Yes, I really like it so far! Dreaming of flying…
I’m using Luna translator in stead of Textractor, and it works great. Luna works with every VN I have tried so far.
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But hang on, is this in English or Japanese?
I tried to install it but my computer screams malware / virus when scanning it, anyone has an opinion about that? I guess you are using it anyways?
As it it open source I am inclined to trust it, but the dev’s comment about the question are not really helping antivirus detected trojans · Issue #1208 · HIllya51/LunaTranslator · GitHub
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Yes, I choose to trust it and make an exception in my antivirus for it. It’s a program made to inject into another program - of course it looks suspicious. The developer updates it constantly and almost every time I open it there’s an update. I had a problem with one VN, asked the developer on Discord, and he told me how to get around the problem. Over the next few days he fixed it. I do close it when I’m not reading though.
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Aokana on Steam is both! Press E to see English text, press J to se Japanese.
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Switch store pages will usually have a language list if you scroll down a bit. For instance this is from the one you were looking at
So as you can see, the international Switch version only has English, so you’d have to buy the Japanese one to play the game in Japanese on switch (for what it’s worth it’s pretty easy to create a Japanese nintendo account, though obviously the Japanese store won’t have the same prices and sales)
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Just to show what reading Aokana on PC (Steam edition) looks like.
I use Luna translate as a text hooker and have it output the text to the clipboard. Then I use JL which gives me a window on top of the VN, with hoverable JMDict lookups.
And if I still don’t understand something, I can press E inside the game and get the text in English. Pressing J switches the text back to Japanese.
It’s not always a direct translation, but it’s more than enough if I just need to check my understanding. Luna translator plus JL plus a good VN - my favorite way to read!
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Wow, that developer seems like a complete train wreck. If they don’t want to talk about that topic anymore, why not make it a FAQ item in the readme? I figure that this would be a concern to a lot of people.
Oh, that seems really nice compared to reading it in a texthooker window. What’s JL?
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It’s what you see in my post, a window that grabs (Japanese) text from the clipboard and presents it in a window on top of the VN. You can hover over the window and get translations from JMdict and several other dictionaries. Just like Rikaichamp, Rikaikun, 10ten and others in web browsers. Download here.
The other alternative is to use a clip board inserter for your web browser plus a texthooking page like this one and read in a browser. I prefer to read the VN in full screen and have JL on top, but reading in a web browser is OK too.
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Aaand…
Few days ago I finished it.
It was quite decent moege. Nothing less and nothing more 
All heroines are quite likeable, with my personal favorite being quiet Yao 
I love the remarks she makes on various occasions - short, but always amusing 
The routes are unfortunately a bit uneven in quality. Definitely the most interesting and elaborate one was Houmi’s story.
It featured some light supernatural/sci-fi parts, which was a bit unexpected, but they worked decently in the end. (And actually they aren’t that rare in typical moege when you think about it). And this route had my favorite kind of ending when it comes to moege/romance VNs.
Unfortunately I started the game with the weakest route - childhood friend Itsuki. While she’s great character, her route felt very underdeveloped, especially in all-ages version. (Not that H-scenes made it much better 
. It almost made me drop this game, but I’m glad I didn’t, since all other routes were much better.
There are also some side-endings for other characters - the weirdest one being definitely the route for the “上級生女子Ｃ”, where we never learn her actual name . Those routes feel a bit rushed, since they are much shorter and come kind out of nowhere, with little connection to the common route - they really have the feel of “unlockable bonus content”.
IMO the best one of those side routes by far was IMO Rokkaku Suzume | vndb - I’ll never say no to a cute tsundere 
There’s also console-exclusive heroine - Marika. Her route was nice, but also a bit unpolished IMO.
The main highlight of this VN for me (apart from quite likeable heroines) is humor - I found it quite funny, and laughed many times at character’s remarks or reactions.
All in all - 7.5/10, which is my “base” score for decent games. It might go higher when there’s something special about it, or I will detract points for annoying or badly made things. I consider anything 7 and upwards to be good. (I even enjoyed many of the 6.5 or 6 titles, but their shortcomings were too glaring and/or annoying to rate them higher)
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After 130 hours I finished Little Busters!'s true route before the end of 2024.
There’s still much more alternate content to play through and while it’s still fun, I’ll keep it for another time so I don’t get tired of it 9/10, classic Key nakige…
I’ll start 2025 fresh with 忠臣蔵46+1. It’s the story of 47 ronin… with a twist? 
I got the physical copy from Surugaya some time ago.
For now the VN is terrorizing me with kanji in basic words like:
| JP (with kanji) | English | JP (with hiragana) |
|---|---|---|
| 筈 | should | はず |
| 何処 | where | どこ |
| 殆ど | almost,nearly,mostly | ほとんど |
| 此処 | here | ここ |
It feels like different writers have different styles of typing Japanese xd
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I’m not very familiar with this one you started, but I’m curious what you’ll think of it! You’re making me feel justified for mining the rarely used kanji forms of words like these, haha, I’m ready to go. I gotta get to Little Busters one day, as well. Summer Pockets was an early VN I read in Japanese, my only Japanese Key experience so far. And really my only English one was many years ago playing a lot of Clannad, but not totally finishing it.
