions and we can never interact directly, it's not a game.

[Guest Poster]

You can choose to read a story where Hisao sticks with the art club or leaves it, but in the end we're still reading a story where a fucking idiot encourages Rin to go into professional art under the guidance of a greedy bastard and someone who is quite clearly unreliable and who never encourages her to leave even though she's breaking down. Since it's never our actions and we can never interact directly, it's not a game.

Ummm...there's a truckload of games where your actions cannot control every single thing the protagonist says or does. In fact, I can't even count the amount of games where half the problems you face are the direct result of the main character making some stupid decision in a cutscene. Your actions hardly ever write the plot...they influence it. KS has limited interaction, but it does have interaction.

[Oddball]

No. You can't do anything different, it's always turning the page of a story and occasionally selecting which section of the story is canon out of multiple possibilities.

*snip*

trying to involve a player and get said player to project onto Hisao wouldn't work since Hisao ultimately makes his own decisions.

So, which is it. Are you selecting what happens next or is Hisao doing it without you? Can you never do anything different, or can you select different options and have a different story unfold before you?

Since it's never our actions and we can never interact directly, it's not a game.

So, because there are actually characters there that have their own personalities and opinions, that means it's not a game? So, RPGs aren't games either? Regardless of what I do, Cloud is still going to go chasing Sephiroth. I have no option to do otherwise.

but in the end we're still reading a story where a fucking idiot encourages Rin to go into professional art under the guidance of a greedy bastard and someone who is quite clearly unreliable and who never encourages her to leave even though she's breaking down.

Huh.
I didn't read that version of the story at all.
I wasn't even aware they made a Deluxe Cynic Edition of KS.

[Pyramid Head]

You can choose to read a story where Hisao sticks with the art club or leaves it, but in the end we're still reading a story where a fucking idiot encourages Rin to go into professional art under the guidance of a greedy bastard and someone who is quite clearly unreliable and who never encourages her to leave even though she's breaking down. Since it's never our actions and we can never interact directly, it's not a game.

Ummm...there's a truckload of games where your actions cannot control every single thing the protagonist says or does. In fact, I can't even count the amount of games where half the problems you face are the direct result of the main character making some stupid decision in a cutscene. Your actions hardly ever write the plot...they influence it. KS has limited interaction, but it does have interaction.

The player does have direct control in gameplay though. In order for Katawa Shoujo to gain an exception to the rule of visual novels not being video games like the Ace Attorney games which are marked as visual novels it would need to have had some way in which the reader could influence events. Without gameplay Katawa Shoujo would need a highly adaptive narrative with dozens of more arcs than it actually has to count as a video game. As is, it's a book with multiple endings. It's a good one, but just a book.

[Guest Poster]

In other words:

VN with less than x decision points: not a game.

VN with equal or more than x decision points: a game.

x obviously being your personally preferred amount of decision points.

Seems like a very subjective criterium.

[Oddball]

Without gameplay Katawa Shoujo would need a highly adaptive narrative with dozens of more arcs than it actually has to count as a video game. As is, it's a book with multiple endings. It's a good one, but just a book.

It's not a game now, but if it didn't change anything at all except gave you more choices, it would be?

How many choices do it need to be to be considered a game then?

[Pyramid Head]

The formula is a little more complex than that, but more decisions would be the easiest and most obvious solution where we have direct input as opposed to us just choosing which version of "The Misadventures of a Dopey Heart Patient" to read next. Without direct control of the player, a visual novel dependent entirely on narrative would need ways for the player to influence events. But everything is predetermined, it's a book with multiple endings that is well written and where each ending seems like a distinct possibility as opposed to the story coming to a horrific end because someone didn't present the right amount of clues or press the right button at the right time. It's why Katawa Shoujo works, but it's also why it's not a video game.

...i wonder if that will sound more coherent tomorrow when i'm not severely sleep deprived and rehash the argument to someone else.

[Oddball]

...i wonder if that will sound more coherent tomorrow when i'm not severely sleep deprived and rehash the argument to someone else.

I doubt it. I'm wide awake now and it doesn't sound the least bit coherent to me.

[Selim Bradley]

The formula is a little more complex than that, but more decisions would be the easiest and most obvious solution where we have direct input as opposed to us just choosing which version of "The Misadventures of a Dopey Heart Patient" to read next. Without direct control of the player, a visual novel dependent entirely on narrative would need ways for the player to influence events. But everything is predetermined, it's a book with multiple endings that is well written and where each ending seems like a distinct possibility as opposed to the story coming to a horrific end because someone didn't present the right amount of clues or press the right button at the right time. It's why Katawa Shoujo works, but it's also why it's not a video game.

...i wonder if that will sound more coherent tomorrow when i'm not severely sleep deprived and rehash the argument to someone else.

But everything in every video game is predetermined. Every single possibility has to be coded into the game for it to work.

[Pyramid Head]

...i wonder if that will sound more coherent tomorrow when i'm not severely sleep deprived and rehash the argument to someone else.

I doubt it. I'm wide awake now and it doesn't sound the least bit coherent to me.

I feel like i should throw something sharp at you. Repeating arguments guest poster presented in slightly different phrasing and then commenting on your alertness when i'm saying i'm severely sleep deprived and suggesting that your alertness would somehow cancel out me having insomnia. Go away Oddball, i'll ague with you on a different thread later. Right now you're only making the proceedings more confusing.

[Oddball]

...i wonder if that will sound more coherent tomorrow when i'm not severely sleep deprived and rehash the argument to someone else.

I doubt it. I'm wide awake now and it doesn't sound the least bit coherent to me.

I feel like i should throw something sharp at you. Repeating arguments guest poster presented in slightly different phrasing and then commenting on your alertness when i'm saying i'm severely sleep deprived and suggesting that your alertness would somehow cancel out me having insomnia. Go away Oddball, i'll ague with you on a different thread later. Right now you're only making the proceedings more confusing.

No.


You get no say in my actions. If you're the one that's sleepy and confused it might be best for you to take a rest yourself. It's not my fault that Guest and I have similar opinions on the subject, nor is it my fault that you're tired and confused. For that matter, I'm the one that first questioned you. Why should I be the one to leave?

(Also, quite a few times I've written out my replies only to see that Guest had already posted.)

[Xanatos]

Putting something that isn't a video game up against real video games designed as such is going to hurt it.

What makes it not a video game?

What makes a CYOA book not a game?

[Auratus]

I think... there are war around here, and for mental stability I shouldn't join it.

Hmm. On-topic. As half-assed Emi fan. I think... I'm happy? I love Rin much more but you have to admit that Emi probably cause humanity at whole lose its weight 100 times of her own, which is quite a feat (and I guess she are now more idol-ish than Pistorius now )

I think I might try other VNs that mentioned in the poll. I need something to do anyway.