5 Question Survey on VN Preferences

[jezebelthenun]

Hello, friends!

If you have a minute, could you please fill out this very short survey about VN preferences? I'm trying to collect some very basic data from the people who make and play VNs to better understand exactly what people are looking for, and what they love about VNs.

Feel free to bring up and discuss anything that you feel I might have overlooked in this thread. Once I've analyzed the data, I'll be sharing the results, which are completely anonymous. Please be extremely honest. I won't know who said what.

Also, there are 2 rating questions that say to rate from 1-8. There is a 0 option, I believe, but I would appreciate it if that wasn't used. If it is used, I will count 0 as 1, meaning the best or most important.

Thanks so much for your time! I really think this will help me, and other creators, understand the VN community's desires for content. Feel free to share the link with anyone you know who is also a VN player. I look forward to the results!


IMPORTANT NOTE:

Ranking is 1-8/10 with ONE (1) BEING THE MOST IMPORTANT/BEST and 8/10 being the least important/worst!

[trooper6]

Generally speaking, my preference is to see something I haven't seen before. I want to play a VN that is an artistic creation of the makers, not something made by survey.

I want to hear the artists' voice, not my own voice reflected back at me.
I want to be challenged by the art I engage with, and it is hard to be challenged when the artist just tells me what I want to hear.

[Kailoto]

I like stories that play with choice and really dig in to what decisions mean. To be fair, I like most visual novels regardless of that aspect, but I think VNs are unique in the aspect that they allow for player agency without any unnecessary mechanics. This combination allows for all sorts of moral and philosophical questions to be posed: What if life really is deterministic and free will is an illusion? If you have to choose between dating the girl or keeping your best friend, what would you do? I want games that will pose actual choices, not just problems masquerading as choices. Choices where there is no right answer, where the decision you make really means something to you and isn't just a means to an end.

Above all else, however, I want people to create stories that only they can tell. If someone else has done the exact same thing before, or if you only listen to others and don't put yourself into the project, I consider that a bit sad. Do yourself a favor and never lose sight of what it is you want to do.

[Tempus]

[Sorry this post comes off really negative!]

As with most surveys and quizzes, I feel like the questions funnel me into a saying things I don't agree with. The first question, in making me rank the options, excludes the possibility that some of those options could be of equal importance to those answering. For example, the following:

• Length
• Highly interactive/Many opportunities to influence the story
• Voice acting
• Sense of humour
• High replay value/many endings

...are all equally unimportant to me. It doesn't matter to me if a VN is a certain length, interactive or not, has voice over, etc. I can think those things were done well in a particular VN, but their presence isn't at all necessary to me. To be clear: it's not the options available I don't like; it's that I'm being forced to rank things much higher than I'd prefer. The #6 in my ranking is no more preferential than my #10, but this won't be reflected in the results.

A better system would be to allow a ranking of preferences that isn't mutually exclusive, i.e., multiple options can be ranked 10 or whatever number on a scale.

Lastly, like trooper6, I find myself much less attracted to the idea of design by (or influenced by) committee. An exception to that would be if the survey focused on something like, say, accessibility (that is, accounting for colour blind folk, or those with physical handicaps). IMO it's best to make the thing (or know what you're making), then figure out the audience for it, not the other way around. It's also worth mentioning that people don't know what they want half the time, even when they think they do. How's that saying go... something like: if you'd asked people before the car what they want they'd have answered, "a faster horse."

[gekiganwing]

I saw the phrase "Goal / Skill Oriented," and was not entirely sure what it meant. Would that be a story in which the main characters are trying to achieve a goal? Or would it be a story driven video game in the player's gaming skills are challenged through combat, simulation gameplay, puzzles, and so on?

Above all else, however, I want people to create stories that only they can tell.

I agree. Write a story that *you* want to create. Don't worry about length, genre, or type of content.

[Donmai]

Nice little survey, jezebelthenun. Surely would like to see the results you'll be getting.
Like most people here I believe everybody has the right to do their things as they think they should do. And that includes running a survey before doing things.

[Quelcezot]

I agree with Tempus about the lack of support for equal preferences.

I'd be mindful of how closely the orders really represent how people think.

I've answered honestly though to the best of my ability, and hopefully you'll get some interesting results!

[jezebelthenun]

I appreciate the feedback, everyone!

I saw the phrase "Goal / Skill Oriented," and was not entirely sure what it meant. Would that be a story in which the main characters are trying to achieve a goal? Or would it be a story driven video game in the player's gaming skills are challenged through combat, simulation gameplay, puzzles, and so on?

