Oh good to know, thanks! With my messed up character counts and 999 not on jpdb I had to leave it out. So yeah, anyone following that club is reading the equivalent of a really large book. And that presumably doesn’t count puzzle rooms because IIRC no one got those hooked.
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I think Voi could actually hook them ^^ . I gave up sadly, both with hooking puzzles and with counting the total, because I sort of stopped looking at reading speed for now, so at the moment I’m only keeping daily counts to check how much I read every day, then log it in the challenge thread and wipe the file to repeat the cycle.
I had a feeling that the count was going to be weird anyways since once we started repeating stuff I didn’t know what to include and what not to, because I like to re-read things I don’t remember well, and then having to constantly toggle when something was new or not felt like trouble for very little benefit. And the other reason is because I felt that since I still look up a lot of words and mine a lot from what I read (I’m finally back to Anki as well, we’ll see), I think for me looking at reading speed is still early, so knowing the total count has become less important and therefore I don’t really track it any more other than for 9-nine- planning. I’ll start looking at that again when I can consistently read things without too many lookups and the goal becomes improving fluency. But then again the process is the same, reading and reading and reading… I feel like that improves naturally anyway, so I’m genuinely not sure how beneficial it is exactly to look at speed, if at all. I guess I’ll know when I get there.
But yeah that’s why I’m not really counting anymore, sorry! Keeping counts of how long a week is though might be beneficial for the club for estimates, in case it’s easy to do, like we do with 9-nine-. In that case I don’t mind keeping weekly records if it helps, it’s very little effort (I mean I have to, otherwise I can’t plan ahead 
). But 999 has been a bit weird for me to track, the result was bound to be very inaccurate.
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Leaving this here in case it’s helpful to someone. I was looking around if there was a way to disable community content in the Steam library because I kept seeing screenshots and whatnot from other players when I only meant to open games. This feature straight showed huge spoilers for 9-nine-, and I was very lucky that the content I was spoiled was just coming up the following week for the club, but it could’ve ruined a big part of the game. Since then I’ve really tried not to look at that when opening games, but sometimes my eyes just drift there naturally. It’s the same case for Zero Escape, I’ve tried really hard not to look at those and succeeded so far, but I’ve been wondering that instead of constantly risking a slip, if there is any way to disable that feature, and there is!
You have to go to Steam > Settings > Library > Disable community content.
The option is still there, but you now have to click on it to load instead, and you can also find it in the Community menu up top. Product pages in the store can occasionally include spoilery images as well sometimes, so keep an eye out for those as well…
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Thanks! I’ve ran into the same issue before and hadn’t thought that it was possible to turn it off. It is now done 
The Achievements page can be super spoilery too, don’t go there if it’s available…
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You know what – I’ve had this in my head for a long time and I decided it’s time to go for it. Gonna nominate something now to have it up for a while from now, after Fatal Twelve. Time to stop idly mentioning it now that I talked myself into it lol @rikaiwisdom
大逆転裁判 ‐成歩堂龍ノ介の冒険‐ / The Great Ace Attorney: The Adventures of Ryuunosuke Naruhodou
Developer: Capcom
VNDB Play Time: 33h52m
VNDB Link: Dai Gyakuten Saiban -Naruhodou Ryuunosuke no Bouken- | vndb
Character count: 544k-646k based on the vndb calculation estimate
Number of weeks to finish: 22 weeks, with these very rough estimates it’ll have to be read at a pace of closer to ~27k/week
Summary
Immerse yourself in a dramatic yet charming and witty world of evidence-gathering, deduction and courtroom battles with this double-pack of the adventures of rookie lawyer Ryunosuke.
Availability
Steam - So the game is only available in English on Steam, but there is a mod to return it to Japanese by simply dropping a couple files into the game’s directory.
Nintendo Switch - Japanese version must be purchased
Playstation 4 - Japanese version must be purchased
Personal Opinion
Alright so this game is pushing it in a couple ways because you have to do a tiny mod with the Steam version to get Japanese, it might not work with texthooking (the original trilogy didn’t), it’s a little on the long side (note that character counts might be overstated because gameplay time is presumably including, like, thinking about the puzzles). But if you take anything from this, it’s that I believe these games are so good that it’s worth nominating no matter how many roadblocks come up. This is the best of the Ace Attorney series that I’ve played, and it works perfectly as a standalone if you’ve played none of the others.
