A Break to Discuss Visual Novels · 5:49am Feb 6th, 2016
Yes, this is mostly an excuse to discuss a visual novel I recently played, but partly to dissect it as research. See, I've wanted to make my own visual novel for a while (probably for free or under $5, because it'd be more for fun than for a profit motive). I really like reading/playing visual novels, and I like experimenting with my writing, so writing my own visual novel seems like a natural progression of these two things. I have a few artist friends and a couple of people I could probably at least get help from for music, so the pieces could be there if I had the time (which I currently don't).
Since I don't really have the time to plan out a story for a visual novel, the next best thing I could do is devote some of what free time I have to reading/playing other people's visual novels and sort of figuring out what works and what doesn't.
Enter An Octave Higher(Steam link included in case you're interested in checking it out), a visual novel I've just finished reading. It's a good example to use, I think, because while I liked it overall, it does have a mix of things that I think were good and bad about it. Discussion below the break.
So with a name like An Octave Higher, I think it's fitting to start with the music. The developers have made the full soundtrack available for purchase as DLC. Do I think it's worth it? Well, currently, it's probably worth the extra fifty cents from being 75% off, but don't expect anything mind-blowing. The soundtrack is pleasant, but ultimately forgettable. It's not something you'll likely listen to on its own. That's okay, I think. Music in a visual novel is not the highest priority, and as long as the tone of the song fits the scene, that's really all that matters.
As far as visual novels go, I think this one did a solid job. The soundtrack includes 26 classic songs and eleven original tracks, although three are just different arrangements of the theme. Each original track fits with a theme that it's named after: Action plays during fight scenes, Bourgoise acts as the main theme of Frederic and plays in the nice part of town, Conservatoire is Franz's theme and plays during conservatory scenes, etc. It does the job nicely, and it subtly shows what's going on in the scene. The classical music gets one use per song, if I'm not mistaken, and it didn't feel particularly necessary. Had those been replaced with original tracks, this soundtrack might merit more discussion and been more worth listening to on its own. Ultimately, that's the difference between a good soundtrack and a great one, and this one is merely good.
While I'm going on about audio, I should mention the sound effects. They're not very good. Water-based attacks have a weak splash noise that makes them seem incredibly underwhelming, and the others are also kind of lazy. There might be one or two good ones, but the bad ones stuck with me most. This is easily the worst part, though it's mostly a nitpick.
The next aspect I'd like to discuss is the visual part of the visual novel. The character design is pretty good, in my opinion. Each character is distinct, and they all look pretty good (though I wish Franz didn't have his stupid ponytail thing). The animations and expressions are... less impressive, but they suffice. (One of the common emotions is winking and frowning at the same time, which looks dumb. The blushes also aren't that good, which is a pet peeve of mine in VNs.) I think the best aspect of this story, from a visual perspective, is the CGs of the characters. They have some really nice drawings of the characters, and some of the fight scenes look great. The city and backgrounds are decent to good: the color palettes are a bit bland in the city, but that's really my only gripe with it. This aspect is perhaps the strongest part of the VN, which is a pretty good choice of focus. The visual aspect of visual novels generally seems to be the one that sways people the most on whether or not they should play it.
Now, to the novel part of the visual novel. I'll split this into four sections: style, story, world, and characters.
The most immediate aspect of the writing is the style. Unfortunately, it's dull and tell-y most of the way through, although it tells too much because it fits in so much worldbuilding, so it's forgivable. Because so much is explained, it makes it much easier to follow what's going on later in the story. When it shows details instead of telling them, the writing isn't too bad, actually. I just wish it did that more often.
I should explain the world before I explain the story, because it's somewhat confusing without that context. The game is set in Overture, a magical steampunk city with great prosperity among the upper class (unoriginally named bourgois. That's not a typo; they literally just took the e off of "bourgoise". Can't even copy Marx right.) at the cost of the many poor people (referred to as "proles", naturally). Magic is the main status symbol in this world and the main way of getting ahead. Naturally, poor people can't afford magic (which is replenished with potions called Mana), so the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Standard fare there, really. The magic system is unlike most of the ones I've seen before. Each kind of magic is tied to an emotion (fire and lightning are courage, water is intellect, healing is compassion, earth and gravity are willpower, and wind is faith). It made me roll my eyes a bit, but it's a potentially good way of showing character traits. The part I liked the most about it, however, was that magic is so well understood that it can actually be studied as a science. There are mathematical formulas for most spells, and there's even engineering based around using magic in machines. It's kind of cool.
The story is not particularly unique or interesting. There are two arcs to it. The first is the arc that unites all three main characters. Elise, a poor factory worker, cons her boss into giving her an extra bottle of Mana so she can try to use compassion magic on a broken piano she found behind the factory. Since this is healing magic, and healing only works on living things, the spell fails... sort of. It works for just a split second, and the piano actually makes a single perfect, pristine note. Franz, a magical studies major who just happens to be researching the effects of healing magic on inanimate objects, just happens to be walking by (this is a bit more justified than it sounds; he ends up lost in the poor part of town) and witnesses this. He then decides to try and recreate this attempt. However, magical studies take money, and to get that, he has to get funding from a lord. Enter Frederic, the son of a lord who doesn't care one iota about magical studies. What he does care about is Elise, who he is smitten with at first sight when he also ends up lost in the poor part of town. As soon as he finds that she's involved with the study, he tries to convince his dad to fund it. The lord, who's swayed more by the fact that his son cares about something other than himself than by the argument, agrees to fund the study. This carries the game until the second arc kicks in.
