In short, I’d long since abandoned visual novels as a method of storytelling and as a style of game, content to only return to it for exceptional cases.Īnd then I came across Goodbye Volcano High at PAX East. Even though, in both cases, I wished for something a bit, well, more. And even while I’ve enjoyed both of those, they were flawed exceptions for me games that still carried the baggage of all visual novels, but just happened to be well-written and special enough to prove that at least something could work. It’s a downright bleak method of storytelling, in my opinion, made barely tolerable by the relative bright spots of games within the medium like Doki Doki Literature Club or the Phoenix Wright series. This opinion is not improved by the majority of them being a… let’s say lurid romantic fantasy where the “choices” - the only style of engagement for most visual novels - boil down to which character you most want to romance. Suffice to say, I do not have a high opinion of visual novels. Typically, they have stock anime-style art, a generous conception of what “choice” means, and hackneyed writing that is so self-indulgent that you could psychoanalyze it in order to figure out in what ways the writer’s parents failed them. They are a medium that lacks the specificity of a novel proper, while also lacking the interactivity of a video game.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |