Katawa Shoujo Forums

Anonymous22 wrote:It's more like a play where you're given multiple endings. Comparing it to D&D is dumb because D&D can take you a whole lot of places while visual novels are a static experience with illusory engagement.

I think this is the key. It's not an RPG, it's not a game. It's one of those pieces where you can see multiple endings which the author considered and worked out. You can imagine the author had no particular intention, but that's on you and not on the author.

Anonymous22 wrote:Also I find it repugnant to have to explain anything. I'm out of here.

I thought you were here by choice?

I really do appreciate you stopping by and sharing your thoughts A22.

Granted, it doesn't change my personal preferences or opinions, but it does give me insight into why the route actually is the way it is.

Thank you.

Anonymous22 wrote:Also I find it repugnant to have to explain anything.

Thank you, Mary Poppins. Will give your words due consideration.

Anonymous22 wrote:"Writing for this medium" is the kind of thinking that leads all visual novels to be the same banal girl-centric slop where you pretend you're actually making decisions beyond which emotionally manipulative girl you want to bang. Really, I was thinking of adding more choices in Shizune's route later on but realized it was pointless because I was too lazy to effectively structure the thing so every choice meant something. So in the end the choices would be false choices tripping arbitrary switches to put you on rails to one of two endings. Aura did interesting things with structure, but most of the time, you're not going to see that in a VN and I would just take the standard route out of laziness. If given the choice between a bunch of meaningless fake choices that people would just reload the game through until they got to their ending of choice, and a choice that actually changes the writing in noticeable ways, I'd rather have the latter.

On visual novels in general, these things aren't really novels, and using words like "gameplay" is giving them a little too much credit. It's more like a play where you're given multiple endings. Comparing it to D&D is dumb because D&D can take you a whole lot of places while visual novels are a static experience with illusory engagement.

Also I find it repugnant to have to explain anything. I'm out of here.

You're right that VNs aren't D&D. My purpose in bringing up tabletop RPGs was to bring up another example of a medium where 1) They started with methods that weren't working very well 2) They adapted methods straight from literature that also didn't work very well so now 3) people are actively trying to figure out how to have methods that actually work for the medium.

So thinking of VNs in terms of games is probably a bad idea. I think of them that way because once I've made a decision in a VN, I *hate* going back until I've gone through to the end, bitter or sweet. Life gets played touch-move. Of course VNs per se don't need choices, Narcissu being the classic example.

So, what is the purpose and effect of having choices in a VN? I'm not sure, I've really just started thinking about this. (I think it was Andrew Gellman that said that the reason he publicly writes is to figure out what *he* actually thinks about something.) The effect I experience is that it creates a whole lot of personal identification with the avatar character, and that's unique to choice-based VNs; this is on top of the immersive effects of art+words+music. No, I don't have anything more profound yet, still cogitating.

Liminaut wrote:

Anonymous22 wrote:Important person stuff

No, I don't have anything more profound yet, still cogitating.

Please continue to cogitate- it's interesting.

Anonymous22 wrote:"Writing for this medium" is the kind of thinking that leads all visual novels to be the same banal girl-centric slop where you pretend you're actually making decisions beyond which emotionally manipulative girl you want to bang.

http://0-media-cdn.foolz.us/ffuuka/boar ... 091730.png


Basically, I think what people want is more touchy-feely stuff.

http://fireden.net/4chan/images.4chan.o ... 300639.png


Realism is great, but most people don't really want it in their fantasies, I guess. (Not to say Shizune, Misha and Kenji are written "realistically").

And I'm bored too. And found this topic completely by random chance.

(Wasn't even looking for KS in the first place..)

Forum is full of interesting "discussion" as ever. If this, I'm talking about the entire KS community, is really the best level of discourse you can throw up, then there really is no point.

LordDarknus wrote: Basically, I think what people want is more touchy-feely stuff.

Yeah? No shit, my nigga. But how can people seriously talk about "this medium" and writing for "this medium" and talking about the story, the characters, speculating about this and that, when what they actually want is "more touchy-feely stuff?" Do you realize how fraudulent that is? People say they want to be engaged, they want to think, they want something different. In reality, you're intellectually lazy. You want your hand held, you want to be made to feel special, you want to be emotionally manipulated. This doesn't mean that emotional value in writing is inherently cheap or bad. There's nothing wrong with playing with a reader's emotions and evoking feeling. But when nebulous "feels" become the entire benchmark, that's just disgusting. If you are reading a static visual novel over and over again because you're addicted to feeling something, that is rather hollow.

Liminaut wrote:So, what is the purpose and effect of having choices in a VN?

