What is a Visual
Novel?
I feel compelled
to explain, because so many people in everyday life ask me this if I ever
mention that I play “visual novels”. I don’t pretend that I will be educating
anyone here, because in all likelihood nobody will read this. I just like
talking to myself, and acting as though I’m talking to someone else makes me
feel more sane.
First,
there are two main styles in which most visual novels are presented. There’s
the “novel style” in which text is displayed over the entire screen, and there
is the “action/adventure style” in which text is displayed in a dialogue box
like it would appear in most video games. The difference is a matter of
personal preference.
Second,
there are two main levels of player interactivity. There are “kinetic novels”
which are visual novels that require no input from the player whatsoever, and
there are what most people consider normal visual novels that require the
player to make occasional choices that influence the story. Visual Novels are not video games. It’s
probably easier to think of them as books that were given a soundtrack and some
pictures rather than a game, they are very text-heavy and story driven.
Here are some example pictures of different types of visual
novels:
Action/Adventure Style:
Novel Style:
Choice point (also adventure style):
By the way, I’ve played all of those. In order they are:
Clannad, Higurashi no naku koro ni, and RE:Alistair. The last one only took
about two to three hours to finish all of the routes, Clannad is a 300+
hour visual novel if you want to see EVERYTHING (though very well written), and Higurashi is quite long too,
though it’s a kinetic novel so there’s only one path. RE:Alistair can also be
downloaded for free from Sakevisual, so you can play that one if you want to see
what a visual novel is like.
Most people can figure out what they like and don’t like
pretty quickly though. Now go, go and read!
