flowerthief wrote:1. When the setting is a high school, do you prefer your protagonist to be a
I don't care much about such details. High school, well is a high school - each year has it's own nice and bad sides and there isn't a big difference in them in aspect of character's age. The only notable things that count can be the attainment of maturity and preparations for final exams in the last year, which leaves them less free time and more work to do, while first classes have more free time to spare and usually involve in various activities.
It's clear, that I like BxG visual novels the most, because they're easier for me to relate to, but lately I've started to play also some GxB out of interest, and while I highly dislike classical cliched otome games (gimme a break, they're plain horrible in almost every aspect - how girls can even play such stuff?!), I generally don't care if the hero in a traditionally oriented visual novel is a boy, girl, man or a woman - if the story and characters are good enough, I will like them, no matter the game's preffered demographic profile. Also don't forget, that not every visual novel in which the girl is the main heroine is an otome game.
flowerthief wrote:2. Which is your preferred means of input when you play a ren'ai sim or visual novel on a personal computer?
I use all of those devices, though I usually like to turn on the auto-forward function and just sit and enjoy the show
I depends on how complex the game is, when it's a sim or a hybrid VN with lots of gameplay I usually stick to keyboard and mouse, and I sometimes even use the gamepad, when I want to relax a bit on the couch.
flowerthief wrote:3. For you personally are there any features of the game system of a ren'ai sim or visual novel that you consider essential? (Example: the option to fast skip through text)
Personally, I like highly customizable games, but not in terms of general gameplay but system functionality, although I know that they're quite a hassle for game devs to prepare. I won't be talking about such features as the auto-forward or skip options, cause they're the basics, that should be always present; I hate when the reading speed is forced - NEVER, EVER DO THAT. Differen't people read at different speeds, don't take their reading pleasure away. Ren'Py engine comes with almost all pivotal functions and I find removing them absurd.
Having a neat and shiny or clean, yet always functional interface scores a big point, because that's what we will be seeing on the screen, no matter we like it or not; it's better to make it likeable. They are also very important, unfortunately most of amateur visual novels have horrible interfaces, which give only a little bit of functionality if not any at all; they use horrid or unreadable fonts, don't fit the rest of the game including it's mood and are put together without any thoughts on how the player will later use them and what will be important and what will be not. Making a good interface for a visual novel is a big part of success, and simplicity and cleanliness means much here.
As for the save/load feature, I threat customizable menus as a standard nowadays - it's good if they include a thumbnail of the in-game screen, game save date along with game-specific dates included (if they are important), in-game save descrpition (as the name of chapter) and even comment field for players to write in (those are really good, when the game requires a lot of saving due to many important choices and routes - players can easily keep track of their saves and won't become confused when the count will reach 20-30 saves or more; furthermore it's easier to find the save you're looking for).
A good and enjoyable game requires a lot of hard work, especially in terms of mechanics and overal look - first gaming experience is important and can decide if the player will like the game from beggining or just mumble and stop after a couple of minutes. This also applies to visual novels, as a nice working engine and interface are mostly the only things (besides game assets, storywriting and overall idea), that exist to bring the joy. For example, I highly enjoyed interfaces in Hanihani (nicely made, loved the character chibis teling hints on what does what), Yume Miru Kisuri (A perfect example on how interfaces and menus should be done), Planetarian (the main menu screen is too plain, but I liked the ingame menus and that functionality with bookmarks and neatly done save/load screens), while Girlish Grimoire is a masterpiece itself (the FFD - floating frame director system, beautifully hand drawn menus, options screen with almost every function I could dream of, a lot of customization including even the ability to adjust the volume of each character's voice
great stuff in overall).
Hope that helps.
