visual novel rant (⌒_⌒;)

spoiler warning for You and Me and Her and Needy streamer overload!!

i havnt played thaat many visual novels but for the ones i have played, ive really enjoyed some parts, and hated others,,,,, so heres a little rant that wont be easy to read cus im just writing as i go ^^

so ive been playing alot of valhalla cyberpunk bartender action lately (i havnt gotten all the endings yet so no spoilers!) and compared to other visual novels ive played its my fav by far, one thing i think really makes it entertaining is the vibrant artstyle, many visual novels have pretty bland art imo (this is prob bc most of them where made in the early 2000s/2010s when anime art wasnt super vibrant but used more desaturated and pastel colors), and when you have a game thats HEAVILY based on having a compelling story with some nice art, it can be a make or break situaition when it comes to characters sprites, backgrounds and potential cutscenes

Now having desaturated colors CAN work, you just have to make sure it fits the story, an example of this working is You and Me and Her, the art in this game has a very pastel color scheme, but since the story is set in a typical japanese highschool, with a more realistic approach to characters looks/personalities and grim topics, it works. the blood on the sprites later in the game really contrasts with the pastel school uniforms and little/soft shading in a nice way

valhalla is a game that does this really well too, but in the opposite direction, its set in a cyberpunk future wherethere aer neon signs everywhere and cyborgs/robots are usual customers at the bar you work at. With this the artstyle is a perfect mix of bright and darker colors, and all sprites/assets/visuals are done in pixelart which looks really nice and fits the hyper-digital society its set in

Needy Streamer Overload is a really good example of this too, since its also a very digital game and played on a windows homescreen looking interface, the pixelart fits really well, the colors look amazing too and really contrast the topics, but in a nice way, since its very inspired by Jirai Kei and especially landmind girls (jirai girls) the aesthetics fits perfectly with the hyper feminine substyle that deals with mental health issues

one game that KIND OF misses this point is Corpse Party, DONT KILL ME YET THO hear me out, the big sprites artstyle fits and the cutscenes are beautiful, but the pixelart sprites of the characters dont match well with the backgrounds, the values are too similar but yet super different? this makes the characters stand out on the screen in a wierd way, it almost looks like assets from two different games that someone slapped on top of eachother and called it a day, one thing that makes this really evident is the lack of a clear outline on the characters, they also have a much lighter color palette compared to everything else

another thing i find improtant is how the characters are written and talk/behave, when characters are fit into anime types, like typical tsuderes and such, i find it harder to finish the game and keep reading after the first few hours, it gets boring and almost predictable, when characters are more realistic its so much easier to get into the game, again ill be using valhalla as an example cus im a proud valhalla glazer !!!!! :P but the main character that you play as, Jill Stingray, talks and thinks in a super realistic way, she acts her age, being 27 living alone in an apartement, her thoughts are really mature. But its not only her that acts like a real person, most of the other characters, such as Alma, Stella and Beatrice all act in really realistic ways, ofc every character is a bit over exaggerated compared to real life, but only to an intertaining degree, not too much not too little

personally i find it super hard to get into a visual novel if the artstyle doesnt fit/is boring, cus, for me, its a huge part of the whole experience of playing these types of games, im also an artist myself and im always trying to take inspo/get better at art by studying others, so with visual novels i can study pretty art while playing a cool game at the same time!!

You and Me and Her, A Love Story

Valhalla Cyberpunk Bartender Action

Needy Streamer Overload

Corpse Party

!! these are all screenshots of gameplay so you can see what it really looks like when playing !!