Tsukihime

[SeanTucker]

I just finished Arcueid's route, and... that was somewhere between and .

Seriously, the True Ending felt like a punch in the gut on the level of TTGL's epilogue.

[SeanTucker]

Also, on a side note, there should be something like ReTake done with the Tsukihime manga. The anime blows ass, but the manga is made of awesome, especially since they worked a few appearances for Nanaya Mode in the route they adapted.

[Chowwow]

I'm sorry that this thread looks like crap no one cares about, but I'm sure there are people who have an opinion - they are just busy...

The Tsukihime manga is something I really want to get into, but haven't been able to as of late (like lots of things). As for the game and anime, no thanks: I don't have the time or sanity for those!

Seriously, the True Ending felt like a punch in the gut on the level of TTGL's epilogue.

You serious? TTGL's epilogue was nothing like EOE's ending, so this ought to be nothing...

[Maverick]

I remember playing the translated version of the Tsukihime game. Hentai comments aside, I did enjoy the game's narrative. The anime is a shallow river compared to the game.

[SeanTucker]

Q + TOPIC

You serious? TTGL's epilogue was nothing like EOE's ending, so this ought to be nothing...

EoE didn't really feel much like a punch in the gut, since everyone who wants to come back from the dead is free to do so. Nothing's changed, except for Shinji actually doing something useful for once, and Tokyo-3 getting destroyed.

TTGL's epilogue, however, felt like a punch in the gut because it just totally subverted the entire message of the series. The inevitability of Nia's death contradicts the whole "ROW ROW FIGHT THA POWAH" mentality the show presented. Same for Simon's existence as a drifter, with no one knowing about his prior heroism.

[oOoOoOo]

Anyone ever play Tsukihime? I've never played a proper Japanese "visual novel", and there's a fan translation patch, so I thought I might as well give it a go. I saw the anime adaptation and thought it had an intriguing atmosphere and some truly gorgeous music. I'm a little hit and miss with Type-Moon stuff, but I generally dig their style and am left with a good vibe even if I'm not blown away.

Also, please use spoiler tags because I don't want to be spoiled!

I guess we could also make this topic about visual novels in general. I really don't know much about them. Recommendations are also appreciated!

P.S. There's an old 2008 topic about this with four posts but it looked spoilery... >_>

[Ornette]

P.S. There's an old 2008 topic about this with four posts but it looked spoilery... >_>

Merged. There were no spoilers in this thread.

[oOoOoOo]

Haahahaha, I'm such a dork. Thanks for checking for me. ^^; I'm really paranoid about spoilers. Anyway we can change the topic to be more visual novel-centric, though? I'm curious about the whole shebang.

[The Bastard King]

I'd rather not touch the anime with a ten-foot pole, but the manga is a brilliant adaption of the visual novel, which itself is a masterpiece. With porn. Kagetsu Tohya was similarly good, plus not having to make save points at every junction to not miss anything was a nice change. Also, the additional side stories in the game, such as the history of the Nanayas and the epilogue to Akiha's true ending, were both great additions. Melty Blood is also a worthy addition to the series, but best be preparing for Chaos being a complete and utter cheap bitch to beat.

I've just started jumping into the side stories of the Naruverse, such as the Kara no Kyōkai movies (awesome AU movies with female Shiki counterpart), and playing Fate/Stay Night (most action packed visual novel ever). After I complete everything, I'm thinking of grabbing Battle Moon Wars and the translation patch on my compy. I think I might be becoming a wee bit of a Type Moon fan.

[oOoOoOo]

Funny you mention Kara no Kyoukai, because as I've been playing through Tsukihime, I've been imagining that the protagonist is the female Shiki. (I'm getting a little sick and tired of all the "ordinary high school boy" avatars to be found in every corner of geeky fandom.) I'm maybe about four hours into the game now. Instead of reading my pretentious news magazines I've been sipping coffee and playing Tsukihime.

So far I'd compare the story to something like Twilight. It is clearly a haremesque wet dream for quiet, "ordinary" school boys, but I appreciate a bit of pulpy whatever now and then. (I enjoyed Twilight because it spoke to me on a base level, so I'm not trying to be insulting to Tsukihime.)

I do like the combination of words, pictures, and music. I wish more "normal" novels in the West would have illustrations. I just like all sorts of media mixed together. I also used to love "choose your own adventure" stuff, so this is a bit of a nostalgia kick for me. ^^;

It is really funny that Type-Moon is such a bitch about piracy, when they don't even fucking sell the Tsukihime visual novel anymore. I'd rather have bought this in a store than try to figure out what the hell an iso image is.

P.S. What are some other top notch visual novels? I really know zilch about them.

[BrikHaus]

Everything by Type-Moon is trash.

[oOoOoOo]

Yeah, so I played a few more hours of Tsukihime, and it is definitely Twilight for boys. It is as if the entire narrative was constructed in order to allow young males to enjoy contrived sexual encounters.

For pornography, though, it has a pretty good plot.

