Katawa Shoujo Forums

Ok, so this may be more based on opinion than anything else, but it'd be interesting to know what is your "true" route.

"True", meaning what route do you think was the route that Hisao "really" took if the game could play itself? The route that makes most sense, or the arc that you could really see happening in a real life situation if all the characters were real.

Which person does he end up taking to Act 2, 3 and 4 and which ending is the "true" ending?


My personal opinion is Lilly's Good ending, it makes everything in the world seem good or "put right" and whilst you know that Hisao is probably in grave danger at the end, you also know that whatever he has left will be in happiness and with the woman he loves. It also is the only arc to really play on his condition and remind you of just how serious it is.

The length, how it pans out, the way it concludes, the loose ends it ties up and how tightly it pulls you in means it gets my vote.

As unpopular as the route was, I personally think Shizune's good ending was the "true one". She was the first to meet Hisao, and she and Misha spend a lot of time with him at the beginning - the Hisao of Act 1 just seems to gel so well with the two girls. They just seemed to be what he needed to move on - he can never forget about his condition, but they at least helped him take a new look on life. Later on in the route, he then knows what he wants to do in life, and so do Misha and Shizune, and all have learned pretty valuable lessons while together in school - whether Hicchan and Shicchan last or not doesn't make the ending less satisfying. I kind of like that they didn't have the dependence on that factor. You don't see that much in VNs, really.

Guest wrote:As unpopular as the route was, I personally think Shizune's good ending was the "true one". She was the first to meet Hisao, and she and Misha spend a lot of time with him at the beginning - the Hisao of Act 1 just seems to gel so well with the two girls. They just seemed to be what he needed to move on - he can never forget about his condition, but they at least helped him take a new look on life. Later on in the route, he then knows what he wants to do in life, and so do Misha and Shizune, and all have learned pretty valuable lessons while together in school - whether Hicchan and Shicchan last or not doesn't make the ending less satisfying. I kind of like that they didn't have the dependence on that factor. You don't see that much in VNs, really.

I find it hard to fault your logic here. However, I can see two other routes being equally likely: Emi's and Hanako's. Both are "easy" routes; Emi's is likely if Hisao takes the nurse's advice to heart and makes a conscious decision to beat his condition, and the route flows pretty naturally as a result. Similarly, Hanako's route seems likely if he decides to take it easy -- he's bookish anyway and she's the least threatening member of the cast, so they'd be drawn together like magnets. Both routes require a minimum amount of effort on his part to unfold, so I think they're both pretty natural choices.

I think Rin had the least likely route. She's a confusing girl, and he has to avoid doing pretty much everything he wants to do to even begin to connect with her. Mind you, hers is an interesting route. It just doesn't seem very likely.

I believe it was Lillys, simply for the fact that there is an epilogue.

Guest wrote:As unpopular as the route was, I personally think Shizune's good ending was the "true one". She was the first to meet Hisao, and she and Misha spend a lot of time with him at the beginning - the Hisao of Act 1 just seems to gel so well with the two girls. They just seemed to be what he needed to move on - he can never forget about his condition, but they at least helped him take a new look on life. Later on in the route, he then knows what he wants to do in life, and so do Misha and Shizune, and all have learned pretty valuable lessons while together in school - whether Hicchan and Shicchan last or not doesn't make the ending less satisfying. I kind of like that they didn't have the dependence on that factor. You don't see that much in VNs, really.

Man, I was just about to vote Emi's good ending but I actually think this is just as likely.

I think emi's route seems most likely aswell, I voted for the good one, since it's also hard to actually get the bad one ( Even if you screw most of it, misha still offers a way out ).

That said, I think it's hard to tell what the true route would be, even though we get a lot of information about he is when he went to yamaku, there's not that much information about before, besides him being a independent young person that liked hanging out with a few close friends. Those characteristisks are filled in by your own and will end up changing who would be the true route, at least that's what I believe.

the thing about this game is, all of the conclusions flow pretty effortlessly from early seemingly innocuous choices. someone started a thread a long time ago titled something like "hisao's 6 different personalities" knowing so little about him going into the game, his personality is shaped around the girl you choose (and not just by the girl) such that by the end of the story, the only logical choice for the hisao that you are is the girl that you are with. even the bad ends flow pretty flawlessly, hisao repeatedly saying the exact wrong thing such that it is impossible to see it working out, even though the most offending action happened two acts ago and is only now reaching its logical conclusion.