It was already said. To give the illusion of choice and allowing you to experience multiple stories within one setting and one set of characters. It's a static experience and it is up to YOU to put in the intellectual work to mine more value out of the experience than what's on the surface. There is nothing active or life-like about playing a VN other than that real life is also filled with long moments sitting through pointless bullshit and waiting to get your bone on, so comparing it to an engaged storytelling event like D&D is just off.

Anonymous22 wrote:Forum is full of interesting "discussion" as ever. If this, I'm talking about the entire KS community, is really the best level of discourse you can throw up, then there really is no point.

*sigh*

Obvious troll is obvious.

Look, if you want to engage the KS community, that's great. You've been around the block, so I presume you know how to do it, and this, frankly, ain't it.

...and you call us intellectually lazy?

dewelar wrote:

Anonymous22 wrote:Forum is full of interesting "discussion" as ever. If this, I'm talking about the entire KS community, is really the best level of discourse you can throw up, then there really is no point.

*sigh*

Obvious troll is obvious.

Look, if you want to engage the KS community, that's great. You've been around the block, so I presume you know how to do it, and this, frankly, ain't it.

...and you call us intellectually lazy?

You're calling one of the game developers a troll. That's...pretty bold.

At any rate, the discussion in this thread has actually made me a decided fan of Shizune's route. Whatever your thoughts on us & on the forums, A22, you tell (have told?) a compelling and interesting story. In the end, perhaps, that's what really matters.

dewelar wrote:
Look, if you want to engage the KS community, that's great.

No, you small-minded man. I'm just commenting on what I see, and I'm here because I'm bored. I have no intention to "troll" you.

What you should actually be asking yourself is, "Man, why is discussion of KS so shit across the board? Is this really it?" You shouldn't need me to show you how it's done or to engage you. You should be having engaging discussions yourself. Why don't you go fulfill one of those empty platitudes and be the change you believe in and let it all start with you instead of thinking all criticism is a "troll" and that someone should hand you literally everything, even instructions on how to talk, about what to talk about? Also, you heave a great big world-weary sigh and shake your head as you gaze upon the condescension of this troll... but you didn't say shit in that post of yours. You didn't reply to the actually relevant portion of my post. So, yeah, maybe you aren't intellectually lazy. Maybe you're intellectually shriveled. But this isn't what I want to talk about. I want to talk about all the shit you ignored to get huffy about shit like this.

Do you still not understand?

d2r wrote:You're calling one of the game developers a troll. That's...pretty bold.

Well, I called that statement a troll, which it was. You may infer from that anything you like .

And, for the record, I am among those who have enjoyed Shizune's story more each time I play it, and that is in large part due to the discussions I've read here, especially the efforts of ProfAllister. A22 basically came in and took a dump on that. So...yeah. Troll.

And since it just popped up, here we go:

Anonymous22 wrote:What you should actually be asking yourself is, "Man, why is discussion of KS so shit across the board? Is this really it?"

Sturgeon's Law.

EDIT: Deleted the rest of the post because it's not worth my time and energy.

dewelar wrote: You give off the vibe that you're ashamed of yourself for participating in this project in the first place, you want to distance yourself from the fanbase, and you're doing so by acting in a severely condescending manner.

The only thing I'm ashamed of is the fanbase's terrible discussions, that far outnumber the good ones.

And it's too late, your wrongness lives on in my quote. Internet Psychologist 2: Son of Shitty Psychology.

Anonymous22 wrote:

dewelar wrote: You give off the vibe that you're ashamed of yourself for participating in this project in the first place, you want to distance yourself from the fanbase, and you're doing so by acting in a severely condescending manner.

The only thing I'm ashamed of is the fanbase's terrible discussions, that far outnumber the good ones.

Well, sure, but that makes it different from every other fanbase...how? Also, you may think what you will of this, but I think better discussion happens on the Fan Fiction boards than this one. Of course, Sturgeon's Law applies there, too.

And it's too late, your wrongness lives on in my quote. Internet Psychologist 2: Son of Shitty Psychology.

*laughs* I can live with that .

d2r wrote:You're calling one of the game developers a troll. That's...pretty bold.

Well, some of them have called themselves trolls before. Not that bold.

Wait a minute...Lousy discussions outnumber the good ones here? Oh shit. It's almost as if...This is a fandom. Or, y'know, Sturgeon's Law is a thing but whatever.

If the discussion here is shit, start some that isn't. If you don't care to...Well, unhelpful complaining doesn't exactly help anything, does it? That's just logic.

Inb4 he goes on a ramble about how I'm intellectually lazy/shriveled and all other manner of condescending drivel because his shit surely smells like lilacs and honey.