Emi ending (spoilers for days)

[Ritter Delorges]

To help someone overcome their greatest fears and demons and to see them improve and have them love you and all. It's essentially one of the most beautiful things in life.
Actually. This is probably why i'm a HUUUUGEEE Hanako fan and not an emi fan.

Um, isn't that pretty much what happens in Emi's route?

[Liminaut]

One of the things I like about Emi's route is its' symmetry. Hisao wants Emi to open up and accept Hisao's help. In order to do this, Hisao has to open up and accept help from others -- either Mutou or Misha.

It's also the most complete route. We find out Emi's whole story, pretty much, and in all the other routes there are major questions unanswered. In fact, to a good extent the other routes are defined by what we don't find out; we usually just get shadows of the truth.

As for the minimal extent of apologies and other scenes: keep in mind the technical limitations of the medium. The story gets delivered 2-3 lines at a time. Walls of text are rare, jarring, and still not that extensive. There is also the artistic limitation that stories need to be told with a handful of sprites and not dynamic graphics. This means that in an apology scene, if we were writing the story we could spend quite a bit of time describing body language, vocal mannerisms, and extensive nuanced dialog. If we were doing a graphics cartoon or graphic novel, we could show all of those through the art. In a VN, we don't get either of those. This means the ready has to fill in a lot of these details, and how the reader fills in these details completely changes the scene. I think this demand on the readers is on of the aspects that creates the huge immersion that VNs generate.

[Pandas]

To help someone overcome their greatest fears and demons and to see them improve and have them love you and all. It's essentially one of the most beautiful things in life.
Actually. This is probably why i'm a HUUUUGEEE Hanako fan and not an emi fan.

Hanako's route isn't about Hisao helping Hanako overcome her greatest fears and demons only to see her improve and have her love him. If that's the impression you have then you missed the point of her route.

Because Hanako accepts the help more as where Emi wants to hide it.

No, she doesn't. She accepts support from Hisao as long as he allows her to also support him. The time Hisao offers to protect Hanako is also the moment he nearly blows his relationship with her.

The way we interpret a story is purely based on life experiences. Saying you "missed the point" is missing the point in itself.
And yes.
You help Hanako.
She wants to be close to Hisao, she just wants to have someone she can trust. Hisao does that part.
For someone who is alone, reminding them things will be okay and things of them sort is helping them.
Trying to help with someones past is different.
He helps her most when its indirect. Just being near him makes her happy.
Hence, he's helping Hanako, and secretly himself for that matter.

And technically. Hanako is afraid of people seeing her scars, that's a demon that Hisao slowly has her get comfortable with by being with her and taking her out etc. So he helps her overcome a demon, and for the time they spend together, she falls in love with him.
Just saying.

[Liminaut]

Because Hanako accepts the help more as where Emi wants to hide it.

No, she doesn't. She accepts support from Hisao as long as he allows her to also support him. The time Hisao offers to protect Hanako is also the moment he nearly blows his relationship with her.

Not completely. When Hanako has her catatonic break in class, Hisao walks her to the nurse's office. Sometimes Hanako flat out needs a white knight.

[Guest Poster]

I didn't really see that as Hanako accepting Hisao's help, but more like not really being in a position to accept or refuse.

Hanako doesn't need a white knight, not at that point or at any other. As the nurse points out after Hanako's breakdown: she simply needs a friend.

[Pandas]

I didn't really see that as Hanako accepting Hisao's help, but more like not really being in a position to accept or refuse.

Hanako doesn't need a white knight, not at that point or at any other. As the nurse points out after Hanako's breakdown: she simply needs a friend.

I realize what your saying.
But being there... being that friend.
That's helping.

Whether you go up to someone and give them a 50 dollars.
You help someone through a problem.
Or just simply being there... being a friend. Caring.
All of it is help.
Just different forms.

[AaronIsCrunchy]

There is a fine line between being a friend and white-knighting, and I suppose that's simply a matter of overdoing it. It can be difficult to gauge though.
I suppose it'd be like - if Hisao was constantly checking on Hanako, every 5 minutes 'are you alright', 'let me help you with getting through the canteen' and almost forcing his help then yeah, she's gonna get pissed (as indeed she does). However, he can still do that but balance it out with general friendly chit-chat, or playing chess, or whatever, and I think THAT's the difference.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong :p

[Pandas]

There is a fine line between being a friend and white-knighting, and I suppose that's simply a matter of overdoing it. It can be difficult to gauge though.
I suppose it'd be like - if Hisao was constantly checking on Hanako, every 5 minutes 'are you alright', 'let me help you with getting through the canteen' and almost forcing his help then yeah, she's gonna get pissed (as indeed she does). However, he can still do that but balance it out with general friendly chit-chat, or playing chess, or whatever, and I think THAT's the difference.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong :p

At one point he does get a bit aggressive with it. But i'm referring to when he was just trying to be a friend.