Gods, angels, demons, spirits and whatever... people!

Whenever there is multiple endings, there's always this stupid question of which is "canon", "true", "more likely than others", "the best" "the most likely to happen", "what would happen if real world was like game XYZ" "what would happen if we never intervened" "Which ending is the natural one"...

This is hopeless.

I can never understand this train of thought. Why the need to categorize things as such? Why strain our minds over what would happen, when clearly, in a game where a protagonist mirrors us to the same extent as he has his own personality, the true ending is the one we have worked for?

Shizune's good isn't the true ending, because Hisao may as well be uneasy with a girl that possesses such a personality and VASTLY prefer someone else. He may even be a bastard, cheater, sensualist/hedonist or a nymphomaniac, or simply prefer Mischa from the beggining just without being comletely sure of it, and as such, get Shizune's bad ending.

Emi's route isn't any truer than others, either, because Hisao may simply not have any interest in improving his condition little by little through rather hard exercise. Even if he does, he may have no interest in Emi herself, or may simply take up something different than running AFTER graduating from Yamaku on either of the other girls' routes.

Same applies to Lilly's route. The fact that she's the one and only case of an epilogue doesn't make her true, it's just that Suriko had this writing style and developed a story where immediate ending wasn't desireable and to end it on a happy note required a small timeskip.

To be honest, without intervention from player, who can give a clear-cut direction to Hisao and stop his depression as well as his jadedness by simply trying to get to know the girl(s) he thinks are nicest, dying after the manly picnic is the most likely.

Hisao needs the player in order to obtain any ending, because you're supposed to strengthen the existing parts of Hisao's personality and fill out the missing spots. Your ending is the true one, for you. Not anybody elses. Not a single ending is superior, better or more likely because no kind of logic applies to all possible variants of Hisao.

The topic will probably continue, but I must say this is pointless and hopeless.

Each of the good paths have a solid claim to being the "true" one.

Emi's good has Hisao end up his healthiest, and probably the longest life he could live of all of the endings.

Rin's good has Hisao continuing down his cynical/jaded path that he entered Yamaku on.

Lilly's good probably has Hisao at his happiest.

Shizune's good has Hisao with his most clear picture of his future.

Hanako's good has him meeting up with someone just like him.

The bad ones all could be true as well, but they are only true because Hisao is a dumbass in all of the bad paths.

Hanako's bad ending is the most awesome scene in the game, and True art is angsty so yeah...

Rivan wrote:Your ending is the true one, for you. Not anybody elses. Not a single ending is superior, better or more likely because no kind of logic applies to all possible variants of Hisao.

But that's the whole point of this thread. It's not asking which end is the true one; it's asking which one is your true end.

Playing the game through naturally with no walk throughs or flow charts, I got Emi's good ending, so I guess I'll vote for that.

The only route I have left to play is Lilly; please keep that in mind as I write this.

I feel that Emi is the "traditional" high school relationship, and although I liked her story, I wasn't caught up in it.

Shizune's story did intrigue me, since I thought I didn't like Shizune... and it turned out I only didn't like Misha! Heh... personally, I found her story rather boring, with a few interesting touches. But that is just me.

Rin was my favorite so far, probably because she is the most like myself. I "got" the relationship between the two of them, and in addition, it felt very "adult".

Hanako was my other favorite, possibly because I found myself falling in the same trap as Hisao. I wanted to protect her from the world; and I think this is how the game would play out on it's own. He seems oddly drawn to Hanako, and the two of them are surprisingly similar.

For me it is Lilly's, I just cant really connect properly to the other characters.

Lilly's. I'm not gonna write over and over again about how her route has to be the right one. I think it's pretty logical: it's the longest one (it was for me), it has the only epilogue, Hisao is at his happiest out of all the routes, there is no real 'bad end' and I'm pretty sure that, when he met her in Act I, he was in awe. He definitely didn't comment on the other girls as much or as positively as he did about Lilly.

I'm pretty biased, though. Anyone can decide whichever route is the 'true' route. No route is more canon than the other.