The Games I Used to Play
After deciding to make a visual novel, something strange happened. Before looking into how to build one, the games I used to play surfaced first. To understand a genre, you analyze its structure. AI can handle that. But "why this genre pulls people in" isn't something analysis can answer. That was stored in memory. The First Visual Novel I Played I can't remember exactly when. Probably high school. On a friend's computer, or at my desk in my own room. There are games whose titles I can't quite recall. Games that would turn up with a search, probably. But it's not the titles that stuck — it's the feeling. I remember the setting was a school. Characters in a classroom. Lunch breaks. After-school hours. When a choice appeared, I'd pause and think. Which option would this character like? What dialogue would follow? I saved and loaded over and over, trying different choices. Looking back, it's almost laughable. Agonizing over raising a 2D characte...