By goal/skill oriented, I mean that the game is moved forward by boosting skills and achieving certain goals. It could be like quests, puzzles, experience points. . . This is in contrast to games that progress regardless of stats and skills, or without the addition of those components to the game at all.

As for the ranking, I agree that it could be more accurate, but for the purposes of this particular survey, I wanted people to think as critically as possible. If two things are equally important upon first consideration, like sense of humor and length, perhaps consider that the humor is excellent, but the length is not what you want at all. Which is more likely to influence your enjoyment of the game? What if the length was spot on, but the humor was dry and difficult?

I might consider changing the ranking to make multiple choices prioritized to the same rank, but I think it would actually hinder rather than help the results I'm looking at.

And as for doing what I want vs what people say they want, I guess that's not exactly what I'm going for. I have my ideas, and I love them. I'm not going to compromise them for the sake of a survey. However, if I can add more of what people want, while still maintaining the integrity of what I want to create, I honestly only see it as a win-win. My goal is to make interesting games that people love to play. There is no perfect formula, I know, but information, imagination, and knowledge are the catalysts for innovation.

Thanks again to everyone who has participated so far, and to everyone who has expressed an opinion in this thread. I love it!

[firecat]

By goal/skill oriented, I mean that the game is moved forward by boosting skills and achieving certain goals. It could be like quests, puzzles, experience points. . . This is in contrast to games that progress regardless of stats and skills, or without the addition of those components to the game at all.

sounds like you making a RPG, a visual novel is like a high school book, you cant expect gameplay to help in a VN. you need to understand the writing side of things to do a story or else it will be nothing but gameplay that people see.

[sasquatchii]

This is neat!! Thanks for putting this together.

If you'd like, I could help create an infographic once you've collected enough data!! Feel free to PM me or DM me on twitter if that's something you'd be interested in

EDIT: Maybe next time around, you could add a comment box for each question/section so people can elaborate or justify why they've said what they've said! I'm noticing in this thread some people feel pidgeon-holed by the format, so a comment box might help with being able to factor in everyone's thoughts & feelings.

[Pannacone]

I'm in agreement with Kailoto. One of the key features of the Visual Novel genre is an emphasis on player choice and consequence, which makes a large amount of choices and options a really important feature in VNs for me. I want to feel like I'm actually driving the plot forward and making meaningful decisions. Games that present the player with important choices excel where games with inconsequential decisions tend to just fall flat.

[Willowen]

When I think of a visual novel, I want it to be unique and different from other 'common' stories such as one just about high school life. I love it when the writer adds their own twist on things like fairy tales about characters you wouldn't expect to have a story line. A Troll's Fairytale which is one of my favorites and tells a story from a female trolls perspective or The Knife of a Traitor is a classic.

Also, I find the writing portion to be a large part in deciding whether to play a VN or not. It's important (in my opinion) to easily follow along what is happening in the story even if the characters choices change the storyline. They don't call it a visual novel for nothing. Like a book, writing is key to getting your point across and captivating the readers attention.

Having a bunch of different characters with different personalities is nice to have as well. I want to see a variety of characters with a strong will, hardy stubbornness, are witty, independent and so on.

And as many others in this topic have said, being able to decide the outcome of a characters fate by choosing a bunch of different choices is a large part of the visual novel experience. As the reader and viewer, we are put in the main characters shoes and are the ones deciding the outcome's.

[jezebelthenun]

It's interesting to consider what a Visual Novel really is. Take games like Serena and Dear Esther, for example. I consider both to be VNs in that they're story driven narratives rather than fully interactive games. With those games, though, you arrive at basically the same ending no matter what. The journey is more important than the destination. I also consider games like Long Live The Queen to be VNs, and that game is all about stat raising and strategy, and getting many different opportunities along the way with many different endings based on how you decide to progress. I think Visual Novel is such a broad term that putting rules on the amount of choice, the amount of characters, and the specific type of gameplay is a little constraining to the genre.

[Godline]

Also, I find the writing portion to be a large part in deciding whether to play a VN or not. It's important (in my opinion) to easily follow along what is happening in the story even if the characters choices change the storyline. They don't call it a visual novel for nothing. Like a book, writing is key to getting your point across and captivating the readers attention.

Having a bunch of different characters with different personalities is nice to have as well. I want to see a variety of characters with a strong will, hardy stubbornness, are witty, independent and so on.

Agree 100%. That's kind of what drives me into VN dev. To create VNs that I'd want to play. Something that shakes up the field a bit and has amusing characters. Hooray for unique ideas!
(speaking of unique ideas, there's a game thread I forgot to respond to on here- hehe).