The quick concept is you are a lawyer defending the wrongly accused, with light point and click sections to look for clues, talk to witnesses, etc, and then big courtroom duels where you comb through testimony and present the inconsistencies in cross examination. The game maintains a light, humorous tone despite all of the murder, but also has loads of serious character moments and dramatic, shocking twists built into each case. This particular entry takes place in both Japan and Britain, at the time when the two nations were beginning to interact more, and there’s loads of interesting historical backdrop and appearances from people like Natsume Soseki and Sherlock Holmes. It’s hard to gush enough for what this deserves about how well it pulls off likeable amusing characters and a big intricate plot so well.
That said, I do also have to confess that the first game does not end satisfyingly on its own, everything between the 2 is tied together, and I’m roping you in for a spinoff 2 parter just like 9-Nine-. At least this time both are included in the one package, so you actually get double the reading material for the money spent. Unfortunately I currently own the game on console locked to English, but if there seems to be interest, I can grab it in an upcoming steam sale to double check I have no issues with the mod and find out about texthooking for sure, etc. By all reports the mod seems to work well, but I don’t mind making sure.
Pros and Cons for the Book Club
Pros
- It’s so funny and charming. I cannot stress to you how good this game is. You’re going to love it. All hoops are worth jumping through. Part 1 is #303 by rating on vndb but part 2 is #13 (they’re a single cohesive story so awkward to rate 1 alone)
- Proper mystery, there should be lots to speculate about and be surprised by
- Entertaining gameplay that is entirely language focused; the puzzles are about the text
- Text boxes are quite small so it shouldn’t be a demanding read, and should be easy to move through even at a faster pace and/or without texthooking
- It’s structured into multiple cases so this may help with planning, though they definitely are not equivalent in length so it’ll still take some creative thinking.
Cons
- Potentially faster reading pace needed, though gameplay sort of complicates judging that when there are no real character counts available
- Texthooker is unlikely to work?
- Somewhat inconvenient to get with the steam mod and need to buy a Japanese version on consoles
- A 2 parter – good value for money but you are committing to doing an offshoot to see the whole story
- Mostly not voice acted
Pictures
Difficulty Poll
How much effort would you need to read this VN?
- No effort at all
- Minimal effort
- Moderate effort
- Significant effort
- So much effort my head might explode
- I don’t know
0
voters
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I figured I’d reply here so I don’t spam the read every day thread with Flowers talk
But yeah, barring anything crazy happening I would be down to start rereading Flowers once our 9-nine club is finished. I’d start now but I’m not sure if managing 3 VNs is reasonable at the moment for me so I think it’s better for me to wait until 9-nine is done.
Since you already read Printemps, I’m not sure how we should set up threads (or when). One for each game would make sense but not sure if Printemps would get any posts since you read it already and @Akashelia would probably be done with it by the time I start? Unless more people see us talking about it and decides to join in 
I wouldn’t mind a more casual club where we can read at our own pace and post our thoughts in each games’ thread. Although having a general timeline on all of us to finish before starting the next game would be good. All the games are split into chapters so it’d be somewhat easier to hide spoilers that way but I am open to any ideas on how to set it up.
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I like the sound of that; I think a lot of side clubs do more relaxed structure and that’d work out great for me the way I like to have something I can move through at my own pace so I can fill in vocab mining any day I’m not reading VN club picks. But yeah, I guess we’d need to feel around for it anyone else is likely to join to see if Printemps can have a proper slot.
And if we follow through on this you all should if your schedule permits! The first Flowers VN was great, nice music and absolutely lovely art for a character-focused story that’s a lot more lowkey and… “elegant?” than a lot of other VNs. It’s got some literary vibes, good chance to practice against that sort of writing and maybe pick up some less common kanji. Fully texthookable and voice acted.
Isn’t the art nice? 
Oh yeah, looking through my screenshots from when I read this one, it also features 里心, the controversial Wanikani word, and you can’t pass up the chance to see that it is, in fact, a word used sometimes.
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Yeah I think the VN is so nice and I’m only at the first episode out of four! The atmosphere is very relaxing and absorbing, could play it for hours.
I like the idea of a special BC for it, I could use a place to share my thoughts as I go, and would be awesome to have more people checking it out.