My favourite part is...

SPOILER: Show

Shiki getting hilariously raped by his sister and a goddamn French maid.

This is the kind of thing that gives otaku a bad name, hahaha. I laughed so hard playing this, but a part of me was really let down by the lack of good artwork. I mean, the illustrator isn't even trying.

[The Bastard King]

Yeah, you can definitely notice a difference in quality between Tsukihime and Fate/Stay Night.

[Teague]

Everything by Type-Moon is trash irrelevant to my interests.

Fixed for diplomacy.

I love Tsukihime and Fate/Stay Night, but isn't it sad that the tsukihime remake is going the way of Duke Nukem Forever? Let alone the sequal...*sigh*, will Satsujinki never see a canon appearance?

I've played through Battle-Moon wars and immensely enjoyed it (although one or two moves make me facepalm), although for some reason the epilogue was untranslated for me...

I'm gonna wait until all of DDD is out and translated before I read it...

[firegirl26]

i like the anime

[Merridian]

Necrobumping because I’ve just finished Tsukihime. Well, I did it at 3am this morning, because I have a general policy to play VNs only at night, and given how my schedule has been, that means only after midnight. As a result of hectic real-life circumstances, I’ve been using the time I usually used to peruse evageeks and watch animus to play this cruddy VN instead. Stress relief? Well, maid-rape works.

Is it Twilight for boys? Yeah, pretty much. Except I’ll give Mirror Moon’s translations of Nasuspeak over Meyer’s craptastic prose any day, even if Nasuspeak is pretty mediocre throughout most of it. There are plenty of lolType-Moon plot elements that are fairly creative, but the most interesting one I’d already seen before in Kara no Kyoukai. I guess Akiha’s hair gig was pretty cool too, even though you don’t see that until the very end of the game. To its credit, Tsukihime’s strength lies in its typical-of-TM psychotic characters, and a few twists were pleasantly surprising—how Kohaku is handled through the Dark Side routes was pretty cool, for instance.

The illustrations suck. That’s my biggest complaint. The writing isn’t bad, and the narrative structure is pretty interesting (especially the contrast between the two main branches), but the illustrations are downright ugly at times. The dialogue reaction image whatevers are fine, though.

TBH I think just about everything was improved with Fate/Stay Night. Nasu’s writing was better, the plots were more interesting and the characters more developed, and the creativity he poured into the routes was of a higher caliber as well—not to mention FSN simply looks and sounds better than Tsukihime does, but those are things that money can do. I mean, the characters in Tsukihime were a-ok, and after having to replay parts of it about three or four times, I can admit that I got attached to some of them enough to feel a little depressed over their endings (Akiha’s endings weren’t any fun), even though I thought characters like Hisui and Akiha were fairly boring despite being well-explored. It was nice to be surprised by them, even though Hisui was mostly still pretty boring (especially by Type-Moon standards… I guess they needed a straight-man act in there someplace). It's just that the whole thing reeked of convenience, and each route was a constant reminder that I was playing something that was little more than a glorified eroge with a few horror elements thrown in. It had some strong first steps, but... well, I guess the fellas at Type Moon got better as they went along.

Speaking in terms of preferences, Arcueid is definitely my favorite route. She’s also the main heroine anyway, so I guess that makes sense. After her, in order of preference I’d probably list Kohaku, Hisui, Akiha, and Ciel. Ciel sucks. Ciel can go jump off a bridge. She made a good villain, because I still hate her even though I played her route first.

Overall, it was entertaining even though it wasn’t utterly spectacular. I’m looking into the sequel, but I probably won’t get to that for a little while.

[symbv]

Time to get the manga...... 10 vol. of it.....

I think a lot of improvements can be explained by Type-Moon being a doujin software make in Tsukihime, and it being a proper commercial undertakings. Without the foundation of Tsukihime, there would not have been Fate/Stay Night...

And am I the only one who was amazed by how professional a doujin software maker can be and how successful it can achieve?

[Mr. Tines]

And am I the only one who was amazed by how professional a doujin software maker can be and how successful it can achieve?

If you're actually in the industry, chances are you'll be using industrial-grade tools that are essentially doujin works -- maybe even ones by Japanese writers.

[symbv]

If you're actually in the industry, chances are you'll be using industrial-grade tools that are essentially doujin works -- maybe even ones by Japanese writers.

If ruby is the only thing they used I can understand as it is open-source. Otherwise I would expect industrial grade tools should include some tools that cost $$$$ which I would not expect doujin circles to be able to afford...

[Mr. Tines]

I mentioned Ruby because it is the most famous Japanese free/open-source software (FOSS) tool; if asked to guess I would expect most doujin games to use a Python based engine, since that seems to be a major niche that Python occupies.

Really, the point I was making is that the whole FOSS phenomenon is to software what doujin works are to anime and manga. Both can produce output that is professional grade and indistinguishable from commercial offerings : it's not surprising that when the two worlds overlap that level of quality can result.