The second story arc is the classic revolution arc. The poor people (because "proles" just makes me cringe) are fed up and decide to revolt. They spend quite a bit of time making threats and not a whole lot else before kidnapping Frederic. He's saved, and depending on character relationships, either that's the end or he fights with Franz. If he fights with Franz, Franz and Elise can either join Libertad (seriously, the person in charge of naming things needs to be fired) or go against it. I haven't gotten all the endings yet, but they seem pretty shallow and unsatisfying, with little variation in the story leading up to it. You can pair off Elise and Franz, Franz and Aretha (his best friend who's the best character in the game), Frederic and Elise, or no one at all. There's a Franz/Frederic counter that gives off the false impression that there's a yaoi ship, but this is mostly for the sake of deciding if you get to part two. Elise and Aretha get no counter at all, which is sad because they have as much potential for shipping as any of the others. What's more disappointing than the hetero-only shipping selection is that the ships barely feel like couples at all. The endings give off more of an impression of close friendships than actual romance, which saddens my inner shipper. Also, you can only get one pairing-related ending at a time, which sucks royally.
Ending on a mostly-positive note, though, there are the characters. I like the characters in this game, but I like their interactions even more. (Except for Frederic. He's almost decent, but not really, because rich snot rag.) Elise is kind of cutely innocent despite being raised in a brothel, and that makes her interactions with Aretha (who's flirty, drama queen-ish, and constantly teasing Franz) absolutely hilarious at points. In fact, this was probably what I found most charming about this game. I liked the main characters, even though I felt that we didn't get enough about them. I wanted to see where their stories went and what happened to them and how they changed. Especially Aretha. Seriously, why is Aretha not a PoV character?
Overall, I found this game really useful as a study in how to make a visual novel, particularly in where its shortcomings are. You can get by with a soundtrack that just serves its purpose, but I feel like VN developers should try to make the soundtrack good enough that it's worth listening to on its own. Sound effects aren't too important, but the best VNs polish up even these small details. Art is absolutely crucial. Character designs should stand out, not only from each other, but from other VNs as well. Although sprite work can be time-consuming, it's worth that time investment to make sure each character has a good variety of expressions and poses. CG can really sell a visual novel, so those have to be one of the game's best points. The setting can be an important point of immersion, so it should be interesting from both a visual and a literary standpoint. Building a solid world isn't essential (Katawa Shoujo took place in a high school and it was still fantastic), but it makes it easier to get the audience invested in the story. Good characters do just as much to make up for a lackluster story, as their interactions can be fun enough on their own to keep people playing. And for goodness' sake, if characters are going to act like they're romantically attracted to each other, that aspect needs to be satisfying. Common sense needs to be used. Main Character A shouldn't be shippable with everyone down to Man on the Street #12, but every pairing of main characters that have good romantic chemistry should probably be shippable. Any ship undertaken needs to receive adequate care to ensure that it doesn't feel thrown together. Also, in this day and age, if it makes sense to include homosexual romance options, that should probably be included as well.
Oh, and the game shouldn't feel like it ended before it began, even if it's on a "bad end". I reached my first ending three hours in. That's not bad, but I seriously thought I was less than halfway through the game until about five minutes before my first ending. The game had so much more to do, especially with the piano thing. (To be fair, I haven't gotten the "true" ending yet, but it doesn't seem as though that is particularly satisfying in that regard.)
Overall, I found the game enjoyable for what it was, and the $3.49 I spent on it was worth it, I feel. I just wouldn't buy it at full or even half price. Still, picking it apart made for some useful research, and it has given me a few small ideas to ponder or perhaps work into my own writing. (Probably not into that first serious attempt at a VN, though. I don't think steampunk, class warfare, or elemental magic will factor into that, although it'll depend on what works with whatever team I can assemble.) It was a good first attempt, and I hope that my own first VN can be at least as good. I look forward to whatever future visual novels Kidalang produces.
P.S. This was only made by three people (one of which seems to only be involved in helping the game sell), and it's Indonesian, not American or Japanese. This is pretty impressive, considering that. It has nowhere near the resources of a Japanese VN. It also looks like it's getting a prequel, so that'll be interesting to see.
Interesting. Also impressive.
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What was impressive? My analysis, or the visual novel itself?
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The analysis. Though there are a few places where you could break up the paragraphs and not make them blocky, but that's an aesthetic issue. It was an interesting read.
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Well, with so much to say about each topic, it was difficult to do smaller paragraphs without having a million of them. It's the price of being opinionated, I guess. Still, I'm glad you liked it in spite of the walls of text. I wasn't really sure whether anyone would want to read about a fairly obscure VN, but I thought some people might be interested to know that I was thinking about making a visual novel of my own. T'was fun to write, and the fact that someone enjoyed reading it makes it worth the time and effort.