I dunno.
I feel like its me vs. the world on these forums.
Books are all on how you interpret them and apparently i'm wrong.
But it's fine. I don't expect people to agree.

[AaronIsCrunchy]

Phaha, trust me, it's good to have some varying opinions on these things And I wasn't actually disagreeing with you (I don't think), as you said 'being there' is what a friend does. And as you said, at one point Hisao does get a bit aggressive with it, so in my eyes we've reached an agreement

But don't feel it's you against the world here, you're just presenting a different opinion. And that's important for keeping forums like this going.

[Pandas]

Phaha, trust me, it's good to have some varying opinions on these things And I wasn't actually disagreeing with you (I don't think), as you said 'being there' is what a friend does. And as you said, at one point Hisao does get a bit aggressive with it, so in my eyes we've reached an agreement

But don't feel it's you against the world here, you're just presenting a different opinion. And that's important for keeping forums like this going.

Well good then!
We have reached an agreement in a way.
And yeah, i usually do have a very weird and different opinion on things.
My friends (who play this game) say i'm alot like rin in a way because i'm extremely straight forward and have a different opinion. Except i voice mine more.
Weird

[SpunkySix]

The SpunkySix bait has been placed, awaiting his arrival shortly.

I literally can't right now. Give me some time to write up a lengthy Greek epic about how not okay the OP is, and I'll be back soon enough.

[FelOnyx]

The SpunkySix bait has been placed, awaiting his arrival shortly.

I literally can't right now. Give me some time to write up a lengthy Greek epic about how not okay the OP is, and I'll be back soon enough.

No pressure, take all the time you need.

[Pandas]

The SpunkySix bait has been placed, awaiting his arrival shortly.

I literally can't right now. Give me some time to write up a lengthy Greek epic about how not okay the OP is, and I'll be back soon enough.

Ahahah, we all see it in different ways!
Don't be too angry at me! <3

I like Emi in her cute little ways but at the same time she just seems flat out rude.
Although after posting this and seeing what people have said, i've slightly warmed up to why she acted the way she did!

[Guest Poster]

Note that Emi is, objectively, a little rude or at least a little foul-mouthed. TheHivemind admitted that this was a little trait of himself that ended up leaking into the route.

[Mirage_GSM]

Allow me to fill in for Spunky Six for now

I like Emi in her cute little ways but at the same time she just seems flat out rude.

Well, yes, Emi is rude in that scene in the kitchen - but not nearly as rude as Hanako is in her bad ending. The main difference is that Emi's route gives you a chance to fix things afterwards... Also Hisao was kinda holding the idiot ball in that conversation so Emi blowing up on him was no big surprise.
Try reading Emi's path without going through that scene: Accept the help of the other characters when it is offered - Mutou's, Nurse's and Meiko's - and compare what happens in that version.

a cute bouncy girl turns into a emotionless jerk who gets away with things because she can say sorry and have sex...
...
But to just say "sorry, I have commitment issues" isn't really saying much.
...
The way we interpret a story is purely based on life experiences.

This makes me wonder if you have ever been in a relationship or more specifically in a relationship with a girl who had any kind of emotional problems...
Let me tell you this: A girl (or let's say "people" to avoid seeming sexist) can blow up for no apparent reason even if their experiences were far less traumatic than losing their father and their legs in an accident. And if you value your relationship you better be prepared to accept the apology afterwards (whether or not it's accompanied by sex...)

I like Emi's storyline best because it's the one that feels the most real to me. Though Katawa Shoujou tries hard to avoid archetypes (and mostly succeeds) you can still see them shining through. Lilly, of course, is the Lady (though she does have issues), Rin (and to a lesser extent Shizune) are quite far removed from any girl I've ever met in reality (though for those two it's probably intentional) and even for Hanako, I feel like the writer didn't capture the problems of PTSD quite as well as Hivemind did, though she comes in at a close second.

Emi is the girl I could most readily accept as a living breathing girl with all the problems such a girl has as opposed to an anime character...
Yes, that includes being a bitch sometimes.
You have been warned.