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I consider Flowers 2 to be the masterpiece of all yuri VNs. I’ve read all four of them in English and they are all lovely. I’ve heard it’s a pretty difficult read in japanese, but I really want to give it a try (for Flowers 2 at the very least), so it’d be happy to join an informal club even though I’d probably end up reading it veeeery slowly 
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Yeah, 2 is super good! Seems like all the Flowers fans I meet, their favorite in the series is either game 2 or 3. I love the entire series (if it isn’t already obvious) but game 3 is the peak for me. That game really blew away all the expectations I had before going into it and changed my mind on some characters in a very positive way.
Glad to see some more interest in the informal club 
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I wonder why and at the same time I can kinda see it. Most of the time it feels like it’s slice of lifey vocabulary, but they often make references to books or movies that I don’t even know.
Yeah I also didn’t have big expectations and am already pleasantly surprised, so can’t wait to find out more 
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I read 1 in Japanese and it was a combination of “fancy” kanji you don’t see too often in standard writing and the author loving to stack tons of descriptors onto every noun, so the writing style made these huge phrase blobs. Looking back I don’t think I’d struggle with it as much now? But I did have to take it quite slow at the time.
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Hi hello that’s me!
I know I am not a regular member of the VN club, and I don’t know how much I should pick up more clubs at this point in time, but this game one has been on my list forever, so I’d probably hop in if people start playing it as a casual club 
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I think 4-5 people is totally enough for an informal group club 
How would we go about it? @AzusaChan I want to nominate you as the Flower Book Club creator, but don’t know if you have the time / want to do that?
Sounds like we have a good mix of people who want to try Flower 1 / replay it in JP / continue it in EN, and people who want to play Flower 2 soon, so we could start with Flower 1 and give it a few months?
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I don’t have any experience running clubs on here but I could give it a try. I’d need to spend some time looking at the templates to see how to format everything first 
Once we get a home thread up for Flowers, we could gauge interest to see if more people want to join (there might be people who don’t check this thread but would be interested?). Ideally I’d want to start reading Printemps once the 9-nine club has finished which would put the start date sometime around mid to late October I believe. Since it’d be a more casual club having one thread for each game and then hiding posts behind a spoiler would be fine I think since the game is split into chapters so we can mark spoilers that way.
We wouldn’t have any reading “assignments” each week but having a finish date before we start the next game would be good. I was thinking something like 3 months per game and then start the next thread. Of course, once the home thread is up I can put up polls for all of this so we can vote on what everyone wants to do.
I haven’t looked too much into the other side clubs on here, so if anyone has any ideas/suggestions feel free to chime in 
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I like it all the start date works well for me too, might get a bit busy when I start Quartet in a couple of weeks.
I also like that there are no assignments but only discussions, as there will be many different paces and people might have already finished the first one or not started.
And I like the polls idea to see if our assumptions are right!
Also if there are no assignments, maybe we could just have all four threads up from the start? And they will simply be active whenever someone plays and has something to say
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I was thinking of doing new threads every 3 months (or some similar period of time) so people could read at their own pace but focus discussion on that specific game during that time period. I think it’d at least make the start of each new game more active for discussion since we’d start at the same time to discuss things. Although it could die down later as some people read faster than others etc. when I read the series in English I was too addicted and was finishing a game every 3-5 days
I can put that in a poll too though to see if everyone would rather have all the threads up at once and read the entire series at their own pace.
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I think one thread at a time to loosely pull us together a little bit more would be good, personally. Looking forward to it!
Also I finally realized I needed to change the title to say we’re reading Fatal Twelve now and added 999 as to the past VNs list
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I’m working on making the home thread for Flowers now so we can start the polls for planning and whatnot. Few questions though, how should I word the title? Call it an off-shoot club, informal club?
Does anyone know where to legally buy the jp version? Its on DMM but for some reason that site is region locked when it comes to all-age games (but not 18+ ones for some reason…). Its on the Gungnir site too but I haven’t bought from them before, not sure if that is region locked? Unfortunately the English versions don’t have the jp text included otherwise it’d be a lot easier to get. The console versions are on their respective stores (psn store/nintendo store) but I think the majority of us would like a PC option.
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I guess “offshoot” has been used for the ones that spin out of a pick so maybe informal is best? Sometimes it seems with book clubs people just call something they made themselves “Book Club” with no other qualifiers but that works better because the book clubs have more distinct names for the different levels where we already just use the most generic and default a visual novel club name can be. Ultimately doesn’t really matter too much whatever you pick though.
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