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Does anybody else feel like they like Shizune but they don't like her route? I feel like this. I don't know why, but her route just didn't entertain or fulfill me. I can't find the correct words to put it in.

AkioVuadan wrote:Does anybody else feel like they like Shizune but they don't like her route? I feel like this. I don't know why, but her route just didn't entertain or fulfill me. I can't find the correct words to put it in.

I'm not Shizune fan, but I do think her best scenes where in other people's routes.

Hanako's breakdown and Lilly's leaving to be precise.

The correct words are "wrong" and "incorrect". Shizune's route was fine. But many do seem to dislike the route...Though they also tend to dislike the character as well so you might be alone there. She did have some great scenes in other routes too...

Shizune's route is a weird one. For my part, I think it's a great path in terms of the story but I dislike playing through it, and I dislike it for basically the same reason that I like it.

Let's start with this route's Hisao. He's depressed in all the routes to some extent or another, but in this one he has it bad. For instance at the start he's constantly whining about how hard Shizune and Misha work him, but he does what they say anyway. Hisao later admits that he badly needed someone to grab him and pull him along, and by the end of the arc he is freely committed to helping. This is a fascinating character arc to read about. However, by its nature the process of playing the game creates a lot of identification with the protagonist, and at times the path just makes my teeth hurt in frustration.

Shizune herself. Playing the route I was infuriated at how badly Shizune treats Hisao, for instance during the trip to her house. She rides him like a joystick and then barely talks with him for a few days. Looking on it as a story, this is again fascinating. My interpretation of her actions is that Shizune was kind of nonplused at the idea of having a boyfriend. Her world had consisted of either antagonists or minions. As a boyfriend, Hisao is suddenly in neither category. It is also apparent why it's not going to work if Hisao stands up for himself. If Hisao starts challenging Shizune, then he puts himself in the 'antagonist' category and the story ends.

There is a huge amount of ambiguity in the story. Two immediate puzzles are "Misha's disability or lack thereof" and "what happened to Shizune's mother?". There are much deeper ambiguities in the story. Contrast Shizune's story with Emi's. Emi clearly has big issues, we find out what they are, and work through them. In Shizune's route there are changes going on in the characters but they are very much behind the scenes. In this route Hisao functions as emotional support for Shizune and Misha as they go through growth stages, instead of being a catalyst for change like Hisao is on the other routes. Again, this makes for a very fascinating story but is rather unsatisfactory to play through. My feeling at the end was "I guess I did something right, but I'm not sure what".

To wrap up: great story, unsatisfactory route, and for the same reasons.

Linguistic note: "nonplussed" is an interesting word. It comes from "no more", that one is so perplexed that one can't act or do anything more. It's also come to mean "unperturbed", somehow. I guess if one is completely unperturbed then one also doesn't act, but for different reasons.

Aye, I definitely agree with you there, Akio

Although her route had some good points, I found it overall quite unlikable.
Shizune, however, is one of my favourite girls!

She and I both do the whole 'make a game out of it' thing, and I can't help but admire her organisational skills, especially since mine are job-ruiningly catastrophic...
And to boot, her strict nature make all her romantic scenes just that much more sweet :3

I liked Shizune's route myself, on account of its handling of time & the necessity of moving on. Something about how it depicted the eventuality of having to leave the cocoon of Yamaku appealed to me. I dunno; I didn't find it all that dssatisfying. I will say that the bad ending disappointed me to the extent that Hisao never gets taken to task for sleeping with Misha. OK, sure, it causes his relationship with Shizune to fall apart, but it's never directly addressed, which was unsatisfying. I was expecting a meltdown of some kind - plus, Hisao doesn't experience anywhere near the level of guilt I'd have expected after doing something like that.

This said, I still found it good overall. I did like how you slowly learn to talk to S., demonstrated by the gradual reduction of [...] in favour of expanded text. Something about that was nice; gave more insight into the character when we'd previously known her only via the intermediary of Misha. But I digress.

AkioVuadan wrote:Does anybody else feel like they like Shizune but they don't like her route?

Have you done it more than once? I found it takes at least a second time to really come together.

I'm going with pretty much what d2r said, Shizune should have absolutely torn a strip off of Hisao for that and she just... didn't. Romantically, the story is the tiniest bit perplexing as to how you go from boyfriend/girlfriend to sex to worker bee then back to boyfriend/surprise sex, but I did like the whole graduation idea a lot It's not as much of an emotional sledgehammer as the other four I find, so maybe (as I did) if she's one of the last routes you play (or THE last) then the feeling of having been on a journey isn't there as much but... it's a good route. Not my favourite route but certainly not without merit.

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:[...] if she's one of the last routes you play (or THE last) then the feeling of having been on a journey isn't there as much but... it's a good route.

I completely agree. I actually regretted not doing hers LAST (I did it second last before Rin's), after I finished it, since it makes such a good bookend for KS as a whole.

d2r wrote:

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:[...] if she's one of the last routes you play (or THE last) then the feeling of having been on a journey isn't there as much but... it's a good route.

I completely agree. I actually regretted not doing hers LAST (I did it second last before Rin's), after I finished it, since it makes such a good bookend for KS as a whole.

I'd never actually thought of it that way! Her route was the last I did, but you pointing that out makes me realise that yeah, it is actually. Good call that.

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:

d2r wrote:

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:[...] if she's one of the last routes you play (or THE last) then the feeling of having been on a journey isn't there as much but... it's a good route.

I completely agree. I actually regretted not doing hers LAST (I did it second last before Rin's), after I finished it, since it makes such a good bookend for KS as a whole.

I'd never actually thought of it that way! Her route was the last I did, but you pointing that out makes me realise that yeah, it is actually. Good call that.

Indeed. I think of Shizune/Lilly as bookends, and Emi as the core. Hanako and Rin provide the body in between, so to speak.

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:you go from boyfriend/girlfriend to sex to worker bee then back to boyfriend/surprise sex

Yes, how dare she not go after Hisao for something she didn't know about...

And...I think you may be thinking of Lilly's route here. Or Emi's. Hell, Hisao and Emi don't even have a relationship beyond fucking, because that's how Emi likes it.

Potato wrote:

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:you go from boyfriend/girlfriend to sex to worker bee then back to boyfriend/surprise sex

Yes, how dare she not go after Hisao for something she didn't know about...

And...I think you may be thinking of Lilly's route here. Or Emi's. Hell, Hisao and Emi don't even have a relationship beyond fucking, because that's how Emi likes it.

Nah, I meant when Hisao was doing the bad thing with Shizune :L Although I guess that maybe Misha might count as surprise sex as well, probably.
Haha, nope, definitely thinking of Shizune's route! With Lilly's you do stay pretty boyfriendy with her, and there's quite a few nice non-h-moments with Emi, but it seems like in Shizune's she seems to disappear almost out of his life for a bit, and then BAM, sexy time.

AaronIsCrunchy wrote:it seems like in Shizune's she seems to disappear almost out of his life for a bit, and then BAM, sexy time.

That's because unlike those two lazy bums, Shizune has a council to run. It gets better once Hisao joins.

It's a little different too, since with Emi, she does try to keep it as physical as possible as an emotional barrier, but Hisao very clearly is dating her the whole time.