I’ve been finishing some more VNs recently, so here are my thoughts.
君と彼女と彼女の恋 - Pretty good! I think it’s a much better developed (and it came first) version of the meta story thing Doki Doki Literature Club was going for. It parallels close in some places. Acquiring a Japanese copy is kind of hard, but it’s easy to texthook and very easy to read. The one thing to look out for is that later in the game there are some voiced sections with no text, so realtime listening comprehension gets tested. It’s all pretty slice of life though. Basically it’s a dating VN with two girls, one of whom knows she’s in a dating game, and there are some dark twists as a result of that. It’s not entirely horror but horror-adjacent I’d say, reader discretion advised. It’s a little hard to recommend if you aren’t already deeply into the medium because it’s so pointedly about the experience of reading these sorts of VNs and coming to know these characters. The unique artstyle is really pretty, while the meta story thing is nothing phenomenal I think it develops the concept well, and I really liked the implications of the ending I got. 4/5
ファミコン探偵倶楽部 消えた後継者 - The first of the Famicom Detective Club games, the series Emio is from that I was posting about before. This and the following one are remakes of the old games and basically what I had heard is true, the plots are a bit less developed, they aren’t going quite as all out with the wide variety of nice art, and figuring out the right actions is arbitrary enough to lead to frequently randomly mashing every option for the 10th time or running to a guide. In this one one time even using a guide I struggled, lol. That said, they still have the same strengths, just diminished. I still vibed well with the mood and story here, but it’s a little more cliche. These are fully voiced and not too hard to read, same as Emio, and in addition these two actually have furigana. As with Emio, Switch only, and unlike that you now have to buy from the Japanese switch store instead of it allowing for a language change. 3.5/5
ファミコン探偵倶楽部PartII うしろに立つ少女 - Same as the above but WAY more refined such that the gap is a lot tighter compared to Emio. Progression is still a pain but the story is really interesting and well presented, there is a character I love enough that I wish I knew other people who read this to just share our no doubt mutual adoration for ひとみちゃん, and the finale seriously rocks. I think Emio as the entry point to the series is still the right call, and if you sufficiently enjoy it, going backwards to these two works just fine, nothing is spoiled and they’re still worth experiencing. 4.5/5
From here, I’m gonna start on the Ace Attorney: Investigations duology soon. Whenever I work up the enthusiasm / hate myself enough I’ll see if I can drag through Muramasa at my current level. But I’ve been working on starting to practice output so I’m kinda chilling with easier VNs for reading time currently.
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At what level would it be good to start trying to read visual novels in japanese?
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In my opinion JLPT level 4, so you have enough grammar and vocabulary and kanji knowledge to understand basic sentences (I think for kanji knowledge that’s around Wanikani level 25). But nowadays, you can use a lot of tools and assistance to help with translation as you read, so technically it’s even possible earlier, depends on how much you want to rely on the tools.
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I started to read the visual novel ISLAND at around Wanikani level 6, JLPT level 4 or so. If you know some basic grammar, you can use tools to look up. It might also be a good idea to read a VN where you can easily switch between Japanese and English to check your understanding.
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I basically started at JLPT4 as well, though I did kinda ease my way in with Satori Reader and had been doing graded readers and stuff the whole time. Really the soonest you can make anything out of it and the amount of time and work it takes for you is tolerable at all, the sooner the better. Some people start VERY early. It’s gonna be tough and slow going but you can get instant lookups in a lot of VNs which helps a lot. Making the move to trying to read, one way or another, is the best thing you can do as soon as you can deal with it.
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If anyone want to read The House in Fata Morgana, we are getting a club going 
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Yes! I’m in!
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Please do consider joining us for Fata Morgana; it’s great!
Coincidentally, today I finished Ace Attorney Investigations 2, so that’s both games of the combined pair finished.
I quite liked it! The first game has some cool moments but it’s kind of known for just being ok Ace Attorney and I think I agree. Which still isn’t a bad thing! The second… I think I had more serious issues with the pacing than some people do when it comes to case 2 and 3, but it got a lot better later on for me. I like that that game had a lot on its mind broadly, about the ways parents impact their children, the use and misuse of the law itself, etc.
I try to post here about pros and cons for learners, but the major thing is you really shouldn’t play this before at least doing the original Ace Attorney trilogy, so by then you kind of broadly already know what AA is about. People have unique speaking styles and there is some fairly specific terminology, but the lines are relatively short. No voice acting. The big thing about AAI2 especially is that it has a minigame that is specifically about reading and making choices quickly. The timer only ticks when you’re choosing between 2 or 3 options but they are presented and time starts instantly, so being a learner makes that game harder depending on how your speed is. The game can be a little strict if you aren’t making all the right choices about failing you, but you’re allowed to fail and restart many times so in another way it’s not that strict. Still, it’s an added challenge.
There’s also a little auto playing text, mostly just case intros and you can use the log to look back at it. The one exception is the cute character epilogues during the credits; that’s a lot of reading at native speed and it was tough to hang in with for me at times. Not essential but still, sudden spike in challenge.
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